TITLE: Mercy Killing Storm Hits High Court DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

WASHINGTON — U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts presided over the Supreme Court for the first time Oct. 5, and the issue was a hot one: assisted suicide.

Consider how much assisted suicide has been in the news:

— An attorney who helped the family of Terri Schindler-Schiavo claims euthanasia is “happening every day.”

— Authorities in New Orleans are investigating hospitals and nursing homes for reports of “mercy killings” of elderly and infirm patients in the hours before Hurricane Katrina approached

— Over the summer, a soldier who was severely wounded in Iraq died in a hospital in Wisconsin because he had signed a living will stating he would not want to be kept alive “artificially” on a feeding tube.

— Lawyers for the state of Oregon argued Oct. 5 at the U.S. Supreme Court not to strike down a law permitting physicians to hasten a person's death.

— Pope Benedict XVI beatified Blessed Bishop Clemens von Galen of Germany on Oct. 9. The anti-Nazi bishop once said, “Once we have the right to kill unproductive persons … then none of us can be sure of his life.”

Has the “death with dignity” movement created such a slippery slope that some doctors in emergency situations as in New Orleans automatically kill patients they once might have tried to save?

The Register spoke with leading legal minds, bio-ethicists and medical professionals to get a glimpse of the state of euthanasia in the United States.

Wesley Smith, an attorney and consultant for the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide in Castro Valley, Calif., told the Register that studies don't indicate it's extensive.

“Some advocacy groups say that there is underground euthanasia, but in studies only 7% of doctors said they have actively killed a patient by overdose.” Smith said, “Only a few doctors who have ideological predispositions are willing to assist suicide regularly, even in Oregon; that's notable.”

What seem to be much more common are attempts to starve people to death, according to Dana Cody, attorney for Life Legal Defense Foundation in Napa, Calif.

“I would say we get 25 to 50 calls a year from people with loved ones in danger of having their feeding tube removed or being denied basic medical care,” she said.

Robert Destro, the attorney for the Schindler family and professor of law at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., said in an interview in August with Anita Crane of American Life League that families like the Schindlers “exist all over this country.”

Key Distinction

Catholic Medical Association President Dr. R. Steven White, a pulmonologist in Daytona Beach, Fla., sees much confusion over the issue.

“I believe that the majority of Americans oppose euthanasia. But there is a lack of understanding regarding the difference between actively ending a person's life and allowing for a natural death,” he said. “There is no question that the majority of people express the opinion that they would not wish to be kept alive ‘artificially’ on a feeding tube if they had what they deemed to be a ‘poor quality of life.’”

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches: “Whatever its motives and means, direct euthanasia consists in putting an end to the lives of handicapped, sick, or dying persons. It is morally unacceptable. Thus an act or omission which, of itself or by intention, causes the death in order to eliminate suffering constitutes a murder gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and to the respect due to the living God, his creator.”

It goes on to say, “The error of judgment into which one can fall in good faith does not change the nature of this murderous act, which must always be forbidden and excluded. Discontinuing medical procedures that are burdensome, dangerous, extraordinary or disproportionate to the expected outcome can be legitimate; it is the refusal of ‘over-zealous’ treatment. Here one does not will to cause death; one's inability to impede it is merely accepted” (Nos. 2277-2278).

That principle seems to be reflected in a report issued Sept. 29, warning of an explosion in the size of the elderly and frail population and a looming crisis in caring for them. “Taking Care: Ethical Caregiving in Our Aging Society,” a report of the President's Council on Bioethics, said that medical treatment decisions must not focus exclusively on extending life and delaying death.

“Even as we must never seek or aim at the patient's death, so we are also under a positive obligation not to impose treatments that would unduly burden the patient, make his dying more difficult, or otherwise deprive him of a more peaceful end of life or of final hours in the company of those who love him,” the report said.

The report focuses primarily on the care of people with dementia — currently estimated at 4 million Americans, but expected to triple by mid-century. It says euthanasia and assisted suicide “are antithetical to ethical care giving” for those with dementia or who are otherwise disabled.

In his work fighting the tides of euthanasia, Smith found that Americans do not want to think a lot about the subject.

“Right-to-die advocates complain they can't get people engaged in the issue, and it's hard for me to oppose euthanasia for the same reason; people aren't excited about the issue,” he said.

Still, some progress has been made in the last months, according to Franciscan Brother Daniel Sulmasy, a physician who serves on the medical ethics committee at St. Vincent's Hospital in New York City.

“Since Terri [Schiavo] died, I've seen an increased interest in advanced medical directives; patients are bringing it up to me themselves instead of avoiding the question.”

Unfortunately, the case has also led to some confusion among Catholics, Brother Sulmasy said.

“Our medical ethics committee is getting many requests for clarification from people who think no matter what is wrong with someone, he or she needs a feeding tube. It's hard for people to distinguish between conditions at the end of life, and they think the Church now says everyone has to have a feeding tube,” he said.

A medical directive is one option for those who are concerned about their care when they are incapacitated. But Destro suggests another.

“Terri taught us that you had better appoint a power of attorney you can trust who will get in a doctor's face and force him or her to answer questions,” he said. “A living will is just a piece of paper; it can't have informed consent. A power of attorney can decide what's best under the circumstances.”

In an effort to educate and prepare Catholics for these important decisions, the National Catholic Bioethics Center in Philadelphia has issued “The Catholic Guide to End of Life Decision,” a document that explains the moral issues and provides forms to be filled out to designate a proxy or an advanced directive. National Catholic Bioethics Center President John Haas also encouraged Catholics to turn to the U.S. Bishops’ Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities for resources.

“Catholics should avail themselves of the carefully developed moral tradition of the Catholic Church in the area of health care,” Haas said. “There is no other institution out there with such a sophisticated approach to these difficult questions.”

Annamarie Adkins is based in St. Paul, Minnesota.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Annamarie Adkins ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Campus Watch DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Rattling Sex-Ed

THE WASHINGTON POST, Sept. 27 — College sex-ed classes “typically use far more graphic materials than do high schools,” and have led to increasing criticism of what many consider the pseudo-discipline of sexuality studies, reported the Post.

In recent years, the issue of what is appropriate for such classes has “rattled some colleges and universities,” said the newspaper, which bemoaned the trend.

“There has been an increasing attack on sexuality education in the college classroom,” said Gilbert Herdt, director of San Francisco State University's program in human sexuality. “The result is that college professors are more careful about what they teach.”

Hunting Witches

DES MOINES REGISTER, Sept. 26 — The Iowa daily's article on the current apostolic visitation to American seminaries hewed closely to the story line typical of the mainstream media, including the comment that many see the Vatican review as a “gay witch hunt” that will only drive homosexual seminarians and priests deeper into the “closet.”

This prompted Bene-dictine Father Benedict Neenan, president-rector of Conception Seminary College in Conception, Mo., to say: “The purpose is not a witch hunt, although there may be some witches who need to be hunted.”

To its credit, the newspaper also reported that its own informal poll of those going to Mass on a recent Sunday indicated that Catholics “approve of the policy” of not admitting homosexuals to seminary.

All ’bout Football

MARION COLLEGE, Sept. 29 — The Indianapolis college has hired former Kalamazoo College coach and physical education professor Joseph Haklin as the college's first full-time athletic director since 1979.

In keeping with Marian's growth initiatives, and based on “studies [that] have shown athletic programs have a direct correlation with student enrollment,” the college's press release announced that “one of Haklin's initial tasks will be to prepare a business plan for the development of a football team.”

Founded and administered by the Sisters of St. Francis, Marian has been co-ed since 1954.

Victorian Values

BBC NEWS, Sept. 26 — The southwest London borough of Kingston is reviving a Victorian approach to tackling “the stubborn problem of truancy,” reported the BBC.

While other education authorities are trying high-tech monitoring, cash rewards or jail threats for the parents of errant pupils, Kingston is presenting a “Mayor's Medal” to students with 100% attendance record for a whole year.

Not issued since 1920, “this upright, municipal recognition of perfect attendance” was very popular prior to World War I.

Any effort to stem the tide of truancy is probably welcome as an estimated 55,000 British pupils skip school each day.

Drinking Ban

ALBANY TIMES UNION, Oct. 20 — While it's not unusual for colleges to ban drinking in dormitories, Siena College in upstate New York has banned drinking outside dorms or any public outdoor area on campus.

Officials at the college in suburban Albany say the new policy is in response to some problems that have taken place at parties held outside student apartments earlier this semester.

The policy covers all beverages, including bottled water.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: Margaret Mary's Meeting Place DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

I knew from the start that we were in good company. Our visit to Paray-le-Monial, one of nine shrine towns in France, began at 25 Avenue Jean-Paul II.

Like the namesake of the street, our group — some 40 pilgrims mostly from the Diocese of Pittsburgh — had also come to this small town in Burgundy in hopes of drawing closer to the mystery of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

It was in Paray-le-Monial in the 17th century that Jesus revealed his heart “burning with love for all men” to a young Visitation nun, Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque. (The Church celebrates her feast Oct. 16.)

All too often, Our Lord told her, his love had been met with contempt even by those consecrated to him. He asked her to make reparation by receiving holy Communion on the first Friday of every month and by sharing, through an hour of prayer every Thursday evening, in his agony in the Garden of Gethsemane.

The Holy Hour was born from this. Later Jesus instructed Margaret Mary to help establish a feast day in honor of his Sacred Heart so that all people might know of his overflowing love.

It was from Paray-le-Monial that the message of Our Lord's revelations was first championed beyond the cloister walls by Saint Claude la Colombière (1641-1682), the Jesuit who served as Margaret Mary's spiritual director.

Long before the apparitions, however, Paray-le-Monial was a place of great prayer.

After visiting the Office de Tourisme, we went directly to the reception center of the shrine. We were met there by Céline, a young French guide. She explained that the shrine was not one building but several churches scattered hereabouts. Before setting off on our walking tour, we watched “Message of Paray,” a video that helped put the historical significance of this town in context.

Before Paray-le-Monial, we learned, there was simply Paray, a village located west of what was once the famous and now lost Benedictine abbey of Cluny. It was the Cluny monks who established a monastery in Paray, gave the town its “last name” and, at the end of the 11th century, began construction of the church that would be our first stop. The monks modeled it on a smaller scale after their own great abbey.

Raised to the rank of Basilique du Sacré-Coeur (Basilica of the Sacred Heart) by Pope Pius IX in 1875, its Roman Cluniac style is reason alone for some visitors to come to Paray-le-Monial.

The church is built in the shape of a cross, with thick plain walls, rounded arches and pointed-barrel vaults that allow for the generous but not soaring height of the nave. As Céline led the way into the basilica, which now serves as the parish church, she pointed out the “triplets” — three rises of steps, three levels in the choir and three tiers of high vertical windows welcoming the “light of God.”

We then headed to Chapelle Claude La Colombière. It houses the relics of the priest whom Jesus described to Margaret Mary as his “faithful servant and perfect friend.” Arriving in Paray-le-Monial when many, including sisters in her very community, accused Margaret Mary of being deluded, Father Colombière recognized the revelations given to the nun as true. His spiritual stamp of approval and own consecration to the Sacred Heart did much to spread the devotion.

In contrast with the understated basilica, the interior of the Colombière Chapel, built in 1930, is colorful. The mosaic front of the altar shows deer drinking from a spring with three streams. For Margaret Mary, the Heart of Jesus was an “inexhaustible spring” with streams of mercy for sinners, charity for those in need, and love and light for the “perfect friends it wants to unite to itself.”

A vision Margaret Mary had two years before her death inspired the fresco above the altar. It portrays Jesus enthroned with his heart ablaze. His mother is to his right and the saints of the Sacred Heart — Margaret Mary and Claude — are before them.

Mary, in a gentle, motherly fashion, is confiding in Margaret Mary what needs to be done. The Visitation Sisters were charged with promoting the Sacred Heart of her son, according to the inscription below the fresco, and the Jesuits were to instruct others in its mystery.

At long last, we arrived at the very heart of this shrine town, Chapelle des Apparitions, attached to the Visitation Sisters’ convent.

As we knelt preparing for Mass on the First Friday of the month, I looked at the altar and to the cloister grille to the right of it. It was behind the grille that Margaret Mary praying before the Blessed Sacrament mystically encountered Christ between December 1673 and June 1675.

Eucharistic Encounter

Above the altar, artist Luc Barbier has attempted to capture the brilliant intensity of the second “great apparition” in which Jesus showed himself in glory with his “five wounds shining like so many suns.” A glance to the side of the church reveals the above-ground tomb of Margaret Mary at which John Paul II prayed in 1986.

“It is near the Heart of Christ,” he later reflected, “that man's heart is given the capacity of loving.”

One of the three priests accompanying us spoke of this love in his homily. While expressing awe for what occurred in this chapel, he said it was important to remember that Jesus miraculously comes to each of us in the Eucharist every day.

The love that Margaret Mary said Jesus “cannot hold back anymore in himself” continues to bless Paray-le-Monial. More than 100,000 pilgrims journey here each year, the Visitation Sisters remain, new religious communities have formed and the Community of the Emmanuel, an association of priests, deacons, religious and laity, welcomes young people and families to evangelization sessions.

More than 300 years after the apparitions, a new generation hears the beat of Jesus’ heart, calling them to conversion and love.

Kerry A. Crawford writes from Pittsburgh.

Planning Your Visit

The reception center at the basilica is open every day from 9:30 a.m. to noon and from 2 to 6 p.m. Mass times vary by day and season. For more information about pilgrimages to Paray-le-Monial and other shrine towns, visit villes-sanctuaires.com/anglais/paray_pelerinage.htm on the Internet.

Getting There

Paray-le-Monial is accessible by car and train, and served by Saint-Yan airport. For more, go to villes-sanctuaires.com/anglais/paray_pelerinage.htm on the Internet.

----- EXCERPT: Basilica of the Sacred Heart, Burgundy, France ----- EXTENDED BODY: Kerry A. Crawford ----- KEYWORDS: Travel -------- TITLE: Don't Give the Devil More Than His Due DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Strictly speaking we owe the devil nothing but our enmity.

He is the ancient enemy, the deceiver. Against the absolutism of bumper stickers, the Christian affirms that, in the case of our approach to the devil and his legions, hate is a family value.

There is no hope for Satan's repentance, and we would waste our time praying for it. We are commanded to resist the devil by refusing to fix our gaze upon him — our eyes are meant for Christ.

If we accustom ourselves to looking at Christ who is the truth, we will immediately recognize the serpent condemned to crawl on his belly as he tries pathetically to pass either in the guise of an angel of light or the equally deceptive pose of a lion prowling about, seeking those whom he would devour.

We must see clearly with eyes of faith or we will succumb to the temptation inherent in these disguises and give the devil not just our enmity but either our worship or our fear. Christ himself showed us the way, rejecting Satan's false offer of the kingdoms of the world for one measly show of adoration. And he warned us against the second, telling us to fear only the one who can throw body and soul into hell.

God alone has that authority.

My great worry for the believing Catholic (and that is what I am) today is that fear of the devil is a more powerful temptation than worship.

For us, there is a certain tendency to panic because of what we see as the hold the devil has on this world. I do not say that we are perpetually cringing at the devil's power. Indeed, many do not cringe at all, but seem to valiantly attack wherever the devil seems to show his face, as if we were engaged in a supernatural game of whack-a-mole.

And therein lies the problem.

Our holy vigilance can sometimes be a sort of panic. Colleen Carroll Campbell, in her book, The New Faithful: Why Young Adults Are Embracing Christian Orthodoxy, acknowledged in a very understated way that “conservative Catholics often are overly alert to the missteps of those they regard as inadequately orthodox.”

I think it's more than that. So-called “modern Catholics” often have a point: we “New Faithful,” particularly those of us who are young, are often overly quick to judge other Catholics as inadequately orthodox.

We observe a pattern of facts in people we don't really know, make the inferences necessary, and assume that the devil has seduced them. We realize we must say something. So we attempt to “evangelize” them. Only afterward, do we realize that we have spoken without knowledge.

Aim! Fire! Ready?

A story: A young couple I know are at a party with a number of devout, believing Catholics. One of the young priests sees the two, with their model good looks (he in his early 30s, she in her late 20s), their two successful careers, their nice clothes, and their zero children. Aha! Selfish young Catholics caught contracepting their early fertility away!

Father NewFaithful engages the young woman, attempting to convince her of the glories of Catholic motherhood. She agrees. Not taking Yes for an answer, he attacks the culture of contraception. She clearly agrees. Father NewFaithful takes one more swing at the glories of motherhood as experienced by young marrieds. She strongly agrees, escapes the conversation and cries the entire way home.

My friend, you see, has no children neither because her career is too important nor because she is addicted to a selfish life of money. Nor have she and her husband contracepted during their marriage. My friend has no children because she has had problems conceiving. And because she failed to declare her reasons for lack of children, she received — no questions asked — an attempt to convert her.

At that party the devil received more than his due.

If we don't want our New Springtime of Evangelization to become simply a Hot Angry Summer of Pious Badgering, followed by more defections from the Church because of our insensitivity, our judgment will have to be just — we will have to know whether we have the right target before we aim and fire at it.

The same goes for our evangelization of non-Catholics. It is no surprise that Mark Brumley had to write his very good book, The Seven Deadly Sins of Catholic Apologetics. He understood what Chesterton did: “For the convert's sake, it should be remembered that one foolish word from inside [the Church] does more harm than a hundred thousand foolish words from the outside.”

This unnecessary and dangerous payment to the devil is simply a form of despair mixed with pride: The Holy Spirit, who convicts us of sin and plants the desire to seek God, simply isn't keeping up, so we must do his work for him.

Better we should imitate John Paul II. Colleen Carroll Campbell quotes Rosalind Moss on our late Pope's trust in God's work in people: “He assumes that they want God, that they want to fulfill their calling in life. He assumes they're up to the task.”

David Paul Deavel is an associate editor of Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought and Culture and a contributing editor for Gilbert Magazine.

He lives in St. Paul, Minnesota, with his wife and two children.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: David Paul Deavel ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: The Father on Fox Television DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Father Jonathan Morris oversees 400 students as vice rector for the Legionaries of Christ Seminary in Rome. When he's not performing his duties at the seminary, he can often be seen on television.

Father Morris serves as a Fox News news contributor, offering commentary on breaking news stories of the day.

He recently spoke with Register staff writer Tim Drake while working from Fox's studios in New York.

Where did you grow up? Tell me about your family.

I grew up in Ann Arbor, Mich. I'm the third of seven children. My dad is an attorney. My mother is a stay-at-home mom who is a social worker by profession. I grew up Catholic.

Do you have a favorite childhood memory?

When I was a freshman in high school, we moved from Michigan to Ohio. I just assumed that I would be attending the local Catholic high school, but before enrolling us, my dad made a visit to the school, sitting in on some of the classes, interviewing the teachers, and getting a feel for the overall environment.

I remember having a family meeting that night, and he informed us that he wasn't satisfied with what he had seen, in particular what was being taught there in terms of theology and Christian living. Instead, we would be attending a local public high school where my older brother and I would be a 2% minority in an otherwise all black school. I remember clearly the reasons he gave us for his decision.

First, he preferred that we not receive any religious training at school rather than something improper that we might think was our faith. Secondly, he wanted us to have the experience of being a racial minority. It was a great experience all around. I was challenged to live and defend my faith and at the same time I learned to adapt to other cultures. I am grateful to my dad for that.

What led to your vocation?

My parents never mentioned the priesthood to me as a possibility or anything they were interested in me pursuing. But by their own testimony they taught me that to be a Christian means to say Yes to God always and in every circumstance.

When I experienced the call of God, I couldn't help but make reference to what my parents had taught me with their own example — God's invitations are non-negotiable.

As it turns out, while I was a sophomore in college, my roommate and best friend, Rhett, was thinking of becoming a priest. I was always giving him a hard time, often asking him in the presence of his date how the discernment process was going. I thought he should just give it a try.

One day Rhett told me that a priest from Connecticut was coming to visit him. I was pretty excited for him, and to make sure that he went along to the meeting, I decided to tag along.

I saw in that priest something that changed my life forever. He was passionate about God, about life, about doing something great for others. He didn't try to recruit me. He just was. His very presence invited me to question what I was doing with my life, and to ask the big question: “God, what do you want me to do for you?”

At the end of the lunch, the priest invited the two of us to do a spiritual retreat at the seminary. “How did I get myself into this?” was running through my mind.

After two visits to the seminary, I wasn't sure if I had a vocation, but I felt like I needed to give it a try. I remember so vividly the 10-hour drive back to Ohio to tell my girlfriend of a year and a half that we needed to take some time off so I could figure this thing out. She was very respectful.

After a three-month summer discernment program, I knew that this was what God wanted for me, that he had created me to be a priest, and he was now inviting me, not forcing me, to take up the challenge. The first person I told was my girlfriend. The second was Rhett.

“Rhett, you have to take care of Tosha for me. You have to make sure she gets back to school and finishes up well.”

Rhett did a good job. One year later, he visited me and asked for my permission to ask her out on a date. He and Tosha are now married and have six children and remain my very good friends.

How did you come to be a commentator for Fox?

Because I worked in Rome, through the death of Pope John Paul II and the papal events, I started doing some commentary for various television programs — CNN, Fox, and Larry King. I think those remarkable events had an impact on secular media outlets as they soaked in the unprecedented love shown to John Paul II. And they realized that it wasn't just a Catholic thing — the streets of Rome hummed with universal spirituality. And the media caught it.

They picked it up, transmitted it, and the viewers said thank-you for recognizing what we hold so dearly. As a follow-up to all of this, several stations asked me to consider doing continual work with them throughout the year. I ended up firming something up with Fox.

What was the particular highlight for you through all of those events in Rome?

While doing live coverage of the funeral of Pope John Paul II, I was standing on a platform on the end of Via della Conciliazione. I was on top of the media platform looking out over the crowd as the coffin was lifted before bringing it into the basilica, and I could see all of the international flags. There were upwards of 1.5 million people saying their last goodbyes to a man who had transformed the world, the papacy, and to a very real degree, each of their own lives.

The reporter and I were preparing for our next commentary, when the skies opened up, and the sun came down on the coffin just at that moment. The correspondent couldn't believe it. He was trying to be objective, just reporting the facts, and without personal interpretation. But he couldn't help but report the emotion of the moment. I'll never forget it.

We let the rest of the funeral mass air without commentary.

You're referred to as a “news contributor.” How is that different from a religious analyst?

I'm not sure what my title is. I prefer to go by “Father.” But yes, you're right. People have noticed that I am not doing commentary on just religious issues. I guess you could say that my job is to give special commentary on ordinary news.

A lot of news items are complicated, but the information given to viewers is all too often one dimensional. The goal here is to give viewers a broader perspective. I'm drawing from the social, human, spiritual, religious, ethical and moral levels to help viewers make a fully informed judgment for themselves.

Can you give me an example?

I was recently asked to do a segment on “What constitutes torture?” in response to the controversy created by the treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay. It was one way — among others — to present the news in its fullness, instead of becoming fixated on partisan politics.

I think it is great that here in America we are asking these questions on national television. People have a right to hear all sides of the issue.

Two minutes before we went live, there was breaking news on the Natalee Holloway case, the young woman who disappeared while on a high school senior trip to the coastal island of Aruba. The anchor asked me to stay on set and to change my commentary topic accordingly. We had a good discussion, delving into very relevant issues of a social and moral nature.

When do your commentaries air?

Since my segments depend on the news items of the day, the days of the week and hour of the day often vary. I have generally been on about once a week, live from Rome, between the 2-3 p.m. hour [EST], on a show hosted by Martha MacCallum. Segments last about 10 minutes.

What are you doing when you're not on television?

I work as vice rector at the Legionaries of Christ Seminary in Rome. There are 400 students there. Most of the work I do there is working on an individual level with each of the seminarians and the priests, helping them along in their preparations for the priesthood and their early ministry. The world needs good priests more than ever. Please pray for us.

Tim Drake is based in St. Joseph, Minnesota.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Tim Drake ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican -------- TITLE: Activist Fighting for the Ones We'll Never Know DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Deirdre McQuade became a pro-life activist in her teens.

That's when she first missed some days of high school to attend the March for Life in Washington, D.C., and later started the first Students for Life group at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania. Now, after serving as national program director for Feminists for Life, she has been named the new director of planning and information at the U.S. Bishops’ Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities, succeeding Cathy Cleaver Ruse.

She spoke to Register staff writer Tim Drake from her office in Washington.

Tell me about yourself.

I was born in New York City, but grew up in northern New Jersey. My parents met at the New York World's Fair and have been married for 38 years. I have one younger sister who is married with two daughters. In the past year, they all moved to Virginia, so we will be able to see more of each other now. I'm really looking forward to that.

My father is retired and has a new part-time career in real estate, but most of my life he was a route salesman for Entenmann's cakes. My mother spent many years working hard raising us. Her educational background is in design. During our high school and college years she worked for a textbook publishing company. Their daily commitment to Christ shows in everything they do — from leading prayer meetings and selling houses to caring for their grandchildren.

Did you grow up Catholic?

Yes, I'm a cradle Catholic. I received my first Communion, made my first confession, and was confirmed at St. Virgil's Church in Morris Plains, N.J. Church was a real hub of activity for my family. I attended public elementary school and a private high school. After graduating from Bryn Mawr, I went to Notre Dame for graduate studies in philosophy and theology.

From junior high onward, I've been involved in weekly Christian fellowship — Bible studies, prayer groups and service projects. Being able to pray and have fellowship with other Christians is a tremendous gift.

Last year, I worked for The Vine, an amazing ecumenical non-profit that builds relationships among diverse believers for greater unity in the body of Christ and for cultural renewal. There, my distinct Catholic perspective was welcomed and valued, and through prayer, conversation and recreation with fellow Christians, my own love of God was enriched. It will be a joy to see how the Holy Spirit blesses the world through many friendships started there.

Did you have any early experiences that attracted you to the pro-life movement?

During high school, our youth group traveled by bus to the March for Life. I remember some classmates asking, “Why go? You'll get frostbite.” I was going because the group was going. I didn't have a very developed philosophical sense of why it seemed important to be pro-life, but rather thought it was important to stand up for women and the unborn. At the marches, I got outside my local context. It put a face on the pro-life movement for me. I was struck by the size and diversity of the crowd and the many different ways that people stood up for life.

At Bryn Mawr College, my sister and I helped start a pro-life group that continues today. We felt it was important to say that the National Organization of Women does not represent every woman on this issue. We developed ways to address the issue at a traditionally feminist women's campus.

Do you have any immediate plans?

I've dedicated the office to Our Lady of Guadalupe. Her picture hangs on the wall overlooking the television set where I watch the news. I entrust my work to her care and intercession.

I have also been so bold as to entrust all the abortionists and abortion advocates to her as well, knowing that nothing is impossible with God. I pray that they would have the courage to face what they are doing and change their ways that they might be powerful witnesses in defense of life rather than its destruction.

What are the secretariat's current projects?

Our main focus is on educating people about the Roe v. Wade decision and its implications. There is a deep misunderstanding that the Roe decision legalized abortion only through the first three months. It has to be understood that, paired with its companion case, Doe v. Bolton, Roe opened the floodgates so that abortion on demand is legal at any time throughout pregnancy. Many people aren't aware of that.

Our “Roe Reality Checks” examine basic myths and misconceptions about Roe and answer them with basic facts about the decision. Many legal experts have said it employed a faulty mode of legal interpretation, simply asserting a new right not found anywhere in the Constitution.

If Roe were overturned, it would place the decision-making capacity back to the states, into the hands of the state legislators and their voting constituents rather than in the hands of nine people on the Supreme Court. So, even if Roe were overturned, our pro-life work would not be over.

In addition to our focus on Roe, embryonic stem-cell research and cloning are very much on our radar screen.

Recent studies seem to suggest that especially among the young, more and more are embracing a pro-life stance. Do you think we are turning a corner on the issue in this country?

This generation has not lived a day without abortion. They aren't protesting a change they've seen in their lifetime. They are standing up for life, I believe, because in their lived experience, they see how impoverished their world is. They're sitting in classrooms that should have more classmates in them. Some are aware of siblings or cousins who have been aborted.

This is a deep wound.

A pro-life speaker I know reports that students often come up to her weeping, saying that they know their mother had one or more abortions in college.

They are grieving the loss of someone they never got to know. They may even feel insecure about their own status: Was I wanted or was I a “mistake,” too? These wounds are present in our culture, but not recognized. The young see that Roe is the law of the land, but many are challenging this status quo, saying we can do so much better than abortion. I believe that if we equip them well, they will help build a world where every life is valued.

Tim Drake is based in St. Joseph, Minnesota.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Tim Drake ----- KEYWORDS: Inperson -------- TITLE: Give Miers a Chance DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

EDITORIAL

We ought to be crying bloody murder at the new Supreme Court pick.

After all, prominent pro-family voices are denouncing President Bush's nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, calling her a dangerous unknown.

So, why aren't we upset? Perhaps we will be after her hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee. But, so far, we don't find the arguments against her all that compelling. In fact, we find them self-contradictory.

In appointing her, President Bush is accused variously of promoting a stealth candidate and of cronyism. Those who accuse Miers of being a “stealth” candidate like to invoke Justice David Souter. President Bush's father appointed him, it is argued, because he had little record to show how he would vote on the court. As it turned out, he would vote very reliably for abortion — a painful judicial legacy for a president who campaigned as a pro-lifer.

The problem with stealth candidates is that not only the public, but the president himself can't predict how they'll vote. Miers is accused of being a stealth candidate who lacks a record and who, Souter-like, very well may betray the president's good intentions.

But detractors make another accusation, simultaneously: that Miers is a crony candidate. They say she is too well known to the president. Her appointment amounts to a president putting his friend on the court

Well, which is she — the dangerous unknown or the overly familiar?

In fact, it seems that President Bush understands exactly who Harriet Miers is. One of her jobs in the White House was helping Bush vet other candidates for the Supreme Court. Well-connected Washington reporter Fred Barnes quotes White House sources saying that Miers only became a candidate herself after she showed how well she understands Supreme Court issues in interviews with other candidates.

Is that cronyism? Maybe. Is it bad? Not if it produces a judge who is faithful to the Constitution and our country's bedrock principle that all human beings have a right to life.

Two other accusations about Miers also seem to us self-contradictory. On the one hand, that she is under-qualified and, on the other, that she may be too much of a moderate to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court case that made abortion legal at any point in pregnancy, and in all 50 states.

Usually, when making this argument, the accuser points out that Bush passed over many heavy-hitting, erudite candidates and appointed “his own lawyer” to the court. But we wonder: Would professorial constitutional experts really be more likely to overturn Roe v. Wade than an evangelical Christian woman who, as president of the Texas State Bar, took on the American Bar Association over its stance on abortion?

No specialized knowledge is necessary to understand and apply the principles our country was founded on. No less than the great constitutional commentator Joseph Story (1811-1845) said so:

“Constitutions are not designed for metaphysical or logical subtleties. … They are instruments of a practical nature, founded on the common business of human life, adapted to common wants, designed for common use, and fitted for common understandings. The people make them; the people adopt them; the people must be supposed to read them, with the help of common sense.”

The central crisis in American democracy today is precisely a misunderstanding of the power of our court system, and, most of all, the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Court isn't a high priesthood that declares infallibly on the meaning of a strange document that takes tortuous mental exercises and years of training to understand and expound upon. The Court is one of three co-equal branches of the federal government interpreting the plain language of the Bill of Rights.

Yes, justices should be qualified. But no, that needn't mean years of Herculean labors in Ivy League schools.

Pro-lifers are right to be vigilant about the president's commitment to our cause. We should watch the hearings carefully and let our senators know what we think of her.

But too often, pro-lifers demand that the president play a game he can't win rather than one he can. If Bush wants to seat a pro-life justice who can win confirmation onto the court instead of undergoing a gargantuan struggle over one who possibly can't, then why not let him?

We hope that senators will give Harriet Miers the hearing she deserves.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Opinion -------- TITLE: Feverish Fans DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

FACTS OF LIFE

People will put off going to the doctor if they're fans of a sports team that is playing well at the time. That's according to researchers at Harvard Medical School, who found that emergency-room visits throughout the Boston area rose and fell in direct proportion to the fortunes of the Red Sox last fall. The authors described how they determined the association between rising pennant fever and declining hospital visits in a letter published in the October Annals of Internal Medicine.

Source: USA Today, Sept. 26 Illustration by Tim Rauch

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Bush Backers Stage Revolt Over Miers DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

WASHINGTON — Several pro-life leaders who supported President Bush in 2004 in hopes that he would re-shape the Supreme Court say Harriet Miers’ nomination was a disappointment.

Among the candidates reportedly considered to fill the seat being vacated by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor were unapologetic pro-lifers who hold firm views on the limited role of the judiciary.

Bush's choice of White House counsel Miers came as a surprise. Her nomination was even suggested to Bush by a pro-abortion Democrat, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.

In Washington, D.C., the reaction among pro-life Christians was one of shock and betrayal.

“I was willing to swallow hard on John Roberts,” said former presidential candidate and evangelical leader Gary Bauer, an erstwhile ally of Bush's policies. “I'm not willing to do it again. … I don't think godly people or the politicians we support should approach any issue on a stealth basis. That's not a way to touch hearts and minds. What would Lincoln have been if he’d never talked about slavery?”

Miers is a former president of the Texas State Bar who served as Bush's personal attorney before taking on her role in the Bush White House.

Several facts emerged about her personal and professional life that seemed to assuage fears that she may support abortion. Although she's a fallen-away Catholic, she became attracted to Christianity again in her 30s, becoming active in a Texas evangelical church that describes itself as pro-life. In the early 1990s, she opposed the American Bar Association's support of legal abortion.

When she ran for City Council in Dallas, she told a homosexual-rights group that she felt homosexuals should have the “same civil rights” as heterosexuals. But she opposed repealing Texas’ prohibition of sodomy.

Miers used to be a Democrat. When she was, she gave money to Democrats running for office — and nearly all Democrats who run for office are pro abortion. She gave money to Al Gore's presidential campaign in 1988 just after Gore had abandoned his pro-life beliefs and embraced abortion on demand in order to be palatable to Democrats.

Father Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International, was another pro-life leader to criticize the nature of the Miers nomination.

“The nomination of Miers is a slap in the face to pro-life lawyers and judges who have not been ashamed of the principles that inform their conscience,” he said in a prepared statement. “Evidently, courage of conviction disqualifies candidates for the bench.”

Although the ambiguity over Miers’ policy views may protect her nomination from excessive scrutiny by Senate Democrats, it is making Bush's political allies extremely nervous about where she stands. It has already fractured Bush's supporters and cost him political capital at a time when he had very little to begin with. The electoral consequences for the Republican Party in 2006 could be catastrophic, said Bauer.

“I think there are millions of evangelicals and millions of Catholics who may not like Republican economic policy, but who nonetheless see the party as a defender of Judeo-Christian values,” he told the Register. “If those voters decide that even when their party controls the White House, the House and the Senate, it is unwilling to spend political capital on these values issues, then that raises the risk of the whole GOP strategy of becoming the majority party unraveling.”

Sean Rushton, executive director of the pro-life Committee for Justice, took up the defense of Miers. “She seems to be pro-life, and I think that's a positive,” said Rushton. “A number of people who know her well have spoken strongly in her favor.”

Pepperdine Law Professor Douglas Kmiec has been one of Miers’ prominent defenders. Although he acknowledged some of the criticism about Miers’ qualifications and her personal closeness to the president, he praised Bush's choice of someone with extensive experience in litigation and in government work.

“I view her as someone who has a well-developed sense of the judicial role as being limited and restrained, and focused entirely on statutory and constitutional interpretation,” he told the Register. “She has a very healthy sense of the separation of powers, and therefore is a nominee who is not going to be inclined to legislate from the bench or to displace the will of the people when it comes to the right to life.”

Kmiec said that his own conversations with Miers and those around her have commended her well.

“She is very careful, her work is extremely thorough and well considered,” he said, “and if I was looking for a counsel for my own personal interest, Harriet Miers would be on my list.”

Miers’ confirmation is still very likely, but not inevitable. The greatest chance to defeat her will come in the Senate Judiciary Committee, where hearings will begin in early November. If bipartisan opposition materializes, it will focus around the three presidential hopefuls who sit on the panel — Sens. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., Joe Biden, D-Del., and Russ Feingold, D-Wis.

Interviewed Oct. 5 on “Good Morning America,” Brownback said there is “a good chance” he will oppose Miers if she says that Roe v. Wade is “settled law,” already an ambiguous phrase that Roberts used in referring to the decision. If she does not use that phrase, though, Miers could endanger the votes of Democrats on the panel.

David Freddoso writes from Washington, D.C.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: David Freddoso ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Plasticene Never Looked So Precious DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

By now it's a sight familiar to countless Wallace & Gromit fans: At the pull of a lever, Wallace's mattress, counter-weighted by a cinder block hanging from the ceiling, tips up steeply like the bed of a dump truck, dropping Wallace neatly through a trap door in the floor at the foot of the bed directly into his chair at the breakfast table, where mechanical arms commence dressing him …

Oops. Not so fast. It seems Wallace isn't slipping through the trap door quite as handily as he once did. On the kitchen table is a possible indication of the culprit: a jar of spread. “Middle-Aged Spread,” to be precise.

Ah, yes. Stop-motion animation cult heroes Wallace & Gromit, the brainchildren of British animator Nick Park, may not be unchanged in the transition from their charmingly dotty, wildly funny shorts to their first feature-length film, but they're still recognizably themselves. The humor is a bit broader at times, with a sprinkling of rude humor not found in the shorts “A Grand Day Out,” “The Wrong Trousers” and “A Close Shave” (though in the main comparable to jokes in Park and Aardman's first feature film, Chicken Run, and mostly within the bounds of reasonable taste).

But the same wacky invention, cheerful silliness and satiric homage of classic film as those classic shorts animates Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.

What a canny stroke of luck or genius that Park made Wallace — bald-headed, cheese-loving Wooster to level-headed Gromit's canine Jeeves — an eccentric inventor. That conceit opens the world of Wallace & Gromit to a host of possibilities, from the endearing moon shot of “A Grand Day Out” motivated by the quest for cheese (“Everyone knows the moon is made of cheese…”) to the exquisite parody of 1950s sci-fi thrillers in “The Wrong Trousers.”

Now, in Curse of the Were-Rabbit, Wallace's do-it-yourself, eccentric-scientist puttering provides the occasion for a sublimely silly excursion into the world of classic Terence Fisher-style 1960s British horror (The Curse of the Werewolf, The Curse of Frankenstein) and 1930s Hollywood horror (King Kong, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde).

As always, Park brings perfect pitch to his evocation of the conventions and devices of his inspirations: the glistening of rain-slicked streets at night, the “jump” moment of an eerie silence abruptly interrupted by a large object unexpectedly crashing onto the hood (or bonnet) of a car; the angry, frightened pitchfork-packing mob.

At the same time, there are images of strange charm and even beauty that come from nowhere but Park's own eccentric imagination, such as the inexplicably poetic vision of bunnies floating dreamily in space, suspended in the clear plastic containment tank of Wallace's humane vacuum-powered rabbit-extractor, the “Bun-Vac 6000.”

As this suggests, Wallace (voiced by Peter Sallis), last seen dabbling in window washing (“It's only temporary … I'm inventing mostly”), have gone into the pest-control business under the trade name “Anti-Pesto,” and are now putting their techno-smarts to work protecting the neighbors’ vegetable gardens from ravenous herbivores.

It's a shrewd career move, as vegetable gardening is a local passion. In fact, every year by local tradition there's a vegetable show at the posh Tottington estate, home of the deliciously flighty Lady Tottington (a hilarious Helena Bonham Carter), who becomes one of Wallace's customers, and may become even more. (Lady Tottington is known informally as “Totty,” which, I'm told, is both an old-fashioned nickname for “Dorothy” and current British slang for “hottie” or “babe.”)

In this neighborhood, veggies are lovingly tucked in at night like children, and nocturnal bunny attacks are as feared as kidnappings, so Wallace has a sizable customer base. He also has potential competition, both in the bunny-control department and as a possible suitor to Totty: Lord Quartermaine (grandly over-the-top Ralph Fiennes), a sneering, aristocratic British counterpart to Beauty and the Beast's Gaston, brandishes his ever-present shotgun as a constant alternative to Wallace's more humane methods.

What does Wallace do with his incarcerated bunnies? He claims it's a “trade secret,” but the truth is he's got them all in hutches back at his house. To experiment on them? No, he's just too kind to dumb animals to dispose of them, let alone experiment with.

And yet: What if the rabbits’ destructive appetite for veggies — like Wallace's over-fondness for cheese — could be scientifically treated?

Naturally, this ill-advised course of action has disastrous results, and leads to a scene in which the high-strung local vicar (Nicholas Smith) inveighs against the consequences of “tampering with nature.” Lord Northcliffe, though, snorts at these fears, suggesting that “the vicar's been at the communion wine again.”

This line, incidentally, is one of the two more objectionable bits in the film, the other one being a fleeting gag about the vicar reading “nun wrestling” magazines on the sly. It's a measure of the inappropriateness of the drinking line that the Catholic viewer can't help overanalyzing the sacramental issues: The reference is presumably to unconsecrated wine, and in its Anglican setting the whole sacramental ickiness is less problematic than it would be in a Catholic setting. Yet even to have such thoughts flicker through one's mind is to be taken out of the film.

Which is too bad, because the film offers a fair amount of fun. As a fearsome fluffy lapine monster rampages about the countryside, Curse of the Were-Rabbit is a delight. As always, Gromit, as doggedly silent and resourceful as Buster Keaton, is the true hero, and the rousing finale is far and away his finest hour.

Between the computerized slickness of Pixar's masterpieces and other digital hits (the Shrek flicks, Ice Age) on the one hand, and the failure of such hand-drawn efforts as Treasure Planet and Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron on the other, Hollywood has developed a serious case of cold feet regarding the hand-crafted charm of traditional animation. This amounts to blaming the medium for the failure of the artists.

Curse of the Were-Rabbit, along with the more mature and genuinely macabre Corpse Bride, represents a creative triumph of artists working with pose-able puppets, a form of hand-done animation older and clunkier than cel animation. It's a giddy success of sorts, and a welcome return for two old friends.

Content advisory: Comic menace and excitement; mild rude humor of both the family-film and bawdy varieties, including some comic belching and a few double-entendres; fleeting unflattering comic references to an Anglican cleric surreptitiously reading “nun wrestling” magazines and allegedly tippling communion wine.

Steven D. Greydanus is editor and chief critic of DecentFilms.com.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Steven D. Greydanus ----- KEYWORDS: Arts -------- TITLE: Hard to Be Easy DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

FAMILY MATTERS

Disciplining my children — ages 6, 11 and 14 — is a lot harder than I ever imagined before I had kids. Can you offer any suggestions on ways to make it easier?

After nearly 25 years of shrinking — I used to be 6 feet, 9 inches tall — I have discovered only one absolutely foolproof method for disciplining children less. It works for all parents, all kids and all circumstances. To discipline a child less you must simply do one thing: Lower your standards.

If you're unwilling to do this — and I hope you are — then my response gets a little more complicated. Your question can be answered in many ways. Let me assume a few qualifications to narrow this column down.

First, by discipline you mean expectations and limits backed by consequences. So often, real discipline is confused with lots of words and emotions. No matter how much a parent talks, nags, negotiates, threatens, over-reasons and yells, he is not disciplining. He is frustrating himself and his child. Many think “discipline” is so hard because they aren't really disciplining. They are verbally and emotionally flailing in vain. That kind of “discipline” is real hard, and only gets harder over time.

Second, much of good parenting — sacrifice, supervision, perseverance, patience — is much harder than we imagined as pre-parents. The reality of the parenting journey is more demanding than most of us ever dreamed. So part of your experience is simply unavoidable reality. Blessedly, the rewards of parenting are also far greater than anything we could once imagine.

Now, on to making a hard reality softer.

First and foremost: Talk less, act more. In the short run, acting is harder than talking. In the long run, it's much, much easier. A parent who is willing to make whatever effort is necessary to hold a child accountable for his conduct saves a lot of future effort. To put it simply, discipline is easier if you work hard at it.

Next, act more quickly. If Angelica has been tormenting her brother, Rocky, for 29 minutes, and then, finally hitting your “I've had enough” point, you are emotionally moved to act, or (more accurately) react, you've made the whole scenario much more stressful than it needed to be. The same discipline enforced 27 minutes ago would have been easier on everybody.

Finally, don't take misconduct personally. No offense, but most of the time your kids are acting up, they are probably not even thinking of you. They're misbehaving out of impulse, immaturity or sneakiness. You're not their main focus. Later, if they're caught, you will be. But for now they are not misbehaving to get back at you, or to hurt you, or to worry you, or to frustrate you. No, most often they are acting out of kidhood, which is a partially socialized and partially moralized state.

The less you take kids’ behavior personally, the calmer you'll stay. And the calmer, the easier discipline is, as too much emotion complicates everything.

Our space here is far too short to cover all the many ways to make discipline easier. To elaborate on our beginning advice, there are actually two foolproof ways to make discipline effortless: Lower your standards to zero or have zero kids. Neither one is worth it.

For more of Dr. Ray Guarendi's wit and wisdom, visit DrRay.com.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: DR. Ray Guarendi ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: The Ravine DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Somewhere in the ravine at the Shrine of the North American Martyrs is buried the body of Rene Goupil, one of the first martyrs on this continent.

Nobody knows exactly where. His companion, St. Isaac Jogues, buried what was left of him after the dogs, crows and foxes took their part; and, as you walk down through the woods to the ravine, you become aware that you are in what Pope Pius XII called “nature's own reliquary.”

The shrine is in Auriesville, N.Y., 40 miles west of Albany. Here the French Jesuits John de Brebeuf, Isaac Jogues and Goupil were taken captive by the Mohawk Indians in 1642. Their feast is celebrated Oct. 19.

The ravine is in one corner of the property, but it is really the heart of the shrine. For here you come face to face with the price of our faith, and the chance to measure your faith against that of the martyrs.

As my 18-year-old son, Bobby, and I, read the first few plaques along the trail to the ravine, we were plunged into the sense of danger the missionaries put themselves in by coming to America. The account on the plaques is distilled from Father Jogues’ writings:

“We paused at the gate of the stockade to hear what the two Iroquois had to say. One of them drew a tomahawk from under his blanket, and dealt Rene a blow on the head. Rene fell prostrate to the ground, uttering the holy name of Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. We had often reminded each other to end our speech and our lives with that most holy name. At the sound of the blow, I turned around and beheld the tomahawk dripping with blood. I fell to my knees to receive the blow that would unite me to my dear companion.”

St. Isaac continues the story, saying how the Indians ordered him back to his long house, and there he awaited that day and the next the same deadly tomahawk. “But our Lord averted this,” he says. Then he describes how, early the next morning, at the risk of his life, he went in search of Goupil's body in order to give him a decent burial.

At one end of the ravine is a little memorial to Goupil, and about 50 yards away a statue depicting him making the Sign of the Cross over an Indian lad. It was this gesture that enraged the Indians and led directly to his death.

Bobby said he felt in awe to be in a place where a martyr had died for Christ, one who loved Jesus so much that he died with his name on his lips. “The ravine showed the triumph of the Gospel,” my son told me. “The martyrs didn't die in vain.” And, in fact, Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha was born nearby a decade later.

Re-tracing the North American Martyrs’ steps made us want to be like them — to love Christ and the Church the way they did, to be ready to give our lives for Jesus.

Are we ready?

Bob Horning writes from Ann Arbor, Michigan.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Bob Horning ----- KEYWORDS: Travel -------- TITLE: Couples Opting for Long-Distance Marriage Prep DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Andrew and J’ana Rogers wanted a Catholic wedding, and Bishop Michael Sheridan of Colorado Springs wanted them well prepared.

Like many priests and prelates, Bishop Sheridan is tired of seeing couples use the Church for weddings, only to lead married lives that are anything but what the Church expects of those entering the sacrament of matrimony.

But the bishop's rigorous marriage preparation requirements were a problem for Andrew and J’ana, who couldn't find a way to attend retreats and classes without J’ana quitting college or Andrew going AWOL.

“Andrew was in the military, and I was working and attending college,” said J’ana, a student at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, who married Andrew a year ago.

They could have opted for a justice of the peace or a wedding at Andrew's Methodist church. Instead, they enrolled in CatholicMarriage PrepOnline.com, the $50 one-stop shop for intense marriage preparation by correspondence. It enabled the couple to set aside several hours on Sunday nights to have serious, heart-to-heart discussions that were essential to answering the essay questions posed by the website.

“The fact is, many couples today are separated by hundreds or thousands of miles until they are married, and there are other factors that make it impossible for some couples to attend classes and weekend retreats,” Bishop Sheridan said. “This is much better than giving someone a pass, or having a couple give up on the idea of a Catholic marriage.”

Bishop Sheridan said he has concluded that the only drawback is that couples don't build in-person relationships with other couples while attending preparation functions. That, he said, can be easily corrected with regular Church attendance.

Founded by Christian and Christine Meert, the online curriculum is catching on in a world where challenges of war, work, college and geographic location sometimes keep young couples from receiving any marriage preparation at all.

“What impresses me most is that this program doesn't approach marriage preparation exclusively from a psychological and practical perspective,” Bishop Sheridan said. “It takes very seriously the need to teach couples about the divine institution of marriage and the meaning of marriage as a sacrament.”

Bishop Sheridan said he conducted extensive research about the Meerts, their teaching methods and their online curriculum. He was so impressed with what he found that he asked them to lead the Colorado Springs Diocese office of Marriage and Family Life.

“Christian and Christine Meert have dedicated their lives to preparing couples to live a happy and holy marriage,” Bishop Sheridan said.

Using the website, couples are required to discuss issues such as sex, contraception, children, drugs, alcohol, extended family, religious beliefs, prayer and communication skills. In writing, they answer questions and share their discussions so that the Meerts, and other marriage prep instructors, can assess them and offer feedback.

The online classes follow the same format as the live classes the Meerts developed and continue to teach for the Archdiocese of Denver and the Diocese of Colorado Springs. The classes are rooted in Scripture, Church teachings and Pope John Paul II's theology of the body.

The Meerts became involved in marriage preparation in Denver at the same time the archdiocese was expanding and strengthening marriage preparation requirements. Couples in Denver, and now Colorado Springs, spend roughly a year meeting requirements by attending classes and retreats.

Christian Meert said the idea for online marriage preparation resulted from situations that arose frequently in Denver, when they were teaching only in-classroom marriage prep.

“We had a couple in a remote area on the Western Slopes [of Colorado] that was told by their pastor to go to Denver to do their marriage preparation,” Christian said. “It was a four-hour drive each way, so we started working with them by e-mail. The results were good. They were sharing together in-depth, answering questions and reporting on their discussions. They really opened their hearts and examined their spiritual journey.”

Quickly, the Meerts realized they could provide high-end marriage preparation curriculum to five other couples who simply weren't able to be in the Denver Archdiocese long enough or frequently enough to satisfy marriage preparation requirements.

“Working with them online, the results were very encouraging, so we decided to build a website to facilitate real online classes for the masses,” Christian said.

Widely Used

The online curriculum received an endorsement by Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput.

“This allows couples with difficult schedules or living in different states to have quality marriage preparation as well,” Archbishop Chaput wrote. “Their classes — both online and in person — are deeply rooted in the guidance of the Church and John Paul II's teachings on sexuality, marriage and family life.”

CatholicMarriagePrepOnline.com is recommended as an official option for couples by the archbishops of New Orleans, Denver and the bishops of Colorado Springs and Buffalo, N.Y. Christine Meert said hundreds of couples from all over the world have been granted individual approval by their bishops to use the online course to satisfy marriage preparation requirements. The program has become particularly popular among New York City police officers who find that overtime and erratic schedules interfere with marriage preparation schedules and soldiers in the Middle East who are planning to wed when they return to the United States.

“We're very pleased that it was available, and our marriage is probably better because of it,” J’ana Rogers said. “He's Methodist and I'm Catholic, and we didn't even think that was a big deal until marriage prep online forced us to take a serious look at it, and how it might play out when we have children. It really got us to know each other better before we got married.”

Wayne Laugesen writes from Boulder, Colorado.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Wayne Laugesen ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Letters to the Editor DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Catholicity on Campus

I want to thank you for the insert on truly Catholic universities and colleges (“Catholic College Survey ’05,” Sept. 25-Oct. 1).

What you did was quite brave in terms of the response you will likely engender from rabid alumni; I'm sure you realize this by now if you didn't when you produced it. But what you have done is extremely important. Your insert presented a standard for Catholic higher education (not different from canon law and Ex Corde Ecclesiae-). Hopefully this will become a basic minimum for Catholic schools in our country — and may those that do not measure up now begin to do so.

I have greatly resented for many years that I received an anti-Catholic education at the University of Notre Dame, and only recovered some years later. I don't believe the school has improved; rather, it has gotten worse.

My personal experience and that of my children easily confirms your presentation. One went to the University of Dallas, one to Gonzaga, and a third is now at Ave Maria University. Only the last would I consider a Catholic school; the difference is quite significant. My donations to higher education are limited to the schools on your list until the others reform. Until then, I will keep praying for them, but especially for the students.

JOHN KERIAN

Grafton, North Dakota

Catholic Schools

Thank you very much for the articles and reports on the Catholic schools that are making the effort to pass on the faith to their students.

The sad part is the few there are in numbers.Thank you for doing your part.

BOB DALTON

Parker, Colorado

As chair of the Department of Philosophy and Theology at the University of Saint Francis in Fort Wayne, Ind., I am intrigued with the college survey conducted by the Register. Do you plan on conducting the survey again any time soon?

I ask because our university is in the process of faithfully implementing Ex Corde Ecclesiae and I would like to be able to have USF included in your next survey. Of course, the final decision on whether or not to participate does not rest with me personally, but I am interested in whether or not it is even a possibility.

JOHN P. BEQUETTE

University of Saint Francis Fort Wayne, Indiana

Editor's reply: We do plan to repeat our college survey. Thank you to all readers who contacted us about this report. Several of you even contacted schools, urging them to respond. The survey is online at ncregister.com. Schools that respond to the survey will be added to the online version.

Ms. Miers Means Well

Relevant to “The Changing Face of the U.S. Supreme Court” (Oct. 9-15):

Much has been written on and speculated about Harriet Miers, President Bush's nominee to replace Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court. Many pro-lifers have expressed disappointment, while some pro-abortion senators have indicated support.

There is not enough information on Ms. Miers to confidently say that she will vote to correct Roe v. Wade. However, there are several indications that make us cautiously optimistic.

President Bush is without question pro-life. Nearly all of his court appointments to date have been excellent. Evidence is good that Chief Justice John Roberts will perform admirably on the Supreme Court. President Bush has earned a high level of trust and respect from the pro-life community. I believe his heart is with us on abortion.

Those who know Harriet Miers depict her as a devout evangelical Christian, active in her church. A person's religious beliefs are the foundation of his or her actions. Ms. Miers is obviously a strong person. She was the first woman president of a major law firm and the first woman president of the Texas State Bar. Thus her convictions, whatever they may be, are likely strong.

As president of the Texas Bar Association, Ms. Miers was the chief sponsor of a resolution to change the pro-abortion position of the American Bar Association to one of neutrality. While her efforts failed, she made an impressive attempt.

Pro-lifers painfully remember that pro-life Republican presidents nominated pro-abortion Justices O’Connor, Souter and Kennedy to the court. And since the Supreme Court is our most viable option to ending the modern-day holocaust of abortion, we can ill-afford another tragic mistake. Ultimately, we will only be certain of Ms. Miers’ legal position on abortion after she has been confirmed and rules on an abortion-related case.

In the final analysis, after reviewing all of the known facts, Life Issues Institute feels the odds of her opposing Roe are seemingly to our advantage. That is why we are cautiously optimistic she is the right pick for the court. Obviously, you will have to make up your own mind.

We will continue to closely monitor the situation and bring you important facts as they develop. Please continue to pray for President Bush, Harriet Miers, the Supreme Court and our nation. Please pray that God will end abortion in America.

BRADLEY MATTES

Executive Director

Life Issues Institute Cincinnati

It Takes 2

Relevant to “Knights Pledge to Take ‘Under God’ to High Court” (Sept. 25-Oct. 1):

As a beginning, we need a campaign to clarify the real issues of laws and crimes that are involved in the discussion of separation of church and state. We just throw out the words “church and state,” and few of us know what we are talking about.

First of all, we need to define the terms. Let us say that “church” means churches whose members believe in God and his moral laws, the Ten Commandments. The term “state” includes governments that are concerned with civil and criminal laws, which governments have passed to maintain order in our society for the good of the majority of our citizens.

Both organizations deal with most of the same subjects and have the same long-term goals. Actually, the churches should be the preparatory instruments to help the state laws function better. If the churches teach the moral laws, the state should have fewer crimes to prosecute.

We need to clarify the fact that criminal laws are based on moral laws. This is obvious from reading the Ten Commandments, which teach us not to kill, cheat, steal, bear false witness, commit adultery and more.

This is all spelled out in the commandments of God, and the state has passed laws against these crimes. As an example, one of our states has 200 crimes on its books, including rape, larceny, embezzlement, murder, voluntary manslaughter, criminal negligence, burglary, arson, perjury, kidnapping, assault and robbery.

So why would anyone want to dismantle the Ten Commandments and fail to support the churches that help us to maintain an orderly society? The excuse is seeking false, selfish freedom to do as we please ignoring the good of the majority.

Clarifying these issues might improve the understanding of the moral issues involved. Maybe we can improve both church and state.

DELPHINE MCCLELLAN

Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin

Establishing Freedom

Regarding “Knights Pledge to Take ‘Under God’ to High Court” (Sept. 25-Oct. 1):

The so called “establishment clause” is always only half-quoted. The first part is “Congress shall make no laws” and the second half of it is “nor deny the free exercise thereof.”

The judge is ruling against the Constitution by denying students the free exercise of their religion.

CECIL CORULLI

Chelan, Washington

Straight on La Salette

Regarding the letter to the editor titled “Here Comes the Havoc” (Oct. 2-8):

The writer says, “Our Lady of La Salette said that the seasons would be altered.”

As a missionary of Our Lady of La Salette for more than 50 years, I can assure you that there are no such words in the message Mary gave at La Salette on Sept. 19, 1846, the only (La Salette) message the Church ever accepted.

Everything that has been added to that message since then is mere speculation, if not invention or just plain fantasy.

FATHER LEO P. MAXFIELD, MS

Enfield, New Hampshire

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Opinion -------- TITLE: In the Center Stands the Senate DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

With John G. Roberts and Harriet Miers taking turns in its spotlight, the U.S. Senate is in headlines and leading the evening news. But more than 200 years ago, it had a totally different kind of centrality.

After Vice President Aaron Burr was dumped from the 1804 ticket by President Thomas Jefferson, he made an eloquent farewell address to the U.S. Senate, which he called “a sanctuary and a citadel of law, of order, of liberty” against “the storms of popular frenzy and the silent arts of corruption.” Burr predicted that, should the Constitution ever be overthrown, “its expiring agonies will be witnessed on this floor.”

In the early Republic, even demagogues like Burr recognized that the Senate was the linchpin of constitutional government. The French Catholic political thinker Montesquieu was the first modern advocate for a government based on a strong senate.

John Adams, Charles Carroll (the Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence), and other Founding Fathers implemented Montesquieu's vision of a Senate which would serve as the guardian of the Constitution. Its small size, secret deliberations and six-year terms of office would increase the power of senators relative to that of representatives. The Senate would be elected by the state legislatures, rather than directly by the people, thus providing the government with stability in the face of public opinion and thwarting the tyranny of the majority.

Unfortunately, by the time of Burr's swan song, the Senate's prestige had already begun to wither. Jeffersonian senators failed to maintain the crucial role of the Senate as a check against the president and the people. It is no accident that the first affirmation of the principle of judicial review came three years after Jefferson's election, in the 1803 Marbury v. Madison case.

With the Senate having backed away from its role as watchdog of the Constitution, the Supreme Court, under Chief Justice John Marshall, stepped into the breach, claiming the power to strike down acts of Congress by declaring them unconstitutional.

While this move had some precedent in English law, it was not what the Founders had intended. Montesquieu called the judiciary “next to nothing” in his system. Hamilton, in The Federalist (No. 78), wrote that “the judiciary is beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments of power. … Though individual oppression may now and then proceed from the courts of justice, the general liberty of the people can never be endangered from that quarter.”

Even Hamilton's genius could not foresee the time when the Supreme Court would assume the Senate's pre-eminence, making itself the protector of the common good.

Nor did he anticipate the Senate's gradual drift into irrelevance, greatly hastened by the 1913 ratification of the 17h Amendment, which allows the citizens of each State to elect Senators directly. The 17th Amendment threatened to make the Senate into a mere carbon copy of the House of Representatives, not at all adequate to put a straitjacket on “popular frenzy.”

The problem started, however, with the original Constitution, which did not quite do justice to the historic role of a Senate. The 1787 Constitutional Convention placed the Senate squarely within the legislative branch of government, a departure from both the American and the classical political traditions.

Technically, the Senate in the Roman Republic did not legislate.

It served as an advisory body to the consuls and other elected magistrates. The power to make laws was reserved to the Popular Assembly. In civic emergencies, the Senate would sometimes override popular legislation. Its function was thus to check both the executive and legislative elements in the Roman constitution, armed only with its tremendous prestige.

The institutions that most closely resembled senates during the American colonial period were the councils which advised colonial governors. Like the Roman Senate, these councils belonged neither in the legislative nor the executive branch of government. They served an intermediary function between the executive and the popularly-elected legislatures, advising both branches.

The framers of the Constitution, apparently uncomfortable with the hybrid nature of the Roman Senate and the colonial councils, chose to make the Senate a legislative body.

This guaranteed the development of a separate executive apparatus, what Article II, Section 2 refers to as “other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for.” But the Founders did retain for the Senate an important power relative to the executive branch: the prerogative of “advice and consent” to treaties and to the president's appointments of government officials, including Cabinet officers and federal judges.

A great deal depends on this one fragile link in our constitutional chain, the Senate's power to give “advice and consent.” The judiciary now controls the legislative branch, but without a strong Senate, no effective check on executive power will exist.

The continuance of the Senate in some semblance of its original role depends upon good behavior by both the Senate and the executive.

Although “recess appointments,” such as the nomination of John Bolton to the United Nations, circumvent the “advice and consent” function, they are foreseen in the Constitution. The “nuclear option,” cutting off a Senate filibuster on judicial nominees by majority vote, is of more concern — and with more Supreme Court seats in play, the recent compromise on judicial nominees may be meaningless.

The Senate is a shadow of its former reality. Anything that helps restore its traditional position within our governmental framework is currently desirable. The filibuster, although it is merely a matter of Senate custom, provides an important safeguard against majority tyranny. It gives the less populated states, which are overrepresented in the Senate, a way to check a misguided majority will as expressed through the House of Representatives.

But the Senate's prerogative of “advice and consent” must also be exercised with respect for the common good of the entire nation, which the national executive is best positioned to gauge. In relations between the Senate and the president, much can be accomplished by the judicious use of threats, which can at times be more potent than actions. The Senate may threaten to reject a judicial nominee; through his party leaders, the president may threaten the “nuclear option.”

But let us hope, for the sake of the common good, that these threats are carried out only in the most extreme cases.

The Senate must check the executive, but if it becomes too hostile to executive power, disaster may strike: the disaster predicted by Burr, the disaster that befell Rome when Cicero goaded the Senate into supporting Octavian against the consul Mark Antony.

The Roman Senate's folly was the first step toward the Principate of Octavian — Augustus — and the end of the Roman Republic.

Scott McDermott's biography,

Charles Carroll of Carrollton: Faithful Revolutionary, is available at ScepterPublishers.org.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Scott Mcdermott ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: Sin Isn't Cost-Effective DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Why do some countries develop economically, while others stagnate?

Both the World Bank Institute and economist Alvaro Vargas Llosa answer that corruption is one of the major culprits. The most important “natural resources” for economic development are not raw materials like oil or coal, but moral qualities like the even-handed enforcement of law and the transparency of government.

The World Bank Institute reports that in poor places like India, people pay to give birth, to collect loved ones’ bodies from mortuaries, and for everything in between: garbage collection, clean water, medicines, admission to public schools and even police protection.

A recent San Diego Union-Tribune story, based on the World Bank report, told of the petty bribery families face if their babies are born in a hospital.

“Before the mother even glimpsed her baby, a nurse whisked the infant away and an attendant demanded a bribe. If you want to see your child, families are told, the price is $12 for a boy and $7 for a girl, a lot of money for slum dwellers scraping by on a dollar a day.”

Multiply this little event by dozens over the course of a person's lifetime, and you can imagine how much individual families are burdened by graft. This amount of extortion makes it almost impossible for people to get by, much less to accumulate any wealth.

Multiply that experience by the millions of families in a country like India, and you see that the poor are losing a staggering amount to low-level, semi-legal pick-pocketing.

Public authorities in many poor countries completely ignore experiences like these. The government, officials and even police consider bribery just “business as usual.” In fact, when low-level officials pick the pockets of the poor, it is a good bet that even more corruption is going on higher up the bureaucratic and political hierarchy.

When local health managers pay bribes to senior officials to get good jobs, these same health managers turn around and exact payments from workers lower down on the corruption food chain, including, ultimately, the patients themselves.

Llosa goes beyond mere agreement that corruption is a serious problem for the poor people of Latin America. He believes that corruption is one of the key causes of people being desperately poor in the first place. In his new book, Liberty for Latin America: How to Undo Five Hundred Years of State Oppression, he shows that corruption is far more destructive than simply transferring money from the pockets of the wretched to the pockets of well-placed government officials. Corruption inhibits capital formation and job development.

Opening a new business in many Latin American countries requires compliance with an astonishing number of rules and regulations. Llosa, a native of Peru who is now a fellow at the Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif., cites a Harvard Institute of Economic Research report showing the startling differences in the time required to start businesses legally in different countries.

I recently had the opportunity to address a group of Catholic bishops from Mexico. One of them related a story that substantiated Llosa's argument. This bishop told of a relative of his who wanted to open a gas station. It took him four months to comply with all the regulations for operating a legal business. Those four months are almost exactly the 112 days reported by the Harvard Institute of Economic Research. This contrasts with the mere two days required to legally open a Canadian business. And when I started my own business in Vista, Calif., I thought myself ill-used because I had to spend a morning getting my sales-tax license, my city business license and a zoning occupancy permit to operate out of my own home.

The excessive regulation in poor countries encourages corruption. Low-level governmental officials responsible for enforcing these ordinances expect to be paid off. Obtaining the permits to operate a business legally almost requires people to pay bribes.

These regulations also threaten the “informal economy.” Many people take the calculated risk of ignoring the legal requirements and just starting up their small businesses. These illegal enterprises, which make up about 30% of the Mexican economy, are always vulnerable to being shut down by otherwise insignificant officials. Businesses operating outside the law must pay whatever protection money is demanded of them.

Finally, informally-operating businesses and community associations have limited access to credit. According to the Economist magazine, only one in 10 Africans works in a legally recognized enterprise, or lives in a house that has legally recognized property rights.

A business operating outside the law will have a difficult time getting a bank loan because people cannot use that property as collateral for a loan. Llosa observes that regularizing the ownership of informally-owned buildings and businesses would allow people to access credit which would, in turn, allow the business to expand.

Foreign investment by itself can not jump-start a country's economic development. Capital equipment, important as it is, can't do the job on its own either. A country's “moral resources,” like the transparency of government, a lack of corruption and the rule of law make the difference between an impoverished economy and a thriving one.

Without a legal system that protects investments from theft, few people will take the risk of investing. Within a system that protects those who take bribes, those who produce jobs are at a serious disadvantage.

Reforming the legal system in underdeveloped countries is a necessary part of any strategy for economic advancement.

Put another way, sin is not cost-effective.

Jennifer Roback Morse is a Senior Research Fellow in Economics at the Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty, and the author most recently of Smart Sex: Finding Life-Long Love in a Hook-up World.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Jennifer Roback Morse ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: National Media Watch DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Baseball Commissioner Reviewing Baseball Chapel

WASHINGTON POST, Oct. 1 — Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig is reviewing the organization's cooperation with Baseball Chapel following Washington Nationals’ outfielder Ryan Church's remarks about Jews, said the Post.

In September, Church was quoted by the Post saying that he had asked the Nationals’ volunteer chaplain, Jon Moeller, if Jews were “doomed” because they did not believe in Jesus Christ. Moeller apparently nodded Yes in response to the question. The next day Moeller was suspended and the team issued an apology from Church.

Baseball Chapel is an evangelical Christian organization that provides volunteer chaplains to professional baseball teams.

Selig is considering a recommendation for rotating chaplains from various denominations.

Dioceses Ban Religious Organization

ASSOCIATED PRESS, Sept. 24 — Chicago Cardinal Francis George has become one of four bishops to ban Love Holy Trinity Blessed Mission from meeting in archdiocesan facilities or presenting itself as Catholic, reported the Associated Press.

Founded 12 years ago, Love Holy Trinity Blessed Mission holds weekly prayer meetings in more than 100 Catholic churches in Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, and Wisconsin. Members say that the group is trying to establish itself as a new religious order.

The cardinal's decision followed a six-month review of the group which has been described as cult-like by some. Relatives of mission members have complained that the organization isolates family members and convinces members that God will condemn them if they leave. Because the organization has not been forthcoming with information, the Chicago archdiocese was unable to reach a conclusion regarding the group.

Following similar concerns, the group was previously banned by Archbishop Jerome Hanus of Dubuque, Iowa, and Bishops Robert Morlino of Madison, Wis., and Thomas Doran of Rockford, Ill.

Hidden Treasure Found in Baltimore Basilica

WBAL, CHANNEL 11, Sept. 28 — An architect tapped on a wall above the arches that support the dome of Baltimore's National Shrine of the Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and found it to be hollow. Tearing away protective wood, workers found historic paintings of the four evangelists, a Baltimore television station reported.

The 19th century shrine, America's first cathedral, is undergoing a $32 million renovation. The paintings date to 1865 and had been covered during an 1870s renovation. The art will be there to greet worshipers when the basilica reopens next year.

Cardinal William Keeler of Baltimore has invited Pope Benedict XVI to attend the reopening of the basilica. Spokesman Sean Caine said the Vatican wrote back, saying it would take the invitation into consideration.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Archbishop on Katrina's Impact: 'Joy Amid the Suffering' DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

VATICAN CITY — Archbishop Paul Cordes, president of the Vatican's charitable arm Cor Unum, knows first-hand the enormous rebuilding project that lies ahead for the Americans living in areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina. Less than two weeks after the storm, he toured the flood-ravaged region for five days as Pope Benedict XVI's personal envoy.

Archbishop Cordes spoke with Register correspondent Edward Pentin in an e-mail interview about the suffering — and the faith — he witnessed during his U.S. visit.

What particular aspect of your trip to the devastated populations affected by Hurricane Katrina made the most impact on you?

The aspect that most affected me during the visit was the contrast between the total destruction of much of the area we visited, accompanied by the faith and high spirits of the victims, and those helping them in spite of their losses. I have been to many devastated areas, but saw an impressive level of both hope for the future and drive to recover and rebuild.

The work of Catholic Charities USA and numerous other charitable organizations has been exceptional and immediate. I even found that there was joy amidst the suffering, to which the Vietnamese community enthusiastically gave witness.

The states hardest hit have large Catholic populations. How much did people's faith help them through the catastrophe?

The faith of the people who have suffered in this disaster has played a critical role in not only bringing relief to their physical injuries and losses, but also in addressing the spiritual dimension and meaning to be found in such a catastrophe. Many of the people I visited expressed their gratitude to God for sparing their lives and for the generous outpouring of assistance made available to them by family, friends, neighbors and churches where they live.

Because of the large Catholic population, the bishops of the region have a very important role, as their institutions — especially hospitals and schools — are in the very midst of the recovery effort. Without faith, this would have been a complete disaster.

Many acts of heroism were reported by priests, religious and lay people. How much of this did you witness, and do you have any stories of heroism you can recount?

It is true that there were many selfless and heroic acts made to save lives and to rescue those in danger that were picked up by the media. There are still thousands of others, who, without any accolades, dedicated themselves to helping whoever was in need.

I met countless people who had come in from all over the United States to help; the police, fire and emergency crews, who had to be ordered out by their superiors just so they could sleep after having gone without for days on end; medical personnel, who suddenly faced a hospital at three or four times its capacity, and yet kept on answering the cries of the suffering; priests and religious, who stayed with their people who could not flee to safety; relief workers and military personnel, who took extra shifts and canceled vacations in order to look for the bodies of the dead and any remaining survivors.

These are but a few examples of the goodness I encountered.

What is the Church doing now to help rebuild the areas affected?

Through Catholic charitable organizations on the diocesan and national levels, and primarily through Catholic Charities USA, the response has been dramatic in the United States. It is also important to note that parishes and dioceses from around the world have been sending whatever help they could, in a beautiful sign of communion with local Churches that have usually been the “donors” in the past to relief efforts to those same countries.

What practical help has Cor Unum been offering those hit by the hurricane, and what will the charity be doing in the future?

Our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, sent monetary gifts through Cor Unum to the principal dioceses affected, and through the local Caritas agencies, long-term assistance has been organized and will continue to look after the ongoing needs of the displaced and dispossessed.

Even more important than material aid were the occasions for prayer together — bishops, evacuees, rescue workers, politicians, etc. — especially the celebration of the Eucharist in Baton Rouge; the experience of bearing burdens together as members of the worldwide Church; and the compassion of our Holy Father, who personally sent me on the visit. All of these were sources of hope and energy.

Many Americans called the hurricane “our tsunami.” With you having also visited Asia earlier this year, what comparisons or contrasts can be made between these natural disasters?

To be honest, the scenes were rather different. In Southeast Asia, the tsunami obliterated everything, and so many people died — thousands and thousands. In New Orleans, the sea took over land, and visible neighborhoods, churches, schools, hospitals, and shopping centers; boats and barges were found often far inland. In Biloxi, where tornados had contributed to the devastation, entire neighborhoods were reduced to twisted frames and rubble.

While both events involved the sea, they were very different storms and with very different effects. The human suffering and heartache were equally real for both, however.

You mentioned that you were the only foreign representative of a nation-state to visit the area. To what extent would you have liked to see other states sending representatives to the region?

While it is true that I had the privilege of representing our Holy Father to the good people afflicted by the hurricane, and the only foreign representative to visit in that time, it should also be noted that doing so was not so easy, or even practical, with roads and other means of transportation destroyed and those available being used by relief personnel.

There were other ways to respond, though. While visiting Biloxi, I was pleased to see a detachment of sailors from Holland, as well as some soldiers from Mexico, hard at work clearing roads and helping with the cleanup effort.

Most Americans had never experienced the encouragement of friends from far away, since they usually see themselves as providing the same throughout the world. It was a very good and positive experience for all, and the victims are grateful. Overall, those involved in political life were very open to collaboration.

Edward Pentin writes from Rome.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Edward Pentin ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican -------- TITLE: Eucharist, Front and Center DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

VATICAN CITY — For veteran synod watchers, the early days of the 11th General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops — the largest ever to be held — have delivered something new.

Thanks to Pope Benedict XVI's initiative to dedicate an extra hour at the end of each day for free discussion among the synod's participants, a broad variety of perspectives was spontaneously offered on the synod's theme, “The Eucharist: Source and Summit in the Life and the Mission of the Church.”

Dubbed the “open forum,” the hour-long discussions allowed synod fathers to explore themes such as what it means to have a “right to the Eucharist,” the importance of “interior and exterior reverence,” and how to make Mass more interesting for those who find it “boring.”

The time was also used by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, to successfully propose an hour of Eucharistic adoration in the morning and evening for the synod.

The open forum also served as a venue for raising the hot-button issue of reception of Communion by pro-abortion politicians. In one of his first major public contributions since taking up his position as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Archbishop William Levada quoted a passage from the synod's instrumentum laboris (working document). It noted, “Some Catholics do not understand why it might be a sin to support a political candidate who is openly in favor of abortion or other serious acts against life, justice and peace.”

Archbishop Levada, who served as archbishop of San Francisco until moving to Rome this summer, said the issue had “caused some divisions” among U.S. Catholics during the 2004 presidential elections, and said he hoped to hear how other bishops would approach the problem.

However, the most recurring discussion topics in the first four days of the synod's formal, general congregations didn't involve politics. Instead, the focus was on the need for better catechesis concerning the Eucharist; the importance of making the Eucharist relevant to secular culture; the need to ensure that Catholics understand the Blessed Sacrament in the context of the other sacraments; the worldwide shortage of priests; the relevance of the Blessed Sacrament for evangelization, Christian charity and social justice; the importance of remembering the sacrament's sacrificial nature; and the need for greater reverence and preparation when celebrating the Eucharist and receiving holy Communion.

How to Receive

On this last topic, Archbishop Jan Pawel Kenga of Karaganda, Kazakhstan, advocated a change in reception of holy Communion to recover a sense of the sacred. Two innovations from the Western world, he said Oct. 4, “cloud” understanding of the Eucharist — the removal of the tabernacle from the center of sanctuaries and the distribution of holy Communion in the hand. He proposed that Rome issue a “universal regulation” to establish an official way of receiving Communion in the mouth while kneeling, with Communion in the hand “reserved for clergy alone.”

Cardinal Janis Pujats of Riga, Latvia, made similar comments a day earlier. When communicants stand, Cardinal Pujats said, he feels like a dentist looking into their mouths.

According to information released by the Vatican, Cardinal Francis Arinze, Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, responded by saying that arguments could be made for both practices. Ultimately, he said, it's up to bishops’ conferences to decide what is best in each country, but he added that Communion in the hand needs better catechesis.

The cardinal added that Communion in the hand does make it easier for sacrilege against a consecrated host. He reminded bishops that a host reportedly received at a papal Mass in 1998 was put up for sale on eBay earlier this year before being withdrawn by the seller.

Confession

During one of the open forums, Cardinal J. Francis Stafford, Major Penitentiary of the Holy See and a former archbishop of Denver, highlighted the important relationship between confession and reception of the Eucharist. Several other speakers addressed the same subject, stressing that communicants should understand the need to confess regularly before receiving holy Communion.

And Archbishop Cristian Caro Cordero of Puerto Montt, Chile, called for the Year of the Eucharist to be followed in 2006 by a “year dedicated to the sacrament of penance” because of its “close theological, spiritual and pastoral relationship” with the Eucharist.

There were also calls for clearer guidelines on inter-communion, the practice of members of one Church receiving Communion in another Church, and “spiritual communion.” And several participants spoke on the need for spiritual sustenance to divorced and remarried Catholics who are forbidden from receiving the Eucharist.

Archbishop John Dew of Wellington, New Zealand, compared those who are starved spiritually of the Eucharist to the scandal of those who hunger physically.

“We must look for ways to include those who are hungering for the bread of life,” he said.

However, not all the discussions dwelled on problems in celebrating the sacrament.

Bishops from India were highly positive in their interventions, with one saying that the Eucharist's power to heal is the secret behind a dramatic increase in the number of Catholics in the country. Archbishop Maria Callist Soosa Pakiam of Trivandrum recalled the devotion of local fishermen in his diocese who pray at the Blessed Sacrament in the early hours of dawn and again at dusk.

As well as the full sessions and the open forums, the synod fathers also have been speaking in “small circles” of 25-35 participants. The Pope was present at most of the major sessions in the synod's first days.

The Vatican said there were 256 voting members of the synod — 244 bishops and 12 priests — including the four Chinese bishops who were not able to attend. Of the total number of participants, 12 came from the United States and six from Canada.

Also attending the synod but without voting rights were 32 experts and 27 auditors from around the world. The Vatican said 12 non-Catholic churches and ecclesial communities had been invited to send their representatives to the synod as well.

‘Joyful’ Spirit

During the synod's early days, few concrete proposals were broached regarding how to resolve the thornier issues raised. That process will gather steam with the collation of a list of propositions to be debated and voted on towards the end of the synod, which will conclude Oct. 23.

In the meantime, while some press accounts gave the impression of division among the synod fathers, participants said the general mood is actually positive and open.

“There's a relaxed atmosphere, a lot of camaraderie — it's joyful and collegial,” said one consultant speaking on condition of anonymity. “The Church is Catholic, and so the fathers can say whatever they like about the issues. There are very many areas of legitimate disagreement, but in the end what each bishop says is respected.”

(CNS contributed to this report.)

Edward Pentin writes from Rome.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Edward Pentin ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Why Do Catholics Do That? DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Ever had to explain the ins and outs of the Catholic faith to a curious non-Catholic observer? Not so much doctrine or Scripture or even the Church's moral teachings — but the things we, as Catholics, do to express and live out our faith?

If so, you might draw inspiration from St. Ignatius of Antioch, whose feast we celebrate Oct. 17.

Way back in the Church's first century, he took it upon himself to write a series of letters encouraging the Church to carry on with its practices — all while being transported to Rome to face the lions in the Colosseum. (He also may have been the first person to call the Body of Christ the Catholic Church, at least in writing — and a tradition holds that, when he was a boy, he was the child Jesus called to his side in Matthew 18.)

“I no longer take pleasure in perishable food or in the delights of this world,” he wrote. “I want only God's bread, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, formed from the seed of David; and for drink I crave his blood, which is love that cannot perish.”

Would that we all had that kind of passion for explaining why we do what we do.

And, let's face it: We do a lot of things that can befuddle the casual observer.

Take genuflection, a small gesture but one that says a great deal, explains Al Kresta, host of Ave Maria radio's “Kresta in the Afternoon” and author of Why Do Catholics Genuflect?

“It's a rehearsal for that moment at the end of history when we're all going to end up bending the knee,” he says. “We need to learn to do that now to learn to submit to the one who created and redeemed us.”

We do this in particular before the Blessed Sacrament, continues Kresta. “We're recognizing the real presence in the Blessed Sacrament of Jesus himself right there. The principle: We're in the presence of divinity is what drives us to our knees.”

“Genuflection,” adds Conventual Franciscan Father John Grigus of Marytown, the National Shrine of St. Maximilian Kolbe in Libertyville, Ill.,“is a sensible sign we truly believe in the King of kings, so it's a form of praying and of witnessing our faith in public. That little gesture can teach a whole sense of reverence when you are in church.”

Another public practice that puzzles, one sometimes forgotten nowadays, is the lighting of votive candles. What's up with that?

It's an old symbol for watching and waiting, explains Paul Thigpen, editor of The Catholic Answer magazine and author of a number of books, including Blood of the Martyrs, Seed of the Church (Charis, 2001). “We say a prayer lighting it for a particular intention,” he says. “The candle continues to burn after we leave the church as a sign that God has not forgotten nor have we, and our prayer continues to rise toward heaven.”

Sending Signals

And then there's the novena. It's a nine-day period of prayer and preparation, Kresta says, pointing out that it corresponds to the period of time the apostles and the Blessed Mother waited for the Holy Spirit to descend on the day of Pentecost.

Novenas can be nine days in a row, or, for example, nine consecutive Mondays. Some are connected to a particular devotion, such as to the Sacred Heart or the Blessed Mother. In a sense the “Nine First Fridays” devotion is a novena to the Sacred Heart. When something was urgent, Blessed Mother Teresa's “express novena” consisted of nine Memorares prayed right away.

“My wedding anniversary falls on the feast of St Joseph the Husband,” says Kresta, “and I will do a novena. I've always kept in mind all of us fall short in comparison to St Joseph, and a husband is to love his wife as Christ loves the Church. When I become most aware of the disparity between Jesus’ love for his Church and my love for my wife, I go to St. Joseph to enlarge my heart, sharpen my mind, and give me resolve and strength to be the husband I was created to be. This helps me to fulfill my vocation as a husband, to fulfill my vows to my wife, Sally, and be what Christ is to the Church.”

Relics — objects connected to saints — connect Catholics to the afterlife and the Communion of Saints.

In 2003, when Kresta had his left leg amputated following a devastating illness, friends gave him a relic of St. Anthony of Padua, patron saint of amputees.

“These relics are links to eternity,” he says. “We believe saints’ bones, for example, in some way continue to carry the intercessory power of the saint. Their remains (or objects they wore or used, or even objects touched to those objects) have become a way of connecting us to a greater reality: Death has been shattered. Relics are so perfectly connected with the Incarnation.”

Holy pictures and holy medals are reminders of the mysterious “trafficking” that takes place between heaven and hell. As a convert years ago, Thigpen was somewhat startled by the number of holy pictures of Our Lord and the saints in many Catholics’ homes. He caught on soon enough.

“I see this as parallel to the family pictures we have everywhere,” he says. “Walk into my home and you see pictures of siblings, family, ancestors. How could we fail to display pictures of our spiritual family?”

The principle is similar when it comes to wearable items such as the Miraculous Medal, whose design was revealed in 1830 to St. Catherine Laboure at her Daughters of Charity convent in France. Such items are “kind of a direct contact with Mary, Our Lord and the saints, says Father Grigus. “They're like icons we wear on the person, symbolic of our desire to be in union with them, to receive their protection and seek their intercessions.”

When blessed by a priest, he says, they're sacramentals communicating to us the deeper reality they signify. “Our Lady is not just a human being on a medal but truly a means by which we commune with Christ.”

Sometimes the priest will use holy water to bless a sacramental or a new Bible or even a statue of a saint.

Holy water? Did someone say holy water?

Holy water is, of course, plain water that's been blessed by a priest — at which point it becomes a symbol of spiritual cleansing and invokes God's blessing on all who use it.

With it we make the Sign of the Cross, a practice going back to the Church's early days, says Thigpen. “Christians would cross themselves throughout the day as a way of reminding themselves that Jesus said we must carry our cross every day.”

Evil Flees

And it's also a warning to the devil, he adds. “Ancient Christians realized the devil hated the Sign of the Cross,” he notes. “When they felt temptation or feared his onslaught, they would make the sign of the cross as a way of telling him to back off.”

Thigpen points out that the devil fears and hates holy water and sacramentals, too.

Blessing homes with holy water brings spiritual protection. We bless them, says Father Grigus, so they can be homes in which the Lord dwells, communicating his peace, protection and love — which allow us to be a family of God and to communicate more of the reality of heaven to others.

Genuflecting, relics and the other “mysterious” physical objects and actions of the faith all belong to the realm of the corporeal, where flesh and spirit meet, explains Father Grigus.

Such physicality is “a vehicle for penetrating into the heavenly realm which we cannot see,” he says.

“Kids can understand gesture, movement, words, certain objects like light and water,” he says. “And these things, when explained simply, can be a rich source in educating our children in the deeper meaning of faith from early on.”

“No earthly pleasures, no kingdoms of this world can benefit me in any way,” wrote St. Ignatius of Antioch sometime around the year 100. “I prefer death in Christ Jesus to power over the farthest limits of the earth. He who died in place of us is the one object of my quest. He who rose for our sakes is my one desire.”

A better rationale for why we do what we do could hardly be offered.

Joseph Pronechen writes from Trumbull, Connecticut.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Joseph Pronechen ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Now in Adoration Falling DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

The small stone structure sits in a grove of trees. Quiet and contemplative, it is a refuge from the noise and busyness of daily life — and a place to find Jesus.

Visitors adore Christ in the Blessed Sacrament 24 hours a day in the Portiuncula Chapel at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio. Each semester, about 300 students, faculty and staff sign up for one hour of adoration in the small sanctuary, which is a re-creation of the one that St. Francis of Assisi prayed in.

“It's a place of peace, of safety, of prayer, of order,” says Heather Miletic, 22, a senior English major from Wintersville, Ohio. “Visiting Jesus strengthens my relationship with him, enables him to open my heart so that I understand myself better, and where Jesus can touch me with his love. What an amazing gift, that I can stop in if I'm having a bad day, or if something awesome just happened.”

Similar experiences are being reported at campuses around the country. No hard numbers exist to show that Eucharistic adoration is, indeed, growing. But, judging by the anecdotal evidence coming in, it would be hard to argue otherwise.

Take Jaime Gonzalez, a Franciscan University junior from Fort Stockton, Texas. He didn't always understand the gift of adoration. Following a “reversion” to the faith during his senior year of high school, he would stay after Mass and pray before the crucifix.

“One day, the priest walked by and pointed to the chapel and said, ‘Jesus is over there,’” Gonzalez recalls. “I wasn't used to that, but I realized it was something different. It struck me immediately.”

He signed up for an hour of adoration his freshman year at Texas A&M University. “I saw the grace flow,” he says. “That time in college was so crazy, and adoration was my oasis. I didn't have to think about anything. It was just peaceful.”

At Franciscan, he has made sure to include adoration in his daily schedule. “I love to go there and prepare for Mass,” he says.

Nor is Franciscan University alone. Students across the country seem to be flocking to get close to Christ.

Franciscan University's chaplain, Father Dominic Scotto, says adoration is important to students because they meet Christ in a special way.

“Students are drawn there,” he says. “It's an opportunity to encounter Christ in person. It's the real presence of Jesus, the Jesus in the Gospels — the healing Jesus, the teaching Jesus, the redeeming Jesus. It's an encounter with the very same Jesus and that's awesome. That encounter answers the hurts, problems and temptations, which are part and parcel of everyday life. It's a beneficiary of grace.”

The Silence That Stirs

Joseph Kirkconnell, a senior theology major at the University of Notre Dame, puts it simply: “There's no better way to spend time than to spend time with Jesus.” The 21-year-old says adoration is “a big part of my life.”

Kirkconnell would often stop in to adore Christ during lunchtime at his Catholic high school, and he continued the practice when he went to South Bend. He is among approximately 400 others in the Notre Dame community who fill hourly spots each weekday.

In addition, a Eucharistic procession was held last spring in honor of the Year of the Eucharist, and another procession is planned for this year.

“The students are serious about living the call to holiness,” says Father Kevin Russeau, a Notre Dame chaplain. “On campus we talk a lot about making time for personal prayer, and it's something special when you see the consecrated host.”

Intriguingly, Eucharistic adoration is not confined to Catholic campuses. At the University of Illinois, students gather before Christ in the middle of a large, public university. A holy hour is held daily prior to the 5 p.m. Mass, coinciding with confessions. Eucharistic processions are also held throughout the year there on holy days.

The silence draws the students, according to Msgr. Stuart Swetland, director of the St. John's Catholic Newman Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where about 3,000 students attend Mass each weekend.

“Much of Americans’ lives, especially college students’ lives, is surrounded by noise. There's seldom a place with silence, except before Our Lord,” he says. “For the current generation, so much time is spent in virtual reality, and adoration is an incarnational way to meet Christ.

“We're naturally attracted because we're incarnational beings,” adds Msgr. Swetland. “The senses participate: You see him, you smell incense and you touch the beads as you pray the Rosary or the Chaplet of Divine Mercy. It draws one in, in a tangible way.

“As people fall in love with the Lord in the Eucharist and in the Mass, it's natural to extend time of prayer with the Blessed Sacrament.”

Light for the World

Msgr. Swetland says that time before the Lord is valuable for searching hearts. “As a spiritual director, I find that my directees who regularly go to adoration find it's the best time to speak to the Lord,” he says, “heart speaking to heart.”

Aaron Foege, 23, a senior mechanical engineering student from Naperville, Ill., agrees.

“When Jesus is out in the monstrance, everything else kind of stops,” he says. “It's my friend, my Lord, my Savior, there in a vulnerable form for me to spend time with. Sitting in front of him there on the altar, I say, ‘Lord, I'm yours.’ It's a chance for him to work on my heart, to put into my heart what he wants me to do.”

Foege says that it's a blessing to have the Eucharistic presence in the midst of the campus.

“Nearby is the quad and all of the academic buildings, and buses are going by,” he explains. “There's all of this hustle and bustle going on, and in the middle of it, there's a place that's consecrated for prayer and the presence of God, and students know that.”

“Sometimes I'll be out by the mailbox in front of the church mailing a letter, and the doors will be open,” he adds. “I'll look in, and there's Our Lord. You can see him from the street with the buses going by. It's so cool to literally have this light that shines out to the world.”

Amy Smith writes from Geneva, Illinois.

----- EXCERPT: Eucharistic adoration on the rise ----- EXTENDED BODY: Amy Smith ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: The Shroud's Silent Partner DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

SACRED BLOOD, SACRED IMAGE: THE SUDARIUM OF OVIEDO

by Janice Bennett

Ignatius, 2005

220 pages, $19.95

To order: (800) 651-1531

or Ignatius.com

Since the eighth century, a bloodstained cloth, 21 inches by 34 inches in size, has been kept in the Cathedral of Oviedo, in northern Spain. It is venerated as the Sudarium, the “napkin” spoken of in John's account of the Resurrection:

“When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there, and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place” (John 20:7).

Unlike the Shroud of Turin, the sudarium has generated very little publicity. Only within the last two decades have researchers and scientists obtained permission to study it, hoping to learn, among other things, what bearing this cloth might have on the shroud.

The results of the investigations are now available in English. Drawing from the latest findings and from her own research into the history of the cloth, Janice Bennett offers a fascinating read for anyone interested in relics, the shroud — or simply a better understanding of the death and burial of Jesus.

Part One delves into the history of the sudarium. After legend is sorted from sober narrative, all evidence points to the relic having been kept in Jerusalem until the Persian invasion of 614 A.D., when it was taken to southern Spain. Then the Muslim invasion there caused Christians to flee north with the sudarium. It eventually came to rest in Oviedo in 761, where it has been ever since.

The second section of the book details the investigators’ findings. They were able to determine the precise function of the sudarium. The word itself was a generic term for a small cloth used for multiple uses — towel, turban, apron. The researchers disposed of previous theories that it was either a chin-band or a cloth placed over Our Lord's face beneath the Shroud. Using replica cloths and both head casts as well as live models, they determined that the bloodstains suggest that the sudarium was wrapped around the head of Christ while his body still hung on the cross, and not removed until after his body was anointed and the shroud put in place.

Both the sudarium and the Shroud of Turin contain blood of the type AB. This type is rare among Europeans and common in the Middle East. Although the sudarium's bloodstains do not form a clear image of a complete face, the areas of the nose, mouth, chin and beard can be determined. Measurements of these areas match the size of these features on the shroud. The back of the cloth shows puncture wounds on the head, and wounds to the neck and upper back consistent with scourging. The team's conclusion: “The probability that [both cloths] did not cover the same crucifixion victim is extremely small.”

The Sudarium of Oviedo is a remarkable relic that has added to our knowledge of what happened on Good Friday. Considered in relation to the Shroud of Turin, it may come to be considered as the independent, historic “document” that authenticates the shroud, much as the histories of Josephus verified the life and death of Jesus Christ.

Daria Sockey writes from Cincinnati.

----- EXCERPT: Weekly Book Pick ----- EXTENDED BODY: Daria Sockey ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: Maine Catholics Debate Whether Rights Law Will Lead to Same-Sex 'Marriage' DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

LEWISTON, Maine — Maine residents will have a chance Nov. 8 to veto by referendum a homosexual-rights law that in other states has led to same-sex “marriage.”

Referendum Question No. 1 seeks to reject LD1196 — “An Act to Extend Civil Rights Protections to All People Regardless of Sexual Orientation.” The law passed the State Senate by a vote of 25-10 and the House by 91-58 and was signed into law by John Baldacci, the Democratic governor, on March 31.

Led by Paul Madore, a member of Holy Family Parish in Lewiston, several hundred Catholic members of the Maine Grassroots Coalition working with the Christian Civic League of Maine have taken a bold stand against the law. They gathered the 50,500 signatures needed to put the law on hold pending a people's veto referendum.

Similar homosexual-rights measures have been rejected by Maine voters in referenda in 1998 and 2000.

Rep. James Annis, R-Dover-Foxcroft, was not pleased that the law has resurfaced.

“For the Legislature and the governor to sidestep the previous referendums is unconscionable,” he said.

Still, Baldacci insisted the law will not only send a signal that Maine welcomes all people, but will protect students and employees from discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Annis noted that citizens are already protected.

“The law is totally unnecessary in that any and all forms of discrimination are against one's civil rights,” he said.

Some legislators who oppose the law insist that it has more to do with same-sex “marriage” than anti-discrimination.

“It will lead to same sex ‘marriage’ definitely,” maintained Sen. Lois Snow-Mello, R-Poland. “It happened in Connecticut, in Massachusetts, in Vermont. We know this is part of a bigger agenda.”

Madore agreed. “There's no doubt. You’d have to be deaf, dumb and blind not to see it. Once you include sexual orientation within the human rights statutes, you create a new classification of individuals, and you cannot limit their access to specific rights of employment, housing and credit. They would have a host of privileges, and they could file a grievance with the courts because of not having access to marriage and sue the state.”

Coming Conflicts

Rep. Thomas Shields, R-Auburn, explained what would happen next.

“Through a series of court decisions, gay ‘marriage’ may be possible, if there is legal recognition of homosexual behavior.”

Maine does have a Defense of Marriage Act, but if the new rights law is not overturned, homosexuals could request the right to marry and if the court grants it, the court decision would be in conflict with the legislation, causing further complications.

Massachusetts permitted same-sex “marriage” in a similar way, first granting privileges under a human rights act.

“You cannot include a class of people and give them special protection and then deny them the other privileges afforded to others protected under the statutes,” says Madore.

Madore fears that once a plurality of states grant homosexuals special protection, federal courts will be obliged to give them same-sex “marriage” on the national level. With a homosexual-rights law on a state's books, a court will be able to ask that state what its rational basis is for denying marriage. Because of the anti-discrimination law and legal precedent recognizing homosexuals as a protected class, the state will not be able to say that homosexuality is wrong.

As the referendum vote approaches, Madore and some legislators are hoping Bishop Richard Malone of Portland will take a clearer position. Earlier this year, he presented testimony to the Legislative Judiciary Committee saying he took a neutral stand.

“The diocese is not for and it's not against this law,” said Mark Mutty, director of public affairs for the Portland Diocese. “Obviously, it's conceivable that Catholics could have one view or the other and neither one necessarily would be in conflict with the Church.”

Shields warned, “Unless the Church takes a strong stand on this sodomous abnormal lifestyle, the evil will prevail.”

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in its document, “Some Considerations Concerning the Catholic Response to Legislative Proposals on the Non-Discrimination of Homosexual Persons,” teaches: “Since a matter of the common good is concerned, it is inappropriate for Church authorities to endorse or remain neutral toward adverse legislation” (No. 16).

People's Will

Nevertheless, priests like Father Kevin Martin from Sacred Heart Parish in Auburn are maintaining the bishop's stance.

“I'm in support of Bishop Malone of the Portland Diocese,” Father Martin said. “I'm not taking sides on either end because the Church believes in respecting the dignity of each human person, and at the same time has its obligation to support the moral teaching of the Church. It's a very sensitive issue and I choose to take neither side.”

On Sept. 29, Father Michael Seavey of St. Joseph's Church in Lewiston, wearing a clerical collar, participated in a homosexual rights forum sponsored by Maine Won't Discriminate, urging people to support the homosexual rights law.

Margaret Marcotte, a member of St. Joseph's Parish, attended the forum.

“Father Seavey wants special rights for homosexuals to remain in place,” she said. “The bishop has taken a neutral position, so I told [Father Seavey] I didn't think it was wise to speak out on this. It would mislead Catholics to think this is now the bishop's position.”

Marcotte fears the law will lead to same-sex “marriage,” and that the Church will lose its “ability to say from the pulpit that we believe homosexuality is wrong.”

Madore insists the law is not the will of the people.

“Gov. Baldacci brought this law to satisfy the wishes of the pro-homosexual lobby,” he said. “They're very powerful. They have a lot of money. … They keep coming back until they break the will of the people. This is not the will of the people; it's the strengths of the pro-homosexual lobby that serves the governor.”

But he believes the will of the people will prevail.

Mary Ann Sullivan is based in New Durham, New Hampshire.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Mary Ann Sullivan ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Weekly TV Picks DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

SUNDAY, OCT. 16

Remembering

Pope John Paul II

Familyland TV

This tribute takes place on the 27th anniversary of the late Pope's election. At 1 a.m. and 3:30 p.m., Musical Tribute to John Paul II. At 1 and 8 p.m., Spirit of John Paul II: Stories of His Interior Life. At 7 p.m., In the Footsteps of Peter, a “Be Not Afraid Family Hour” looks at the Pope's thoughts about his callings as priest and pope.

SUNDAY, OCT. 16

Alaska's Arctic Wildlife

Travel Channel, 9 p.m.

The Land of the Midnight Sun is home to many fascinating Arctic species.

MONDAY, OCT. 17

The Journey Home

EWTN, 8 p.m.

Host Marcus Grodi's guest is True Knights founder Ken Henderson, a convert from pornography addiction who promotes “7 Steps to Freedom and Purity.” Re-airs Oct. 18 at 1 and 10 a.m. and Oct. 22 at 11 p.m. Also, don't miss The Best of The Journey Home Wednesdays at 1 p.m.

TUESDAY, OCT. 18

Unwrapped: High-Tech

Food Network, 7:30 p.m.

Find out what's cooking for the future of foods in this look at a kitchen of tomorrow, NASA space chefs, Internet shopping carts and high-tech packaging and trash bags.

WEDNESDAY, OCT. 19

Meet the Ancestors:

Lost City of Roman Britain

History International, 10 p.m.

In Hampshire, England, only a few traces remain of ancient Calleva, once a major city and administrative center in the Roman “county” of Atrebates. Experts “rebuild” the entire city via computer graphics, and historians explain the whys of its demise.

THURSDAY, OCT. 20

Life on the Rock

EWTN, 8 p.m.

Father Francis Mary's guest is baseball slugger Mike Sweeney, the clutch-hitting first baseman of the Kansas City Royals. A cleanup hitter with a .304 lifetime batting average, Mike quotes Scripture readily, speaks at churches and schools and always makes Mass a priority in his busy baseball-season schedule.

FRIDAY, OCT. 21

Classroom: Jules Verne

A&E, 7 a.m.

The travel and adventure novels of French author Jules Verne (1828-1905) employed solid scientific knowledge and included often uncannily accurate sketches of the future.

SATURDAY, OCT. 22

The World Series

Fox, 8 p.m.

The American League and National League champions face off in the first game of their annual best-of-seven game Fall Classic.

Dan Engler writes from Santa Barbara, California.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Dan Engler ----- KEYWORDS: Arts -------- TITLE: Vatican Media Watch DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Secret Police Spied on Cardinal Ratzinger

THE TIMES OF LONDON, Oct. 3 — At least eight East German communist agents were ordered to report on the private life and political views of the future Pope Benedict XVI during the Cold War years, according to his secret police files published in Berlin, The Times of London reported.

It was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger's deep anti-communism and his profound suspicion of atheist states that made him a target of the East German Stasi. Their suspicions seem to be confirmed by his long friendship with Karol Wojtyla, the Polish cardinal and future Pope John Paul II.

The release of the Stasi documents came at a particularly poignant moment for the Pope as he opened his first bishops’ synod since his elevation to the papacy last April.

In his opening remarks, the Holy Father said, “A tolerance that allows God as a private opinion but which excludes him from public life, from the reality of the world and our lives, is not tolerance but hypocrisy.”

In a comment that could just as well have been directed at the East German spymasters who pried into his life, he said: “When man makes himself the only master of the world, and master himself, justice cannot exist.”

Sony Apologizes for Blasphemous Advertisement

REUTERS, Oct. 1 — Sony has apologized for an Italian advertising campaign for its PlayStation game console that featured a young man wearing a crown of thorns with the slogan “Ten years of passion,” Reuters reported.

The ad shows a young man wearing what looks like a crown of thorns. The image recalls Mel Gibson's recent blockbuster movie, The Passion of the Christ. On closer inspection, the crown is decorated by thorn-like squares, crosses, triangles and circles — the characteristic symbols of the Playstation's joystick.

“This time they've gone too far,” said Antonio Sciortino, editor of Famiglia Cristiana (Christian Family), a mass-circulation Catholic weekly. He was quoted as saying in the Corriere della Sera newspaper, “If this had concerned Islam there would have been a really strong reaction.”

Cardinal Ersilio Tonini called it “an irreverent mockery. The advert displays a lack of taste which conceals a lack of respect. Kids shouldn't be induced into believing that the passion of Christ is a game,” Tonini said Sept. 30.

In a statement, Sony Computer Entertainment Italia expressed regret over the reaction to the ad. It acknowledged that the “spirit of the message was misunderstood” and said the campaign would not continue.

Benedict Inviting President Katsav to the Vatican

THE TIMES OF LONDON, Oct. 1 — Israel's president will visit the Pope at the Vatican next month in a move marking a new era of reconciliation between the Roman Catholic and Jewish faiths after centuries of hostility, The Times of London reported.

The state visit by Moshe Katsav to the Holy See Nov. 17 is unprecedented. “This is an historic event, the first such visit in 2,000 years; this is history in the making,” Oded Ben-Hur, the Israeli ambassador to the Holy See, said Sept. 30.

Archbishop Kevin McDonald, who is in charge of relations with other faiths for the Catholic bishops of England and Wales, said that the event was of great significance.

“The Vatican has always wanted to try and engage with religious questions separately,” he said. “In the context of relations with the state of Israel, there are political issues as well.

“Obviously the situation of Christians in the Holy Land and the Holy Places are important issues for the Holy See and these are things that the Holy See will want to discuss with the Israeli authorities.”

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican -------- TITLE: Video Picks & Passes DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

BATMAN BEGINS: PICK

(2005)

BATMAN: PASS

(1989)

THE MASK OF ZORRO SPECIAL EDITION: PICK

(1998)

This week, caped crusaders rule the DVD racks. Summer smash Batman Begins comes to home video, along with new editions of every other Batman movie in the last quarter century, including the 1989 Tim Burton film that started it all. Meanwhile, the imminent theatrical release of The Legend of Zorro— the much-anticipated, long-delayed sequel to the 1998 hit The Mask of Zorro— warrants a new special-edition release for its predecessor.

Along with Superman and Spider-Man 2, Batman Begins is one of the best comic-book films, avoiding the campiness of the Superman films and the cartoonish psychology and relationships of the Spider-Man films, and achieving a more operatic, mythic, larger-than-life feel than the X-Men movies. Above all, it succeeds where the earlier run of Batman films by Tim Burton and Joel Schumacher failed: It creates a compelling, complex personality behind the cowl, a hero who is more than a figurehead in his own film, overshadowed by colorful adversaries. At last, the Dark Knight has a soul.

Lacking super-powers, Batman depends on fear and stealth. Yet he fights for justice rather than revenge, and would even risk his life to save an opponent.

“Your compassion is a weakness your enemies won't share,” warns an enigmatic mentor known as Ducard. “That's why it's so important,” counters Bruce. “It's what separates us from them.”

Ducard is connected with the mysterious League of Shadows, dedicated to combating decadence — but its methods are murder, fear and, ultimately, weapons of mass destruction. In an ambitious showdown, Batman wages a literal war on terror against this al Quaeda-like adversary.

Among earlier Batman movies getting new DVD editions this week, the best regarded remains Burton's 1989 Batman, starring Michael Keaton as the caped crusader and Jack Nicholson as the Joker.

Critics adored the film's gothic set design and Nicholson's showy performance, while comic-book fans credited Burton with rescuing the Dark Knight from the over-the-top camp comedy of the 1960s series and making him suitably dark and brooding.

But, really, it isn't that good. The plot's a mess. Keaton's a cipher, with or without the mask. And, in that stiff rubber suit, he seems less a lithe super hero than a semi-mobile action figure. Nicholson dominates the film, which should have been called Joker instead of Batman, but his ballyhooed performance, while menacing, is lacking in whimsy and conviction. Like much of Burton's oeuvre, Batman is long on style and short on story and characterization.

The Mask of Zorro was one of the best surprises of 1998, a rousing, witty, morally redemptive tale of two Zorros — one the familiar Don Diego de la Vega (Anthony Hopkins), aging champion of the oppressed, and the other a scruffy rogue (Antonio Bandaras) with a grudge against the villains. The latter must learn the meaning, as well as the methods, of heroism. Moral themes such as family, honor and defending the poor are integral to the story. Catholic priests, who aid both Zorros in their missions, are depicted as part of the suffering oppressed, not the evil establishment.

Content advisory: Batman Begins contains recurring menace and frightening imagery, much stylized action violence, a scene of strong-arm interrogation tactics, at least one instance of profanity and some minor profanity and crass language. The Mask of Zorro contains much stylized violence, one gross-out scene with a decapitated head, mild sexual innuendo and sensuality, and fleeting rear nudity. Batman (1989) contains some gruesome images and violence and an implied sexual encounter. All three films are best suited to teens and up.

----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Steven D. Greydanus ----- KEYWORDS: Arts -------- TITLE: Idolatry Is an Eternal Temptation DATE: 10/16/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: October 16-22, 2005 ----- BODY:

Register Summary

Pope Benedict XVI continued his reflections on Psalm 135 during his general audience on Oct. 5, offering his reflections on the second half of the psalm. More than 50,000 pilgrims were present for the general audience, which took place in St. Peter's Square.

The Holy Father explained how two different views of religion are presented in the second half of Psalm 135. The first depicts a living and personal God whose efficacious and saving presence stands at the heart of authentic faith as he defends his people and shows his mercy to them. The second illustrates a distorted and misleading spirit of idolatry.

“An idol is simply the ‘work of human hands,’ the product of man's desires. Therefore, it is powerless in overcoming our limitations as creatures,” Benedict noted. “Man's eternal temptation to seek salvation in the ‘work of his hands’ and place his hope in wealth, power, success and material possessions is clearly depicted in these verses.”

The psalm concludes, Pope Benedict XVI pointed out, with a liturgical blessing.

“The liturgy is a special place where God's word is heard and where the Lord's saving deeds are made real, but it is also the place where the community, gathered in prayer, celebrates God's love,” he said. “God and man meet in a saving embrace that finds its fulfillment in the celebration of the liturgy.”

Quoting St. Augustine, Pope Benedict recognized that some people today are still bound to idolatry, but noted that each and every day many people, convicted by Christ's miracles, are embracing the faith.

The Liturgy of the Hours’ evening prayer divides Psalm 135 — a song with paschal overtones — into two distinct passages. We have just heard the second part (see verses 13-21), which ends with an alleluia, an exclamation of praise to the Lord that also opened the psalm.

After commemorating the Exodus — which is at the heart of Israel's celebration of Passover — in the first part of the psalm, the psalmist now provides a very concise contrast of two different visions of religion. On one hand, there is the figure of a living and personal God, who is the center of genuine faith (see verses 13-14). His presence is efficacious and saving. The Lord is not some lifeless and abstract reality, but a living person who “defends” those who are faithful to him, “shows mercy” to them and sustains them with his power and love.

On the other hand, there is idolatry (see verses 15-18), which expresses a spirit of religion that is distorted and misleading. Indeed, an idol is simply the “work of human hands,” the product of man's desires. Therefore, it is powerless in overcoming our limitations as creatures. Although it might have a human form with a mouth, eyes, ears and throat, it is inert and lifeless, just like any inanimate statue (see Psalm 115:4-8).

The fate of those who worship these lifeless objects is to become like them — powerless, fragile and without life. Man's eternal temptation to seek salvation in the “work of his hands” and place his hope in wealth, power, success and material possessions is clearly depicted in these verses. Unfortunately, he faces a fate that the prophet Isaiah described in a very effective way: “He is chasing ashes — a thing that cannot save itself when the flame consumes it; yet he does not say, ‘Is not this thing in my right hand a fraud?’” (Isaiah 44:20).

After this meditation on true and false religion, on genuine faith in the Lord of the universe and of history, and on idolatry, Psalm 135 concludes with a liturgical blessing (see verses 19-21), which spotlights a series of figures who were present during worship as practiced in the Temple of Zion (see Psalm 115:9-13). A chorus of blessing rises up to God, the Creator of the universe and the Savior of his people, from the entire community gathered together in the Temple, expressed in a diversity of voices and humility of faith.

The liturgy is a special place where God's word is heard and where the Lord's saving deeds are made real, but it is also the place where the community — gathered in prayer — celebrates God's love. God and man meet in a saving embrace that finds its fulfillment in the celebration of the liturgy.

Commenting on the verse of this psalm regarding idols and how those who trust in idols begin to resemble them (see Psalm 135:15-18), St. Augustine makes the following observation: “Indeed, my brothers, believe that there is a certain likeness in them to their idols, that is not expressed, of course, in their flesh, but in their inner man. They have ears but do not hear, no matter how much God cries out to them, ‘Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear!’ They have eyes but do not see, for they have eyes of flesh and not eyes of faith.”

Likewise, “they have noses but do not smell. They are unable to perceive that aroma of which the apostle says, ‘We are the aroma of Christ everywhere’ (see 2 Corinthians 2:15). What does it profit them to have noses if they are not able to breathe the sweet fragrance of Christ?”

Augustine acknowledges it is true that there are still many people today who are in bondage to idolatry: “But everyday there are people who embrace the faith, convicted by the miracles of Christ Our Lord. Everyday the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf are opened, noses that were blocked at first begin to breathe, the tongues of the mute are loosened, the limbs of paralytics are strengthened, and the feet of the crippled are straightened. From all these stones, the children of Abraham are raised up (see Matthew 3:9). To all these, therefore, let it be said, ‘House of Israel, bless the Lord!’ Bless him, you leaders of the Church! This is what ‘House of Aaron’ means. Bless him, you servants! This is what ‘House of Levi’ means. What about the other nations? ‘You, who fear the Lord, bless the Lord!’” (Esposizione sul Salmo 134, 24-25): Nuova Biblioteca Agostiniana, XXVIII, Rome, 1977, pp. 375, 377).

(Register translation)

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Church Mentors to Stop Abortion

THE AGE, Oct. 2 — The Catholic Church in Australia is intensifying its opposition to abortion and the morning-after pill by encouraging believers to become mentors for women who are considering an abortion, the Australian website reported.

The Church's social arm, Centacare, is calling on Catholics to take steps to end the tragedy of abortion rather than simply telling women that terminations are wrong. Some estimates on the number of abortions carried out in Australia are as high as 80,000 a year.

Project Lisa, inspired by Cardinal George Pell's Pregnancy Counseling and Support Services, will provide practical support for pregnant women, such as driving them to the doctor or taking them shopping.

“We see the abortion rate in Australia as a tragedy,” Bishop Anthony Fisher said. “But we want to be doing more than just saying No to women. We want to be doing something practical to help.”

Thirteen Dead After Student Bus Collides With Truck

ALL HEADINE NEWS, Sept. 30 — Thirteen people were killed after a bus carrying high school students on a pilgrimage to Poland's most sacred Roman Catholic shrine collided with a truck, All Headline News reported.

The bus carrying 12th-grade students from the northeastern city of Bialystok to Czestochowa in southern Poland, collided with a truck and burst into flames. The students were on their way to the shrine of Our Lady at Jasna Gora.

In a Sept. 30 telegram to Archbishop Wojciech Ziemba of Bialystok, the Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, said Pope Benedict XVI had been informed of the crash and was “united in grief and prayer” with the families of the victims, who were mostly ages 17 and 18.

The telegram stated, “Their pilgrim trail became, in a dramatic way, the end of their earthly pilgrimage, but trust in the mercy of God bids us to believe it has found its purpose in glory to the eternal Father.”

Bishops Prod President on Death Penalty

MANILA TIMES, Oct. 1 — The Bishops Conference of the Philippines will ask for President Arroyo's support in advocating the abolition of the death penalty and other prison reforms, the Times reported.

Bishop Pedro Arigo, chairman of the bishops’ Commission on Prison Pastoral Care, said Oct.1 that the bishops will seek an audience with the president and congressional leaders to discuss and recommend solutions to issues and concerns affecting prisoners, particularly those on death row and juvenile delinquents.

“Once every year, we make it a point to remind all our people to remember our brothers and sisters who languish in our prisons and jails,” Bishop Arigo said. “It is quite easy to forget them as fellow members of human society. After all, to our minds they are derelicts now suffering for their sins or offenses against society, and our laws have seen to it that they pay for their transgressions.”

The bishop added, “Killing people is a rejection of God's call to ‘love one another as I have loved you.’ Human life is inherently precious and those who commit crimes do not give up their human dignity.”

Irish Loyalists ‘Must End All Violence’

BBC NEWS, Oct. 4 — Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain urged Loyalist paramilitaries to end their violence and allow democratic politics to move forward, BBC News reported.

Hain was speaking on a visit to St Louis’ Catholic Primary School in Ballymena, which was targeted by sectarian arsonists in August. He was accompanied by Member of Parliament Ian Paisley.

Violence does not pay and progress will only be made when paramilitaries leave the stage,” Hain said, adding the threat was a “medieval throwback to a past of violence and bigotry.”

Principal Liam Corry said the children were “thrilled” to meet the two politicians. “Mr. Hain expressed his disgust at some of the things that happened at the end of the summer,” he said, “but I think he realized that we're all moving on in these schools and we just want to leave all that behind us.”

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