FAMILY MATTERS
I work in a militantly secular corporate culture. The low point came recently, when two people from another department came to my cubicle and loudly asked, “So, how much are you giving to the AIDS walk?” I had the distinct feeling I was being given a litmus test designed to ferret out anyone who's not absolutely thrilled about gay rights and causes. I like my job, but how do I live in an environment like this without getting totally discouraged?
So you're a missionary. Working in a thoroughly secular culture (as 99% of us do) is a lot like making a daily parachute drop behind enemy lines. The good news is: That's where the souls that need conversion to Christ tend to hang out.
I know a colleague who, in a similar situation to yours, went to his human-resources department and told them he didn't like being pressured to participate in politically correct, extracurricular activities. HR swiftly implemented a “No Office Solicitations” policy. That kept the agenda-pushing activists at bay, but it also blocked out fundraisers for good, apolitical causes.
This strategy is analogous to pretending to be out when Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons come calling. Some of us actually relish such encounters. My wife, for example, gets excited when she sees the guys in the white shirts bicycling down our street. And why not? She's schooled in philosophy, and she knows a New Evangelization moment when she sees one.
Just a couple of pointers to keep in mind if you're up to the challenge of turning the tables on militantly secular workplace “evangelists”:
First, overcome the aggressors with kindness. Care more about their cause than they do. Then state your perspective without fudging:
“Thanks so much for interrupting me for this very worthwhile cause. I am totally in support of helping people with AIDS and helping people with same-sex attraction. After all, I'm a Christian and I believe in the inherent dignity of every human person. The problem is, I don't think that the AIDS walk really helps enough. I think the antics of a lot of the marchers can hurt the cause of AIDS prevention by alienating and offending many people who would otherwise contribute to the search for a cure, and I'm not sure how much money really gets to researchers. So I find it better to give to (name a Catholic charity) or to a group like Courage, which deals more directly with these issues.”
Second, be ready to counter-evangelize:
“Sure, I'll give you a few bucks for the AIDS walk if you'll read this.” (Here's where you whip out your copy of The Gospel of Life, The Splendor of Truth or The Theology of the Body.) “I'll check back with you in a week to see how you liked it!”
Bottom line: Have confidence in the truth of the Catholic faith, and don't be ashamed to hold to it when you're pressed by forces indifferent or hostile to it.
If presented with charity and understanding, the faith will make its own friends — and win its own converts.
Art Bennett is director of Alpha Omega Clinic and Consultation Services (aoccs.org).
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Art Bennett ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: To Cologne, With Music DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:A common complaint among aspiring musicians is that record companies control everything, including artists’ creativity.
To hear Catholic singer-songwriter Kara Klein tell it, you might think she ascribes similar behavior to the Holy Spirit — but she's not complaining.
“The honest truth is, I'm not a good songwriter at all when I try to do it on my own,” the 19-year-old admits. “I'm really grateful when the Holy Spirit inspires me.”
Case in point: “Beautiful Still,” a song that has touched many in the wake of the Terri Schiavo tragedy. Klein was waiting for the metro at rush-hour in Washington, D.C., when, she says, the song came to her. She wrote it in her notebook as quickly as possible as she rode the subway home.
Klein was not aware that Terri's feeding tube had been removed that very day; nor did the connection with the dying woman occur to her until her mom pointed it out. She had only just decided to return home for Easter that weekend, which allowed her to arrange and record the song with her studio manager before returning to school. The song was sent to EWTN, where a video was prepared and scheduled to first air on the same day Terri died.
Klein was humbled and amazed by the confluence of events that brought about “Beautiful Still: Terri's Song,” and by the overwhelmingly positive response to it. The melancholic, piano-driven ballad, which showcases her dulcet tones and impressive range, has now been released on CD to raise money for the Terri Schindler-Schiavo Foundation.
Such moments of sudden musical inspiration are nothing new to Klein, however. She speaks of God “giving” a song to her, often when she is praying or journaling.
“The best way I can describe it is that it's like hearing a song on the radio for the first time,” she says. “I hear the music in my head, and I usually finish writing it within five minutes.”
Klein, who grew up with six siblings just outside New Orleans, credits her mother's conversion with inspiring her own love for the Catholic faith.
As for music, she started singing and performing at the age of 8, getting involved in theater, choirs and cantoring for school Masses. She also started writing songs. The first specifically Christian song she wrote was for a youth festival in eighth grade, marking the beginning of her “musical collaboration” with the Holy Spirit.
Another pivotal point for Klein was attending a United Nations session on the rights of the child in 2002. She was appalled at the measures advocated by various world leaders.
“The experience had a profound effect on my life,” she recalls. “It was then that I decided, ‘I'm going to devote the rest of my life to fighting for life.'” Klein has spoken or sung at several pro-life events, and donates $1 from every album sold to the Susan B. Anthony List, a pro-life organization.
With that kind of focus on the real-world concerns of our time, it's not surprising that Klein feels particularly called to minister to youth. With the Catholic music industry still in its fledgling stages, she sees that there is a great need for young Catholic speakers, singers and role models to promote the culture of life.
In order to dedicate herself more fully to this cause, Klein decided to leave The Catholic University of America in Washington upon completion of her freshman year. She hopes to continue with her degree in philosophy via distance learning, but she'll spend the upcoming year traveling, speaking and singing.
She will also complete her second album, “Home in His Love,” which she describes as “a combination of love songs to God and love songs to us from God.” Currently in the process of whittling down the track list, she is very excited about the project. “Most of the songs from my first album, “A Touch of Your Grace,” are from when I was 16,” she says. “I think I've matured in the last three years.”
Like her first record, the follow-up effort will be produced independently and distributed via her website and some Catholic distributors.
Later this summer, on the heels of her performance at the Steubenville South youth conference, Klein will sing at World Youth Day in Cologne, Germany.
“One event has led to another, and now I have a pretty busy summer,” she says. She plans to sing at high schools and churches, and hopes to sing at more conferences and retreats.
At her shows, Klein intertwines music with message — sharing her thoughts on the personal meanings of the songs, how God has worked through her, how she has grown in love with Christ. “My hope is that when people listen to my music, they come out experiencing a little bit more of God's love.”
Klein says she has no idea what the future will bring; while acting on her immediate goals, she waits to see where God will lead her in the long run. She admits that leaving Catholic University to concentrate on her music ministry has been frightening.
“It wasn't my plan at all,” she says. “But I don't think God ever gives us a task that he doesn't also provide a desire for, if we let him.”
So, far from being subservient to a large record corporation, Kara Klein sees herself in a far more exciting and enviable position — being a “pawn of God.”
“I can honestly say that I don't have any control over what I write, or what happens, or what God does,” she says. “All I can do is open myself and totally try to be an instrument.”
Iain Bernhoft writes from Spokane, Washington.
Do Not Be Afraid
words and music by Kara Klein
You are walking on a narrow road
To a place which few have found.
It's steep and long, and your pace is slow.
Uncertainty lies all around.
Do not be afraid.
I've been there before.
I am holding you in my hands
Here forevermore.
I know your thoughts, Your fears and dreams.
I've felt your doubts, Your suffering.
Do not be afraid.
I've been there before.
I am holding you in my hands
Here forevermore.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Iain Bernhoft ----- KEYWORDS: Arts -------- TITLE: Campus Watch DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Thanks to Vouchers
Thanks to vouchers, St. Benedict the Moor expects to reach its capacity of 200 students over the next few years even though enrollment dropped to a low of 110 just last June.
Parents of voucher students attending Catholic schools told the newspaper that they like the schools’ moral values, discipline and structure.
Source and Summit
CHRISTENDOM COLLEGE, June 16 — “The Eucharist: Source and Summit of the Life and Mission of the Church,” will be the subject of this year's annual summer institute July 16 at the Front Royal, Va., college.
Jesuit Father Mitch Pacwa will deliver the keynote address for the one-day conference. Franciscan Father Benedict Groeschel will speak on the history and theology of benediction of the Blessed Sacrament.
Dr. Timothy O'Donnell, the president of Christendom, will speak on Mary as the Mother of the Eucharist, and Father William Saunders, a pastor and a faculty member at Christendom, will consider Eucharistic miracles and their effects on the belief in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
Discrimination
Kempling defended traditional marriage in 2001 in a letter to the editor of a local newspaper in which he identified himself as a member of a Christian political group, not as a teacher.
The College of Teachers suspended Kempling after finding that his letter was discriminatory against homosexuals. According to the paper for the Archdiocese of Edmonton, he may appeal the case to the national Supreme Court.
Atheist Teachers
Religion remains part of the public school curriculum, but the content of the classes now strays widely from Christianity.
One clergyman objected: “Christianity has shaped so much of our culture, our heritage, our literature, as well as many of our national institutions. If we do not understand Christianity we do not understand ourselves.”
Good for Business
YAHOO.COM, June 22 — “Schools with strong faith identities with strict behavioral codes are not succeeding despite their religious mission, but because of it,” concluded Naomi Schaefer Riley, author of God on the Quad: How Religious Colleges and the Missionary Generation Are Changing America.
In a column for the webite, she said enrollment has “skyrocketed” at evangelical, Jewish and Catholic colleges like Thomas Aquinas College near Los Angeles because the colleges promise intellectual rigor, a respite from the severe secularism at other private and public colleges (where enrollment is flat), and the opportunity to feel comfortable about their faith.
Also, “the skills students absorb at religious colleges might be giving them an edge in the job market,” said Riley.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: Even for John Paul II, Canonization Is No Formality DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:VATICAN CITY — During April's pre-conclave meetings, the cardinals were asked through a petition that the future pope immediately open the cause for canonization of Pope John Paul II.
The petition was entrusted to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, dean of the College of Cardinals — a petition that he obviously had at hand when he was elected Pope himself.
On May 13, Pope Benedict XVI announced that he had formally waived the five-year waiting period after death for a cause to be introduced. That was expected — the five-year waiting period is to ensure that a real reputation for holiness exists and is not a passing sentiment. The funeral week of John Paul had adequately proved that his reputation for holiness was widely shared and deeply rooted.
Consequently, the actual cause formally opened June 28 in the Diocese of Rome.
Nevertheless, a beatification should not be expected shortly. While the five-year waiting period has been waived, the process was not officially modified for John Paul. No doubt special attention will be given, and matters expedited as much as possible, but John Paul's cause will proceed according to the regular rules.
That immediately proposes a serious logistical problem for those responsible for organizing the cause. The first phase consists of research into the life of the candidate and requires that all his writings be examined, including correspondence. While it is arguable that his papal writings need not be examined — they have already been scrutinized even before publication — Karol Wojtyla had a vast literary output before he came to Rome.
The first phase also requires testimony to be taken from those who could speak for or against the holiness of the candidate and, again, in John Paul's case, that list could number into the hundreds. Finally, the research phase invites testimonies of those who have been touched in a particular way by the candidate and any invitation of such testimonies would produce thousands upon thousands.
In short, the research phase of John Paul's cause could easily take a decade or more, and involve a small office working full-time, producing tens of thousands of pages of documentation.
Priorities
It is unlikely that Benedict wishes to wait that long. Indeed, in the cases of both the Ukrainian martyrs and Mother Teresa, John Paul himself decided when he wanted them beatified, leaving those responsible for the cause to scramble to assemble the necessary research on time.
Using that precedent, Benedict may indicate that the work be completed in a couple of years. In that case, decisions will have to be made to seriously limit the research documentation, more or less restricting the research to the most important items. In such a case, the Congregation for Saints must balance the need for speed with the need to ensure that the riches of John Paul's life are brought to the fore by the cause.
In particular, there will be three high priority items for the cause.
First, testimony and documentation about the interior life of John Paul are most important, as it is his holiness — not his worldly accomplishments — that is the basis for canonization. To that extent, the day-to-day figures of John Paul's life — his longtime lay friends, the sisters of his household, his closest collaborators in Krakow and Rome — will need to testify about not what John Paul did, but how he lived.
In particular, much will be needed to be examined about John Paul's prayer life and his particular devotions. One thinks particularly of Divine Mercy, so close to his heart in life and the liturgical context of his death.
It should be remembered that it was the cause for Mother Teresa that revealed that her prayer life was dominated by dryness and darkness for more than 50 years. It could well be that John Paul's prayer life will be a surprise.
Second, his miracles. During his life, many claimed miracles were worked by John Paul — either directly after contact with him, or indirectly after asking for his prayers. For reasons of prudence and to avoid sensationalism, his secretaries and biographers declined to publicize such events.
But now it will be time to document any such miracles. They won't “count” for beatification — such miracles have to take place after death — but they are powerful indications of how providence works through chosen instruments.
Archbishop Dziwicz
The third priority for the cause is a person — Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz. Now archbishop of Krakow, Archbishop Dziwisz will be the central figure in the cause of John Paul. Having been at his side almost every day for 40 years, no one knows better the life of Wojtyla/John Paul.
Archbishop Dziwisz recently revealed that he had kept all of John Paul's notes, despite the late Holy Father's wish that his private notes be burned upon his death, saying that he “absolutely [didn't] see anything to destroy in what was left. It belongs to the Church and society.”
Archbishop Dziwisz is the custodian of John Paul's memory, and kept meticulous diaries of every day of the pontificate, recording whom the Holy Father met with and what he was working on. Those diaries — which Dziwisz says do not contain personal evaluations — need somehow to be shared with the wider Church. It may be that the sainthood cause is not the proper forum for that, but it will at least have to take account of it.
Indeed, now that Archbishop Dziwisz is now in Krakow, it may be that he will spearhead the coordination of the Krakow research that, along with his own particular contribution, will be the necessary complement to the work going on in Rome.
While many reports of Benedict's decision to waive the five-year period made it seem that John Paul's beatification is around the corner, that is unlikely. The work is just beginning.
Father Raymond J. de Souza
served as the Register's Rome correspondent from 1999-2003.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Father Raymond J. De Souza ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican --------- TITLE: Weekly DVD/Video Picks DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:National Treasure (2004)
“We have to steal the Declaration of Independence!” Disney takes a stab at a lost art form, the family-friendly swashbuckler, in a tale that combines Indiana Jones’ archaeological spelunking, Ocean's 11 caperism, and Da Vinci Code historical revisionism — but eschews the gratuitous PG-13 violence and sex that typically mar such films nowadays. Nicolas Cage searches for the riches of King Solomon's temple, discovered by the Crusaders and hidden by the Knights Templar and the Freemasons, who planted clues on the back of the Declaration of Independence.
Most of the film's esoterica is harmless nonsense, with one glaring drawback: the flattering endorsement of the Freemasons, with their imaginary historical pedigree. Especially galling is the depiction of Charles Carroll — the lone Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence — as a Mason! Yet unlike Dan Brown, National Treasure doesn't subvert the ideas on the front of the page, so to speak; the film is in no way anti-Catholic or even anti-American.
Annoying Freemason stuff aside, National Treasure works fairly well as slick, enjoyable hooey that not only comes up with two different approaches to stealing the Declaration of Independence, but gives the hero a credibly righteous motive for doing so — to protect it from the bad guy who wants to steal it first.
Content advisory: Action violence; a few mildly grisly images; minor profanity; fictionalized, uncritical depiction of unhistorical claims of Freemasonry. Could be okay for older kids.
The Patriot (2000)
The British take a beating in more ways than one in Mel Gibson's sentimental, manipulative, rousing action-movie take on the American Revolution. Blending sober antipathy to war with gung-ho battle scenes, meticulous period visuals with historical revisionism, heartfelt reverence for family with monstrous caricatures of the enemy, The Patriot's convictions may be half-baked, but it has the courage of them.
Along with Saving Private Ryan, The Patriot spares nothing of the horrors of war, and the protagonist's heartfelt early speech against going to war is striking. Yet the villainous British officers are so utterly irredeemable that they might as well be Nazis.
Still, it's a well-made, exciting movie with some worthwhile ideas, heartfelt sentiments and striking sequences.
Content advisory: Bloody battlefield violence and gore; non-historical war atrocities; a few strong expressions. Mature viewing.
The Four Feathers (1939)
Newly available on DVD, Zoltan Korda's classic British adventure yarn of honor and redemption in 1880s Sudan is as flag-wavingly gung-ho for the British Empire as The Patriot is hostile to it — and all the more effectively so because, like The Patriot, The Four Feathers begins by letting the hero passionately doubt and challenge the rightness of the cause in which he spends the rest of the film fighting.
Korda's film is neither the first nor the last adaptation of Mason's 1902 novel — but it's the only one that matters (forget the dull 2002 version starring Heath Ledger). The story: A young British officer resigns his commission with mixed motives, then realizes he can't live with the stigma and goes incognito in an effort to redeem himself. With spectacular battle scenes and striking set pieces, The Four Feathers isn't just for Anglophiles.
Content advisory: Restrained battlefield violence and mayhem.Fine for older kids.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Steven D. Greydanus ----- KEYWORDS: Arts -------- TITLE: Benedict and the U.S. Church DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:EDITORIAL
America seems to get it from both sides sometimes.
From one side comes the complaint that America is hopelessly decadent, a place where the filth in the popular culture has reached toxic levels. From the other comes the charge that America is dangerously power-drunk, using the war on terror as an excuse to increase its worldwide dominance.
Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have been critical of America in ways that echo both of these lines of complaint — but without the casual prejudice and cynical anger of the anti-America crowd. For both popes, America is the source of more hope than fear.
For the past six years, the Register has celebrated July 4 each year by publishing Pope John Paul II's words of admiration for America's founding principles.
John Paul made his remarks about America on visits to the country and on several diplomatic occasions in the Vatican. Less than three months into his pontificate, Pope Benedict has not yet had such opportunities. But before his election, Benedict was very clear about what he saw as America's greatness.
If Pope John Paul II saw hope for the world in America's founding principles, Benedict sees hope for the Church in America's Catholics.
In the book God and the World, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger recognized that the Church in America is “characterized by divisions.”
As is the case elsewhere in the Church, there are strong elements in the Church and who resist the movement of the Holy Spirit. But, from Rome in the year 2000, Cardinal Ratzinger said, “I can indeed see many old and dying branches in the Church, which are slowly dropping off, sometimes quietly, sometimes loudly.”
In America, they are being replaced by “quite new and vital religious manifestations. New religious communities are being formed whose members quite consciously aim at a complete fulfillment of the demands of religious life. They live this out of a great joy in their faith, also particularly intending to read again the Fathers and Thomas Aquinas, and to form their lives on what they read.”
Cardinal Ratzinger didn't just see hope in America's new movements, younger members and new congregations, either.
“This is a Church that is very strongly bringing to bear the vital element of religion: the courage to give one's life to and out of faith, in the service of faith,” he said. “This is a Church that takes great responsibility in society through her considerable system of education and through her hospitals.”
The future pope said that the actions of America's bishops were a model worldwide.
We are accustomed to complaints that our bishops have not done enough in one area or another, or that they have done the wrong thing. Cardinal Ratzinger points to the positive, instead. From his unique purview as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he could compare our bishops and institutions to others around the world, and see what has been going well.
He called U.S. bishops’ decision-making process a model for the world. Hospitals face a moral problem. The bishops’ conference brings opinions of Catholic experts to bear on the problem. Then the bishops write guidelines for all to follow.
“These remain partial at first,” said Cardinal Ratzinger, “for the time being American, so that, as it were, other experience can be brought to bear and the door is not closed. Yet they are already model decisions that have an effect on medical ethics in other parts of the Church and at least give some direction there.”
America is the new trend setter for the Church worldwide.
“It used to be said that what happens first in France then happens in the rest of the world,” he said. “Nowadays it is more the case that America, on the one hand, provides secular fashions and slogans that spread throughout the world yet, on the other, also offers ecclesiastical models.”
If Europe is still burdened by the baggage of the successes and failures of millennia of Christendom, America is still in some way the New World whose inhabitants want to take the best from the past and make it work as effectively as possible in the present day.
American Catholics at their best, said Cardinal Ratzinger, “do away with a Christianity that is seemingly modern but at the same time too rationalistic, insufficiently saturated with faith, and replace it with genuine impulses of faith and also model forms of the life of faith.”
Pope Benedict expects a lot from the Church in America, from the Catholics in the pews to the Catholics in the bishops’ offices. Let's not disappoint him.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Opinion -------- TITLE: Choosy Schooling DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:FACTS OF LIFE
A new study by the Heritage Foundation shows that more states are offering real choices to parents in how their children are educated than ever before. The number of families nationwide home-schooling their children has topped one million, and more than 624,000 families use vouchers, tax credits or tax deductions to attend the school of their choice.
Illustration by Tim Rauch
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Tim Rauch ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Born to Be DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Poor little thing. So much of her fins and tail had been eaten away that she looked more like a rubbery blue tube than a beta fish.
She was in such bad shape that she couldn't even eat. Without a means of propulsion, the food escaped her before she could get it into her mouth. She reminded me of the fish from a game I had when I was a kid. There was a rinky-dink fishing pole with a blunt plastic hook and six blobby plastic fish that floated on their sides at the top of the water. That's exactly the way the little blue fish was floundering in the fishbowl by the windowsill.
My 16-year-old daughter, Monica, had four beta fish — two males and two females — that were part of a biology experiment for school. Her assignment was to study their behavior under varying conditions. Before her experimentation got fully underway, however, the fish all caught a fungus that eats away at the fins and flesh. Left untreated, the disease will destroy the fish entirely. Monica's fish all had cases that advanced at a surprising pace — but the little blue female on the end was the worst of all.
Monica bought some special drops to put into the water that were supposed to kill the fungus. When she began the treatments, I was hopeful but not optimistic. The little blue female seemed too far gone. But, after the third treatment, the ugly white patches began to recede and the fish started perking up. Each morning, I would check to see how she was responding. Within a few days, she was able to wriggle around enough to feed herself. Little by little, her tail and fins grew back and at long last she was her same old self, swishing this way and that propelling herself around the bowl effortlessly.
One morning as I watched her, I chuckled to myself, “Once a fish, always a fish.”
Of course, I remembered enough from my own schooling to know that the little blue female's tail and fins would grow back and that she would resume her identity as a fish and not morph into a tadpole or a snail. Still, watching the miracle of it was fascinating.
Even a crippling disease couldn't alter the essence of the creature. And isn't this true of all God's creatures — especially human beings? We can become diseased physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually, and yet the essence of our being cannot be altered. God created us individually, uniquely. Each of us has a specific mission to fulfill that can't be fulfilled by any other human being.
The words of the prophet Isaiah are also true for us: “Listen to me, O coastlands, and hearken, you peoples from afar. The Lord called me from the womb, from the body of my mother he named my name. He made my mouth like a sharp sword, in the shadow of his hand he hid me; he made me a polished arrow, and he said to me, ‘You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified'” (Isaiah 49:1-3).
We hear a similar message from Jeremiah: “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5).
Parts of us may become eaten away by sin, overactivity, spiritual dryness, worries and the influence of the godless world around us — but we will never cease to be who we were formed in the womb to be. We only have to open ourselves to God's grace to kill the disease and allow ourselves to continue to grow into the person we're meant to be.
Marge Fenelon writes from Cudahy, Wisconsin.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Marge Fenelon ----- KEYWORDS: Travel -------- TITLE: Virginia Catholic Kept Alive For Baby DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Susan Torres, like any loving, expectant mother, is nurturing the unborn child in her womb.
The difference between Susan and other pregnant women is that Susan is brain dead, and her body is being sustained with life-support systems.
On May 7, the day before Mother's Day, Susan Torres, a vaccine researcher at the National Institutes of Health, lost consciousness at home in Alexandria, Va. She had not been feeling well for weeks, and her husband, Jason, was serving her dinner in bed. She stopped breathing, and Jason called 911. He performed CPR while waiting for an ambulance.
The 26-year-old woman was rushed to Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington for what was believed to be a brain aneurism. But doctors discovered that Torres had a melanoma, a return of the deadly cancer for which she had been treated at age 17, at the back of her brain.
The new tumor's eventual growth put too much pressure on her brain, and a resulting hemorrhage left her devoid of brain function. Her doctors would have taken her off life support were she not pregnant. But they operated to relieve some of the pressure on her brain and are keeping her alive for the sake of her unborn baby. She was 17 weeks pregnant at the time of her collapse.
“We knew from the beginning that we had other options,” said Justin Torres, Jason's brother and spokesman for the family. “The doctors laid everything on the table for us and made it clear that they couldn't guarantee anything. But I come from a big family, and we love children. We believe that if you can fight for the child, then you should fight for the child. Plus, Susan wanted this baby, and we knew that if she were here, she would tell us to do exactly what we're doing, even if it takes the amount of mental and emotional energy this child is taking.”
By mid-June, the cancer had spread to Susan's neck, back and the lymph nodes under her arms, according to a June 17 Washington Post report. Treating the cancer would harm the baby. The pregnancy must progress far enough to safely deliver the baby before the cancer spreads throughout Susan's body to the womb and her unborn child. In mid-July, when she reaches 25 weeks of pregnancy, the baby will have a greater chance of survival outside of the womb.
The family is praying for a miracle.
“They are extraordinary Catholics going through an extraordinary trial,” said Father Denis Donahue, pastor of St. Rita's parish in Alexandria, where the Torreses, along with their 2-year-old son Peter, have been parishioners.
“Susan loved Peter, and was so happy to be pregnant again. She would go to heroic measures to save the lives of her children, which is what Susan and Jason are doing now for their unborn child.”
The Torres’ heroism is being tested in many ways. Not only must Jason, also 26, cope with the loss of his wife, the challenge of parenting two motherless children and the medical complications from a child born prematurely, but he also faces a huge financial loss because insurance covers a mere fraction of the cost of keeping Susan alive.
According to The Washington Post report, Jason estimates that his cost for Susan's 110- to 130-day hospital stay will be $300,000 to $400,000.
For that reason, the family has appealed to the media to tell Susan's story and has established a website (susantorresfund.org) to help raise funds to cover the ensuing medical expenses.
First Baby Kick
A June 21 update on the website said that Jason and Susan's parents felt the baby kick for the first time: “A nice day. And a good reminder, amidst everything, of what this is all about.” A sonogram on that day showed a normal, healthy infant and that the pregnancy was progressing optimally, according to Justin.
By June 24, the family still didn't know the baby's sex.
“Jason is understandably tired and overwhelmed by the sudden explosion of media attention. Yet, given the circumstances Jason is doing remarkably well. He's far more composed that I would be,” said Justin, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and a contributor to a Catholic blog, TheThingIs (thefactis.org/TheThingIs/).
Skeptics might question Jason Torres’ decision to accept the risks involved in keeping Susan's body alive. But ethicist Edward Furton of The National Catholic Bioethics Center in Philadelphia is certain Jason is doing the right thing.
“No one has ever recovered from brain death,” he said. “Jason is correct in his decision to do what's best for the life of the child. Unfortunately, the unborn child is considered not of any value in our culture. It's one of the regrettable consequences of the Roe v. Wade decision.”
“From an ethical standpoint,” said Kevin Miller, associate professor of theology at Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio, “the baby is a patient, too. Whatever the doctors can do for the health of the baby, they should do.”
Arlington internist Chris McManus, also a Catholic, is Susan's physician. On June 16, he told The Washington Times, “Fortunately, a lot of friends are saying a lot of prayers for her. We're doing her breathing for her, and her heart is still good. The focus is in taking care of any infections that come up. There are a lot of bridges to cross with her. But with technology, we can keep the body alive. How long, we cannot say.”
The Torres family is astonished by the response they've received from Catholics and non-Catholics all over the country who have reached out to them.
“It's not easy to trample your own privacy” by opening yourself to public attention, said Justin. “But the response has been amazing, not just because of the financial support, but because of the notes, Mass cards, prayers, and well wishes of people we will never meet in what is obviously a very difficult and even a very lonely time.
“So many people have taken this to heart, and we will keep them in our prayers,” he added. “We know this: This is a very wanted baby.”
Marge Fenelon is based in Cudahy, Wisconsin.
Information
The Susan M. Torres Fund
P.O. Box 34105
Washington, DC, 20043-0105
SusanTorresFund.org
stfund@susantorresfund.org Or call Dan Purtill
(703) 641-8948
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Marge Fenelon ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: America and the Academy DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Sixty-five summers ago, in 1940, with nearly all of Europe under Hitler's control and the Soviet Union suffocated by Stalin's chokehold, the long-term prospects of democratic government appeared, at the very least, to be grim.
During the 1920s and '30s, fascism and communism had spread like wildfire throughout the globe, feeding off the widespread economic and political dissatisfaction that simmered following World War I and during the Great Depression. By 1940, the spread of totalitarianism had been augmented by the massive German war machine, which in a matter of months had placed the remaining bastions of democracy, the United States and Great Britain, in a precarious position.
Peering out from these ominous clouds that signaled the first chapter in a global catastrophe, intellectuals in the United States, in conjunction with intellectual exiles from Europe, sought to articulate an alternative vision for modern man.
Toward this end, a conference was organized in September of that year to discuss how best to integrate science, philosophy and religion into the democratic way of life in the hopes of staving off the spread of totalitarianism.
One of the presenters at that conference was the maverick Jewish philosopher Mortimer Adler. Adler believed that the only way to steer man clear of the errors of Nazism and communism was to articulate a clear vision of the ultimate truth about the worth and dignity of man.
According to Adler, this vision was rooted in traditional ethical values, without which there was no hope for the survival of Western democracy.
Unfortunately, when Adler presented his paper to the conference attendees, he did little more than alienate himself and his position.
With the buzz of Nazi war planes echoing across the ocean, Adler remarked, “The most serious threat to democracy is the positivism of professors, which dominates every aspect of modern education and is the central corruption of modern culture. Democracy has much more to fear from the mentality of its teachers than from the nihilism of Hitler.”
Not surprisingly, the remark drew horrified stares from those in the audience.
In the aftermath of his unfortunate remark, Adler received a cold shoulder from most of his colleagues and an outright rebuke from the press who were quick to dismiss Adler's position entirely.
While it is clear that the remark was ill-timed, given the context of world events, 65 years removed from the event one could argue that Adler wasn't too far off in his assessment. In retrospect, having seen the damage inflicted by an intellectual vision devoid of any semblance of a moral foundation, one can argue that it rivals the damage inflicted by the totalitarianism of Hitler.
First, let's explore what Adler meant by “the positivism of professors.” Positivism states that the only things that are true are those that we can observe in the physical world. For example, one can demonstrate scientifically through observation that sex can lead to pregnancy.
The vast majority of us are testimony to this principle. On the other hand, one cannot demonstrate via scientific reasoning that sexual relations are virtuous only within the confines of marriage. This would be going well beyond the limits of science and positivism. In fact, the very ideas of virtue or beauty or honor are outside the realm of the observable physical world and therefore have little to no meaning to the positivist.
For those who follow this line of reasoning, theology and philosophy have little to say about anything important. The guiding principles sought by these disciplines are outside the realm of the physical observable world. As a result, in the positivist world, theology is reduced to a sociological study of mankind's fascination with building gods and rituals to prop up arbitrary moral standards.
No longer does theology or philosophy deal with the search for universal moral truths and principles, because these no longer exist. In their absence though, disciplines such as politics, science and sociology are divorced from any clear ethical guidelines or standards. While it was hoped by positivists that this would enhance the ability of these disciplines to move forward unfettered by religious superstitions, the lack of moral certitude has left these disciplines with a hollow rotting core.
Regrettably, that is how these disciplines are taught to today's university students, radical theories are presented to students who have not been equipped with a framework by which to judge their merit. Not surprisingly, the students emerging from this educational experience find themselves adrift upon a sea of moral indifference.
The effect of this gradual decay in higher education is hard to estimate, but one could make some simple connections in an attempt to quantify the cost. One of the results of the positivism of the professoriate is that the fundamental norm that human life is sacred has been undermined.
If the spiritual aspect of man is hogwash, then the principle that human life is sacred because we are made in the image of God is no longer valid because it cannot be proven scientifically. As a result, human life can easily become a commodity, something to be had or not based on the utility or perceived utility of it.
Such an attitude has led directly to the nearly worldwide spread and acceptance of abortion. If one were to look solely at the millions killed by abortion in the United States — approximately 50 million — since the legalization of the practice, the number would dwarf the combined number of soldiers killed in World War II.
Even if you factor in civilian deaths, including the number of Jews, clergy and other “undesirables” executed during the Holocaust, you still do not approach the number of children worldwide killed by abortion.
Unfortunately, the debasement of life is now spreading beyond the womb, as the Terri Schiavo case demonstrated, and soon we as a society could be adding millions of euthanized elderly and handicapped to the list of the casualties.
Of course the numbers of the dead do not give a complete picture of the carnage this intellectual “vision” has caused. Just as millions were displaced, left without family, friends, jobs or opportunities as a result of the World War II, a similar situation has occurred as a result of the rejection of any transcendental values within the university.
For example, widespread no-fault divorce, a direct result of the rejection of traditional sexual mores championed by a radical academia, has left children without parents and women without the necessary income to support a family. This process feeds upon itself because, having marginalized the influence of the family, the powers that be are better able to influence the minds of the young.
That is what is happening at universities today. Students who have not been taught by their family, their church or their schools what is true, good and beautiful, are sent off to college to learn that there is no real truth, goodness or beauty in the world.
This is in direct opposition to the way in which Catholics should see the world, and it is why it is so imperative that Catholic colleges teach in accordance with the faith. We must articulate what is good, beautiful and true, and equip students with the tools to discern this in their own lives.
Certainly, this implies offering authentic Catholic theology classes at Catholic universities, but one cannot forget that it involves every other discipline as well.
It does little good for a psychology major to get a couple of orthodox theology classes when they take a dozen psychology classes that teach them to be value-neutral and not to judge such activities as homosexuality, drug use and marital infidelity.
Likewise for a biology major who might get a dozen classes that teach man is the blind random product of material processes and lacks free will. No, it is not just theology that must be reformed; all disciplines at a Catholic college must advocate reason informed by faith.
Unfortunately, this idea is usually met with resistance. Opponents argue that it would reduce academic freedom and, with all the non-Catholic students present at these universities, one would not want to impose one set of moral values. Regarding the first point, they are correct. It certainly reduces the freedom of academics to advocate irresponsible ideas.
However, that is an activity that could easily be delegated to non-Catholic universities. Academics at Catholic universities should not be free to say that sexual promiscuity is permissible, especially when they don't have the integrity to take the responsibility for the consequences of such an idea.
The second response is not much better. It focuses on the fact that we are a pluralistic society made up of people with many different value systems. While this is certainly true, we have a majority in our society that aspires to the Judeo-Christian tradition, particularly at a Catholic institution.
This value system is not something that we should apologize for. Rather, it is something upon which Catholic universities should build.
We should use our universities to bring our values to the world. If we don't, the world will continue to bring its values to us, and the effects, as Adler predicted, will not be pretty.
Daniel Kuebler, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of biology at Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Dan Kuebler ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: National Review Board Getting Less Activist, to Dismay of Some DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:CHICAGO — The days of pro-abortion activism by members of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ National Review Board for the Protection of Children and Young People are over.
That's the message the bishops’ conference delivered to new appointees to the board.
Past board members Leon Panetta, Robert Bennett and Pamela Hayes came under criticism from Catholics for contributing funds to politicians who support abortion rights and embryonic stem-cell research. All three contributed to campaigns of Sen. John Kerry, last year's failed Democratic presidential candidate with a long pro-abortion voting record.
Hayes, in an interview with the Register last October, defended a life of abortion rights activism that pro-life advocates said was counter to the protection of children and young people.
Three of four new appointees to the board met June 14-16 in Chicago in advance of the annual meeting of the bishops’ conference, where the issue was addressed by past appointees still serving on the board.
“There was discussion at our meeting that said those issues [abortion and embryonic stem-cell research] had been touched on in the past, and it was by way of reminding board members, including newcomers like myself, that this was not part of our responsibility and we were not even going to try to address any of that,” said Dr. Joseph Rhode, a physician from Midland, Texas, who's among the new appointees.
Rhode declined to reveal further details about the discussion. But he told the Register he's a lifelong, pro-life Catholic who has never embraced philosophical stands in opposition to Church doctrine. He and his wife, Dr. Caroline Creighton Rhode, also a physician, have seven children.
Others appointed to the board include:
“ William McGarry, the president of Anna Maria College in Paxton, Mass. McGarry told the Register he's a lifelong, devout Catholic who attended Catholic schools in New Jersey through high school. McGarry said during six years as president of Anna Maria College he has worked with faculty, students and staff to make the college more Catholic.
“We, like every other university or college in America, are affected by society, so it's always a struggle, and we work very hard at it,” McGarry said. “I think we're working our way in the direction to live out our Catholic mission, and I hope someday to say we're completely there.”
McGarry said to the best of his knowledge he holds no views that are in conflict with Church doctrine on life issues or anything else.
“The process of this appointment included an extensive vetting and background review that explored some of those topics,” McGarry said. “If I had issues with the Church on any of them, I don't think you would be talking to me today.”
“ Thomas DeStefano, the former interim president of Catholic Charities USA and the first lay executive director of Brooklyn Catholic Charities in New York. DeStefano is the father of two. The Register was unable to reach him for comment.
“ Milann Siegfried, a retired registered nurse and philanthropist. Siegfried and her husband, Ray, have six children. She could not be reached by the Register.
Board member Patricia O'Donnell Ewers, an educational consultant and past president of Pace University in New York, was appointed as chairwoman to replace outgoing chairman Nicholas Cafardi. Members are appointed to three-year terms.
Others leaving the board include Alice Bourke Hayes and Ray Siegfried.
Pamela Hayes resigned in November — after defending her pro-abortion activism to the Register — at the request of Bishop Wilton Gregory, former president of the U.S. bishops’ conference.
Ewers told the Register after her appointment to the board in October that she would not publicly reveal her stance on abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem-cell research, cloning and homosexual “marriage.” She said she had promised conference officials, during an interview for the appointment, that she would not take public stands on Church issues that don't pertain directly to the work of the review board.
Study Expected
The two most recent rounds of board appointments have raised concern among the leaders of the Survivor's Network of those Abused by Priests. David Clohessy, the organization's national director, said it's apparent the bishops are trying to appoint less controversial board members who are more obedient to Church doctrine.
Clohessy said he has no objection having members who abide by Church teachings, but he said rebellious members of the past seemed more interested in policing Church hierarchy in order to end sexual abuse.
“We think the key qualification has to be a willingness to speak out against Church leaders whenever necessary to protect children,” Clohessy said. “Certainly, it's only fair and logical to expect that the bishops would favor appointees who are in line with Church teachings. But from our point of view, theology and ideology are nearly irrelevant regarding the charter of the national review board.”
Bishop William Skylstad, president of the bishops’ conference, said in a statement about the new appointments that the review board has “played a tremendously important role in helping the Church confront and deal effectively with the crisis of the sexual abuse of minors in the Church.”
Ewers said the board's progress has slowed in the past nine months, mainly because she and four other members appointed in October came just before a change in administration in the office of Child and Youth Protection — which is overseen by the review board. The first director of the office, Kathleen McChesney, ended her two-year contract Feb. 25 and was replaced by Teresa Kettelkamp.
“We're hoping we have reached a time now that we can go about our work 100%,” Ewers said.
The board planned to announce in June who will receive the contract for the review board's study into the causes and contexts of the sexual abuse crisis, a project that's expected to take several years to complete.
Ewers declined to express her beliefs about the causes of abuse. Rhode said the study is likely to determine that the causes of sexual abuse are myriad and complex, but he has some theories of his own.
“Formative issues, like what type of household an abuser was brought up in, are likely to play into it,” he said. “An abusive environment, for example, may have an impact on a child's sexual identity. Some of the problem has to do with societal changes that occurred in the '50s, '60s and '70s — when most of this abuse occurred.”
Wayne Laugesen is based in Boulder, Colorado.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Wayne Laugesen ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Letters to the Editor DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Rich in the Theological Virtues
My first task from Mother Abbess is to thank you. We are the community of Poor Clare nuns mentioned in a recent article you ran about the nuns and the conclave (“Poor Clares ‘Conclave’ Prayed for Pope,” June 12-18).
My second task is: Mother wondered if you might consider running a two-liner with a real photo of us? One of our communities advised it and so we thought it wouldn't hurt to ask. I have attached several photos to this from which you could choose if you decide to honor our request. If none of them suit you, there are more at our website, poorclarenuns.org.
The “domain” name is a recent gift to us from a young man here. When Mother finally decided to take the plunge and try using e-mail — another friend pays for that — the box included a website. I begged permission to try making a website and, with some reluctance, Mother gave it to me. Great! Only I had no idea how to do it, what “html” meant, etc. It was a long road, learning by studying sites of monasteries I found on the Web. That was back in 1999.
The newsletter itself is very new, just started last November. A good friend who has real savvy in such matters all but twisted my arm off in her effort to convince me that we should do this. During the past three years we have lost more than half of our income.
Since the very beginning of the foundation, three elderly Dutch religious donated their pensions to us; one has died and the other two needed to be admitted into retirement homes for medical assistance. That left us for the greater part dependent on our American friends, and the newsletter was envisioned by our friend as a good way to maintain contact.
I was not happy with that approach but went ahead, knowing it would be a wonderful, quiet way of reassuring people of the value of their faith and also forward the real reason the site exists: fostering vocations to the religious life. Through it we have been able to guide young women who contact us to monasteries in America, Germany and England, and our youngest found us through the site.
Perhaps the newest inquirer, if she is truly called, will have to come here (No monasteries are to be found in New Zealand).
Again, we thank you for your kindness. Living in a virtually pagan country, watching the circle of those who still believe grow ever smaller, it all makes such gestures as yours as moments of strength. Since the foundation we have grown from six to 11. We do not aspire to be large, just to be what is most essential: true daughters of the Church, true children of Our Father. God bless you.
SISTER MARY ANTONETTE
Eindhoven, Netherlands
Stem-Cell Sanity
President Bush would be completely justified in vetoing the so-called Stem-Cell Research Enhancement Act, which forces taxpayers to fund the unnecessary destruction of human embryos (“GOP House Okays Embryo Research,” June 12-18).
The fact is that we have made scientific progress toward curing maladies from paralysis to leukemia, but without destroying human embryos. On Thanksgiving Day last year, American and British studies were published that showed umbilical cord blood — and the stem cells it includes — could save the lives of many adults with leukemia who cannot find bone marrow donors.
Three young American women, Laura Dominguez, Susan Fajt and Melissa Holley, who suffered paralysis resulting from spinal cord injuries, have regained muscle control after serious spinal injuries, thanks to a procedure using adult stem cells taken from their own nasal tissue.
You may not have heard about them, even though on July 14, 2004, Fajt and 19-year-old Dominguez testified before the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space. They are among more than 20 patients successfully treated with their own adult stem cells by Dr. Carlos Lima, a neuropathologist at Egaz-Moniz Hospital in Lisbon, Portugal.
Dominguez and Fajt never though they would walk again after near-fatal automobile accidents that left them paralyzed with severe spinal-cord injuries. Dominguez was a quadriplegic at the age of 16, with a C6 vertebrae fracture, but treatment using her olfactory sinus stem cells helped her walk with braces.
There are almost 80 therapies — actual treatments, not theory or research — using adult stem cells. There have been over 250 adult stem-cell clinical trials. There are zero treatments using embryonic stem cells and there have been zero clinical trials.
The simple truth is that most progress in stem-cell research is being made using the adult, rather than the embryonic, variety. And the truth is that the secular press and the secular media are largely ignoring that fact, while portraying opponents of embryonic stem-cell research as heartless Bible-thumpers prolonging human suffering.
DANIEL JOHN SOBIESKI
Chicago
Off-Centering
Regarding “Centering Prayer Priest Dies Following Car Accident” (June 19-25):
I was surprised that you printed the obituary of Trappist Father Basil Penington without an accompanying article or some mention of the controversial nature of the “spirituality” he preached and wrote so much about.
Having been taught that “centering prayer” is not consistent with Catholic theology, I did some research.
The Vatican authored two documents on the irreconcilability of centering prayer with Catholic teaching: “Jesus Christ, the Bearer of the Water of Life,” issued by the Pontifical Council for Culture and the Pontifical Council on Interreligious Dialogue, and “A Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on Some Aspects Of Christian Meditation,” issued by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on Oct. 15, 1989.
Father Pennington's teaching has been controversial for years, and some mention should have been made of that, lest some readers come to believe his teaching is orthodox Catholicism. It is not.
RICHARD L. JOHNSON
Kirkland, Washington
Three's a Party
Regarding “Betrayal” (editorial, June 12-18):
You raised some excellent questions about the pro-life “leanings” of the Republican Party and, frankly, I believe actions and/or lack thereof, speak louder than words. Unfortunately, there is an appearance of the Catholic Church, as well as Catholic organizations (such as the Knights of Columbus) being “in bed” with the Republican Party, which impacts on how some rank-and-file Catholics vote.
Sen. Rick Santorum is a good example of one who is otherwise soundly pro-life, yet shows himself to be a Republican first, as when he supported Sen. Arlen Spector for another term — instead of the very qualified and pro-life competing Republican candidate.
Truth be known, I agree with the idea that the two-party monopoly is the major problem upsetting our government system. I'm hoping that a third party will be formed, with a firm pro-life platform as its base. Ideally, this third party's charter members will be courageous, currently serving members of Congress, otherwise unhappy with their respective political party.
At a minimum, this development would provide a real choice when it comes time to vote.
K. DALE ANDERSON
Randallstown, Maryland
Principle or Power?
I have been at a loss trying to understand why anyone who is really pro-life, and is willing to vote for candidates or deny votes for candidates based upon this issue above all others, would support the Republican Party (“Betrayal,” editorial, June 12-18).
When Ronald Reagan was elected, it seemed that the tide had finally turned. But absolutely nothing happened. Even Reagan's appointments to the Supreme Court (not to mention “pro-life” President Bush 41's appointments), as the major media like to say, “grew into” their offices.
Even the people that President G.W. Bush has nominated for the courts have not been pro-life; they would not overturn Roe v. Wade or Griswold. Sure, some of them would permit a few additional “restrictions” that might save a miniscule number of children, but the tide has turned. Abortion and “family planning” (i.e., contraception) is unconditionally accepted by the two major parties.
If Catholics woke up and abandoned these two parties and put their efforts into a third party, perhaps the Constitution Party (formerly the U.S. Taxpayers Party) it would guarantee Democratic wins for a while, but real change could be in the wings. Besides, eight years of Bill Clinton proved that this would not mean much of a change of course toward death and ceding our national sovereignty to the United Nations.
We could finally have a nation governed by men of principle instead of men desirous of ruling for the glory of power.
DANIEL A. PECK
Greenfield, Indiana
Father Gonzalez Fan
I just want to say that your article “Dynamo on the Divine” (Priest Profile, June 19-25) on Father Marcos Gonzalez is the truth. I hope others are inspired to imitate him. He was the assistant pastor in our St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church here in Camarillo, and was everything the article said, and more.
He taught a two-year Catechism course and was able to cover it while adding important background information as well. He was excellent in the confessional, and he was always the epitome of a Catholic priest.
The Church should be so blessed to have him and thousands more like him. St. Andrew's is fortunate to have Father Gonzalez. We miss him.
ROBERT E. WARREN
Camarillo, California
Correction
In Joanna Bogle's June 12-18 commentary “That Election in Britain,” the Latin phrase gaudium magnum (great joy) was incorrectly rendered “gaudium magnamum.” We regret the error.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Opinion -------- TITLE: The American Pontifex DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Soon, we may have to choose a new pontifex maximus.
No, I am not forecasting the demise of our new pontifex, or pontiff, Benedict XVI. God forbid. May he live a hundred years.
I mean the pontifex of the American civil religion, namely, the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
While I wish Chief Justice William Rehnquist the best in his struggle with thyroid cancer, it seems likely that he will step down before President Bush's term expires. With the consent of the Senate, the president will have to appoint a replacement. The process will be fraught with difficulty, because the Supreme Court has in recent years transcended its role as interpreter of the laws. The court has made itself the ultimate authority whenever matters of faith and ethics come into political play.
Rehnquist is a pontiff in spite of himself. God knows he resisted the role of spiritual arbiter in civil society. His legal reasoning has always emphasized the primacy of elected legislatures, the principle of majority rule and the importance of states’ rights.
Yet it is undeniable that during his tenure as chief justice, the Rehnquist Court has become increasingly sacralized, rewriting the American conscience in a way that no previous court has dared.
The court crossed the Rubicon with Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), as Russell Hittinger suggests in his important essay “A Crisis of Legitimacy.” In their joint majority opinion in Casey, Justices O'Connor, Souter and Kennedy did much more than merely uphold Roe v. Wade. Throwing out the moral consensus of civilization over several millennia, the Court declared that “at the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe and of the mystery of human life.”
Essentially, the justices ratified the American tendency toward a “religion of the individual,” and then appointed themselves the priests of this new civil religion. Americans’ commitment to the rule of law, Casey proclaimed, cannot be separated “from their understanding of the Court invested with the authority to … speak before all others for their constitutional ideals.”
If this were taken to its logical conclusion, the Supreme Court would itself become sovereign within the American system. The Casey justices admit this, in so many words: “The root of American governmental power is revealed most clearly in the instance of the power conferred by the Constitution upon the Judiciary of the United States and specifically upon this Court.”
Now, this is alarming. The genius of the American system lies in its refusal to award the ultimate sovereignty to any particular branch or level of government, instead dispersing authority within a limited and mixed government, and reserving the ultimate sovereignty to the people.
To his credit, the chief justice dissented in Casey, and his decision in the 1997 case Washington v. Glucksberg refused to apply the Casey logic to euthanasia. But in Boerne v. Flores that same year, Rehnquist joined the majority decision striking down the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
The Boerne Court ruled that Congress’ clearly defined power to “enforce” the Fourteenth Amendment “by appropriate legislation” extends only, as Hittinger notes, “to those rights whose scope have been defined by the Supreme Court.”
Although Rehnquist has resisted the pontifical mantle, he is nonetheless partly responsible for its imposition on the chief justice. It is impossible to build a stable jurisprudence based on “majority rule,” something that shifts with every spin of the weathervane.
There are indeed fundamental rights, such as life, liberty and property, which must be protected from the whim of legislators. This was the principle of our revolution. Our Founding Fathers did not appeal to the courts themselves, however, as the protectors of rights, but to the “laws of nature and of nature's God.”
The natural law is embedded in our Constitution. Judicial review allows the courts to overturn laws where they conflict with the natural law as it is expressed through the Constitution. Courts do not have the power, however, to redefine natural law in a way opposed to the consensus of ages, or to invent new rights which are not “deeply rooted in our history and traditions.”
Yet this is what the Supreme Court has done, most recently in the Lawrence v. Texas sodomy case.
Human beings need to appeal to the fundamental natural law, which comes from a divine personal lawgiver. Since Rehnquist (among other justices) has rejected natural law jurisprudence, the Court was compelled to invent a new natural law, over Rehnquist's objections. Its author is not God, but the Court itself.
Fortunately, we still have the power to amend the Constitution. The first order of political business for concerned Christians should be an amendment defining the individual's “right to privacy” in a way consistent with the common good and the laws of nature.
It is not surprising that the American pontifex should be our chief lawyer. Not only was our revolution superintended by lawyers, but the original pontifexes (excuse me, you Latinists out there, I meant pontifices) were also involved in the law. Pontifices — priests in the Roman Republic — judged cases touching on home and family life.
The pope borrows one of his titles from the chief pontifex or pontifex maximus. Our American system, too, draws liberally from the Roman model, so why not go all the way and have our own republican pontiff?
For Catholics, of course, this is out of the question. Other Americans, hopefully, may become alarmed when they recall the most famous Roman pontifex maximus. He was Julius Caesar, the man who overthrew the Republic.
If ours is to remain a government of laws and not men, we must choose justices who will respect the natural law, and not divinize themselves by rewriting it.
Scott McDermott's biography, Charles Carroll of Carrollton: Faithful Revolutionary, is available at www.scepterpublishers.org.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Scott Mcdermott ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: National Media Watch DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Terri Schiavo's Grave Marker Angers Her Parents
MSNBC, June 21 — Terri Schiavo died March 31. But the bronze grave marker ordered by her husband, Michael, notes that she “departed this earth” Feb. 25, 1990, the date she collapsed, MSNBC reported. The marker indicates that that is the date on which Terri was “at peace.”
The plaque also reads, “I kept my promise,” an apparent reference to Michael's claim that he promised his wife he would not keep her alive artificially.
“Obviously, that's a real shot and another unkind act toward a grieving mom and dad,” said David Gibbs, the attorney for the Schindlers.
Michael, who had said that he would bury Terri's ashes at a family plot in Pennsylvania, instead had the service and burial at Sylvan Abbey Memorial Park in Clearwater, Fla. Bob and Mary Schindler, Terri's parents, were notified of the gravesite switch by fax after the June 20 service.
Hispanics Give Arlington Church a Boost
WJLA-TV, June 18 — Over the past decade, Hispanics have greatly increased the Catholic population in the Diocese of Arlington, Va., said TV station WJLA.
The diocese has witnessed a 42% increase in registered Catholics over that time period. The increase has led to the creation of a new parish and two new missions to serve the 84,000 Catholics living in three of the diocese's northern counties, where at least one-third of the Catholics are Hispanic. The diocese offers Spanish Masses in more than 30 of its 67 parishes.
U.S. Census figures show that the population of Hispanics more than doubled in size in northern Virginia from 97,559 in 1990 to 198,535 in 2000. Some 400,000 registered Catholics live in the diocese, with an additional 12,000 joining each year.
Editorial Writers Charge
James Patterson and Lisa Coffey filed their lawsuit in federal court June 14. They are claiming religious, racial, and age discrimination against Editor and Vice President Dennis Ryerson, Publisher Barbara Henry, and the newspaper's owner, Gannett Company.
Ali Zoibi, vice president of human resources at the Indiana daily, said that the newspaper doesn't discriminate. He noted that the Indianapolis office of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission dismissed the charges made by Patterson and Coffey.
Patterson and Coffey have asserted that management disagreed “with anyone who had a biblical view of homosexuality.”
“It appears that people at The Star, at a fairly high level, decided … that their views couldn't be tolerated,” said John Price, an attorney for the former employees.
Sony Expects PlayStation Pornography
TOP TECH NEWS, June 17 — Sony Computer Entertainment expects that pornography producers will soon release sexually explicit videos for Sony's PlayStation Portable game console, reported Top Tech News.
Sony's handheld PlayStation, which is used primarily by children and teens, uses a 2.3-inch optical universal media disc to play games or videos. Such discs can be produced and distributed by any company. Two producers of adult movies plan to sell their videos for the console beginning in July, with several other pornographers to follow.
“It is utterly undesirable, but we cannot stop software makers from selling such videos,” said a Sony public relations official.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: ACLU Challenges Public Prayer in Louisiana DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:AMITE, La. — When the local public school board meets here twice a month, something extraordinary occurs.
Dozens of Christians of various denominations gather to pray on the steps of the Tangipahoa Parish School System's central office. They're praying because the men and women on the school board are bound by law to not begin their meetings with prayer. However, board members do pray privately in an anteroom prior to meetings.
In February, U.S. District Judge Ginger Berrigan ordered the school district to cease prayer at school-sponsored events — including board meetings — after receiving an anonymous complaint from a parent, who sought help from the American Civil Liberties Union.
Virtually every public school board in Louisiana, where counties are called parishes, begins its meetings with prayer, according to Mike Johnson, an Alliance Defense Fund attorney working on the board's appeal.
“The Louisiana School Board Association is on record as being outraged at this federal judge's opinion,” he said. “The comment from the president of that group was that all of our school boards open with an invocation. They always have. Most of them are continuing that practice in spite of this ruling.”
The board's plight has drawn national attention, and support from the Alliance Defense Fund, an evangelical Christian legal group started by public figures like James Dobson of Focus on the Family.
The board's supporters are convinced that the case will be overturned on appeal. Congress and all state legislatures open their sessions with prayer, and Johnson said public school boards follow that precedent.
“The U.S. Supreme Court has specifically confirmed that a deliberative public body can open their meetings with an invocation,” Johnson said. “This is something that is deeply embedded in the history and tradition of the country.”
The embattled school district is also facing further litigation from the ACLU, which contends that the district contravened the judge's February court order at least four times.
In one of those instances, former student teacher Cynthia Thompson contended that a fourth-grade teacher at D.C. Reeves Elementary School forced her students to pray every day before lunch. Thompson was subsequently dismissed from the teaching position, according to Joe Cook, executive director of ACLU of Louisiana.
Thompson's suit, supported by the ACLU, contends that after she objected to the prayer, her complaint was not addresed by the teacher and her supervisor at Southeastern Louisiana University. Thompson claims that in retaliation she was not given her teaching certificate.
The school board's public information office did not return the Register's calls.
Growing Disrespect
Prayer in public schools has been virtually non-existent since the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Engel v. Vitale decision in 1962 when the court held that state-mandated prayer in schools was contrary to the First Amendment's ban against the establishment of religion.
Student-led prayer is still constitutional, but the courts have highly restricted prayer involving educators, according to Richard Myers, a professor at Ave Maria School of Law in Ann Arbor, Mich.
“The Supreme Court also struck down an Alabama statute dealing with having a moment of silence because of the way the statute came into existence,” he said. “The court read it as if the Legislature was promoting prayer or expressing a preference for prayer.”
The ACLU's Cook contends that his organization is merely “defending religious liberty.” Prayer in the classroom or at the beginning of public school board meetings makes people feel “unwelcome unless they're fundamentalist Christians,” he said.
“But the Alliance Defense Fund's Johnson says Cook and the ACLU are “on a search-and-destroy mission to hunt down and obliterate all religious expression.
“This is what the ACLU is all about,” he explained. “He's not defending religious freedom. He's demanding a radical secularism that the Constitution doesn't require, and frankly the people of this country are not going to tolerate.”
Father Richard John Neuhaus, editor of First Things and president of the Religion and Public Life Institute, says God won't be shut out of public life.
“God is present everywhere so nobody is going to remove him from anything,” he explained. “To say that somebody should not be who they are because it will make someone feel different is a very stifling notion of the human person in society.
“We live in a democracy in which people not only have a constitutional right, but a moral obligation to honestly engage others in spaces public or private in what they believe it is important to share — including religious faith and piety,” he said.
“That is guaranteed by the Constitution, and the ACLU has, for many decades, simply turned the right on its head in order to insist there is a right in public to be free from religion, which of course, is not to be found in common sense or in the Constitution,” Father Neuhaus said.
Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, agreed.
Groups like the ACLU, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, and People for the American Way, are working to “scrub clean the public expression of religion,” he said. “There's something even more invidious going on here.”
Donohue blames a perversion of “multiculturalism.”
Said Donohue, “What we have is this growing sensitivity to Eastern religions and total disrespect for religions of the West, particularly to Christianity.”
Patrick Novecosky is based in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Patrick Novecosky ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: English Spirit Outside Rome DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:“Don't believe the hype” — or so the saying goes.
With that advice in mind, I kept my expectations in check as the car in which I was a passenger made its way along winding roads through an area of thickly wooded hills outside Rome.
I'd heard glowing reports about our destination from my driver, a colleague who'd invited me to explore this place while both of us were at a press conference in the Eternal City.
As we trundled down an uneven, narrow pathway, the trees gave way to a view that Henry James once described as the most astounding in the whole of Italy.
I was on a visit to Palazzola, a little-known English retreat house in the Castelli Romani region. Situated in a commanding location close to the rim of the extinct volcanic crater that is now Lake Albano, this “little palace” just outside the Italian capital has been a refuge for students of the Venerable English College since 1920.
But as well as being a place for seminarians to escape the bustling city to study and reflect, for the past 30 years, Palazzola, which used to be a monastery dating back to the 10th century, has also been open to groups and individuals looking for a spiritual retreat. Countless pilgrims from all over the English-speaking world have visited here, using it as a base to visit to Rome, or for a few quiet moments before moving on to St. Peter's and the Colosseum.
And it doesn't take a pilgrimage guru to understand why. Palazzola's jewel in the crown is its viewing garden. A peaceful stone terrace and lawn, sheltered by acacia, bay and cypress, this gives way to a breathtaking panorama of the lake. Immediately adjacent is the town of Castel Gandolfo, the summer residence of popes, with its twin telescopic domes belonging to the Vatican's astronomers.
“It's a unique experience here,” says Palazzola's director, Michael Severance. “If you've never been here before, you will be amazed.”
Severance, a genial marketing expert from Phoenix, Ariz., has been brought in by the English College to attract more visitors to the villa. He is also Palazzola's first lay director since its previous managers, the Sisters of Mercy, left last year. Yet as a devout Catholic, he is very keen on making sure the villa retains its long history as a base for spiritual replenishment.
Built on the site of the Via Sacra and immediately next to the tomb of the famous pre-Christian Roman general Scipio, this place has attracted monks and friars from the Cistercian, Carthusian and Franciscan orders; all have lived and worshipped here. Hermits, too, have sought the serenity of the grounds, inhabiting the large caves nearby.
Yet Palazzola is open to all people, regardless of denomination or faith, looking for a time of quiet spiritual reflection. During my visit, I met a non-baptized BBC producer on her second visit after she had fallen in love with the beauty of the place while in Rome to cover the conclave.
Also enjoying a retreat were an Anglican couple who were clearly delighted with their find. “We love the warm welcome we've gotten and the Eucharistic fellowship,” said the husband, a vicar from Devon in England. “We've been here two weeks and we're staying for three,” added his wife, her eyes twinkling.
In fact, the villa has for some years been closely associated with ecumenism. A large Anglican-Catholic conference was held here in 1986; John Paul II attended.
Most visitors, however, are Catholics and, while I stayed, a group of Benedictine monks from Pennsylvania and New England, and Sisters of Mercy nuns from England enjoyed the villa as a base from which they branched out in various directions. They were later joined by the directors of Vatican Radio attending a morning conference and lunch (always cooked in true Roman style by an Italian family — the pork is particularly good and reputed to be the best in Italy).
Peaceful Potential
Now the plan is to also attract families. Severance, who is married to an Italian and has two young children, sees the villa's large swimming pool, tennis courts and acres of ground for children to explore as ideal for families, and aims to host a seminar on family management.
“The home is nowadays sometimes perceived as a workplace,” he points out. “Even kids are sometimes perceived as work, but you cannot relax enough to enjoy them. Here there is a spiritual dimension which will also give families the chance to have some real free time to be together.”
Yet the villa's potential need not end there. Severance would like to host trade shows for pilgrim operators, clerical vestment companies and religious artists. But he is wary, too, of turning Palazzola into a “Holiday Inn on the Lake.”
“The real concern is not to over-commercialize, in the sense of making T-shirts or bottling the scent of old libraries,” he explains. Rather, he says, the intention is simply to capitalize on the “huge market” for retreats, pilgrim groups and inter-religious conferences.
To do so, he argues, is an urgent necessity. “The Church has reached a point where it cannot depend on itself anymore and needs operations like this to exist,” he says. “We can't be a drain on the Church, either, or we'd just have to close it up and turn it into a hotel.”
For some retreatants, Palazzola's downsides will be that it is no longer an active monastery or convent, and therefore without the spiritual life that a living cloister would provide. The villa is also not easily reachable without a car. However, retreatants are not expected to live like monks: The villa is more a place more to unwind, reflect and pray than a center for intense religiosity and penance. And, although buses are few, Palazzola is close to Rome's Ciampino airport, from where cars can be rented.
Needless to say, like so many before me, I was saddened to leave the villa and return to the din of the city. But at the same time, I could not help but be grateful for the time I had in this place where ancient, hallowed ground and nature's outstanding beauty work beautifully to transform the human spirit.
Edward Pentin writes from Rome.
Information
palazzola.it
Planning Your Visit
Summer is a fine time to visit Villa Palazzola, as temperatures average in the mid- to upper-70s Fahrenheit with cooling breezes blowing off the lake.
Getting There
Villa Palazzola is located on the eastern slope of Lake Albano, 18 miles south of the center of Rome. For detailed road and rail directions, go to palazzola.it on the Internet.
----- EXCERPT: Villa Palazzola, Castelli Romani, Italy ----- EXTENDED BODY: Edward Pentin ----- KEYWORDS: Travel -------- TITLE: Prolife Victories DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Positive Steps Against AIDS
The first, he reported, “is the spread of antiretroviral treatment programs. Second, some African governments have gone on the offensive against the disease. And third, the U.S. and other countries are pouring in money to pay for treatments.”
Now, he reports, “a positive test is not a death sentence. Something can be done.”
Program Boosts Birth Rate
ASSOCIATED PRESS, June 12 — The Australian government's $3,000 bonus for every baby born starting in 2004 has helped to reverse the nation's declining birth rate.
The pro-natal program of Prime Minister John Howard — slated to increase to $4,000 for every baby born beginning in July — has played a significant role in halting the nation's declining fertility rate, said Peter McDonald, the Australian National University's head of demography. He predicted the fertility rate would rise to 1.8 births per woman in 2005 as the effect of the baby bonus deepens.
Conscience Respected
Under the rejected provision, a pharmacist who refused to fill a doctor's prescription twice could have been disciplined by the state Board of Pharmacy. Punishment could include license suspension.
While a key state senator told the daily newspaper there was little support for the measure in Nevada, Planned Parenthood is backing “must-fill” bills in several states and Congress.
Music Video Sends Message
WORLDNETDAILY.COM, June 16 — Entertainer Nick Cannon, 24, has released a rap-music video that features the story of his mother nearly aborting him and “sends a powerful pro-life message that is striking a chord with fans,” said the Web news site.
Cannon, a film actor and comedian who played host on two Nickelodeon shows, appears in the video portraying himself as an unborn, pleading with his mother to let him live.
The video has been consistently voted in the top 10 at the music-video rating site 106 & Park for some weeks.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Faith-Based Fun in the Summer Sun DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Now that school's long out and the days are long and warm (maybe a mite too warm), children find themselves with a surplus of hours for the whiling away (maybe a few too many hours).
It's a time when many a Catholic parent will be heard to utter a familiar summer refrain: Thank God for Vacation Bible School.
That's the right response, as Catholic VBS programs offer lots to be thankful for. Not only does a good summer-learning program keep kids constructively occupied during what might otherwise be idle time, but it can also inspire devotion to the saints and sacraments, instruct in proper Christian conduct, even foster a future vocation to the priesthood or religious life.
VBS programs do all this in an atmosphere of fun and friendship, incorporating proven teaching techniques that make learning fun and participation irresistible — from sing-alongs to skits to games.
What's more, one of the best benefits is also one of the most obvious: Kids like being with other kids.
“If you're going to be the body of Christ, you need to be together and know each other,” says Beth Adams, head of VBS at St. Mary Catholic Church in Muncie, Ind., where students come together from two groups that don't regularly associate with one another — the parish's school and its religious-education classes. “VBS is a vehicle to mix the kids together and form a community,” adds Adams.
Adams, who uses Liguori Publications’ Kingdom of the Son: A Prayer Safari as the curriculum for St. Mary's pre-K to eighth graders, points to VBS as a strengthening supplement for youngsters being formed in the Catholic faith.
“There's a richness to our faith that we sometimes miss, and this is a nice vehicle to give that,” she says. This year, for example, “the children will hear about believing in the power of prayer and they'll see how saints like St. Catherine were able to change the hearts of nonbelievers with their prayers.”
This VBS is the Catholic version of a popular program from Gospel Light, a non-denominational evangelical publisher. Liguori's editorial director, Hans Christoffersen, says Liguori adds pieces that integrate Catholic elements into the Gospel Light materials. “We added the sacramental experience,” he adds, “especially focusing on the Eucharist.”
Noting that the Liguori program has an imprimatur from the Archdiocese of St. Louis, Christoffersen points to its simplicity. This is important, he says, because not all adults who help teach at VBS are well-formed catechists.
Catchy Catechesis
The popular Totus Tuus program, which began in the diocese of Wichita and has spread into many dioceses in the Midwest, takes a different tack: It trains catechists for a week. All of them are college-age students and seminarians; they go out in teams of two men and two women for the summer.
“The kids naturally look up to vibrant, faith-filled, young-adult Catholics,” says Chris Stefanik, director of Totus Tuus for the Diocese of Lacrosse, Wis. “It's also a great experience for the team we train to be missionaries for the summer. They have a pretty intense prayer life — the liturgy of the hours, Rosary, daily Mass. They really have the full ministry experience of sitting at the feet of Jesus and sharing what they receive from him with others.”
St. Joachim's in Pittsville, Wis., is this year running the program for the fourth time — and not just because the kids have a lot of fun. Father Jude Ndugbu calls it a “very effective program for bringing them closer to God.”
“I see the children's participation in the Mass has become very active and they share a lot of respect for the Eucharist,” adds the priest. “There has been a lot of improvement in the children's participation in the liturgy.”
All 4 God
Another exciting VBS program also focusing on the Eucharist is K4J Summertime Blast. It's put together by K4J — Kids for Jesus — a Regnum Christi program. (Regnum Christi is a movement of apostolate linked to the Legionaries of Christ.)
Kathleen Conklin, K4J's national director, says that, in conjunction with learning about Jesus in the Eucharist — and receiving him, and bringing him to others — the kids are also learning the virtue of initiative as they come up with new ideas for bringing Jesus into the world. For example, part of the kids’ mission this year is to collect money for Catholic World Mission.
Terri Baum at Highlands School in Irving, Texas, describes how one little boy lit up when he realized why he was saving the money and what he was providing.
“It's a very exciting thing to see a child's face when they see a new teaching about Christ and realize how they can help another person have the same kind of friendship with Christ,” she says.
Barb Avery at Sts. Cyril and Methodius Church in Sterling Heights, Mich., agrees.
“It gives them a chance to develop their own relationship with Christ and do something on their own for him,” she says.
Baum sees the youngest benefiting through characters like Mr. Tabernacle. “I've noticed the younger kids really seem to recognize the tabernacle now and the importance of it,” she says. “We have a chapel and tabernacle in the school and they go to visit.”
K4J is so solid and chock-full of benefits that it received an imprimatur from Archbishop Henry Mansell of Hartford, Conn.
“It would be difficult to exaggerate the good that this children's program can do,” he says. “It is Scriptural; it strives to be solidly doctrinal; it emphasizes the Catechism of the Catholic Church; it encourages the Church's missionary apostolate; it recognizes the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints; it is respectful of the ministerial priesthood; it encourages the Church's social justice doctrines; it evidences reverence for the Mass and Eucharistic adoration.”
Adults can benefit from VBS, too.
“The children can lead the parents in the way they get enthused,” notes Beth Adams. “Maybe they don't come to church too often, but they send their kids, and it's a lead-in.” Last year, one mother decided to return to church after seeing how much her child enjoyed Vacation Bible School.
Father Andrew Beerman, dean of formation at Immaculate Heart of Mary Seminary in Winona, Minn., was an early Totus Tuus volunteer. He points out that, nationally, more than 20 priests have been volunteers, and he credits Totus Tuus in playing a role in their vocation. Nearly as many young women volunteers entered religious life, he adds.
Baum relates how the K4J director in her parish wrote parents explaining Christ in the Eucharist and inviting them to come to reconciliation during VBS.
“I thought that said a lot about having the sacrament available to the parents on a Wednesday morning,” Baum says. They kept the priest busy in the confessional for more than an hour and a half.
Barb Avery indelibly remembers last year's K4J focus on baptism and the Holy Spirit.
“Someone invited one family that was not baptized,” she says. “They came, had a great time and learned a great deal. After going through the camp, they were all baptized. The family realized they wanted to have a relationship with Christ and all wanted to be Catholic.”
There's no limit to what a good VBS can accomplish.
Joseph Pronechen writes from Trumbull, Connecticut.
Information
Liguori Publications
liguori.org
Totus Tuus
denvertotustuus.com
K4J Summertime Blast
catholickidsnet.org
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Joseph Pronechen ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Buffalo Diocese Keeps Tabs on Religion Class DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:BUFFALO, N.Y. — After 30 years as a religious educator, Annette Breen is happy to report that Catholic textbooks are back to teaching about the things that “make us Catholic.”
The director of religious education at St. Francis of Assisi parish in Athol Springs, N.Y., uses Harcourt Religion Publishers’ Call to Faith series, which she likes because “it talks about things that haven't been talked about for years in textbooks — like the precepts and marks of the Church. … It does define being Catholic.”
Call to Faith is on the U.S. bishops’ Conformity Listing of Catechetical Texts and Series, meaning it has been reviewed and found to be in accord with the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Since 1996, the bishops have been evaluating catechetical textbooks for conformity with the Catechism. The list is updated quarterly and posted on the bishops’ website at usccb.org.
Many dioceses now are using the list to guide the textbook choices made by principals and directors of religious education. As part of a series, the Register is examining 20 dioceses with the largest elementary school populations to learn whether they are using textbooks in conformity with the Catechism.
Breen, whose parish is in the Buffalo Diocese, said she selected the Harcourt series mainly because it was new last year, and the publisher offered catechist editions at no cost as an incentive. Previously, she had used Benziger's Share the Joy, which also is on the conformity list.
The Buffalo Diocese, she said, directs catechists to use textbooks in conformity with the Catechism. She is confident that most religion texts available for use today are in accord with the Catechism, and added, “I certainly wouldn't have picked something that wasn't.”
However, not all religious educators in the diocese are aware of the listing, or even the importance of using accepted texts. Some are using outdated books or programs that incorporate materials not reviewed by the bishops.
At Queen of Heaven Parish in West Seneca, N.Y., for example, Brown-ROA's Crossroads series, which is not on the conformity listing, is being used for Grades 7 and 8 in the religious education program. Sister of St. Mary of Namur Lori High, pastoral minister, said she did not choose the books, which were in place before she arrived. She also uses Loyola Press’ Confirmed in the Spirit, which is in conformity with the Catechism, for sacramental preparation.
St. Edmund's Parish in Tonawanda, N.Y., still has the 1995 version of Sadlier's Coming to Faith series in use for the first, third and fourth grades of the religious education program. Only the 1998 and 1999 versions of that series are in conformity.
The bishops’ committee on catechetical texts keeps any recommended changes between themselves and the publishers.
Elaine Volker, director of religious education at St. Edmund's, said the parish is getting new texts for those grades, but has not been able to do so until now because of limited finances. Volker said she was not familiar with the bishops’ conformity listing and depends on the diocesan guidelines for direction in choosing books.
St. James Parish in Jamestown, N.Y., meanwhile, uses Celebrating the Lectionary, a program that supplies lesson plans but no textbook. Julie Rodriguez, St. James’ director of religious education, said she alternates between that program and another lectionary-based one called Living the Good News, supplementing both with articles and activities.
She said she follows a diocesan curriculum, which outlines what should be covered each year, and was only slightly familiar with the bishops’ conformity listing of textbooks.
“I just know that it's something that exists, but I don't really use it, no,” she said. “My guess is the diocese uses it to put their curriculum together and therefore there's a trickle-down effect.”
Parents Don't Know
Likewise, St. Joseph University parish in Buffalo does not use textbooks from the conformity listing for its religious-education program. The parish blends classroom sessions for which the lectionary-based Pflaum Gospel Weeklies, a resource not included on the bishops’ list, serves as the text, with Generations of Faith, a program in which adults and children learn as a community.
Produced by the Center for Ministry Development, which provides planning guides, prayers, “learning experiences” and home activities, Generations of Faith is seen by some as an effective way to involve parents in their children's religious education, but the materials are not on the bishops’ conformity listing.
Diane Lampitt, president of Harcourt Religion Publishers, which publishes the Generations resource materials, said that because the program is not a catechetical series and has no content piece specifically for a child, it is not submitted to the bishops for review. She said the program is published and promoted as a supplement to Harcourt's Call to Faith catechetical series, which is on the conformity listing, and most parishes use it as a supplement.
Arlene Meyerhofer, a mother of three and parish religious education teacher who is part of a team investigating a transition to Generations of Faith at St. Leo the Great Parish in Amherst, N.Y., likes the program because it draws parents into their children's catechesis. She said textbooks are only a small piece of religious education and that without parental involvement and reinforcement, children do not retain what they learn in class.
Carol McLaughlin, who teaches and has children in the religious-education program at St. Francis in Athol Springs, said she has found that many parents of her students have lost sight of what their faith is about.
“A lot of parents don't know what we believe,” she said. “A lot think the Eucharist is a symbol. They don't know it's the actual body and blood of [Christ.]”
Many parents were not properly catechized as children and thus cannot pass on the faith, Breen said, adding, “I think they have a hard time helping their children be Catholic because they don't know how to do it themselves.”
She said her parish adopted Generations of Faith as a supplement to the classroom program to catechize parents.
“We're just trying to help the parents understand what it is they're called to do,” she said. “Kids get it, but if they don't take it home and do something with it, it doesn't make any difference.”
‘We Kind of Coach Them'
When programs like Generations of Faith are used, ideally they should be supplemented with other resources like textbooks, said Mary Beth Coates, director of religious education for the Buffalo Diocese.
New Orleans Archbishop Alfred Hughes, chairman of the U.S. Bishops’ Committee on Catechesis, concurs, saying he would have difficulty with a program that did not use catechetical texts or materials in conformity with the Catechism.
“It would not be fulfilling what the Church asks in regard to catechesis,” he said.
Coates said the Buffalo Diocese does not require parishes using alternative programs like Generations to supplement them with textbooks, but tells religious educators that when textbooks are used they must be diocesan-approved.
“Typically in this day and age, it means they have to be on the conformity listing of the U.S. bishops,” she said.
However, she said it would be difficult to know whether everyone is following the policy, adding, “We have 267 parishes here in Buffalo and three full-time staff members in the diocesan office. We want to work as collaborators in a support system rather than a police department.”
Coates said diocesan officials learn what books are being used through a statistical profile that religious education directors are asked to complete each year.
She said she thinks most catechists in the diocese are using books from the conformity listing. If she notices from the profiles that someone is using outdated materials or something that doesn't follow the diocesan curriculum closely enough, she said, “We kind of coach them into looking at other options that might accomplish whatever they liked about the other series that has a fuller recognition of the Catechism and our curriculum.”
Asked whether he planned to strengthen the current diocesan policy on textbooks, Buffalo Bishop Edward Kmiec said through a spokesman, “Textbooks selected for use in our classrooms must have an imprimatur and be approved by the diocese. Approved religious education texts follow the diocesan curricula.”
In response to another question about whether he was concerned that out-of-conformity texts were being used in some parishes, the bishop replied through a spokesman by citing the current policy, which states that the diocese annually reviews catechetical textbooks being used to make sure they are in conformity with the Catechism and deals with publishers who are aware of the conformity requirements.
Judy Roberts is based in Graytown, Ohio.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Judy Roberts ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: She Left Luther for Mary DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Jennifer Ferrara was a Lutheran pastor.
Now she's a Catholic lay woman.
She converted from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in 1998.
She co-authored The Catholic Mystique (Our Sunday Visitor), a collection of stories by 14 women who defy the popular notion that the Catholic Church is no place for bright, articulate women. Ferrara spoke with Register correspondent Judy Roberts.
I grew up a Missouri Synod Lutheran on a seminary campus and I loved it. I would say I was steeped in the traditions and theology of Lutheranism.
The Missouri Synod has always emphasized preaching, and I enjoyed listening to excellent sermons. The music is something I still miss: the really great hymns and the way Lutherans would sing them with such enthusiasm.
I attended the funeral of my 97-year-old Lutheran grandmother last summer, and there were not many people in the church, but those people sang louder and with more gusto than I hear in most Catholic parishes with hundreds of people. They made that “joyful noise unto the Lord.”
But on the downside, I lived through the breakup of Concordia Seminary.
My father taught there when the majority of the faculty was expelled, and he was one of them. At dispute was the nature of the authority of Scripture. It certainly made me aware of an endemic problem with Protestantism, which is the constant schism, as one group after another think they have the truth. Later I would realize we need a magisterium to interpret Scripture and Tradition.
How did you happen to become a pastor?
I was a fourth-generation Lutheran pastor. For that reason, it was not really an unusual choice for me.
In college, I majored in history, but after taking several courses in religion, I realized my true area of interest lay in theology and church history. From there, I went to Princeton Theological Seminary. I met other like-minded folk who cared deeply about religion and a few truly extraordinary and holy people. I enjoyed all my courses and my field education in a Lutheran parish.
By the end of my first year, I was sure I had found my profession — I wanted to be a parish pastor.
What caused you to question being Lutheran?
The very first time I questioned my standing as a Lutheran is when Father Richard John Neuhaus — at the time “Pastor Neuhaus” — left the Lutheran Church to become Roman Catholic.
That was an earth-shattering event for many of us in the Lutheran Church because he was the de facto leader of the “evangelical catholics.” Those are Lutherans who view Lutheranism as a reform movement within and for the one church of Christ and believe they have a responsibility to work toward reconciliation with Rome. So when Neuhaus left, it seemed as if he had given up on the cause. His move made me confront the fact that Lutheranism is just another Protestant denomination.
However, because I was an ordained female and wanted to remain one, I chose to ignore the implications of his move for several years.
How did you meet the co-author of
I met Patricia because we both were going through the process of becoming Lutheran pastors at the same time. The first time we met was in the bishop's office in the New Jersey Synod. We found that we were on similar wavelengths.
Our journeys were separate, but they were also together, because we talked constantly.
After I read [former Lutheran pastor] Leonard Kline's article in Lutheran Forum criticizing the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's decision to cover the cost of abortions for employees and their dependents, Patricia was the first person I called. I told her I was hyperventilating.
I said, “What are we going to do?”
She was much farther along and later said, “Of course we're becoming Roman Catholic.”
In your story, you talk about a seminal retreat with the Sisters of Life in New York. What occurred there to move you more rapidly toward conversion?
At the time I went on this retreat, I had entered a time of great spiritual dryness. I was in no man's land. I knew that I couldn't remain a Lutheran, but I could not bring myself to be a Roman Catholic. It was in the midst of this that Patricia insisted we go on this retreat for pro-life professional women at the Sisters of Life in New York. And I did not want to go — in part it was because I did not like the retreats I had been on in the past as a pastor. They usually involved a lot of talking and sharing, and that was not the frame of mind I was in.
This couldn't have been more different.
This mostly involved spending time in worship and silence, which was an entirely new concept to me. We also attended talks, and it just so happened that the talks for that weekend were on the writings of St. Teresa of Avila.
I found myself listening to an understanding of the spiritual life, which, even though I had been through seminary and considered myself theologically astute, I had never encountered before. The presenter was talking about the dark night of the soul, the night of the spirit, those spiritually arid periods in our lives and how they often are steps toward a deeper union with God. That our times of despair can be part of that progress was a really new idea for me. It helped to make sense of what I was going through.
And, though I did not receive the Eucharist, we had adoration of the Eucharist. For the first time, I genuinely longed to receive the true body and blood of Christ with my heart, and I wanted that intimacy with Christ.
You tell in the book how your Catholic neighbor was shocked when you shared with her your thoughts about converting. What did you say to her and others who considered your move “a giant step backward”?
I did not answer my neighbor at the time. I was so taken aback that I don't remember responding to her in any sort of cogent fashion.
At first, I answered others by saying there are things that are vastly more important than how the Church views women. In the very beginning, I had not fully appreciated and embraced the Catholic understanding of masculinity and femininity. So I was saying that it wasn't as important when compared to the issue of abortion or the ordination of homosexuals.
Since then, I have found that the Catholic understanding of femininity and masculinity is one of the great gifts of the Church not only to its own members, but, I'm convinced, to the world.
How did Mary figure in your conversion?
As with many people who have converted, when I look back over my life I see that Mary seemed to be involved all along. There was the time I prayed to Mary while still a Lutheran. I was in a Roman Catholic chapel in a Jesuit spiritual center and there was a statue of Mary in the center and I found myself actually seeking her help for the first time.
Even before I felt as though the prayer was answered, I felt a sense of peace and comfort. I have to admit I filed it away, compartmentalized it and didn't try doing that again for some time.
Then there is the story I tell in the book about the stained-glass window in my Lutheran church that had a symbol of Mary on it, which makes no sense in a German, Pennsylvania-Dutch church. I found myself being drawn to Mary in part because the Lutheran church and all Protestant denominations, for that matter, do not have any female role models. People's perception of the Catholic Church is that it's anti-female. And nothing could be further from the truth.
It's the Protestant churches that are starkly masculine. They jettisoned devotion to Mary and the saints and that left people with no female role models. I found myself very much drawn to Mary as a role model of female holiness. Several of the women in the book found themselves drawn by Mary before they even thought of becoming Roman Catholic. I think that's because she is the womb and archetype of the Church, so it makes sense they would feel her presence.
The Church is a living entity that beckons to us. And I think that often takes the form of the Blessed Mother beckoning to us because she is the archetype of the Church.
Judy Roberts is based in Graytown, Ohio.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Judy Roberts ----- KEYWORDS: Inperson -------- TITLE: Blessed Be The Lower Middle Class DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:God bless me, I'm a poor guy with money.
Maybe I should explain. I'm an attorney in a small Midwestern town with a regional corporate and estate planning practice. I work hard, and make what most would consider good money, especially since the cost of living in southwest Michigan is low. I also don't have many debts. My father's ample salary paid for college and law school, so my earnings have always been available for savings and my mortgage.
Monetarily blessed, I am.
But I don't seem to be able to afford a lot of things that other people enjoy.
It struck me last month when I attended a conference on Mackinac Island, a fairly pricey tourist spot on Lake Huron that is accessible only by ferry, just five miles from the Mackinac Bridge.
As the ferry moved from the mainland, I saw my 2000 Venture Van sandwiched by SUVs and Lincolns. When I got to the island, I saw lots of people with expensive bicycles and remembered that my well-worn Schwinn is more than five years old. I saw people nonchalantly drop serious dollars on over-priced memorabilia and artsy stuff, or pay $5 for a hot dog or pay $500 for one night at the Grand Hotel, possibly the most luxurious hotel in Michigan.
Don't get me wrong. I wasn't dwelling on these things. They just kind of quietly lumbered in the bowels of my mind, like the way my crawling baldness does.
Then, on my last morning there, while trying to grab a quick breakfast at a deli, a young couple with their little son and best Tommy Hilfiger leisure look came in and mused over the offerings, including a dozen types of coffee.
After a few moments, the wife asked the worker, politely but with a small air of anxiety, “Do you have mild Starbucks?”
The closest I've come to Starbucks is that “Glenn, Glenn, Glenn” commercial. I would have thought the 12 types of coffee on the menu board pretty much exhausted the list (though on reflection I now realize that “Mocha Cow Cud” wasn't up there either).
Inside, I shook my head. It never would have occurred to me to inquire about a coffee not listed on that board.
It reminded me of a friend who dined at a fine California restaurant and commented to the waiter that she didn't recognize any of wines on the list.
“Those,” the waiter snootily replied, “are the waters.”
The possibility of such a wide assortment of waters wasn't part of her mental landscape, just as the blossoming variety of coffees isn't part of mine.
Since that exchange, I started thinking about all the other things that aren't part of my mental landscape: How to stock a 4,000-square-foot house with nice furniture; the hottest vacation spots; what designer clothes will make me look the most with-it; and what SUV handles best on super-smooth freeways.
For the most part, I don't think about those things for the same reason my friend doesn't think about gourmet waters: It's simply something she can't afford. And even if a financial windfall made it affordable, she probably wouldn't buy it because she doesn't live in a world where such things have a place.
I think it's a blessed state.
Which isn't a stretch. Jesus, after all, blessed the poor.
I had always interpreted the blessing to mean that the poor will do well in the next world, like disease-infected Lazarus in Abraham's bosom.
But in this era when mass society is affluent society, I'm beginning to think it applies to this world, right now.
“Blessed are the poor, for you won't worry about the fashionableness of your car. Blessed are the poor, for you will not think about the difference between Pellegrino and Eddie Bauer waters. Blessed are the poor, for you won't know when your clothes are out of style. Blessed are the poor, for you won't find yourself dissatisfied when the dozen coffee choices don't include mild Starbucks.”
I'm beginning to think that the lower middle-class in America might have it the best: Blessed are the lower middle class in America, for you have enough to live comfortably, but not enough to consume yourself with the comforts.
As the sole wage earner who seeks to provide average comforts for his family, to put his seven children though college and to retire before age 105, I put myself in the lower middle class as far as disposable income goes.
It rarely bothers me that I enjoy far fewer of the creature comforts enjoyed by others, but sometimes the materialistic whimsy rears its head, like when I kind of wished I had the nice Lincoln that I saw next to my van. Then I overhead that lady inquire about mild Starbucks.
As I walked away, I was no longer merely “not bothered” by the lack of moneyed things in my life. I was elated by it.
Now, re-reading the above, I suppose for my next virtue I'll have to root out reverse snobbishness.
Eric Scheske publishes
The Daily Eudemon.
www.EricScheske.com/blog
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Eric Scheske ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: Blind Eye? DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:WASHINGTON, D.C. — When the prime minister of Vietnam visited the United States in late June, the Bush administration gave a lot of attention to trade and military cooperation.
But what about the persecution of religious people? Vietnam is, after all, still a communist country.
Human rights advocates say Bush practically ignored the topic after he met with Phan Van Khai June 21.
“You used the right word; he ‘mentioned'” religious freedom, said Rep. Christopher Smith, R-N.J., who chairs the House Subcommittee on Africa, Global Human Rights and International Relations. “I'm disappointed he did not use strong diplomatic language” to send a clear signal to Khai that the United States does not approve of such behavior.
The president “had an engraved invitation to put this issue on center stage,” he added.
But the only reference Bush made to it was this: “We signed a landmark agreement that will make it easier for people to worship freely in Vietnam.” That agreement, though, was actually made in May, and it has not been made public.
The State Department, at the request of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, has designated Vietnam as a “country of particular concern” in regards to religious freedom, according to the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act.
That list contains countries like Saudi Arabia and North Korea. Once a country has received “country of particular concern” status, the president has several options to sanction it. Sanctions can be avoided, however, if the country signs a binding agreement with the United States that addresses the religious freedom violations.
The secrecy surrounding the “landmark agreement” on freedom of worship in Vietnam does not make Nina Shea very happy. The vice-chairwoman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom issued a press release June 22 calling for the State Department to release the contents of the agreement.
“This is a tragic move and a tragic signal that the United States can be appeased with a secret agreement” on religious freedom in order to get at the seemingly more important issues of trade and military cooperation, Shea told the Register.
Susan Dittman, a State Department spokeswoman, said it was not being disclosed under a provision that allows it be kept from the public if revealing it would jeopardize its implementation. However, she could not say what reasons the department had for believing that would happen.
Smith said he will ask the State Department directly for the agreement.
“This isn't the Manhattan Project,” he said. He accused the Bush administration of being “secretive” on human rights and said that the failure to disclose “is in and of itself a bad sign.”
“You can't have the flowery language without the details,” he said. “Otherwise, how do you hold them to account?”
Smith has already taken action on the issue. The day before Khai's visit with Bush, he held a hearing on human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam. All of those who testified were clear — despite the agreement, religious freedom violations continue unabated.
John Hanford is the U.S. State Department ambassador-at-large for religious freedom issues. At a May press briefing on the agreement, he said that Vietnam had issued decrees prohibiting the forced renunciation of faith and mandating the training of local officials to be more tolerant of religious practice.
But Helen Ngo, chairwoman of the Committee for Religious Freedom in Vietnam, based in Bethesda, Md., called the decrees “a step backward.”
She told Smith's subcommittee that two priests in Vietnam, Fathers Nguyen Huu Giai and Phan Van Loi, wrote that the decrees “practically give the local authorities full control of all religious activities. Local government officials now can do whatever they want, causing uncountable obstacles to the appointment of clergy members, to the registration of seminarians, to the organization of religious activities, and to the demand for the return of confiscated Church properties.
“Both Catholic priests are under house arrest,” Ngo stated.
Nguyen Thang Tranh, chairman of the Vietnam Human Rights Network in Garden Grove, Calif., confirmed the priests’ observations. The decrees, he said, “create more conditions to control religion than to allow it. For instance, anytime you have a religious activity with more than five people, you have to apply for a permit.”
Catholics are not the only targets of the communist government's suppression. Evangelical Protestants, Baptists and various strains of Buddhism have come under fire as well. The government also targets two ethnic minorities, the Hmong and the Montagnard.
“The Montagnard are severely punished not for violating the law, but for being indigenous people, persecuted for their Christian faith and political views,” Y-Khim Nie told the subcommittee.
Nie, is a Montagnard (in French, “mountain dweller”), and now lives as a refugee in North Carolina. His people live in the central highlands and were helpful to U.S. soldiers during the Vietnam War. The Hmong live in Vietnam and Cambodia and were also helpful to the U.S. during the war.
Ngo also cited testimony from a Protestant pastor, Pham Dinh Nhan: “However, there have been many signs showing that this document is aimed at dealing with the international community rather than reflecting a real change in policy.”
The central government, he said, is “letting local authorities continue to oppress Protestant groups. … In reality, the situation is becoming worse. … As a matter of fact, just this Sunday night, June 19, 2005, there were 16 believers who were at Pastor Nguyen Hong Quang's house. The police came and ordered them to disperse; the police also filed a report on them.”
During Khai's visit, Bush accepted an invitation to visit Vietnam next year. Between now and then, Smith said he plans to hold another four or five hearings on the matter to make sure that Vietnam is making progress.
In addition, he has reintroduced a bill, the Vietnam Human Rights Act, which would limit non-humanitarian spending in Vietnam until the country can show it has improved its human rights record. The bill has passed the House twice, but has never never received approval from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Thomas A. Szyszkiewicz is based in Peterson, Minnesota.
----- EXCERPT: Bush's Focus on Vietnam Trade Ignores Human Rights, Say Critics ----- EXTENDED BODY: Thomas A. Szyszkiewicz ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Weekly TV Picks DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:MONDAY, JULY 4
A Capitol Fourth (2005)
PBS, 8 p.m.
The National Symphony Orchestra plays patriotic themes as this 90-minute Independence Day gala in Washington, D.C., celebrates its 25th anniversary. Guests include the Beach Boys, Gloria Estefan, the O'Jays and Irish tenor Ronan Tynan.
MONDAY, JULY 4
Bank of America Presents:
An American Celebration
at Ford's Theatre —
Salute to the Troops
ABC, 10 p.m.
Taped June 12, this hourlong tribute to our military personnel features host Jeff Foxworthy, the Singing Sergeants chorus of the U.S. Air Force, Bill Conti and the American Celebration Orchestra, U.S. Marine Josh Chacin and many stars. Advisory: Rated TV-PG.
MONDAY, JULY 4
Boston Pops Fireworks
Spectacular
CBS, 10 p.m.
From the Esplanade by the Charles River, the Boston Pops under Keith Lockhart once again celebrates love of country on “the glorious Fourth.” As always, the finale will feature Tchaikovsky's “1812 Overture,” cannon fire and all.
TUESDAY, JULY 5
Classroom: Paul Revere
A&E, 7 a.m.
On the unforgettable night of April 18-19, 1775, American patriots Paul Revere (1735-1818) and William Dawes rode out to warn the people of Lexington and Concord, Mass., that British regulars were coming to disarm them. “The fate of a nation was riding that night,” wrote Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in his poem, “Paul Revere's Ride,” and this show gives us insights into Revere's life, character and love of liberty.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 6
Grand Canyon
History Channel, 10 a.m.
“And carven by his power/Rocks are his written words,” wrote the Irish poet and rebel Joseph Mary Plunkett. God certainly had a lot to say, then, when he made the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River. This two-hour show documents the canyon's beauty.
THURSDAYS
Challenge & Change
Familyland TV, 10 p.m.
Do you need extra ideas on sanctifying your daily life? Raising your children as good Catholics? Connecting with other Catholic families? The Apostolate for Family Consecration has practical tips on all these goals and more. Re-airs Fridays at 1:30 p.m., Mondays at 6 a.m., Tuesdays at 1 a.m. and 10:30 p.m. and Wednesdays at 9 a.m.
SATURDAY, JULY 9
Teresa de Los Andes
EWTN, 1 p.m.
“A Carmelite sanctifies herself in order to make all the Church's members holy,” wrote the mystic St. Teresa of Jesus (1900-1920), who was born Juanita Fernandez Solar. She entered the monastery of the Discalced Carmelite sisters at Los Andes, Chile, in May 1919 and died of typhus the next April. Every year, 75,000 or more Chilean young people make a 17-mile pilgrimage in her honor. This eight-hour film about her is in Spanish with English subtitles.
Dan Engler writes from Santa Barbara, California.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Dan Engler ----- KEYWORDS: Arts -------- TITLE: Vatican Media Watch DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Pope Says Church Can Never Accept Abortion
REUTERS, June 21 — Pope Benedict, in his first book published since his election, says the Catholic Church can never accept laws allowing abortion because there is no such thing as “small murders.”
The Europe of Benedict — In the Crisis of Cultures, is a compilation of three major addresses he gave between 1992 and 2005, when he was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and headed the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the body that safeguards doctrinal orthodoxy.
“Why don't we resign ourselves to the fact that we lost that battle and dedicate our energies instead to projects where we can find greater social consensus?” he asked rhetorically, and answered: “because this would be a superficial and hypocritical solution.
“There is no such thing as ‘small murders,'” he wrote. “Respect for every single life is an essential condition for anything worthy of being called social life.”
Bishops’ Conference Meets to ‘Restore Hope'
AGENZIA GIORNALISTICA ITALIA, June 20 — The Italian Bishops Conference will seek to “restore hope Among the Italians, who seem to have lost it,” at its national general meeting, the Italian news service reported.
The meeting, which will be held Oct. 16-20, 2006, in Verona, will focus on theological virtue of hope to be placed at the center of Christian communities “opposing the sense of uncertainty, blindness, tiredness and desperation of modern society,” according to a statement issued by the conference.
The statement further said, “Forty years after the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council, the Church wants to take its cue from the Council's intent and give new momentum to the Gospel of hope.”
Vatican Aids CBS in John Paul II Miniseries
REUTERS, June 17 — CBS television has given producers the go-ahead for a big-budget miniseries charting the life of the late Pope John Paul II, with guidance from the Vatican, the network said.
No casting decisions on the pope project had been made, a CBS spokesman said. Principal production was set to begin in Rome in midsummer, with the miniseries expected to premiere as early as the fall.
The script was written under the supervision of the Vatican, which also granted producers access to exclusive footage for the program in and around St. Peter's Square, said CBS, which is owned by media conglomerate Viacom Inc.
“We're really doing this on a large scale,” Bela Bajaria, senior network vice president for movies and miniseries, told the entertainment trade publication The Hollywood Reporter. “It's a fascinating story.”
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican -------- TITLE: A Dose of 'Evangelical Catholic' Thinking DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:TRUTH AND TOLERANCE: CHRISTIAN BELIEF AND WORLD RELIGIONS
by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger
Ignatius Press, 2004
284 pages, $15.95
To order: (800) 651-1531
or Ignatius.com
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations … teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20).
If only the Great Commission were an easy task. Christ's last words to the disciples before his heavenly ascent highlighted the Church's mission, which continues to the present day. If it is true that many of the pagan beliefs encountered then are no longer prevalent today, it is equally true that they have been superseded by a vast array of other philosophies that are no more efficacious. It is clear that we still have work to do.
Enter the Pope formerly known as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. As prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he worked tirelessly to make the Catholic understandable to those who don't hold it — and to safeguard it from those within who would introduce theological errors or advance dubious doctrinal developments.
It is a gift, then, that we have Pope Benedict XVI's wide-ranging thoughts on what we might call “evangelical Catholic theology” collected in this very readable collection of essays and speeches written between 1963 and 2001.
Could any single volume do justice to such a wide swath of this great thinker's prodigious output? Yes, albeit with its author's own acknowledgement that the writings are necessarily “fragmentary and unfinished” when presented.
For most of us, though, there's more than enough solid food to chew on here. And it's timely, too. For example, one theme addressed, the relationship between faith and culture, emerges at a time when the cultural center of vibrant Christianity is moving away from the West and toward Africa and Asia.
Mindful of the proposal sometimes offered that Christianity is merely a European spiritual form, unsuitable for other cultures, Ratzinger discusses and ultimately disagrees. “For the knowledge that man must turn toward God, and toward what is eternal, is found right across all the cultures; the knowledge about sin, repentance and forgiveness; the knowledge concerning communion with God and eternal life; and finally the knowledge of the basic rules of morality, as they are found in the form of the Ten Commandments.”
For those who like their morning coffee to be of the “instant” variety, be forewarned that this book at times requires patience. Ratzinger presupposes a certain familiarity with various philosophers and thinkers, ranging from Plato to Kant to Rousseau. Readers lacking such a familiarity will undoubtedly want to take it slow. But no such effort will be left unrewarded.
Ratzinger's style is methodical and thorough. Though dealing with contentious issues, he is charitable to everyone, yet does not sacrifice clarity or assertiveness when required. He also retains a healthy appreciation for the genuine faith of everyday people, as contrasted with the sometimes-diseased notions of their more “educated” peers.
“Living in beautiful fictions,” he writes, “may be something that people who hold theories about religion can do; for the person who is asking himself how he can live and die, and for what, they are not enough.”
On balance, Truth and Tolerance lays the groundwork for a more rational discourse with other faiths. The work of evangelization is still our responsibility; however, anyone who takes seriously Christ's command to make new disciples will find the new Pope to be a good friend indeed.
Daniel J. Wambeke writes from St. Paul, Minnesota.
----- EXCERPT: Weekly Book Pick ----- EXTENDED BODY: Daniel J. Wambeke ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: The Lord Saves Us from All Danger DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Register Summary
Pope Benedict XVI met with 31,000 people during his general audience June 22. He offered some reflections on Psalm 124, a song of joy and thanksgiving to God for saving his people from evil.
“During his lifetime, man is surrounded by the snares of the wicked that not only threaten his life but also seek to destroy all human values,” Pope Benedict XVI remarked. “However, the Lord intervenes and watches over and saves the just.” Departing from his prepared text, he observed, “In a sense, this psalm is still relevant today.”
Whenever God's people were threatened by enemies who rose against them — like raging waters about to engulf them or hunters stalking them like birds of prey — the Lord was at their side, the Holy Father noted. He came to their help and rescued them from danger.
“Even when all human hope has disappeared, God's liberating power can appear,” he said. Pope Benedict XVI once again set aside his prepared text: “The Lord only desires our well-being and in this we find our trust and certainty.”
St. Augustine, he pointed out, gives a two-part interpretation of the psalm. First, he saw it as a song of the martyrs in heaven, rejoicing that God has delivered them from their sufferings and rewarded them with the crown of Glory. “St. Augustine was speaking about the martyrs from all ages, including our own century,” the Holy Father observed. St. Augustine also saw this psalm as the song of the Church on earth, expressing our confident hope that whatever difficulties may befall us, the Lord will be at our side.
We have here before us Psalm 124, which is a song of thanksgiving that the entire community gathered in prayer lifts up in praise to God for his gift of liberation. At the very beginning, the psalmist issues an invitation: “Let Israel say” (verse 1), to encourage all the people to lift up a hearty and sincere song of thanksgiving to God, their Savior. If the Lord had not been on their side when they were victims, they would have been powerless to free themselves with the limited resources they had, and their adversaries, like beasts, would have torn them to pieces and crushed them.
Although it has been suggested that the reference is to a specific historical event, such as the end of the Babylonian exile, it is more likely that the psalm is a hymn of thanksgiving to the Lord for providing safety from danger, and a plea for deliverance from every evil.
After the reference at the beginning to those “people” who rose up against the faithful and were capable of “swallowing them up alive” (see verses 2-3), there are two parts to the psalm. In the first part, the raging waters play a dominant role and are a symbol in the Bible of devastating chaos, evil and death: “The waters would have engulfed us, the torrent overwhelmed us; seething waters would have drowned us” (verses 4-5). At this point, however, the psalmist feels as though he is on the shore, having been miraculously saved from the fury of the sea.
The Lord Saves the Just
During his lifetime, man is surrounded by the snares of the wicked, which not only threaten his life but also seek to destroy all human values. However, the Lord intervenes and watches over and saves the just, as Psalm 18 proclaims: “He reached down from on high and seized me; drew me out of the deep waters. He rescued me from my mighty enemy and foes too powerful for me. … The Lord came to my support. He set me free in the open; he rescued me because he loves me” (verses 17-20).
In the second part of this song of thanksgiving, we move from images of the sea to a hunting scene, which is typical of many of the psalms of supplication (see Psalm 124:6-8). Reference is made to a wild beast that locks its fangs on its prey, and to a fowler's snare that has captured a bird. However, the blessing that is expressed in the psalm helps us to understand that the fate of the faithful, which was death, has been radically changed by a life-saving intervention: “Blessed be the Lord, who did not leave us to be torn by their fangs. We escaped with our lives like a bird from the fowler's snare; the snare was broken and we escaped” (verses 6-7).
At this point his prayer becomes a sigh of relief that rises from the depths of his soul: Even when all human hope has disappeared, God's liberating power can appear. Thus, the psalm ends with a profession of faith, which made its way into our Christian liturgy centuries ago as the ideal preface to all prayer: Adiutorium nostrum in nomine Domini, qui fecit caelum et terram [Our help is in the name of the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth] (verse 8). In a particular way, God, who is almighty, allies himself with those who are victims and those who are persecuted, “who call out to him day and night,” and “he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily” (see Luke 18:7-8).
‘Sing With Hope'
St. Augustine has left us an articulated commentary on this psalm. In the first part, he observes that the “members of Christ who have reached a state of happiness” fittingly sing this psalm. So, in particular, “the holy martyrs, who, having left this world are with Christ in happiness, sing this psalm and are ready to take up again their incorruptible bodies, the same bodies that were corruptible before. During their lifetime, they suffered tortures in their bodies, but in eternity their tortures will be transformed into emblems of righteousness.”
In the second part, however, the bishop from Hippo tells us that we too can sing this psalm with hope: “We, too, inspired by a hope that is sure, will sing in exultation. Those who are singing the psalm are not strangers to us. …Therefore, let us all sing with one heart, both the saints who already possess the crown as well as those of us who lovingly unite ourselves to their crown. Together we desire the life that we do not have here below, but that we will never be able to have unless we have desired it in the first place.”
St. Augustine then returns to his first point and goes on to explain: “The saints look back on the sufferings they faced and, from the place of happiness and tranquility in which they find themselves, look at the road they traveled to attain it. Since it would have been difficult to attain deliverance if the hand of the Deliverer had not intervened to help them, filled with joy they exclaim, ‘Had not the Lord been with us!’ That is how their song begins. So great is their rejoicing that they do not even say what they have been delivered from” (Esposizione sul Salmo 124, 3: Nuova Biblioteca Agostiniana, XXVIII, Rome, 1977, p. 65).
(Register translation)
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: World Media Watch DATE: 03/07/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: July 3-9, 2005 ----- BODY:Bishops Decry Zimbabwe's Clampdown
THE SCOTSMAN, June 20 — Church leaders in Zimbabwe yesterday condemned Robert Mugabe's “cruel” clampdown on street traders and shanty town dwellers, saying it “cries out to God for vengeance,” the international website reported.
The government's operation may have left more than 1.5 million people without homes and livelihoods, according to United Nations officials. Police also have arrested more than 30,000 vendors, accusing them of dealing in black market goods and attempting to sabotage Zimbabwe's economy, which has 80% unemployment.
According to the report, nine archbishops, bishops and administrators of Church dioceses, in a formal message to an estimated 1 million churchgoers, said: “Any claim to justify this operation becomes totally groundless in view of the cruel and inhumane means that have been used. We condemn the gross injustice done to the poor.”
Ukrainian Patriarch Reaches out to Rome
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, June 19 — One of Ukraine's top religious leaders told The Associated Press he sees no obstacles to greater cooperation between the Orthodox Church and the Vatican.
“Today the task and mission of Christian churches — Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant — is to support moral values and support spirituality and morality in European civilization,” Patriarch Filaret said. “We don't need to be afraid of Rome, or the Greek Catholics.” The Moscow Patriarchate has accused the Church of encroaching on its territory, and blocked the late Pope John Paul II's long-held wish to visit Russia, the world's most populous Orthodox nation.
Patriarch Filaret, head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church's Kiev Patriarchate, said the churches have much in common and should cooperate in emphasizing the importance of the family and moral values.
Canadaian Priest Prays for Prime Minister
THE CANADIAN PRESS, June 20 — Father Francis Geremia of Montreal is praying that Canada's Catholic Prime Minister Paul Martin changes his stance on homosexual “marriage,” the news service reported.
Father Geremia delivered his message in Italian in a homily during a weekend Mass in Montreal. In a telephone interview Monday with The Canadian Press, the priest said Martin “has to be very careful because he might even lose his [district in the next general election]. You cannot have two faces: Either you serve God or you serve the devil.”
Calgary Bishop Fred Henry has added his voice to those against the homosexual “marriage” legislation, called Bill C-38. He said Catholic politicians who support the bill are putting their souls at risk. In addition, Father Geremia said he would continue to speak out against the legislation because his conscience requires that.
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