St. Anthony Messenger August 2019

Sharing the spirit of St. Francis with the world V O L . 1 2 7 / N O . 3 • AUGUST 2019

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FACING THE

OPIOID

CRISIS

ASSISI’S DANGEROUS SAINTS AUGUST 2019 • $4.99 StAnthonyMessenger.org

SPIRITUALITY AND THE 12 STEPS MARTYR OF AUSCHWITZ

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Compelling Journeys to Catholicism

◆ FROM FIRE, BY WATER

◆ SOMETHING OTHER THAN GOD

Ahmari’s amazing journey from strident Marxism and atheism of a youth misspent on both sides of the Atlantic to a spiritual awakening prompted by the Mass. A young intellectual’s finely crafted story at the intersection of the great ideas and events of our time.

Fulwiler’s journey from atheism to Catholicism reads like a thriller.

A poignant, profound and often funny tale of one woman who set out to find the meaning of life and discovered that true happiness sometimes requires losing it all.

Sohrab Ahmari

Jennifer Fulwiler

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◆ FAITH AND REASON

◆ AN IMMOVABLE FEAST

Using their finely honed reasoning skills, twelve philosophers explain their compelling reasons for believing in Christianity and entering the Catholic Church. Converts include Peter Kreeft, Edward Feser, J. Budziszewski, Candace Vogler, and Robert Koons.

FAREP . . . Sewn Softcover, $19.95

A winsome, page-turning read of the modern spiritual journey of a young convert from a fundamentalist Baptist childhood to the Catholic Church. Blanski’s profound love story reminds us that the Catholic religion is not dead because it is not mortal. It is the festival of heaven on earth. IMFEH . . . Sewn Hardcover, $22.95

◆ NIGHT’S BRIGHT DARKNESS

◆ FROM ISLAM TO CHRIST

An atheist poet’s powerful conversion story to Catholicism in nine electric months. Deeply anti-Catholic, in her research for a book about female sexuality she spoke with a Catholic priest, which led her on a dramatic spiritual quest that ended at the Vatican.

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Raised in Muslim Turkey, Little’s search for spiritual truth took her on an unlikely adventure from Turkey to England to the USA, and from Islam to Catholicism. Her story provides a window into both Islam and modernity, showing that the grace of God knows no bounds.

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◆ ROME SWEET HOME

◆ BEFORE THE DAWN

One of the most famous, influential, and best-selling conversion stories of all time. Scott, a Protestant minister and brilliant Scripture scholar was militantly anti-Catholic, until he discovered that his “enemy” had all the right answers. RSHP . . . Sewn Softcover, $16.95

The remarkable story of how the famous, revered Chief Rabbi of Rome, a Scripture & Talmudic scholar, entered the Catholic Church after World War II. Zolli describes himself as a "completed Jew", recognizing Jesus Christ as the Messiah and joining His Church.

Ed. By Brian Besong & Jonathan Fuqua

Sally Read

Scott and Kimberly Hahn

Tyler Blanski

Derya Little

Eugenio Zolli

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www.ignatius.com P.O. Box 1339, Ft. Collins, CO 80522

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VOL. 127 NO. 3

2019 AUGUST

COVER STORY

24 Facing the Opioid Crisis: A Catholic Response

By Katie Rutter

The country is struggling with an opioid crisis—but its strongest foothold is in the Midwest. Armed with their faith, these individuals are fighting back.

18 Clare and Francis:

Assisi’s Most Dangerous Citizens

By Pat McCloskey, OFM

Sometimes we are so attracted to saints for our own reasons that we fail to see how radical they were in their day.

COVER: STEVANOVICIGOR/FOTOSEARCH

32 Breathing Under Water

By Richard Rohr, OFM

Many find themselves drowning in some form of addiction.

This Franciscan friar and thought leader points out that the road to recovery parallels the path to salvation.

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COVER: Addiction to opioids has reached the level of an epidemic in the United States.

Many of those affected by the crisis have found faith to be a pivotal part of their recovery.

40 Martyr of Auschwitz

By Michelle Martin

St. Maximilian Kolbe laid down his life for another man at Auschwitz, confronting evil with charity. A friar who helped a Chicago parish obtain a relic of the saint shares his story.

46 Easing a Guilty Conscience

By Colleen M. Arnold, MD

Self-awareness is important, but it can be destructive when it turns into self-criticism. Ask yourself these questions before allowing guilt to invade your peace.

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St. Francis of Assisi said that the servant of the brothers should “not become angry at another’s fault but with all patience and humility let the servant admonish and support the other one.”

12 SPIRIT OF ST. FRANCIS

VOL. 127 NO. 3

2019 AUGUST

15 POINTS OF VIEW

10 Ask a Franciscan

5

Questioning God’s Plan

Your Voice

Letters from Readers

12 Franciscan World

14 Faith Unpacked

12 St. Anthony Stories

15 At Home on Earth

13 Followers of St. Francis

16 Editorial

St. John the Baptist Province

Finding Your Saint

Off the Beaten Path

Changing the Climate Change Narrative

Sister Mary Gianna, DLJC

Dream On

54 Faith & Family

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After the Rain

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MEDIA MATTERS 48 Reel Time

The Dead Don’t Die

51 Audio File

The National | I Am Easy to Find

50 Channel Surfing 52 Bookshelf This Giant Beast That Is the Global Economy

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From Fire by Water

55 ALSO IN THIS ISSUE 4 6 55 55 56

Dear Reader Church in the News Pete & Repeat Lighten Up! Reflection StAnthonyMessenger.org | August 2019 • 3

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dear reader

ST. ANTHONY

There but for the Grace of God . . .

W

henever I think about addiction, my cinema-obsessed mind immediately goes to director Darren Aronofsky’s brutal but brilliant 2000 film, Requiem for a Dream. Four characters dominate the narrative—all of them wrestling with drug dependency. And while my younger self reveled in the bleakness of this film, my older self can’t stomach it anymore. True for many casualties of addiction, Requiem is without redemption: None of the four characters could be salvaged.

The cover story for our August issue, by Katie Rutter, takes a look at the opioid crisis that plagues much of the Midwest, yet her article deftly juggles the epidemic and a faith-based approach to addressing it. Counselors and other medical professionals have their work cut out for them. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, more than 130 people in the United States die after overdosing on opioids every day. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that the total economic burden of prescription opioid misuse alone in the United States is $78.5 billion annually.

Along with Rutter’s article is an excerpt from one of our best-selling titles, Breathing Under Water, by Richard Rohr, OFM, who shows us how the Gospelinfused 12 Steps can help people ravaged by addiction.

If you or a loved one struggle with this disease, please know that we at Franciscan Media are praying for you.

MESSENGER PUBLISHER

Daniel Kroger, OFM PRESIDENT

Kelly McCracken EXECUTIVE EDITORS

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Easing a Guilty Conscience

Martyr of Auschwitz

Facing the Opioid Crisis

PAGE 46

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writer

Dr. Colleen M. Arnold is a freelance writer, pastoral minister, and family physician in Lexington, Virginia. This widow and mother of three enjoys being with family, taking care of her patients, writing, walking, and working on her blog, ColleenArnold.org.

writer

Michelle Martin is an awardwinning Catholic journalist.

A graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, she has written for secular daily newspapers and for the newspaper of the Archdiocese of Chicago.

writer

Katie Rutter is based in Bloomington, Indiana, and specializes in Catholic/ Christian media. She is the founder and producer of Thing in a Pot Productions, and she frequently creates multimedia journalism packages for national outlets. You can learn more about her work at JustKatieB.com.

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ST. ANTHONY MESSENGER (ISSN #0036276X) (U.S.P.S. PUBLICATION #007956 CANADA PUBLICATION #PM40036350) Volume 127, Number 3, is published monthly for $39.00 a year by the Franciscan Friars of St. John the Baptist Province, 28 W. Liberty Street, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202-6498. Phone 513-241-5615. Periodicals postage paid at Cincinnati, Ohio, and additional entry offices.

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POINTSOFVIEW | YOUR VOICE Pray for Our Priests Each morning, I read the day’s meditation in Peace and Good: Through the Year with Francis of Assisi, by Pat McCloskey, OFM. Its June 13 offering, “Keep Priests in Prayer,” would have been an excellent sidebar to the June 2019 issue’s special section on sex abuse in the Church (“Sex Abuse in the Church: Help.

Heal. Hope.”).

As Father Pat writes, St. Francis “knew very well that some priests . . . were far from living up to their vocation.” The June 13 appeal in the spirit of St. Francis for the faithful to pray for our priests resonates with the special section’s theme of “Help. Heal. Hope.”

Jim Rettig Williamsburg, Virginia

June Issue a Brave Move

.S.P.S. TION lished of St. nnati, postffices. thony 0189. bram

call n the Single notice ption-

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First, thank you so much for your June issue, especially the special section. Facing the crisis of clergy sex abuse so openly is courageous and transparent for your magazine. I must say there were many articles that touched me besides all the ones on clergy sex abuse.

The “Faith Unpacked” column by David Dault, PhD (“Undoing Life’s Knots”), was something I really needed. I can identify with many of his daily struggles. I especially liked Susan Hines-Brigger’s editorial about Pope Benedict’s response to the sex-abuse crisis (“No More Excuses, Please”). Her editorial only confirmed Pope Benedict’s need to step down. May God bless Pope Francis!

I was almost a victim of clergy sex abuse.

One day, when I was 14, I was told the assistant pastor wanted to see me. I don’t remember his name, but will always remember his face. He looked like a weasel. Upon entering his office, we chatted about things that I can’t recall right now. What I do remember is him putting his hand on my knee, which made me feel very uncomfortable. I told our pastor about the incident, but I don’t know if others had experienced this assistant pastor’s advances. I do know that priest was gone within a few weeks. This took place during the 1960s.

The clergy sex-abuse scandal is only the tip of the iceberg. How long have priests been preying on vulnerable women seeking advice for their troubled marriages? Oh, the stories I could tell! It has been suggested that priests

be allowed to marry. I agree. Certainly not all priests have to marry, but they could at least have the option available to them.

Sexual predators—of all kinds—need counseling. Catholic priests need to have the proper instruction in dealing with their own feelings as well as the needs of those who go to them for counsel. I am now 73 and, after all my experiences, am still learning to trust.

Venita Gorneau Severn, Maryland

Guilty until Proven Innocent?

I’m writing in regard to “A Faith Shaken: Healing from the Sex-Abuse Crisis,” by Sarah Margaret Babbs, from the June issue of St. Anthony Messenger. What if the priest mentioned in the article, Father Martin Boylan, is not guilty? Most of those accused are guilty— but not all.

I have a great concern for those who have been unjustly accused. I have a dear friend who is one. He is considered guilty as accused until civil authorities take the time to declare him innocent. Unfortunately, civil courts are overloaded and have far more important things to do than spend their valuable time proving that an unjustly accused priest is not guilty. Isn’t that the Church’s job?

My fear is that when we finally recover from the current crisis, we will find ourselves in another, more insidious crisis, the result of our lack of sensitivity to those who have been unjustly accused. Embarrassment and fear of scandal have allowed us to seek peace rather than justice, and I fear such an attitude could encourage false accusations.

Ron Madison Johnstown, Pennsylvania

Bishops, Step Down You certainly covered a lot of ground in the in-depth special section on the sex-abuse crisis in the Church. My thoughts and prayers go out to all the victims and their families. I think you missed one point.

With very few exceptions (Archbishops Chaput, O’Malley, and Gregory, Bishop Robert Barron, and other similar figures come to mind), I’m of the opinion that all US bishops should resign.

A.R. Geiger Avon-by-the-Sea, New Jersey

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church IN THE NEWS

people | events | trends

By Susan Hines-Br ig ger

MASS CELEBRATED AT NOTRE DAME CATHEDRAL

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often pejorative and doesn’t n June 15, the archbishop of Paris do right to the mystery celebrated Mass in Notre which impels humanity to Dame Cathedral for the first come to search for sometime since a devastating fire thing beyond itself.” damaged the historic strucFrench President ture last April, reported Emmanuel Macron has said Catholic News Service that he wants the cathedral (CNS). rebuilt in five years, in time The Mass took place in for the 2024 Olympics being the Chapel of the Virgin hosted in Paris. However, to mark the anniversary Culture Minister Franck of the consecration of the Riester told French radio cathedral’s altar, an event on June 14 that, so far, only that usually takes place on Archbishop Michel Aupetit of Paris celebrates Mass in the Chapel of the Virgin 80 million euros of the 850 June 16 each year. Wearing million euros pledged have inside Notre Dame Cathedral. Those present were required to wear hard hats. a hard hat, Archbishop been received, with most of Michel Aupetit celebrated with about 30 invited guests— it coming from small donations. mostly clergy, cathedral employees, and building contractors.

He also said that the cathedral, originally built in the 12th All wore protective headgear because of dangers of falling and 13th centuries, remains in a “fragile state,” with unsemasonry, although the chapel, situated behind the choir, had cured sections of the vaulted roof still in danger of collapse. been designated as safe.

Religion News Service reported that, under French law, In his homily, the archbishop focused not on the fire but all churches built before 1905 are national heritage buildrather on the purpose of the cathedral. He stressed that the ings and, therefore, public property. Local authorities are purpose of Notre Dame is as a place of Christian worship, responsible for the upkeep of churches in their areas, while not an ornament of the secular state. He said that the cathecathedrals belong to the state, a provision that gives national dral “is a place of worship; this is its sole and proper end. politicians a voice on issues such as expenditures for rebuildThere are no tourists at Notre Dame, because this term is ing Notre Dame.

Basilian Father Thomas Rosica, seen here in a photo from earlier this year, resigned following allegations of plagiarizing the written work of several authors.

asilian Father Thomas Rosica, founding CEO of the Canadian Catholic television network Salt and Light TV and a former Vatican media liaison, resigned from his position at the network on June 17, amid a scandal that he has been embroiled in since February.

According to CNS, Father Rosica has faced allegations of plagiarizing the written work of several authors in his lectures, blog posts, and newspaper articles dating back several years. He has admitted that he failed to properly credit sources in some of his writings and apologized for his mistakes.

He has been on sabbatical since March for “several months of rest and renewal.”

In a statement released the day of his resignation, Father Rosica said: “It has been a great privilege to work closely with our founder, Gaetano Gagliano, his family, and a dedicated board of directors on this media project. . . . I give thanks for the good that was done and for the blessings received, and I ask forgiveness for errors in not properly acknowledging individuals and attributing sources in my writings.”

The board of directors for Salt and Light also issued a statement, saying: “Father Rosica played a critical role in the founding and growth of this network over the past 16 years. The involvement of many young women and men on our various media platforms has made a positive difference in the lives of many people around the world. We are grateful to Father Rosica for his leadership.”

CNS PHOTOS: TOP: COURTESY KNA; BOTTOM: GREGORY A. SHEMITZ

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CNS PHOTOS: LEFT AND MIDDLE: BOB ROLLER; RIGHT: CHUCK AUSTIN, PITTSBURGH CATHOLIC

FOUNDING CEO OF SALT AND LIGHT TELEVISION RESIGNS

BISHOPS ADDRESS ABUSE CRISIS AT SPRING MEETING

During their spring meeting in Baltimore, the US bishops voted on a number of agenda items (left). News conferences, such as seen in the center photo, were held throughout the meeting to provide members of the press the opportunity to ask questions. Here, Judy M. Keane, director of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Office of Public Affairs, calls on reporters. The bishops also heard a message from Archbishop Christophe Pierre, apostolic nuncio to the United States (right).

CNS PHOTOS: LEFT AND MIDDLE: BOB ROLLER; RIGHT: CHUCK AUSTIN, PITTSBURGH CATHOLIC

CNS PHOTOS: TOP: COURTESY KNA; BOTTOM: GREGORY A. SHEMITZ

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he sexual abuse crisis was a major focus of the US bishops when they met June 11–14 in Baltimore, Maryland, for their yearly spring general assembly, reported CNS. On the first day of the meeting, the bishops heard a message from Archbishop Christophe Pierre, the Vatican’s nuncio to the United States. The archbishop made reference to “some dissent” at last November’s meeting about not moving forward quickly in the face of the reemergence of the sex-abuse crisis. At the time, Pope Francis had asked the conference to postpone its vote until after the Summit on Protection of Minors at the Vatican in February.

“In an ecclesial context, faster responses do not always produce the best results,” the archbishop stated. “While not wanting to slow or to neglect our responsibilities, we need to be thoughtful, prudent, and united. A rush to judgment, even for the sake of transparency, is never a guarantee of justice or a good result.”

The bishops later voted to authorize the implementation of a third-party system that will allow people to make confidential reports of abuse complaints against bishops through a toll-free telephone number and a website. The system will be operated by an outside vendor contracted by the conference and should be in place no later than May 31, 2020.

The bishops approved the document “Affirming Our Episcopal Commitments” and promised to hold themselves accountable to the commitments of the 2002 Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, including a zerotolerance policy for abuse. “We, the bishops of the United States, have heard the anger expressed by so many within and outside of the Church over these failures,” they wrote.

“The anger is justified; it has humbled us, prompting us into self-examination, repentance, and a desire to do better. We will continue to listen.”

They also approved a protocol that outlines which canonical options are available to bishops when a retired bishop resigns or is removed “due to sexual misconduct with adults or grave negligence of office, or where subsequent to his resignation he was found to have so acted or failed to act.”

The document says any codes of conduct in their respective dioceses regarding clergy apply to bishops as well.

During the meeting, the bishops voted to implement the document “Vos Estis Lux Mundi” (“You Are the Light of the World”), which was issued by Pope Francis in May to help the Church safeguard its members from abuse and hold its leaders accountable. Other items discussed by the bishops were the upcoming US bishops’ conference election, the border crisis, and the issue of young adults leaving the Church.

Auxiliary Bishop Robert E. Barron of Los Angeles, chairman of the bishops’ Committee on Evangelization and Catechesis, spoke about an upcoming presentation at the bishops’ fall meeting in November on how to respond to the growing number of young people leaving the Church. He said getting the religiously unaffiliated, or “nones,” particularly young people, back to the Catholic Church should be a top priority for the Church, noting that 50 percent of Catholics age 30 and younger have left the Church.

“Half the kids that we baptized and confirmed in the last 30 years are now ex-Catholics or unaffiliated,” Bishop Barron said. “One out of six millennials in the United States is now a former Catholic.”

NEWS BRIEF

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n a statement released by the Vatican June 11, the Institute for the Works of Religion, often referred to as the Vatican bank, reported that it made a profit of 17.5 million euros (about 19.8 million US dollars) in 2018, just over half the profit reported in the previous year, according to its annual report. The bank said the decrease was due “to the strong turbulence of the markets throughout the year and the persistence of interest rates, which are still very low.”

The statement points out that the Vatican bank continues “to make investments aimed at fostering development in poorer countries while respecting choices that are consistent with establishing a sustainable future for future generations.”

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church IN THE NEWS

KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS GET NEW LOOK

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FATHER AUGUSTUS TOLTON’S SAINTHOOD CAUSE ADVANCES n June 11, Pope Francis advanced the sainthood cause of Father Augustus Tolton, a former slave and the first African American diocesan priest in the United States. Father Tolton also founded the first African American Catholic parish in Chicago, according to a press release from the Archdiocese of Chicago.

Father Tolton is now deemed “Venerable,” which formally recognizes he lived the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity and the cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance at a heroic level. If it is confirmed that a miracle has been granted by God through the intercession of Father Tolton, he will be declared “Blessed.” A second miracle may be required for canonization.

Following the announcement, Chicago Archbishop Blase Cupich said: “Father Tolton’s holiness comes from his patient suffering, his brave spirit, and his pastoral heart for all who came to him. His struggles to become a priest and his remarkable service to God’s people are admirable examples, particularly in these times, of the value and dignity of every person. I am grateful to Bishop Joseph N. Perry for his work as the diocesan postulator for the Tolton cause.”

RHODE ISLAND BISHOP FACES BACKLASH OVER CONTROVERSIAL TWEET

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ust days after he sent out a tweet encouraging Catholics not to take part in Pride Month activities this past June, Rhode Island Bishop Thomas J. Tobin apologized, saying he did not mean for his comments to be so controversial. In a statement issued June 2, the bishop said: “I regret that my comments yesterday about Pride Month have turned out to be so controversial in our community, and offensive to some, especially the gay community. That certainly was not my intention.”

The day before, Bishop Tobin tweeted that Catholics should not support or “attend LGBTQ Pride Month events” because “they promote a culture and encourage activities that are contrary to the Catholic faith and morals. They are especially harmful for children.”

People immediately responded, citing the harm caused to children by the clergy sex-abuse crisis.

A rally by the LGBTQ community and supporters took place outside the Cathedral of Sts. Peter and Paul in Providence. In his statement, Bishop Tobin said: “The Catholic Church has respect and love for members of the gay community, as do I. Individuals with same-sex attraction are beloved children of God and our brothers and sisters.

“As a Catholic bishop, however, my obligation before God is to lead the faithful entrusted to my care and to teach the faith, clearly and compassionately, even on very difficult and sensitive issues. That is what I have always tried to do—on a variety of issues—and I will continue doing so as contemporary issues arise.”

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CNS PHOTO/DEBBIE HILL

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CNS PHOTOS: TOP LEFT: KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS; TOP RIGHT: COURTESY OF ARCHDIOCESE OF CHICAGO ARCHIVES AND RECORDS CENTER; LOWER LEFT: BOB ROLLER

n an attempt to attract younger members, the Knights of Columbus have retired the uniform for the organization’s Fourth Degree and replaced it with a pareddown one, without the ceremonial capes and plumed chapeaus, reported CNS. As of this past July 1, 2019, the ceremonial Color Corps regalia associated with the fraternal Catholic order for the past 79 years will now be a blue blazer with the Fourth Degree emblem, dark gray slacks, a blue tie, and a black beret. The ceremonial swords will continue to be part of the uniform. The uniform of the Fourth Degree has undergone several changes since it was adopted in 1900. But it has remained relatively the same since 1940, consisting of a plumed chapeau, a tuxedo, a cape, and a ceremonial sword.

In a press release announcing the change, the Knights’ board of directors said, “While we understand that some members may prefer the old regalia, the supreme master and vice supreme masters urge all Fourth Degree members to put the good of the order before any personal preference.”

CHURCHES AGREE TO MORE RENOVATIONS AT CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE

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of Crusader knights, according to the magazine.

All three communities will help finance the project with a joint fund-raising campaign as well as with financial assistance pledged by the Vatican and King Abdullah II of Jordan.

The shrine is revered by Christians as the site of the remains of the cave where Jesus was buried and rose from the dead.

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CNS PHOTOS: TOP LEFT: KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS; TOP RIGHT: COURTESY OF ARCHDIOCESE OF CHICAGO ARCHIVES AND RECORDS CENTER; LOWER LEFT: BOB ROLLER

fter successful cooperation on the 2016 restoration of the Edicule in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the leaders of the three churches who serve as guardians of the holy site have signed an agreement to continue with restorations, this time on the pavement and foundations around the tomb, reported CNS. The Greek Orthodox, Catholics, and Armenian Orthodox agreed to the floor project this past May. Two Italian academic and scientific institutions will undertake the two-stage project under the supervision of a joint committee of the three communities. The previous restoration work was led by Greek experts.

The Franciscan Terra Sancta magazine reported that the current pink stone pavement rests on a metal structure damaged by rust. Condensed moisture from leaking underground pipes—some dating back to the Ottoman Empire—and runoff rainwater have accumulated in the underground space.

Restoration work would also help shed light on various archaeological discoveries found in the past century

by Father Virgilio Corbo, a Franciscan archaeologist. He discovered the remains of the basilica built by Emperor Constantine, beginning in 324; the remnants of the earlier foundations of the Temple of Hadrian, constructed in 135; and first-century tombs near Calvary as well as the graves

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SPIRITOFST.FRANCIS | ASK A FRANCISCAN Questioning God’s Plan

By Pat McCloskey, OFM

My wife and I are both seriously ill and have been since we married 14 years ago. Now her medications have stopped working, and we are meeting with the doctors. I’m currently very angry and questioning God’s plan. I don’t know if I’m losing my faith. Although I will always believe in Jesus, our present suffering and fear overwhelm me with questions. She is everything to me, and I want to be strong for her. God’s will be done. I feel like a sinner for questioning—I am simply lost.

ONLINE: StAnthonyMessenger.org E-MAIL: Ask@FranciscanMedia.org MAIL: Ask a Franciscan 28 W. Liberty St. Cincinnati, OH 45202

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WANT MORE? Visit our website: StAnthonyMessenger.org

WE HAVE A DIGITAL archive of Q & As, going back to March 2013.

Just click: • the Ask link and then • the Archive link.

Material is grouped thematically under headings such as forgiveness, Jesus, moral issues, prayer, saints, redemption, sacraments, Scripture—and many more!

Fragrance-Free Masses

I have heard that 95 percent of modern fragrances harm a person’s mind and body. For some people, they can cause coughing, an asthmatic attack, tearing or burning eyes, and a spike in blood pressure. I no longer attend Mass in a Catholic church because of this threat to my health. I’m not the only woman, man, or child affected in this way! I think Masses and other church events should be fragrance-free.

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’m sorry for the distress this is causing you at church—and presumably at stores, banks, movie theaters, and everywhere else that people gather. You are not the first person to raise this issue with me. I leave the science to others.

The Catholic Church cannot simply ban perfume, cologne, or aftershave. It encourages their moderate use. Unfortunately, not everyone has good sense in this area. Perhaps attending the earliest Sunday morning Mass will lessen the likelihood of encountering this problem. Sitting close to an exit may also be advisable. I hope you can find a solution other than the one you have proposed.

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Father Pat welcomes your questions!

hope your doctors will find effective medications or therapies for her. If not, they may recommend a local hospice program that will benefit both of you.

You are probably not losing your faith in God but are on the uncomfortable cusp of a deeper faith, one you could not have previously developed because there was no need for it. Questioning God now is not the enemy of your faith but the engine for a more mature faith in light of your painfully changed circumstances. Questioning was part of how the faith of Thomas the apostle grew (Jn 20:24–29).

Your faith is not simply its content (including the idea that nothing this bad will ever happen to you). It is also relationship. Your relationship with your wife has probably enjoyed good times and survived tough times. I pray that your new relationship with God will do the same.

TOP LEFT: MC KOZUSKO/SAM; TOP RIGHT: BIALASIEWICZ/FOTOSEARCH; BOTTOM: J GROUP/FOTOSEARCH

Pat McCloskey, OFM

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Quick Questions and Answers

I’m single and lost without my grandmother who died last year. I can’t share my life with anyone the way that I could share it with her.

If your grandmother could advise you about this, wouldn’t she encourage you to honor her by living out the values most important to her? For example, wouldn’t she encourage you to grow in generosity, prayerfulness, and compassion—among other virtues? I encourage you to channel your grief over losing her into some type of service to others who may need the very things your grandmother provided for you.

The Bible tells us to avoid repetitious prayer. Isn’t the rosary a repetitious prayer?

Many of my friends ask me: “If Jesus has already died for my sins and paid for them, why can’t I sin now?”

I’m afraid this solution to dealing with temptation is too simple to be true. If Jesus died for the sins of the world, would it be OK if I robbed your home?

Every attempted shortcut around God’s ways turns out to be a dead end. In the long run, we become whatever we choose consistently. May Jesus help all of us to grow in his grace and love.

A friend told me that, according to Canon 1398, anyone who votes for a person who supports abortion is as guilty as a person who has had an abortion and is, therefore, excommunicated. Is this true?

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TOP LEFT: MC KOZUSKO/SAM; TOP RIGHT: BIALASIEWICZ/FOTOSEARCH; BOTTOM: J GROUP/FOTOSEARCH

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says: “In praying, do not babble like the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words” (Mt 6:7). My prayer or yours does not create an obligation that God must fulfill.

That is the pagan attitude that Jesus rejected. Genuine prayer is all in the intention, not in the externals. The rosary has been a form of genuine prayer for many people over the centuries.

No, it is not. In fact, Canon 1398 reads: “Anyone who procures an abortion procures a latae sententiae excommunication.” That Latin phrase means “automatic.” Your friend is making a connection that the US bishops have never made. Every four years, since 1976, they have issued a statement on elections, always stressing the need to protect the rights of the unborn but also rejecting single-issue voting. My answer to the question above applies here in a different context.

Joshua will begin formation as a novice soon. Would you consider a gift to help sustain him and our other men on their journey to priesthood or brotherhood?

Visit

www.Franciscan.org

The Franciscan Friars, Province of St. John the Baptist 1615 Vine St., Ste 1 Cincinnati, OH 45202-6492

www.stanthony.org

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SPIRITOFST.FRANCIS “We must love greatly those who unjustly oppress us, for we shall possess eternal life because of what they bring us.”

—Francis of Assisi, Earlier Rule

FRANCISCAN WORLD

St. John the Baptist Province

BORN IN France in 1838, Frédéric Janssoone lost his father at age 9 and worked several years as a traveling salesman to support his mother.

After joining the Friars Minor, he served 11 years in the Holy Land. He first went to Canada in 1870 to collect funds for the Holy Land, dying in Canada in 1916.

He promoted pilgrimages to the Holy Land and served at the Shrine of Our Lady of Cap-de-Madeleine near Trois-Rivières. Frédéric was beatified in 1988. His feast is August 3.

—Pat McCloskey, OFM

?

WANT MORE? Learn about your saints and blesseds by going to: SaintoftheDay.org

In 1898, Friars Anselm Weber, Juvenal Schnorbus, and Placid Buerger arrived in St. Michaels, Arizona, to begin working with Native Americans.

ST. ANTHONY STORIES

Off the Beaten Path

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his past April, my fiancée, Julie, and I visited with some friends in North Carolina.

Our friends own a cabin in the Appalachian Mountains with plenty of hiking trails nearby to explore the outdoors. We had been having a great time until the third day, when Julie and I decided to go on a daylong hike on one of the more physically demanding trails. We thought we were up for it, but we didn’t count on the thick fog that just didn’t seem to lift. By midmorning, we were lost and not sure if we were even still on the trail.

That’s when I remembered that, when I was a child, my mom would pray to St. Anthony when she lost something. In this case, we were the lost items! Julie and I stopped to have a drink of water, catch our breath, and get our bearings. I took that opportunity to say a quick prayer to St. Anthony. About 15 minutes later, the fog lifted, and we spotted a sign pointing us in the direction of the cabin. On the walk back, the sun started shining, and I felt deeply grateful to St. Anthony.

—Ben Croxton, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

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PHOTO COURTESY OF SISTER MARY GIANNA

With great zeal, he spread the good news of Jesus in Europe, the Holy Land, and Canada.

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t the invitation of Bishop John B. Purcell, the Province of St. Leopold in western Austria sent Father Wilhelm Unterthiner to Cincinnati in 1844 to work with Germanspeaking Catholics. Other friars followed.

Fifteen years later, a custody was established; a province began in 1885. The friars began serving Navajo, Pueblo, Hispanic, black, and Caucasian Catholics in parishes. Some friars worked in China, later the Philippines, Japan, and now in Jamaica.

The friars established St. Anthony Messenger in 1893 and have been very involved in ministry of the word, high schools, Catholic Theological Union, chaplaincies, and various specialized services.

As of June 1, the 114 solemnly professed friars work in 10 states in the Midwest, Arizona, New Mexico, Jamaica, and the Philippines. There are five men in initial formation. Our Lady of Guadalupe Province (headquartered in Albuquerque, New Mexico) began in 1985.

“God gives his grace,” wrote Father Unterthiner in 1844 about his efforts to learn enough English to preach in that language. That grace continues to bless the life and ministry of the friars of this province.

LEFT: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS; TOP RIGHT: COURTESY OF ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST PROVINCE BOTTOM RIGHT: DAVEALLEN/FOTOSEARCH

BLESSED FRÉDÉRIC JANSSOONE, OFM

By Pat McCloskey, OFM

s

FOLLOWERS OF ST. FRANCIS

ST. ANTHONY

From Columbine to Christ “The journey and transformation I have experienced in my life have helped me to be more compassionate and sensitive to others.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF SISTER MARY GIANNA

LEFT: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS; TOP RIGHT: COURTESY OF ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST PROVINCE BOTTOM RIGHT: DAVEALLEN/FOTOSEARCH

Later, Jenica attended the Franciscan University of Steubenville. During her freshman year, she went through the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults and eventually entered the Catholic Church.

One thing that remained with her from the Columbine tragedy was the example of student Rachel Scott, who was shot for professing her faith. “I remember in college, reflecting on Rachel’s life, wishing I could have been like that in high school. Then I felt convinced that I can be like that now!

As she died for Christ, I thought I can live for him.”

While she seriously discerned her calling, she visited the DLJC, a Franciscan Catholic charismatic religious community in Prayer Town, Texas. “I felt at home with the Franciscans, especially after attending Franciscan University and traveling to Assisi, Italy, as part of the study abroad program. I love St. Francis of Assisi, his story and example, and how conformed he was to Christ,” she says.

She entered the DLJC community in August 2010 and professed her final vows eight years later. Currently, Sister Mary Gianna serves as administrative assistant at The Ark and The Dove Retreat Center in Gibsonia, Pennsylvania, the birthplace of the Catholic charismatic renewal.

“The journey and transformation I have experienced in my life have helped me to be more compassionate and sensitive to others,” says Sister Mary Gianna. “My desire is to reach out to others in love to help them find the healing, wholeness, and restoration we all so desire and the fullness of life God has called us to.”

—Janice Lane Palko

FRANK JASPER, OFM

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n some lives there is a pivotal moment when everything that has come before it narrows to that point and then is magnified afterward. Such is the case with Sister Mary Gianna, Disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ (DLJC). Sister Mary Gianna was born Jenica Thornby in Houston, Texas, into a loving family. After a number of moves, the Thornby family settled in Colorado when Jenica was 11.

Bullied in middle school, Jenica found life even more difficult when she entered high school. Instead of trying to figure out where to sit at lunch, she decided to spend her lunchtime studying in the library. One day during her sophomore year, she felt compelled to skip the library and leave the school.

A friend who she often studied with in the library saw her and asked where she was going. Jenica, who was 16 at the time, persuaded the girl to leave too.

“As we were driving out of the parking lot that day, in my rearview mirror I could see students pouring out of the school,” says Sister Mary Gianna.

That day was April 20, 1999, and her school was Columbine High School, the site of one of the worst school shootings in US history, with 13 people killed and 24 wounded, not including the two deceased perpetrators.

“For me, personally, the days after the shooting became progressively darker,” says Sister Mary Gianna.

“There were almost daily bomb threats at Columbine, and one student took his own life shortly thereafter.”

It was during that time that a Catholic friend invited her to St. Frances Cabrini Catholic Church where a youth minister, Kate, shared something with her that shined a light in the darkness that had enveloped her.

Sister Mary Gianna, DLJC

BREAD s

The National Shrine of St. Anthony is located in Cincinnati, Ohio. Consecrated in 1889, it includes a first-class relic of St. Anthony and serves as a center for daily prayer and contemplation.

The Franciscan friars minister from the shrine. To help them in their work among the poor, you may send a monetary offering called St. Anthony Bread. Make checks or money orders payable to “Franciscans” and mail to the address below.

Every Tuesday, a Mass is offered for benefactors and petitioners at the shrine. To seek St. Anthony’s intercession, mail your petition to the address below. Petitions are taken to the shrine each week. viSit our webSite to:

StAnthony.org

s

mAil poStAl communicAtionS to:

St. Anthony Bread 1615 Vine St. Cincinnati, OH 45202-6498

s

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POINTSOFVIEW | FAITH UNPACKED Finding Your Saint

By David Dault, PhD

David Dault, PhD

David hosts the weekly radio show Things Not Seen: Conversations about Culture and Faith. He also cohosts the Francis Effect podcast with Father Dan Horan, OFM. He lives with his family on the South Side of Chicago.

Want a certain topic covered? Send us your request.

E-MAIL:

FaithUnpacked@ FranciscanMedia.org MAIL:

Faith Unpacked 28 W. Liberty St. Cincinnati, OH 45202 PODCAST:

The Francis Effect podcast can be streamed live at FrancisFXPod.com.

few weeks ago on Twitter, a friend who is In other words, “Fake it till you make it.” becoming Catholic asked, “How do you Years later, I encountered this wisdom pick out your saint?” There were lots of good again when I started attending a 12-Step responses. I added mine, saying that, in my meeting as part of my journey of recovery limited experience, it’s a mutual process. You from the family dynamics of alcoholism. Like might be looking for a saint, but the saint is Aristotle, the literature encouraged us to “act also looking for you. as if ” we were sane, self-reliant, and patient— That was certainly what happened between in the hope that we might, over time, come to me and my patron, St. Genesius of Rome, embody these things. patron of actors, thieves, lawyers, and indiTime after time, each step toward healviduals with epilepsy. ing for me has followed this route: I start According to many sources, from the outside and work the Genesius was a comedic balm inside. Because I believe actor living during the third anything worth doing is worth century, a time when the doing badly, I go through the Church was undergoing motions until I figure out persecution from an emperor how to “be” the better, more named Diocletian. Genesius grounded version of me. was part of a troupe putting Faith was like that. Having on a play mocking Christians, been raised an atheist, I felt and he went through a “mock” every hymn and every act of Baptism on stage. worship as alien. It took time Regardless of its mocking and repetition to work the intent, the Holy Spirit was at habits of prayer and praise into work. Genesius emerged from my body. As the habits deepthe ritual, claiming that he ened, so did my faith. was now a real Christian, and began testifying to the lordA PERFECT PAIRING ship of Jesus Christ. At first When I was reconciling to the amused, Diocletian realized he Catholic Church in my midwas serious and sent him to be 30s, I was in the same position tortured. Genesius maintained as my friend on Twitter. I was his newfound faith to the end, looking for a patron, with no and the emperor had him idea how to find one. So, one beheaded. day I went to a Catholic bookFrom method actor to store and found a book about St. Genesius of Rome Christian martyr, Genesius a bunch of saints. I closed my fascinated me from the eyes, said a prayer, and opened moment I learned his story. For much longer to a random page. than I was looking for him, however, Genesius There he was. As I read the description, I had his eye on me. realized I would not have even known how to find so perfect a fit on my own.

Having a patron saint is a kind of relationWORK IN PROGRESS Back when I was an undergraduate phiship. My walk with Genesius these years has losophy major, one of the first books I was reaffirmed that my imperfect initial attempts assigned to read was Aristotle’s Nichomachean at faith and virtue will be rewarded over time Ethics. It’s an ancient text about how to live a if I “keep coming back.” The habits of goodgood life. For Aristotle, this goodness does not ness grow from the outside in when you “act as if.” begin with our desires, but with our actions.

We become virtuous if, over time, we act in Genesius of Rome and all the saints, pray for us! virtuous ways.

TOP LEFT: PHOTO COURTESY OF CHICAGO SUNDAY EVENING CLUB/KHIEM TRAN; CENTER: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

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POINTSOFVIEW | AT HOME ON EARTH

Changing the Climate Change Narrative

By Kyle Kramer

TOP LEFT: COURTESY OF KYLE KRAMER; TOP RIGHT: RAPIDEYE/FOTOSEARCH

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believe that global warming is happening, that it’s very serious, that humans are largely responsible, and that we need to act quickly and at scale to address it. All that said, I know that because climate change has become a politically polarizing issue, there are plenty of people (including friends, neighKyle Kramer bors, and relatives of mine) who will disagree with everything I just wrote.

Kyle is the executive So here we are: deeply divided and dawdirector of the Passionist dling when we need to be working together Earth & Spirit Center, across political, racial, national, and sociowhich offers interfaith economic lines to assure a livable present educational programand future for our own species and countless ming in meditation, other creatures. It’s a maddening situation, ecology, and social and, frankly, I constantly waver between hope compassion. and despair.

He serves as a Catholic I do take encouragement from state, climate ambassador municipal, and business efforts to address for the US Conference global warming; perhaps the federal governof Catholic Bishopsment will someday follow their lead. I’m also sponsored Catholic aware that it’s not necessary for 100 percent Climate Covenant and of the American population to be convinced is the author of A Time about global warming because meaningful change can be brought about by a much to Plant: Life Lessons in Work, Prayer, and Dirt smaller group.

(Ave Maria Press, 2010).

More recently, I’ve also been intrigued and He speaks across the encouraged by a simple but radical idea put country on issues of ecolforward by Charles Eisenstein: What if we just ogy and spirituality. stopped debating about climate change and He and his family dispensed with abstract metrics like “parts per spent 15 years as organic million atmospheric CO2” and “gigatons of farmers and homesteadcarbon emissions”? ers in Spencer County, What if, instead, we just opened our hearts Indiana. and minds and imagined the kind of world we want to give to our children and grandEarthandSpiritCenter.org children? What if all of us invested our time and energy into whatever was particularly ours to do—whether or not it had anything WANT MORE? explicitly to do with the reduction of carbon Visit our website: StAnthonyMessenger.org emissions?

This may seem hopelessly fuzzy and idealistic compared to the clear metrics and urgent warnings the climate scientists have laid out for us. But scientists have been laying out clear metrics and urgent warnings for decades with little effect; perhaps it’s time to try a different approach. Let’s face it: Numbers and fear don’t move people. So why not try love,

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beauty, and belonging instead?

Ultimately, we are challenged to make a leap of faith, trusting that even if our particular calling isn’t directly related to mitigating climate change, it can still help create a more beautiful world. After all, reality is far more complex and interrelated than we can possibly understand, so why not? Surely, we Christians, bringing our varied gifts to the unified body of Christ, know a thing or two about leaps of faith.

HELPFUL

TIPS

1

Gaining Insights

For some encouragement about how small groups of people can effect substantial change, check out Malcolm Gladwell’s insightful book The Tipping Point.

2

The best ideas I have encountered for developing a new narrative about climate change are from Charles Eisenstein in his new book, Climate Change: A New Story.

3

The US Catholic bishops have addressed the issue of climate change. Their September 2001 statement on the issue, “Global Climate Change: A Plea for Dialogue, Prudence, and the Common Good,” is still powerful and relevant.

The document is available at usccb.org.

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POINTSOFVIEW | EDITORIAL

Dream On

“It is both our moral duty and in our nation’s best interest to protect them and allow them to reach their full God-given potential.”

—Bishop Joe Vásquez

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he word dream is closely connected to our cultural identity as Americans. From the idea of the American Dream to Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, there’s something about that word that seems to resonate in our society. The Founding Fathers’ vision for the United States as a place where people can enjoy what the Declaration of Independence calls “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” was a sort of collective dream of a bright future.

However, for the estimated 800,000 recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), or “Dreamers,” their future in the United States is on shaky ground. Dreamers might be our friends, relatives, neighbors, coworkers, or complete strangers to us. But they’re all human beings with inherent dignity, a strong work ethic, and love for our country (witness the 900 Dreamers who are also military veterans). With a better understanding of who they are and how they contribute to our society—and guided by the moral compass of Catholic social teaching—we can come to the realization that their dream for a better life is interwoven with our own.

SAFE—FOR NOW

Over the past few years, there have been multiple hints, statements, and near-guarantees about rescinding DACA. In many of his campaign speeches for the 2016 election, then-candidate Donald Trump said that he would end the program on “day one” of his presidency. Following former Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ September 2017 announcement that DACA would be repealed imminently, the White House released a memo that urged Dreamers to “use the time remaining on their work authorizations to prepare for and arrange their departure from the United States.” In August 2018, Federal District Court Judge Andrew Hanen ruled that DACA is “likely unconstitutional,” but stopped short of putting an end to the program. In his decision, Judge Hanen wrote, “If the nation truly wants a DACA program, it is up to Congress to say so.”

Seemingly taking their cue from Judge Hanen’s words, on June 4, the House passed the Dream and Promise Act of 2019. This piece of legislation combines protection for both Dreamers and the estimated 320,000 people with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) who have sought refuge here from either armed conflict or natural disasters in their homelands. At the time of this writing, it remains to be seen what will happen to the act once it reaches the Senate. Even if the Senate, in a rare show of bipartisanship, passes the act, the president could exercise his veto power. The Supreme Court also denied a request from the Trump administration to fast-track a decision on DACA before its summer recess,

but will likely revisit the issue when the justices reconvene in October. It seems that Dreamers are, at best, in limbo no matter how the government decides to handle DACA. DOLLARS AND SENSE

If 800,000 Dreamers end up being deported to their countries of origin, some estimates put the financial loss the US economy will incur over the next decade at half a trillion dollars. Moreover, according to the results of a nationwide survey of Dreamers spearheaded by Professor Tom K. Wong of UC San Diego, DACA recipients have a positive impact on the local, state, and national economy. For example, 62 percent reported purchasing their first car after receiving DACA status. Nearly 75 percent are pursuing bachelor’s degrees in fields such as mechanical engineering, neuroscience, accounting, and law. Of those currently employed, 72 percent work for Fortune 500 companies, which collectively account for $2.8 trillion in revenue annually. So, even for those who maintain a position of “America first,” it’s actually better for our nation as a whole to keep Dreamers here.

Our faith leaders have weighed in on the issue, helping us to view it through a moral lens. Following the 2017 announcement that DACA would be repealed, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) issued a statement, saying: “The cancellation of the DACA program is reprehensible. . . . DACA youth are woven into the fabric of our country and of our Church, and are, by every social and human measure, American youth.”

Three months prior to the House’s passage of the Dream and Promise Act, Bishop Joe Vásquez of Austin, chairman of the USCCB Committee on Migration, penned a letter of support for the act. The bishop wrote: “My brother bishops and I believe in protecting the dignity of every human being, particularly that of our children and families. The Catholic bishops have long supported Dreamers and TPS holders, as well as their families. We recognize and admire these individuals as contributors to our economy, academic standouts in our universities, and leaders in our parishes. It is both our moral duty and in our nation’s best interest to protect them and allow them to reach their full God-given potential.”

What will become of the Dreamers and others in precarious immigration situations largely depends on what our political leaders decide in the coming months. But in the long run, their dreams—so closely linked with the overarching American Dream—rely on the good sense of US citizens and the solid moral ground upon which we stand. Do we have the courage to stand with them and keep their dreams alive?

—Daniel Imwalle

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DANGE CLARE & FRANCIS: Sometimes we are so attracted to saints for our own reasons that we fail to see how radical they were in their day.

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n August 1212, if the small Umbrian city of Assisi’s post office had displayed “Wanted” posters, Chiara di Favarone di Offreduccio and Francesco Bernardone might well have been on them. Their crime? Seriously disrupting the social, economic, and religious stability of their native city.

Intervening centuries of veneration for Assisi’s two most famous citizens have obscured for many people how much Clare and Francis challenged the most important foundations and assumptions of their society.

A RELIGIOUS CHALLENGE

ASSISI BACKGROUND AND ST. FRANCIS: FATHER FRANK JASPER, OFM (2); ST. CLARE: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS/CHRIS LIGHT

Although in August of 1212, Clare and Francis were personally on good terms with Assisi’s Bishop Guido II, they were objects of great suspicion for many other people. A mere four months earlier, with encouragement from Francis and Bishop Guido, Clare had left her family home under the cover of darkness, leaving the safety of that walled city. She and a maidservant went down the hill to the chapel of Our Lady of the Angels. Francis cut her hair and gave her the clothing of a lay penitent and a simple habit, setting in motion a radically new form of religious life for women. For a very short time, Clare lived as a servant in the Benedictine monastery of San Paolo alla Abbadessa and later with a group of laywomen at San Angelo in Panzo near Assisi. There were plenty of women’s monasteries nearby, but Clare felt that God was calling her to a different type of religious life.

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EROUS

: ASSISI’S MOST

CITIZENS

ASSISI BACKGROUND AND ST. FRANCIS: FATHER FRANK JASPER, OFM (2); ST. CLARE: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS/CHRIS LIGHT

By Pat McCloskey, OFM

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This cathedral is in Albi, a French city that gave its name to a group opposing the Church.

Clare could have entered a respectable monastery, bringing with her a sizable dowry in land or cash, enabling her to live with other noblewomen in the style to which they had become accustomed. According to conventional thinking, young women without a dowry were clearly not being called by God to religious life.

Women from all ranks of society, however, soon joined Clare at San Damiano, a rundown roadside chapel that Francis and others had repaired and that Bishop Guido made available.

In 1206, Francis had shocked the men and women of Assisi by renouncing his inheritance and starting to live out the Gospel via a poor, itinerant lifestyle. By the spring of 1209, he had attracted 11 brothers and received from Pope Innocent III verbal approval for a form of religious life very different from the monasticism that had become standard in Western Christianity.

Trouble for the Church ALBIGENSIANS, the Catholic Church’s fiercest critics in the 12th and 13th centuries, won many sympathizers by contrasting the poverty of Jesus, Mary, and the apostles with the wealth controlled by popes, cardinals, bishops, monks, and nuns.

When the Church’s first response (sending wealthy Cistercian abbots to preach to the Albigensians) failed, the Church backed an unsuccessful military crusade against them. When Father Dominic Guzman encountered the Albigensians on a trip from Spain to Rome, he discovered a new mission to which he and his followers (the Order of Preachers) generously dedicated themselves. Anthony of Padua did likewise.

Waldensians, followers of Peter Waldo and then a significant group in Italy, were not as radical, but they and their sympathizers also rejected the Church’s wealth and political influence.

Francis led the rebuilding of San Damiano on the plain outside Assisi. Clare and her companions moved there in late 1212. Other buildings were added later. Shortly after Clare died, the city of Assisi expanded so that the nuns could move into the city. A novitiate for several OFM provinces is now at San Damiano.

Monks and nuns for centuries had based their lives on Acts 4:32: “The community of believers was of one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they had everything in common.”

While honoring that verse, Francis was much more inspired by Jesus’ missionary discourse (Mt 10:1—11:1) with the poverty and itinerancy that it implied.

Members of the Order of Preachers (Dominicans) were inspired by the same Scriptures but saw their ministry as serving the Church through sound preaching on doctrine, reinforced by a life of poverty.

Francis and his brothers cared for lepers, their era’s most despised group of Christians, because many people considered this disease just punishment for the sins of those afflicted by it. The admonition “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here” (the sign over the gates of hell in Dante’s Inferno) originally appeared over the main gate of a leprosarium, of which Assisi had two, plus a leper hospital. Before 1215, when Lateran Council IV required that all women religious be cloistered, Clare and her sisters sometimes helped Francis and the friars “show mercy” (Francis’ expression) to women and men suffering from leprosy.

The emphasis that Clare and Francis placed on evangelical poverty aroused still more suspicions in Assisi and nearby areas. Were they and their followers like

TOP LEFT: MIP IMAGES/FOTOSEARCH; CENTER IMAGES: FATHER FRANK JASPER, OFM (2)

Named for Albi, a city in southern France, the Albigensians were dualists, believing that the world we see was created by a good God (responsible for everything spiritual) and an evil God (responsible for everything material). Thus they rejected the Incarnation and the sacraments (especially the Eucharist), and despised the “carnal” Church they saw, praising instead heaven’s “spiritual” Church without stain or wrinkle.

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many other groups (see sidebar on page 20) that promoted Gospel poverty but ended up being denounced by a Church that had initially encouraged them?

ECONOMIC DISRUPTION

“Upward mobility” was pretty much unheard-of in 13thcentury Western Europe. People generally expected to remain within the social group into which they had been born. But the times were changing radically as Francis and Clare grew into adulthood.

A feudal society based on land ownership was giving way to a merchant economy based on cold, hard cash and the

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Francis and his followers served at the Santa Maria Maddalena leper colony that was on the plain outside Assisi, which also had a leper hospital in Francis’ day.

ability to identify and fulfill new needs of the general population. Pietro Bernardone, Francis’ father and a cloth merchant, may eventually have become the richest man in Assisi by buying land and renting it out. Many merchants, in fact, were richer than nobles with impressive titles but few material resources. In 1198, Assisi’s minores (those not of noble background) led an uprising that resulted in the destruction of the Rocca Maggiore fortress, a symbol of imperial power.

So how did Francis and Clare challenge the economic system? By avoiding land ownership, they opted out of the interlocking relationships that drove the economy. If dowries were not accepted from the women who joined Clare at San Damiano, that meant that women from much more modest economic backgrounds could become nuns there in a new style of monastery.

The nobles—women and men—who joined Clare and Francis experienced a decline in their standard of living after doing so. They sought to live by the work of their hands in a

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society that generally considered manual labor a curse to be avoided whenever possible.

Begging was considered socially disruptive and contrary to the Bible. Francis and Clare wanted their followers to live from the work of their hands and beg only if absolutely necessary. Caring for lepers generated no income.

By 1228, Clare had secured from Pope Gregory IX the “Privilege of Poverty” (permission not to accept lands to generate income)—but this applied only to San Damiano.

Any other Poor Clare monastery would have to secure a similar guarantee on its own.

Popes, cardinals, and bishops were haunted by the fear that becoming Poor Clares might eventually turn noblewomen into paupers. Only two days before she died in 1253 did Clare receive Pope Innocent IV’s approval for her “Form of Life,” the first Rule written by a woman for women religious.

In that regard, Clare posed a much greater threat to Assisi’s economic system than Francis did.

SOCIAL IMPLICATIONS

In this topsy-turvy world, the families of Francis and Clare were not originally friends. The Bernardone family (part of the minores) participated in the revolt that forced Clare’s household and other noble Assisi families (the majores) into exile in nearby Perugia for four years. When Clare was a child and a teenager, the people in her household probably spoke very negatively about Francis, his family, and the minores in general.

Traditional monasteries of nuns were needed in a patriar-

chal society where many men died young in battle or joined monasteries, taking a vow of celibacy. Single women either were looking to become married or had already become widows. Life in women’s monasteries had many of the creature comforts the nuns had enjoyed at home. According to many people, religious conversion was good but was much like recently introduced spices from the East—always used with great moderation!

What Francis and Clare began challenged all that. The baker’s daughter might one day become a Poor Clare abbess, directing the work of a noblewoman nun in charge of that monastery’s laundry.

Soon after Clare began a new form of Gospel living, her sister Caterina (known to us as Agnes) joined her. Their other sister (Beatrice) and their mother (Ortolana) eventually joined them. Rich monasteries of women began to ask for a nun from San Damiano to help them follow the example of that monastery.

That Francis could initially have been a spiritual guide for Clare was certainly shocking—almost as much as some friars later seeking spiritual guidance from Clare!

In a world where most people held office for life, the possibility of voting out an abbess or general (worldwide) minister was utterly shocking. And yet that would eventually become possible for a Poor Clare abbess and a Friar Minor general minister. People of all social backgrounds became radically equal in Poor Clare monasteries and among the Friars Minor.

Today we generally have a positive attitude about new things, but in the Middle Ages “new” was often linked to

Anything but Cute: Domesticating the Saints

We honor saints not by making them “cute,” but rather by imitating their expanding openness to God’s grace and their shocking readiness to see Christ in people whom our society frequently dismisses as people of no importance.

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FATHER FRANK JASPER, OFM

The higher the pedestal on which we place saints, the more easily we consider them heroes or heroines to be admired from afar—but not people encouraging us toward deeper conversion.

Perhaps that’s why Dorothy Day, cofounder of the Catholic Worker Movement, once said: “Don’t call me a saint. I don’t want to be dismissed so easily.”

ISTOCK IMAGES: MAMMUTH/PETER ZELEI (2)

ALL SAINTS have undergone a great conversion, challenging whatever they and their contemporaries considered “normal.” We are strongly tempted to whittle down the saints to a size we find comfortable, making them “cute” in order to blunt the challenge their lives always represent.

whatever was religiously suspect, politically dangerous, and/ or socially disruptive.

The “new and improved” tagline would appeal to some people, but for most it would have made as much sense as “square circles.” Clever words, but together what could they mean?

In 1228, Thomas of Celano, the first biographer of St. Francis, wrote: “Men ran, and women, too, ran; clerics hurried, and religious hastened that they might see and hear the holy man of God who seemed to all to be a man of another world. Every age and every sex hurried to see the wonderful things that the Lord was newly working in the world through his servant” (First Life of Francis, chapter 15).

Thomas meant this as high praise of Francis, but many people in his very status-conscious society thought this mixing of social classes was hopelessly idealistic and extremely dangerous.

This egalitarian view was especially true of the Secular Franciscan Order (formerly known as the Third Order of St. Francis), where nobles, bootmakers, seamstresses, and members of every class and occupation sought to live the Gospel in their own way, but after the example of Francis and Clare.

Clare and Francis did not promote change merely for the sake of change. They simply responded to their society’s hunger for deeper conversion to Jesus’ way as recorded in the Gospels.

That hunger still continues among us.

FATHER FRANK JASPER, OFM

ISTOCK IMAGES: MAMMUTH/PETER ZELEI (2)

This is the cell that St. Francis used in the friars’ hermitage at Greccio. In 1223, he preached powerfully at the Christmas midnight Mass outside that city, inspiring among those present a greater devotion to “the babe of Bethlehem.”

Pat McCloskey, OFM, is Franciscan editor of this publication, writing its “Ask a Franciscan” and “Franciscan World” columns, as well as editing Franciscan Media’s two homily services. His most recent book is Peace and Good: Through the Year With Francis of Assisi (Franciscan Media).

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FACING THE OPIOID CRISIS

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A Catholic Response

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By Katie Rutter

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The country is struggling with an opioid crisis—but its strongest foothold is in the Midwest. Armed with their faith, these individuals are fighting back.

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Opioids, a broad category that has come to include heroin, methadone, fentanyl, and some prescription painkillers such as OxyContin, act on receptors in the brain that regulate the body’s pain and reward system.

They mimic natural chemicals created to reinforce behavior, which makes these substances extremely addictive.

yan Dattilo estimates that he knows at least 100 people who have died from a drug overdose. These people were not just numbers—they were friends, siblings, sons, daughters, and parents. “The drugs take over, and they make you do things that you never think you would do,” explains the 36-year-old Cincinnati resident.

“I would hurt my mom and I would do all these things, but that never meant that I didn’t love my mom. It didn’t mean that I was choosing drugs over her—that drugs were more important. It just meant that I was in the grips of an addiction,” Dattilo says.

In 2017, President Donald Trump declared the opioid crisis a national emergency. While actual usage is impossible to estimate accurately, well over 70,000 people died of an overdose in 2017, according to the National Center for Health Statistics, which is operated by the Centers for Disease Control. Overdoses killed more Americans under 50 years of age than any other cause.

Opioids, a broad category that has come to include heroin, methadone, fentanyl, and some prescription painkillers such as OxyContin, act on receptors in the brain that regulate the body’s pain and reward system. They mimic natural chemicals created to reinforce behavior, which makes these substances extremely addictive.

In the national crisis, West Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania are at the epicenter. These three states had the highest rates of death due to drug overdose in 2017, and those rates had increased significantly from the previous year.

Dattilo grew up right in the middle of the epidemic. He became addicted to heroin after a slow transition from alcohol—which he started at 14—to marijuana, and eventually to prescription opioids and crack cocaine. Once in the grips of the addiction, he could not function without regular doses of the drug. When a dealer was not available, or Dattilo did not have the money to spend, he quickly became “dope sick.”

“You feel like you have the flu times 100,” he describes, “diarrhea, fever, clammy skin, achy joints. But you know that once you get what you’re after, you’re going to be fine.”

Dattilo is convinced that these withdrawal symptoms keep people chained to substance use even if they want to quit.

“This is a disease,” emphasizes Sandi Kuehn, president of the Center for Addiction Treatment in Cincinnati, the facility where Dattilo ultimately sought help.

“As a disease, it should be treated medically, and the medical piece of it doesn’t necessarily have to be medication, but we should be treating it as a disease. You can’t arrest yourself out of it,” Kuehn says.

The Center for Addiction Treatment is one of the few medical programs accessible without health insurance. For $20, Dattilo received a 30-day in-residence treatment that included a medical detox, support groups, and help with resources such as housing and employment. Most treatment centers cost between $2,000 and $25,000, which is prohibitive for those whose financial resources have been decimated by their addiction.

“I know people who were going to jail on purpose, trying to get into the drug court because they can’t pay for treatment,” Dattilo says. “[And the courts say], ‘We’ll get back to you in six months.’ The reality is people can be dead in six months out here.”

THE BIGGER PICTURE

For every person struggling with substance use, there are dozens of family members and friends struggling alongside them. Addiction can have devastating effects on everyone connected to the individual, straining relationships and destroying families.

“We were so far apart, on different pages, with how to deal with it and not knowing how to deal with it,” says Tina Garera, 57, whose marriage was nearly torn to shreds when a loved one became addicted to multiple substances.

Tina and her husband, Tony, have helped found several Northern Kentucky branches of the national support group Parents of Addicted Loved Ones (PAL). In PAL meetings, family members of persons with an addiction come together for camaraderie and mutual support. One particular group meets twice a month in the Diocese of Covington’s Catholic Charities building. The Gareras facilitate group discussions, with as many as 20 people sharing current struggles and offering suggestions to each other.

“We need to be in recovery too,” Tina says, outlining the shame and isolation that confronted their family because of the stigma associated with addiction.

“Except for working, we didn’t go out of the house much.

We didn’t take vacations because we had to be there for our loved one,” Tony adds. “[Our family member] started getting better when we started getting better.”

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When one person takes action, the ripples of relief are impossible to overestimate.

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“It has to start at the pulpit. It has to start with the pastors and the priests and the deacons. They have to let families know that it’s OK to talk about this—that it’s going on in this church, and that they have to learn to love people right where they are. I guarantee you, sitting there in that congregation, every single person has been affected one way or the other by this epidemic.”

—Tina Garera

The Gareras say that the support group meetings—coupled with a divine prompting to return to church and ask God for help—are what ultimately saved their marriage.

Unfortunately, many church communities are not welcoming to those struggling with addictions and their families.

“It has to start at the pulpit. It has to start with the pastors and the priests and the deacons,” Tina says. “They have to let families know that it’s OK to talk about this—that it’s going on in this church, and that they have to learn to love people right where they are. I guarantee you, sitting there in that congregation, every single person has been affected one way or the other by this epidemic.”

In West Virginia, where substance use is at its highest, a simple presentation broke the silence and brought about concrete actions, which saved lives.

Ellen Condron, the parish nurse at All Saints Catholic Church in Bridgeport, suggested that her parish host a “community conversation” about substance use in their social hall. A professor of psychiatric nursing at Fairmont State University, she had learned that children were coming to school without food or clean clothes. Addicted parents were simply incapable of tending to their children.

“A lot of the people in our community had no idea how bad it was,” she says. “It was like a third-world country within our community that we didn’t know about.”

Condron organized a two-hour presentation in the parish social hall, asking local experts to speak on different aspects of the crisis. The conversation was so well received that she continued to organize presentations, with the ninth community conversation occurring last May. She estimates that each event draws at least 100 people, with some attracting over 200. During each community conversation, Condron asks local organizations to be present and distribute information about resources available.

“The other day a woman I didn’t know came up to me and said, ‘You have to keep doing what you’re doing,’” Condron recalls. “She gave me a hug and told me about her relative who had been helped and was now drug-free.”

These conversations have led to other bright spots, both large and small, in addressing the epidemic. All of the local schools were provided with washers and dryers so they could wash the clothes of children whose parents wrestled with addiction. Several local churches provide food to these same children on Fridays so that they will have something to eat over the weekends.

Pope Francis speaks at a conference organized by the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences at the Vatican. The pope called for protecting the dignity of substance abusers and also condemned the “vast, powerful networks” behind the drug trade.

Group counseling, such as this at the Center for Addiction Treatment in Cincinnati, Ohio, is an effective step in the recovery process.

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CARING COMMUNITIES

de.

Condron, now recognized as a community expert, also met with their representative from Congress about the crisis.

Their meeting led directly to the activation of the Office of Drug Control Policy for West Virginia. The office closely follows a model that she and other activists created.

‘I BELIEVE YOU CAN GET BETTER’

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ial

Children were coming to school without food or clean clothes.

Addicted parents were simply incapable of tending to their children.

Condron said that church communities already have the power to stem the epidemic. Worshippers just need to “let the spirit guide.

“Within churches, you have a core group of people like we did,” she explains. This group can form the basis for activism: gathering resources, organizing details, distributing information, and finding areas of need.

“We seem to have created a following with what we’re doing. And I think it’s because we support each other and we know that this is important,” she says.

Back in Cincinnati, Kuehn describes a church group that organizes childcare for those who are working toward recovery.

“When someone needs to go into treatment, they may not have anyone reliable to watch their children while they are in a residential program,” she says. They vet people in the community who are willing to step in and help addicts with childcare.

These people say, “‘Yeah, I’ll do that for you for a year, because I believe you can get better. And whatever stability I can give your child is something that could affect them, which then could affect, in a positive way, our community,’” Condron says.

LITTLE THINGS COUNT

When one person takes action, the ripples of relief are impossible to overestimate. During the worst part of his struggle with addiction, Dattilo was living on the streets. He camped beneath a Cincinnati bridge for three years and had no means of a steady food supply or access to basic hygiene.

“I didn’t see an exit for myself. I knew I deserved better, I knew I wanted better, but I just didn’t know how to connect the dots from A to B to actually get out of there,” he recalls.

On the streets, he came into contact with workers from a local nonprofit called Downtown Cincinnati Inc. In the below-freezing temperatures of January 2018, one of the workers gave him a ride to the treatment center. He was admitted into their residential program the next day.

“I looked like an absolute shell of a man. You look at Tom Hanks in Cast Away—that can give you the mental image of me. I smelled so bad, it was embarrassing,” he says.

Even with new clothes and regular showers, Dattilo said it took time for his hygiene to recover. Some of the other residents at the treatment center avoided contact with him.

But it only took one counselor, a woman named AJ, who had herself been in his shoes, to restore his dignity and hope.

“She’s a beautiful lady, and she made me feel welcome.

She made me feel like anything is possible. I felt like she was seeing my potential—she wasn’t seeing me as I was. And that is the first person who had believed in me in a very long time, who showed me that there was hope,” Dattilo says.

Dattilo graduated from the center and has been living in recovery ever since. He now works for the very same organization that picked him up off the streets and volunteers StAnthonyMessenger.org | August 2019 • 29

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The Opioid Crisis at a Glance ACCORDING TO THE National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), more than 130 people in the United States die every day from opioid overdose. “The misuse of and addiction to opioids— including prescription pain relievers, heroin, and synthetic opioids such as fentanyl—is a serious national crisis that affects public health as well as social and economic welfare,” the site reports.

BELOW ARE MORE STATISTICS FROM THE NIDA. • 21–29 percent of patients prescribed opioids for chronic pain misuse them.

• 8–12 percent develop an opioid use disorder.

• An estimated 4–6 percent who misuse prescription opioids transition to heroin.

• About 80 percent of people who use heroin first misused prescription opioids.

• Opioid overdoses increased 30 percent from July 2016 through September 2017 in 52 areas in 45 states.

• The Midwestern region saw opioid overdoses increase 70 percent from July 2016 through September 2017.

• Opioid overdoses in large cities increased by 54 percent in 16 states from July 2016 through September 2017.

as a peer advocate at the Center for Addiction Treatment.

Ultimately, he wants to have a job working on the streets, spreading hope to the homeless.

When asked how church communities can help those who are struggling with addiction, Dattilo’s request is simple.

“Pray,” he says, adding that God’s providence is the reason he is alive today.

“If you feel comfortable enough to stop and have an actual conversation with a homeless person or a drug addict, let them know that Jesus still loves them. Let them know that they are not forgotten about. Let them know that they exist, that they matter, that there’s hope,” he says.

The Gareras and Kuehn echo the same sentiment: In this epidemic, faith matters. Those who embrace spirituality are more likely to recover from their addiction. Those who have a spiritual center are more likely to withstand the stresses that come with having a struggling loved one. Hope is possible: Christ’s people are called to be the light, especially in the darkest depths of despair.

“When society and people walk by you and ignore you every day for a long time, you just really lose your selfworth,” Dattilo recalls from his years on the streets. “If you improve one person’s day, you’ve made that person’s day,” he continues. “That changes the world realistically. You made life better for one human being.”

Katie Rutter, an award-winning video producer, editor, and journalist based in Bloomington, Indiana, specializes in Catholic/Christian media. Along with her work as a freelance writer, she creates short documentaries, promotional videos, and news reports. Her article “Brother Marinus: War Hero and Selfless Monk” appeared in our March 2019 issue.

Additional Resources Delphi Health Group’s Addiction Resource: AddictionResource.com National Institute on Drug Abuse: DrugAbuse.gov Parents of Addicted Loved Ones: PalGroup.org Catholic in Recovery: CatholicinRecovery.com

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Those who embrace spirituality are more likely to recover from their addiction. Those who have a spiritual center are more likely to withstand the stresses that come with having a struggling loved one. Hope is possible: Christ’s people are called to be the light, especially in the darkest depths of despair.

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Patron Saint of Addicts

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I

n June 1979, then-Pope John Paul II visited the cell in the Auschwitz concentration camp where St. Maximilian Kolbe—prisoner 16670—was confined. Kolbe, he proclaimed, is “the patron saint of our difficult century.” It was not until three years later, though, that he officially canonized the Franciscan, who had given his life for a fellow prisoner.

The pope’s words could not have been more prophetic for our world today. The struggles with addiction that are currently ravaging our world are calling out for a spiritual guide.

That guide is Maximilian Kolbe.

The saint is the patron saint of those suffering from addiction, perhaps due to his death on August 14, 1941, following a lethal injection of carbolic acid at the Auschwitz concentration camp.

Kolbe suffered more than 15 days of torment before succumbing to that lethal injection. He died on August 14, 1941, at the age of 47, a martyr of charity.

Pope Paul VI declared Father Kolbe Blessed on October 17, 1971, and Pope John Paul II canonized him a saint on October 10, 1982.

St. Maximilian is the patron saint of families, prisoners, journalists, political prisoners, drug addicts, and the pro-life movement.

Flowers sit on the railway tracks at the former Nazi death camp in Auschwitz, Poland. Hundreds of thousands of Jews and people of other faiths, including Catholics St. Edith Stein and St. Maximilian Kolbe, were killed at Auschwitz.

Some might know that St. Maximilian Kolbe, depicted above in his Franciscan habit and draped with his concentration camp uniform, was killed at Auschwitz. It may come as a surprise, though, that he is the patron saint of addicts, perhaps because his death was by lethal injection.

Prayer for the Addicted ST. MAXIMILIAN MARIA KOLBE, your life of love and labor for souls was sacrificed amid the horrors of a concentration camp and hastened to its end by an injection of a deadly drug.

Look with compassion upon [person’s name] who is now entrapped in addiction to drugs and whom we now recommend to your powerful intercession.

Having offered your own life to preserve that of a family man, we turn to you with trust, confident that you will understand and help.

Obtain for us the grace never to withhold our love and understanding, nor to fail in persevering prayer that the enslaving bonds of addiction may be broken and that full health and freedom may be restored to him/her whom we love.

We will never cease to be grateful to God who has helped us and heard your prayer for us. Amen. ­—Mission of the Immaculata StAnthonyMessenger.org | August 2019 • 31

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BREATHING UNDER WATER Many find themselves drowning in some form of addiction.

This Franciscan friar and thought leader points out that the road to recovery parallels the path to salvation.

By Richard Rohr, OFM

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lmost 25 years ago, I gave a set of talks in Cincinnati, Ohio, to link the wisdom of the 12-Step Program with what St. Francis called “the marrow of the Gospel.” I was amazed how obvious and easy a task it was and was surprised this was not equally obvious to everybody involved in either of these fields. So the least I can hope to do here is to make what seems obvious a bit more obvious.

“Twelve-Steppers” sometimes thought they had left the church for the Wednesday night meetings in the basement; and many upstairs in the sanctuary presumed that their “higher” concerns were something different from “those people with problems” down below. The similar messages between the two teachings assure me that we are dealing with a common inspiration from the Holy Spirit and from the same collective unconscious.

In fact, I am still convinced that on the practical (read “transformational”) level, the Gospel message of Jesus and the 12-Step message of Bill Wilson are largely the same message, even in some detail. (I will frequently quote Bill W.

as the assigned creator of the 12 Steps and author of the socalled Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous, but I am aware there is some doubt as to who exactly wrote what.)

My original lectures were called “Breathing under Water,” a title taken from a telling poem by Carol Bialock, RSCJ, which seemed to sum up so much of the common message (see text on page 38). The original cassette recordings continued to move over the years, eventually became CDs, and morphed into a second set of talks called “How Do We Breathe under Water?” more than 15 years later. People continued to encourage me to put some of these ideas into written form. So, with some added growth and experience, here is my attempt. I hope it can offer all of us some underwater breathing lessons—for a culture, and a Church, that often appear to be drowning without knowing it. But do not despair. What Ortega y Gasset calls the state of mind of the “shipwrecked” is perhaps a necessary beginning point for any salvation from such drowning.

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will also try to point out the similar paralhad become the official religion of the Roman lels in institutions, cultures, and nations. As Empire, which left us needing to agree on its organizational consultant and psychotheratranscendent truth claims (for example, Jesus pist Anne Wilson Schaef said many years ago, is God, God is Trinity, Mary was a virgin, our society itself shows all the signs of classic etc.), instead of experiencing the very pracaddiction. I began to wonder whether addictical “steps” of human enlightenment, the tion could be one very helpful metaphor for central message of our own transformation what the biblical tradition called “sin.” into “the divine nature” (2 Pt 1:4), and bringI personally am convinced that is the case, ing about a “new creation” on this earth (Gal which might be the first foundational con6:15). It became theory over practice. nection between the Gospel and the 12-Step We henceforth concentrated on how to Program. How helpful it is worship Jesus as one united to see sin, like addiction, as empire instead of followNow we suffer a disease, a very destructive ing Jesus in any practical the consequences disease, instead of merely ways (even though he never of a bodilysomething that was culpaonce said “worship me,” ble, punishable, or “made but often said “follow me”). addicted and God unhappy.” If sin indeed The emperors, not popes too often soulless made God unhappy, it was or bishops, convened the society, while still because God desires nothnext few councils of the arguing the abing more than our happiChurch, and their constractions of theness and wills the healing cerns were usually not the ology and liturgy, of our disease. The healing healing of the masses but a and paying out ministry of Jesus should united empire, and surely have made that crystal clear; not Jesus’ clear teaching on an always availhealing was about all that nonviolence, simplicity of able Holy Spirit he did, with much of his lifestyle, and healing those to the very few teaching illustrating the on the edge, which would who meet all the healings—and vice versa. It have derailed the urgent requirements. is rather amazing that this concerns of an empire, as did not remain at the top of we see to this day. all Church agendas.

Our Christian preAs Carol Bialock says in her poem, we occupation with metaphysics and the future cannot stop the drowning waters of our became the avoiding of the “physics” itself and addictive culture from rising, but we must the present. Endless theorizing and the taking at least see our reality for what it is, seek to of sides, opinions about which we could be properly detach from it, and build a coral right or wrong, trumped and toppled the unicastle and learn to breathe under water. versally available gift of the Divine Indwelling, The New Testament called it “salvation” the real “incarnation,” which still has the or “enlightenment;” the 12-Step Program power to change the world. called it “recovery.” The trouble is that most As Tertullian, sometimes called the first Christians pushed this great liberation off Western theologian (AD 166–225), said, into the next world, and many 12-Steppers “Caro salutis cardo” (the flesh is the hinge settled for mere sobriety from a substance on which salvation swings and the axis on instead of a real transformation of the self. which it hangs). When Christianity loses its We have all been the losers as a result—waitmaterial/physical/earthly interests, it has very ing around for “enlightenment at gunpoint” little to say about how God actually loves (death) instead of enjoying God’s banquet the world into wholeness. In endless arguing much earlier in life. about Spirit, we too often avoided both body The 12-Step Program parallels, mirrors, and soul. Now we suffer the consequences of a and makes practical the same messages that bodily-addicted and too often soulless society, Jesus gave us, but now without as much danwhile still arguing the abstractions of theolger of spiritualizing the message and pushogy and liturgy, and paying out an always ing its effects into a future and metaphysical available Holy Spirit to the very few who meet world. By the fourth century, Christianity all the requirements.

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GOING TOWARD THE PAIN

There is no side to take in the 12-Step Program! It is not a worthiness contest. There is only an absolutely necessary starting point!

The experience of “powerlessness” is where we all must begin. And Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is honest and humble enough to state this, just as Jesus himself always went where the pain was. Wherever there was human suffering, Jesus was concerned about it now, and about its healing now. It is rather amazing and very sad that we pushed it all off into a future reward system for those who were “worthy.”

As if any of us are.

Is it this human pain that we are afraid of?

Powerlessness, the state of the shipwrecked, is an experience we all share anyway, if we are sincere, but Bill Wilson found we are not very good at that either. He called it “denial.”

It seems we are not that free to be honest, or even aware, because most of our garbage is buried in the unconscious. So it is absolutely essential that we find a spirituality that reaches to that hidden level. If not, nothing really changes.

It is not necessarily bad will or even conscious denial on our part. We just can’t see what we are not forced to see. As Jesus put it, we see the splinter in our brother or sister’s eye and miss the log in our own (Mt 7:4–5).

The whole deceptive game is revealed in that one brilliant line from Jesus. But we seem to need something to force us to deal with that log. For many, if not most, people the only thing strong enough to force them is some experience of addiction, some moral failure, or some falling over which they are powerless.

We are all spiritually powerless, however, and not just those physically addicted to a substance, which is why I address this to everyone. Alcoholics just have their powerlessness visible for all to see. The rest of us disguise it in different ways and overcompensate for our more hidden and subtle addictions and attachments, especially our addiction to our way of thinking.

We all take our own pattern of thinking as normative, logical, and surely true, even when it does not fully compute. We keep doing the same thing over and over again, even if it is not working for us. That is the self-destructive, even “demonic,” nature of all addiction and of the mind, in particular. We think we are our thinking, and we even take that thinking as utterly “true,” which removes

us at least two steps from reality itself. We really are our own worst enemies, and salvation is primarily from ourselves. It seems humans would sooner die than change or admit that they are mistaken.

This thinking mind, with a certain tit-fortat rationality, made the Gospel itself into an achievement contest in which “the one with the most willpower wins”—even though almost everybody actually loses by the normal criteria. That is how far the ego (read “false self ” or Paul’s word, “the flesh”) will go to promote and protect itself. It would sooner die than change or admit that it is mistaken.

It would sooner live in a win/lose world in which most people lose than allow God any win-win victory. Grace is always a humiliation for the ego, it seems.

At that level, organized religion is no longer good news for most people, but bad news indeed. It set us up for the massive atheism, agnosticism, hedonism, and secularism we now see in almost all formerly Christian countries (and in those that just keep up the externals). I now have more people tell me they are “recovering Catholics” than those in recovery from addiction. I am told that for every person who is joining the Church, three are leaving. Are these all bad or insincere people? I don’t think so. Perhaps we failed to give them the good news they desired, needed, and expected.

‘THE VITAL SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE’

On the other hand, the 12-Step Program often became a program for mere sobriety from a substance, and never moved many toward the “vital spiritual experience” that Bill W. deemed absolutely foundational for full recovery. If we can speak of the traditional Christian stages of the spiritual journey as (1) purgation, (2) illumination, and (3) union, too many addicts never seem to get to the second stage—any real spiritual illumination of the self—and even fewer get to the rich life of experienced union with God. In that, they mirror many mainline Christians, I am sad to say.

The 12-Step Program has too often stayed at the problem-solving level and missed out on the ecstasy itself—trustful intimacy with God, or what Jesus consistently called “the wedding banquet.” The world was left with the difficult task of trying to live with even more difficult “dry drunks.” These are people StAnthonyMessenger.org | August 2019 • 35

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were often truly childish. And considering who do not drink or take drugs anymore, but the rough deal life had given us, we felt it they drive the rest of us to want to drink by perfectly natural that we were sensitive. As to their all-or-nothing thinking, which distorts our grandiose behavior, we insisted that we and destroys most calm and clear communihad been possessed of nothing but a high and cation. legitimate ambition to win the battle of life!”

If you think I am being unfair, hear Bill It is my experience after over 40 years as a Wilson’s comment himself in his later years: “When AA was quite young, a number of priest that we could say the same about many eminent psychologists and doctors made an well-intentioned Christians and clergy. Their religion has never touched exhaustive study of a them or healed them at the good-sized group of soThe 12-Step Program unconscious level where called problem drinkers. parallels, mirrors, and all of the real motivation, They finally came up makes practical the with a conclusion that hurts, unforgiveness, anger, wounds, and illusions are shocked the AA memsame messages that stored, hiding—and often bers of that time. These Jesus gave us. fully operative. They never distinguished men had went to “the inner room” the nerve to say that most of the alcoholics under where Jesus invited us, and investigation were still childish, emotionally where things hid “secretly” (Mt 6:6).

Christians are usually sincere and wellsensitive, and grandiose.

“How we alcoholics did resent that verdict! intentioned people until you get to any real issues of ego, control, power, money, pleasure, We would not believe that our adult dreams 36 • August 2019 | StAnthonyMessenger.org

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and security. Then they tend to be pretty much like everybody else. We often gave them a bogus version of the Gospel, some fast-food religion, without any deep transformation of the self; and the result has been the spiritual disaster of “Christian” countries that tend to be as consumer-oriented, proud, warlike, racist, class conscious, and addictive as everybody else—and often more so, I am afraid.

People were Catholic, for example, because they were Italian, Spanish, or Irish—not because they “did the steps” or had any “vital spiritual experience” that changed their lives. We must be honest here, and not defensive; the issues are now too grave and too urgent. Our inability to see our personal failures is paralleled by our inability to see our institutional and national sins too. It is the identical pattern of addiction and denial.

Thank God that Pope John Paul II introduced into our vocabulary terms like “structural sin” and “institutional evil.”

It was not even part of the conversation in most of Christian history up to now, as we exclusively concentrated on “personal” sins. The three sources of evil were traditionally called “the world, the flesh, and the devil.” We so concentrated on the flesh that we let the world and “the devil” get off scot-free. We have our work cut out for us, and the 12-Step Program made it very clear that it is indeed work, and not fast food or cheap grace. Gospel people need to do their honest inner work, “Steppers” need to “do the steps,” and they both need to know that they are then eating from the very rich and nutritious “marrow of the Gospel.”

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FOUR ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT ADDICTION

I am writing this, therefore, with these four assumptions: We are all addicts. Human beings are addictive by nature.

Addiction is a modern name and honest description for what the biblical tradition called “sin” and medieval Christians called “passions” or “attachments.” They both recognized that serious measures, or practices, were needed to break us out of these illusions and entrapments; in fact, the New Testament calls them in some cases “exorcisms”! They knew they were dealing with nonrational evil, or “demons.”

“Stinking thinking” is the universal addiction. Substance addictions like alcohol and drugs are merely the most visible forms of addiction, but actually we are all addicted to our own habitual way of doing anything, our own defenses, and most especially, our patterned way of thinking, or how we process our reality. The very fact we have to say this shows how much we are blinded inside of it. By definition, you can never see or handle what you are addicted to. It is always hidden and disguised as something else. As Jesus did with the demon at Gerasa, someone must ask, “What is your name?”

(Lk 8:30). The problem must be correctly named before the demon can be exorcised. You cannot heal what you do not first acknowledge.

All societies are addicted to themselves and create deep codependency on them. There are shared and agreed-upon addictions in every culture and every institution. These are

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by Carol Bialock, RSCJ I built my house by the sea.

Not on the sands, mind you; not on the shifting sand.

And I built it of rock.

A strong house by a strong sea.

And we got well acquainted, the sea and I. Good neighbors.

Not that we spoke much.

We met in silences.

Respectful, keeping our distance, but looking our thoughts across the fence of sand.

Always, the fence of sand our barrier, always, the sand between.

And then one day, —and I still don’t know how it happened— the sea came.

Without warning.

Without welcome, even Not sudden and swift, but a shifting across the sand like wine, less like the flow of water than the flow of blood.

Slow, but coming.

Slow, but flowing like an open wound.

And I thought of flight and I thought of drowning and I thought of death.

And while I thought the sea crept higher, till it reached my door.

And I knew then, there was neither flight, nor death, nor drowning.

That when the sea comes calling you stop being neighbors, Well acquainted, friendly-at-a-distance neighbors, And you give your house for a coral castle, And you learn to breathe underwater.

This article is adapted from the book Breathing Under Water (Franciscan Media) by Richard Rohr, OFM. Richard Rohr, OFM, is a globally recognized ecumenical teacher and founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation (CAC) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He is the author of numerous books, including Everything Belongs, Adam’s Return, The Naked Now, Breathing Under Water, Falling Upward, Immortal Diamond, and Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi. His newest book is The Universal Christ.

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“Breathing under Water”

often the hardest to heal because they do not look like addictions, for we have all agreed to be compulsive about the same things and blind to the same problems. The Gospel exposes those lies in every culture: the American addiction to oil, war, and empire; the Church’s addiction to its own absolute exceptionalism; the poor person’s addiction to powerlessness and victimhood; the white person’s addiction to superiority; the wealthy person’s addiction to entitlement.

Some form of alternative consciousness is the only freedom from this self and from cultural lies. If the universal addiction is to our own pattern of thinking, which is invariably dualistic, the primary spiritual path must be some form of contemplative practice, once just called “prayer,” to break down this unhelpful binary system of either/or thinking and superiority thinking. “Praying” is changing your operating system! This was well recognized in Step 11 of the 12 Steps.

When religion does not move people to the mystical or nondual level of consciousness, it is more a part of the problem than any solution whatsoever. It solidifies angers, creates enemies, and is almost always exclusionary of the most recent definition of sinner. At this level, it is largely incapable of its supreme task of healing, reconciling, forgiving, and peacemaking. When religion does not give people an inner life or a real prayer life, it is missing its primary vocation.

Let me sum up, then, the foundational ways that I believe Jesus and the 12 Steps of AA are saying the same thing but with different vocabulary: We suffer to get well.

We surrender to win.

We die to live.

We give it away to keep it.

This counterintuitive wisdom will forever be resisted as true, denied, and avoided until it is forced upon us—by some reality over which we are powerless—and if we are honest, we’re all powerless in the presence of full Reality.

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This is the last photo taken of St. Maximilian, who was executed at Auschwitz in August 1941. He had been a prisoner at the concentration camp for six months.

martyrof

AUSCHWITZ St. Maximilian Kolbe laid down his life for another man at Auschwitz, confronting evil with charity. A friar who helped a Chicago parish obtain a relic of the saint shares his story.

By Michelle Martin

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PHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE PHOTO CREDIT HERE

St. Maximilian wore a long beard as a missionary in Japan, which he shaved prior to his arrest in Poland in 1939.

LEFT AND RIGHT: PHOTOS COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE; MIDDLE: PHOTO COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL

Maximilian is pictured above as a seminarian. He made his final vows as a Conventual Franciscan friar in 1914.

S

t. Maximilian Kolbe is known as a martyr of the Holocaust. The Conventual Francis-

can friar was executed on August 14, 1941, at Auschwitz, after giving up his life for another inmate.

His body, like those of most people who died at Auschwitz, was cremated, and the ashes were dumped in a marshy area outside the camp.

That would seem to make it difficult to find first-class relics of the saint. Firstclass relics, defined as bodily remains of a saint, can be as large as bones or even the

was en a .

entire skeleton, or as small as a drop of blood or fragment of hair.

So when Chicago’s St. Ita Parish, a multiethnic community led by the Conventual Franciscans, announced that it had received ary 2018, the first question people asked the pastor was how such a thing even existed. The second, according to Conventual Franciscan Father Robert Cook, was how the parish ended up with it.

The answers to both questions lie in a web of relationships that binds St. Maximilian and Niepokalanow, a monastery he founded in PoPHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE PHOTO CREDIT HERE

LEFT AND RIGHT: PHOTOS COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE; MIDDLE: PHOTO COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL

a first-class relic of St. Maximilian in Janu-

land in 1927, with the Conventual Franciscans in the United States and St. Ita Parish.

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A smiling St. Maximilian (back right) enjoys a game of chess between two young Conventual Franciscan friars in formation.

St. Maximilian was among 50 Franciscans of Niepokalanow, Poland, arrested in September of 1939.

The existence of the relics is not a secret—the friars brought them on an eight-month tour of the United States in 2016—and the Niepokalanow website offers information on how parishes can request a relic. Fragments of clippings from the saint’s beard have been shared with churches around the world since St. Maximilian was canonized by Pope John Paul II on October 10, 1982.

According to the guidelines, the comA BARBER AND A PICKLE JAR munity at Niepokalanow provides relics Father McCurry shared the story on only to parishes that will make them availthe evening that St. Maximilian’s relic able for public veneration, have a letter was installed at St. Ita. The congregafrom the local bishop in support of the tion included friars from Marytown, request, and can send someone to present home of the National Shrine of St. the documentation and receive the relic in Maximilian Kolbe in the Chicago suburb Knights of the Immaculata magazine, person. of Libertyville, as well as dozens of St. Ita founded by Maximilian Kolbe.

All of that came together for St. Ita in 2017, when a parishioners, many of whom hail from countries in Africa and Asia. member of the parish’s Polish community was able to visit It was at Niepokalanow that the fragments of hair— Niepokalanow on the feast of the Immaculate Conception and carry the relic back to Chicago. That parishioner wishes actually trimmings from St. Maximilian’s beard—have to remain anonymous. been preserved since 1939, Father McCurry says. That the Those kinds of connections are just what relics are meant beard trimmings exist at all is something of a miracle, and to reinforce, says Father Cook, who has met several friars it is based on the foresight of the barber at Niepokalanow.

Maximilian wanted his long beard shaved off to make it who knew St. Maximilian. Father Cook likes to compare Catholic veneration of relics to the way he keeps mementos harder for the Nazis to recognize him. The barber thought of his mother, who, while not canonized, is surely in heaven, he might have a future saint sitting in his chair, so he tried to he says. Spending time with things that were important to tuck the clippings away. her makes him feel close to her, he adds.

Maximilian noticed, and directed him to put the hair in The relic of St. Maximilian, housed in a reliquary adorned the stove so it could be burned. The barber did, knowing full well that the day was warm and the stove was cold, Father with a tau cross (p. 41), is one of several displayed at St. Ita. McCurry says. When Maximilian left the room, the barber The same parishioner who collected the St. Maximilian relic brought two others from Poland on other trips: one from St. retrieved the clippings and hid them in a pickle jar, where Faustina Kowalska and another from St. John Paul II. they remained safe.

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PHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE (3)

TOP: PHOTOS COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL (2); CENTER: PHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE

At the center is the friendship between Conventual Franciscan Friar James McCurry and Franciszek Gajowniczek, the man whose place St. Maximilian took when he volunteered to be executed in August 1941. Father McCurry is provincial of the order’s Our Lady of the Angels Province, which covers the eastern part of the United States.

Franciszek Gajowniczek shared the story of how St. Maximilian laid down his life for him at Auschwitz.

Gajowniczek, seated in the middle, visited the Conventual Franciscans at the National Shrine of St. Maximilian Kolbe in Libertyville, Illinois.

“We Catholics do not worship relics,” Father McCurry said at the installation. “We honor them and pay respect to them.” In doing so, Catholics are living in the community of saints and demonstrating their belief that the living and the dead are connected throughout eternity, he said.

who survived the war said that instead of screaming, they heard hymns to Mary and rosary prayers from the bunker, at least at first. Later, it was silent.

“The grace of God, the peace of Christ, was triumphing over the hatred of the Nazis,” Father McCurry says. “[St. Maximilian] accompanied nine hungry, thirsty, naked, homeless, sick, imprisoned people into the death cell and ministered to them.”

When the bunker was opened two weeks later, Kolbe was the only one of the 10 left alive. He was executed with an intravenous injection of carbolic acid, an excruciating way to die. After the war, Gajowniczek and others who knew St. Maximilian said that he often found ways to minister to the other prisoners and inspire them to hope.

“It’s clear that Maximilian had a plan from the moment he walked through those gates,” Father McCurry says. “He was determined to counteract the evil of the Nazi guards by the charity he exhibited.” That meant he gave away some of the meager morsels of food he received, prayed, and heard confessions. He is believed to have saved the life of a 14-yearold Jewish boy who was assigned to his barracks with 600 other men and was in despair because he had been separated from his family. St. Maximilian encouraged him and helped him blend in.

“He said, ‘Hatred destroys. Only love creates,’” Father McCurry says. It was a message Gajowniczek took to heart, and he often spoke about St. Maximilian. He was a guest at the Vatican for St. Maximilian’s beatification in 1971 and at his canonization in 1982. He traveled frequently to the United States to tell his story, and, for many years, his designated driver and escort was Father McCurry.

PHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE (3)

TOP: PHOTOS COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL (2); CENTER: PHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE

LAYING DOWN HIS LIFE FOR ANOTHER

Father McCurry told the congregation that St. Maximilian volunteered to take the place of Gajowniczek as one of 10 men to be put to death as punishment for another prisoner who had escaped. When he was selected, Gajowniczek cried out, asking what would happen to his wife and child if he were killed.

St. Maximilian stepped forward, identified himself as a Catholic priest, and volunteered to take his place. At the time, most of the inmates at Auschwitz were Polish Catholics. It was the year before the Nazis launched the “Final Solution,” their attempt to exterminate the Jews of Europe.

Even so, the camp commandant welcomed inmates by telling them the only way out of the work camp was through the crematorium, Father McCurry says. Men would be worked to death, however long that took. Certain groups were targeted for death sooner: Jews had two weeks, the commandant said, and Catholic priests had a month. His offer was accepted, and St. Maximilian (prisoner 16670) and the other nine men were stripped of their clothes and locked in a dark underground bunker without food or water.

Gajowniczek, who died in 1995, and other camp inmates

A SAINT AND A BROTHER

Father McCurry says his connection to St. Maximilian was formed decades ago when he was a young friar. Shortly after StAnthonyMessenger.org | August 2019 • 43

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St. Maximilian Kolbe was beatified, Father McCurry taught pray that all of us can be as consecrated to Our Lady as at Kolbe High School in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and a porMaximilian Kolbe was.” trait of then-Blessed Maximilian hung in his classroom.

“He pointed right at me and said, ‘You do that,’” Father “I used to ask him for help,” Father McCurry recalls. “As a McCurry said in his homily at St. Ita, just before the Franciscan friar, I look at him as a brother. He’s more than a whole parish consecrated itself to Mary. They did so, says saint to me. The beauty of our Church is Father Cook, “because that is what that the saints in heaven and we on earth St. Maximilian would have wanted.” are bonded. We are bonded in prayer Father McCurry says the message of St. and in love. Saints like Maximilian Kolbe Maximilian Kolbe is just as relevant now are not distant figures from the past. as it ever was, and that message includes They are living.” not simply his death but also his life.

Father McCurry led a pilgrimage of 750 American Catholics to Rome DEVOTED TO OUR LADY for Kolbe’s canonization Mass in 1982 St. Maximilian, already a prominent and managed to get a sneak peek at the Catholic leader in 1939 when the Nazis vestments Pope John Paul II would wear invaded Poland, knew he would likely be the day before the rite. They were red, targeted, according to Father McCurry. confirming that John Paul would canonAs a boy of about 10 years of age, he ize him as a martyr. had a vision of Mary in his hometown That had been in question, Father parish, St. Matthew Church. She offered McCurry says, since St. Maximilian was him two crowns: red for martyrdom killed not for his faith, but in laying and white for lifelong purity. She asked down his life to spare another. “To be a which he would choose; he asked for martyr, you had to die rather than deny St. Maximilian is depicted holding two crowns both, and she gave them to him. the faith,” Father McCurry explained.

“The key to him being able to lead Mary offered him in a vision—red for martyrdom “St. Maximilian Kolbe died putting the that kind of a life was Our Lady, who and white for lifelong purity. faith into the practice of heroic charity.” had invited him,” Father McCurry says.

Sneaking back out of the vesting room, Father McCurry “It wasn’t a lot of pious claptrap. It was so meaningful that it bumped into Mother Teresa, who spoke to him of the gave him hope and purpose.” “heroic example of charity” St. Maximilian offered. “She said When he was 13, he and his brother illegally crossed he showed how the Blessed Mother enables us to live lives of the border into Austria-Hungary to enter the Conventual heroic charity,” he says.

Franciscan seminary. In 1910, he was given the religious name Maximilian, and he made his final vows as a friar in Father McCurry also brought up the gifts at the Mass 1914. and had a brief encounter with Pope John Paul II. When He studied for the priesthood in Rome, and, while he was he offered his gift, he asked the pope, “Holy Father, please 44 • August 2019 | StAnthonyMessenger.org

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LEFT PHOTO COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL; RIGHT: KAREN CALLAWAY/CHICAGO CATHOLIC

Father McCurry carries a poster of St. Maximilian Kolbe before Pope John Paul II at the 1982 canonization.

TOP: PHOTOS COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL (2); CENTER: PHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE

Conventual Franciscan Father James McCurry brings up the gifts during St. Maximilian’s canonization Mass in 1982.

LEFT PHOTO COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL; RIGHT: KAREN CALLAWAY/CHICAGO CATHOLIC

TOP: PHOTOS COURTESY OF FRANCISCAN FRIARS CONVENTUAL (2); CENTER: PHOTO COURTESY KOLBE SHRINE

President George H.W. Bush shakes hands with Father McCurry at a meetand-greet with Franciszek Gajowniczek (middle) in 1989.

there, he founded the Militia of the Immaculata, the worldwide evangelization movement that encourages consecration to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Five years later, after being ordained, he started the Knights of the Immaculata magazine in Poland, and five years after that, St. Maximilian founded Niepokalanow. The community used print media and radio to spread the word that people should love Mary as a mother if they wanted to get closer to Jesus. Despite poor health, St. Maximilian expanded his evangelization efforts to Japan in 1930.

When his health forced him to return to Poland in 1938, Niepokalanow was home to more than 600 friars, and Knights of the Immaculata had the largest circulation of any religious publication in Poland. That was enough to draw the interest of the Nazis, who invaded the country on September 1, 1939.

As he expected, he was arrested on September 13, 1939, on “general suspicion” and was released after a brief time.

Meanwhile, the friars at Niepokalanow had begun offering shelter to Poles fleeing the Nazis, Catholics and Jews alike. Kolbe himself penned one last essay, entitled “Pravda,” or “Truth,” explaining how the Nazis “were out to destroy the whole Judeo-Christian way of life,” Father McCurry says.

In February 1941, he was arrested again. This time, he was sent to Auschwitz.

St. Maximilian’s example offers a path for anyone living in despair, Father McCurry says.

“Many people have any number of causes for getting discouraged,” he says. “To anyone, Maximilian Kolbe would give the same advice: Go to Mary. Let her minister to you.

She knows your troubles.”

Michelle Martin has been writing for the Catholic press for 20 years and is a staff writer for the Archdiocese of Chicago’s newspaper. She lives in Chicago with her family.

Father Bob Cook, pastor, holds a first-class relic of St. Maximilian as Father James McCurry, provincial of the Conventual Franciscans, venerates it at St. Ita Church in Chicago.

Why Do We Venerate Relics?

The tradition of venerating relics of the saints is nearly as old as the Church itself.

The Catholic Encyclopedia cites the eagerness of Christians to obtain the bones of St. Polycarp, burned at the stake in 156, for veneration, and goes on to say that the veneration of relics was “indeed taken for granted, by writers like St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Chrysostom, St. Gregory Nazianzen, and by all the other great doctors without exception.”

Relics generally are divided into three categories: FIRST CLASS: Includes matter that was part of the saint’s body, including bones, fragments of skin and hair, or drops of blood.

SECOND CLASS: Materials that were in close contact with the saint during the saint’s life, including possessions such as clothing or personal items.

THIRD CLASS: Items such as holy cards that have touched a firstor second-class relic.

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Self-awareness is important, but it can be destructive when it turns into self-criticism. Ask yourself these questions before allowing guilt to invade your peace. By Colleen M. Arnold, MD

IS THIS PROBLEM REALLY MINE?

One year, my newly licensed teenager hit another car in a parking lot. No one was around, and she didn’t think any damage had been done, so she simply left and forgot all about it. It turns out there was damage done to the other car, and a witness wrote down both license plate numbers. An hour later a police officer showed up at our door.

I was mortified. Hadn’t I taught her what to do if an accident occurred? Was I a bad driving teacher or a bad mom? I felt guilty for a week afterward until my daughter finally said, “Mom, this is my fault, not yours. Let it go!”

Feeling guilty because I can’t control someone else’s actions is a mistake. People have the right to make their own decisions, whether it’s my husband’s alcohol intake or my daughter’s driving habits. I can’t control anyone’s choices but my own, and I have no business trying. How can people learn from their mistakes or feel God’s help if I am always getting in the way? Don’t we all get annoyed when other people express unsolicited advice? If it’s not mine, I need to let it go. And if I let others fix their own mistakes, I have more time to fix my own.

DID I DO MY BEST? This is the time for an honest self-assessment. Was I too distracted? Too careless? Or worse, too selfish? Not long ago, one of my patients took an unexpected health turn and ended up in the hospital over Thanksgiving. I felt terrible and went back through his medical chart trying to find some clue I had missed. I looked over his meds and his recent test results, and, even armed with the knowledge of his current sickness, I couldn’t predict his sudden decline.

I had to accept the fact that I had done my best, and there was nothing else I could have done to change the situation.

I still felt sad my patient missed Thanksgiving at home, but I gave up the guilt. If I do my best, and things don’t go as I planned, I can trust that God has the situation under con-

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ROLFFIMAGES/FOTOSEARCH

ecently, several friends came to me, feeling guilty about situations that didn’t go the way they planned. I’ve felt the needling of a guilty conscience too, since God has blessed me with plenty of opportunities to make mistakes.

I know how anxiety-provoking it can be. I’m a physician; I’ve seen patients die unexpectedly in the emergency department and been surprised by chronic illnesses in the office that didn’t improve as I anticipated. I’m also a wife and mother. I felt guilty when my husband fell off the wagon of sobriety or one of my kids got in trouble at school.

It’s easy to become paralyzed and overwhelmed by voices shouting in our heads: “It’s all your fault!” or “If only you had done things differently!” Sometimes those voices are appropriate, but other times we struggle with guilt over things that aren’t our fault. How do we weed out the erroneous self-reproach to find the circumstances where true responsibility exists? How do we listen for and identify God’s voice above all the noise?

Over the years, I’ve worked out a plan to quiet those critical voices. After I ask myself the four questions below, I pray with the Bible to open my ears and heart for God’s answers.

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trol. God knows better than I do how things should turn out, and his plans are always better than mine.

I don’t need to understand his purposes to trust them. If I did my best, God’s got the rest.

IS THERE A WAY I CAN FIX IT NOW?

I sat on the phone with one of my daughters, half listening and half looking at my to-do list. “Uh-huh,” I said as I considered the litter box and my cleaning schedule. “Oh, really?” I muttered as I wrote two more things on the grocery list. “Mhhmm,” I mumbled as I tried to figure out if I had enough gas in the car to run the day’s errands. “Mom,” she said, “so what should I do?” I told her, “Oh, I’m sure you’ll figure something out, honey. I’ll talk to you later, OK?” Later that day, I stopped dead in my tracks, frozen in the realization that I had not been listening. I had been looking at the list, planning and figuring, and completely missed what my daughter shared. I felt my face flush a bit as the shame rolled over me.

I called her right then. What a horrible moment it was as I confessed not knowing what she had said. What a blessing it was as she forgave me and started the whole story over again.

Once we realize we’ve made a mistake, feeling guilty is not the only action to pursue. We need to determine a way to correct the situation if possible. This is a good time for prayer, for God loves to help us fix what we’ve messed up. He also provides the strength to right our wrongs.

Can I call a patient and provide a more compassionate explanation to her questions? Can I apologize to the family member I offended or take my neglected dog on an extra walk in the neighborhood?

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CAN I LEARN FROM IT? Some years ago, I made comments that deeply offended a friend. I apologized, but the damage was irreparable.

Although we still see each other occasionally, we are not as close as we once were. We can’t always fix our mistakes, but we can learn from them.

Whether it be with a patient, family member, pet, or stranger, how can I keep from making the same errors over and over? Do I need more sleep? Do I need to trust God more? Do I need to learn to control my temper or deepen my generosity? This kind of evaluation helps me to avoid repeating the same mistakes in the future and stretches me to become a better person.

GIVE IT TO GOD

My four-question system isn’t perfect, but it does help when the anxious, guilt-provoking voices start screaming in my head. When I finish my review, I give the whole process to God, who says: “Do not fear: I am with you; do not be anxious: I am your God. I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my victorious right hand” (Is 41:10).

I ask God to forgive what I’ve done wrong and to fix whatever I’ve missed. Amen!

Colleen M. Arnold, MD, a physician and writer residing in Lexington, Virginia, also holds a master’s degree in pastoral ministry. Her website is ColleenArnold.org.

SCRIPTURE PASSAGES FOR

INNER PEACE Our Catholic faith can help us understand situations in which we might have misplaced feelings of guilt. We can turn to Scripture for insight and help.

IS THIS MY PROBLEM?

• “Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye?” (Mt 7:3).

DID I DO MY BEST?

• “We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose” (Rom 8:28).

HOW CAN I FIX IT?

• “God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self-control” (2 Tm 1:7).

WHAT CAN I LEARN FROM IT?

• “Rejoice in hope, endure in affliction, persevere in prayer” (Rom 12:12).

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media MATTERS

reel time | channel surfing | audio file | bookshelf

By Sister Rose Pacatte, FSP

Sister Rose Pacatte, FSP

DVD Breakthrough Unplanned A Dog’s Journey The Best of Enemies The Public

?

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W

riter-director Jim Jarmusch’s latest film about a zombie apocalypse in small-town middle America premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, where I served on the ecumenical jury last May. Although much applauded, the droll, sociopolitical comedy did not win any prizes.

When cell phones and watches stop working and someone steals the chicken of Farmer Frank (Steve Buscemi), Police Chief Cliff Robertson (Bill Murray) and Officer Ronnie Peterson (Adam Driver) check things out. Back at the station, they connect with Officer Mindy Morrison (Chloë Sevigny). The two younger officers leave Robertson alone with the corpse of a drunk for the night until the new undertaker with a Scottish accent, Zelda Winston (Tilda Swinton), can collect her.

Meanwhile, at the gas station, owner Bobby Wiggins (Caleb Landry Jones) sells old comic books and memorabilia from the store and watches television newscaster Posie Juarez (Rosie Perez) offer grim commentary

on the situation. After two women are killed at a diner, Officer Peterson predicts, “This is going to end badly,” and blames their deaths on zombies.

Hermit Bob (Tom Waits) watches through binoculars as zombies slowly try to consume products they enjoyed in life as well as any living people they capture. His choice to be a hermit seems to be a saving grace.

Or maybe he is a trustworthy narrator telling us what we already know: Destroy the earth and it will destroy you.

Although many critics think the film is derivative of Shaun of the Dead and other zombie movies, I found the film’s absurd, self-conscious premise very funny and its ecological perspective timely. Adam Driver delivers deadpan dialogue perfectly, but Swinton steals the show. It’s as if Jarmusch called all of his friends together to be a part of an ensemble cast and then made the film just for fun.

Not yet rated, R • Gore, violence, language.

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ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD: ANDREW COOPER; LATE NIGHT: COURTESY OF AMAZON STUDIOS

NEW ON

THE DEAD DON’T DIE

LEFT: COURTESY SISTER ROSE PACATTE, FSP/MIKE BLAKE/REUTERS; THE DEAD DON’T DIE: ABBOT GENSER (2)

Sister Rose is a Daughter of St. Paul and the founding director of the Pauline Center for Media Studies. She has been the award-winning film columnist for St. Anthony Messenger since 2003 and is the author of several books on Scripture and film, as well as media literacy education.

LATE NIGHT

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ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD

ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD: ANDREW COOPER; LATE NIGHT: COURTESY OF AMAZON STUDIOS

LEFT: COURTESY SISTER ROSE PACATTE, FSP/MIKE BLAKE/REUTERS; THE DEAD DON’T DIE: ABBOT GENSER (2)

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t’s 1969. The career of actor Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) is on the decline because of his drinking.

His longtime stunt double, driver, and good friend, Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt), passes his time on the set of The Green Hornet and gets into a fight with martial arts star Bruce Lee (Mike Moh).

Dalton gets small parts here and there but performs well in a new series called Lancer.

This gets him an offer to go to Italy to act in spaghetti Westerns. Thinking his career is over, Dalton spends six months in Italy with Booth. Dalton marries an Italian beauty and brings her home to California.

While Booth has a lethal reputation and lives in a dilapidated trailer next to a drive-in theater in Van Nuys, Dalton lives in a very nice home in Benedict Canyon. His new neighbors are director Roman Polanski and his pregnant wife, Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie).

One day, Booth gives a flirtatious young woman a ride to the old Spahn Ranch where Western films

and television shows were filmed years earlier. Booth realizes she is part of the Manson Family cult and that Manson’s crew uses the place to hide out after stalking and killing people.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is timely: This month marks the 50th anniversary of the murder of Sharon Tate and three others by members of the Manson Family. Director Quentin Tarantino’s movie is a fictional reimagining of what might have happened if television heroes, or the actors who played them, had intervened to help their neighbors that fateful night.

The film reflects the deep influence of television on Tarantino from his earliest years. Almost the entire film, except for the last 15 minutes, is a prologue for the graphic slaughter at the end. It is vintage Tarantino, an ode to television’s past with an impressive cast. Only this time, tragically, the plot is based on true events.

Not yet rated, R • Intense violence, language.

Catholic News Service Media Review Office gives these ratings.

A-1 General patronage

A-2 Adults and adolescents

A-3 Adults

L Limited adult audience

O Morally offensive

hen the ratings for late-night host Katherine Newbury (Emma Thompson) take a dive after almost 30 years on the air, her network boss threatens to replace her. Katherine gets involved with her all-male writing team and brings in wannabe writer and chemical plant worker Molly Patel (Mindy Kaling) as a “diversity hire.”

With this change, Katherine hopes to keep her job. She demands that the team write better comedy, but she resists taking Molly’s honest and earnest input into consideration.

Much is revealed about Katherine’s marriage to a divorced older man, Walter (John Lithgow), and their decision not to have children but to put all of their efforts into making her program, Late Night, excellent.

I enjoyed the film—except for the one tasteless joke about abortion. I think the film is a perfect example of postmodernism in television, when the content value of anything important is reduced to nothing. Thompson is brilliant as the host whose tenuous link to any meaning in life is her relationship with her husband. When a revelation threatens their bond—along with the thought of losing her show—Katherine changes and grows as a person.

I would not hold Katherine up as a model for young people who want to be on television, however. She personifies the banality and emptiness of too much entertainment in any culture.

A-3, R • Language and sexual references.

Source: USCCB.org/movies

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media MATTERS

reel time | channel surfing | audio file | bookshelf

By Christopher Heffron

This Giant Beast That Is the Global Economy hether you like it or not, we’re all connected by money,” host Kal Penn (pictured above and inset) says over the opening credits of his timely docuseries This Giant Beast That Is the Global Economy. That’s a cynical position to take but true nevertheless. According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, consumer spending was at a rate of $14 trillion in the first quarter of 2019.

Consumer spending, in fact, made up 68 percent of the US economy.

Americans, statistics show, can’t stop accumulating.

American greed is the hallmark of Penn’s series, which is at turns funny, flippant, crass, and deeply illuminating. In the first episode, he takes a look at money laundering from a global perspective: how shady individuals create shell companies to funnel illegal money through banking transfers or commercial transactions. The profit from this illegal activity is impossible to calculate, but experts opine that it’s in the trillions.

In the second episode—even more salacious and compelling—Penn looks at wealth along the pop-culture spectrum, from reality stars to athletes to actors, and asks why opu-

lence too often erodes humanity. Furthermore, he wonders why those outside the one percent feel the need to follow these celebrities so closely. Does it matter how much Kim Kardashian spent on a Fendi bag? How much did rapper Drake spend on his private jet?

Why do we care?

Subsequent episodes look at the exploitation of the poor to turn a buck, the ever-growing counterfeit game, and how death, our final frontier, is big business.

While the themes and language in this docuseries might trouble some channel surfers, the heartbeat of it is inherently Franciscan, and it’s a good teaching tool for teens. Material wealth might satisfy us in the moment, but it’s a sugar high—it doesn’t last. We can take nothing for the journey.

Penn, who has worked in both Washington and Hollywood, might be an odd choice to host a show that looks at our culture’s corroding integrity, but he’s actually the perfect fit. He’s funny and smart and isn’t afraid to ask this question: Why does money sully our souls?

Our host dares not answer the question, but it’s a lot of fun watching him look for it.

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CHRIS ISAAK: REPRISE RECORDS; THE NATIONAL: 4AD

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF AMAZON PRIME VIDEO (3)

Amazon Prime

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Editor’s Pick

By Daniel Imwalle

THE NATIONAL | I AM EASY TO FIND

A

Retro-spective CHRIS ISAAK | HEART SHAPED WORLD

CHRIS ISAAK: REPRISE RECORDS; THE NATIONAL: 4AD

PHOTOS COURTESY OF AMAZON PRIME VIDEO (3)

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he late ’80s were in some ways the doldrums of pop music. The gleeful rebellion of punk had already faded, and the urgent and intense music of groups such as Nirvana had yet to emerge. Filling the vacuum were hedonistic hair metal bands and artists from the ’60s and ’70s retreading the same kind of music that initially made them famous. Boring! Oddly enough, one of the best releases of 1989 sounded purposely retro, but so genuine that it couldn’t be ignored: Chris Isaak’s Heart Shaped World.

Fueled by the hit single “Wicked Game,” Isaak’s third album is a return to the sound of crooners like Roy Orbison and early Elvis Presley, combined with the twangy guitar styles of Duane Eddy and Dick Dale. Despite its retro sound, the album retains a freshness and youthfulness brought on

by Isaak’s passionate vocal delivery and his timeless tales of love and heartbreak. “Wicked Game” stands out as the spiritual center of the record, with its spacious, desolate guitar and Isaak belting out the vocal part of his career in the chorus (“No, I don’t want to fall in love . . . with you.”).

Along with the iconic “Wicked Game,” other songs that stand out include the mysterious “Spanish Blue Sky” and the driving rockabilly of the title track. It’s hard to explain how this record, despite being pegged to a specific era of music, sounds so timeless today. Throughout the album, it’s clear how powerful the force of love is in the human heart, perhaps most palpable when that heart is broken.

fter 20 years, seven albums, plenty of tours, and a 2017 Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album, melancholic Midwestern rockers the National could have taken a well-deserved break to recharge their creative batteries. However, the band decided to dive right back into songwriting, resulting in I Am Easy to Find, quite possibly their most adventurous offering to date.

I Am Easy to Find walks a musical tightrope. Tense guitar parts and the vulnerability of lead singer Matt Berninger’s vocals are balanced out by lush string arrangements and a number of female vocalists who bring a much-needed feminine dimension to the music. Irish folk singer Lisa Hannigan, French songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Mina Tindle, and Gail Ann Dorsey (longtime member of David Bowie’s live band) are some of the stellar contributors to vocals whom the National handpicked to collaborate with.

“But I’m learning to lie here in the quiet light, While I watch the sky go from black to grey, Learning how not to die inside a little every time, I think about you and wonder if you are awake.”

—from “Quiet Light”

The opener, “You Had Your Soul with You,” is a prime example of the interplay of musical elements in the album and includes the subtle yet crucial inclusion of Dorsey’s vocals. Berninger’s lyrics speak to the myriad small moments when we could have said something to a loved one that would have shifted the course of a relationship, but instead opted for a kind of selfish detachment. “You had your soul with you, I was in no mood/Drift away, and I could forget/I had only one last feather left/I wore it on the island of my head/I had only one thing to do and I couldn’t do it yet,” Berninger sings in the first verse. The song is a reminder—a warning—that getting wrapped up in ourselves creates distance between us and the ones we love. Sometimes, we can’t get that love back once it’s gone.

In “Quiet Light,” Berninger takes us to a particular moment when he’s lying awake in bed during those especially dark predawn hours. “But I’m learning to lie here in the quiet light/While I watch the sky go from black to grey/Learning how not to die inside a little every time/I think about you and wonder if you are awake,” he sings. Berninger seems to be wrestling with what St. John of the Cross referred to as “the dark night of the soul.” However, there’s a hint of hope as he watches “the sky go from black to grey.” Often, it’s that first ray of light or that single, flickering candle that gets us through the darkest hours.

I Am Easy to Find is a moody album, for sure, but one full of sincerity and depth, making it a deeply rewarding listening experience. Other highlights on the album include “Not in Kansas,” “Hairpin Turns,” and the two interludes (“Her Father in the Pool” and “Underwater”) that help give the listener some time to digest the more challenging material.

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media MATTERS

reel time | channel surfing | audio file | bookshelf

By Julie Traubert

A Man’s Route to Catholicism

“I had tried to shut, lock, and bolt every entryway to God and banish him from my mind. But I couldn’t attend to every nook and cranny.”

FROM FIRE BY WATER

BY SOHRAB AHMARI Ignatius Press

O

ne man’s thoughtful and intellectually stimulating journey through the ideological and philosophical gamut, Sohrab Ahmari’s From Fire by Water is not like most spiritual memoirs or conversion stories. Ahmari’s writing and storytelling—filled with irony, subtle humor, dense lexicon, and overall brilliance—are fascinating and

compelling without resorting to the sensationalism rampant in many spiritual memoirs. A must-read in an age of identity politics and finger-pointing, his unique background and personal evolution lend a refreshing perspective on both America and religion.

Ahmari’s ideologically diverse journey—his resiliency to discover sound philosophical and political foundations—positions him as a muchneeded voice that can pierce through people’s self-made echo chambers and the intensity of our culture’s dualism, a voice that can speak truth to sharpen and challenge readers as well as inspire dialogue among opposites.

And whereas Ahmari’s cerebral approach will ignite readers wrestling with philosophy, politics, and culture, it’s his soul’s journey that he details,

which will help readers see the value of discipline, boundaries, and spiritual institutions such as the Catholic Church with its potential to truly transform lives.

Ahmari’s hunger for truth and belonging and his overall hesitancy to enter into religion’s arena are especially relatable, inspiring readers of all stripes to give spirituality—and even spiritual institutions—a shot. Readers will appreciate a book that resists the simplicity of feel-good fixes and relies instead on careful, intellectual exploration that weighs both the sacred and the secular—where the mind’s journey inspires a surrender of the heart.

Reviewed by Stephen Copeland, author of Where the Colors Blend (Morgan James Publishing).

Silent Enough to Hear Ourselves “All in all, the author highlights six contemplative teachers, six contemplative practices, and six themes of the contemplative path in the Christian tradition.”

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any are the articles and books on the benefits of silence, all of this despite the astute warning of some sage who wrote, “Say nothing that does not improve on the silence.” This new book does improve on it.

Mindful Silence impresses on all fronts and is filled with wisdom ancient and new. The author draws wisdom from such revered and familiar names as Ignatius, Clare of Assisi, Merton, Keating, Mother Teresa, John of the Cross, and more. We find, for example, Clare telling us just what we need if we are going to stay committed to the spiritual journey. From Ignatius we are asked to push ourselves to the limit to ask the deepest of questions: Who are

we? Why are we? And then there is the book’s author herself telling us there is “a mixed life” to aspire toward—a life of contemplation and action; we need not make the hard choice between the two.

The contemplative side requires much practice, as we know. Phileena Heuertz outlines some of the best of these life-changing practices, with each chapter offering a distinctive, doable, contemplative exercise. All in all, the author highlights six contemplative teachers, six contemplative practices, and six themes of the contemplative path in the Christian tradition. Add to this array the author’s myriad yet right-on-target stories from her own

MINDFUL SILENCE

BY PHILEENA HEUERTZ InterVarsity Press

spiritual journey, and what do we have?

A simply outstanding guidebook that is too important, too valuable, too userfriendly to miss.

Reviewed by Linus Mundy, veteran writer, editor, and publisher in the religious press.

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REHEARSING SCRIPTURE

ABBA ISN’T DADDY AND OTHER BIBLICAL SURPRISES

BY ANNA CARTER FLORENCE Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

ST. JOSEPH BIBLE HANDBOOK

BY TERRY JEAN DAY & CAROL J. SMITH

BY WILLIAM L. BURTON, OFM

Catholic Book Publishing

Ave Maria Press

“We can’t wait to come back and say something true about the God we encountered.”

“The rich sacred Scriptures are a call to action for us to be coworkers with God.”

“[The] Bible . . . is a large, complicated, unusual book. . . . It needs a handbook.”

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F

ou most likely have never heard of studying Scripture the way that Anna Carter Florence, professor of preaching, invites you to do—through speaking it in community. This book is meant for those in Bible study groups and adds a new dimension to not only read, but actually speak biblical passages. She draws on the world of drama and describes exactly how to rehearse Scripture, encouraging folks to get up out of those chairs and even act out the scenes. Along with many tools and techniques, she offers six questions to accompany each rehearsal, which foster discussion, reflection, and new insights.

t might seem intimidating to consider studying the Bible—it’s so long, there are many different authors, it’s too complex. Fortunately, Scripture scholar Father William Burton, OFM, has written a handy and accessible guide to ease your way into the enriching practice of Scripture study, focusing on Jesus’ life. The first part of the book relays interesting facts about the Bible, including where and when it was created, how ancient Bibles were produced, and the importance of geography in understanding the Bible.

Part two delves into the themes of the New Testament, shedding light on the meaning of Jesus’ teaching.

What I’m Reading

J

KIDS’

Stations of the Light, by Mary Ford-Grabowsky Thomas Berry: A Biography, by Mary Evelyn Tucker, John Grim, and Andrew Angyal

WHEN I PRAY FOR YOU

SPOT P

oyce Rupp, a Servite sister, is the author of numerous bestselling books on spiritual growth, an international conference speaker, retreat leader, and spiritual director.

To register for her free, monthly online newsletter, visit JoyceRupp.com.

illed with photos, colorful illustrations, maps, and charts, this handbook provides a wonderful framework “to help you get a handle on the Bible.”

Each of the 73 books of the Bible is presented with a two- to three-page summary, which includes a helpful, succinct outline, study questions, and two other headings: “Frequently Asked Questions” and “Look out for.” The latter two home in on important events and characters to provide further understanding of historical context. While aimed at those who are new to studying the Bible, this handbook would also benefit younger children and seasoned readers.

BY MATTHEW PAUL TURNER ILLUSTRATED BY KIMBERLY BARNES

arents, grandparents, and caregivers alike all pray for blessings over the children they love. This beautifully illustrated book shows the all-encompassing love that follows a child from birth, the early stages of childhood, and beyond, with prayers for joy and fulfillment.

Books featured in this section can be ordered from:

The Heart of Centering Prayer, by Cynthia Bourgeault

St. Mary’s Bookstore & Church Supply

Walking in Wonder, by John O’Donohue

web: www.stmarysbookstore.com e-mail: stmarysbookstore@gmail.com

Wild Mercy, by Mirabai Starr

1909 West End Avenue • Nashville, TN 37203 • 800-233-3604

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POINTSOFVIEW | FAITH & FAMILY

Susan has worked at St. Anthony Messenger for 25 years and is an executive editor. She and her husband, Mark, are the proud parents of four kids—Maddie, Alex, Riley, and Kacey. Aside from her family, her loves are Disney, traveling, and sports.

Susan welcomes your comments and suggestions!

E-MAIL: CatholicFamily@ FranciscanMedia.org MAIL: Faith & Family 28 W. Liberty St. Cincinnati, OH 45202

?

WANT MORE? Visit our website: StAnthonyMessenger.org

M

y youngest daughter is terrified of thunderstorms. Of course, it probably doesn’t help that her older siblings tell her things like, “Did you know that if your hair starts standing up you’re going to be struck by lightning?”

So earlier this summer, when a good oldfashioned thunderstorm rolled through our neighborhood, I could see her anxiety building with each rumble of thunder. I reassured her that we were fine and there was no severe weather in our area. She didn’t seem convinced, though.

As a parent, I know all too well that there are some things I can’t fix, no matter how hard I try. So, instead, I decided to put my words into action.

But first, let me back up a bit and provide some context. I have always loved playing in the rain. When I was younger, I would run outside during the summer months and use nature as my own personal sprinkler. When I became a mom, I passed that on to my kids.

Anytime I had the opportunity, I would grab them on a rainy day and head outside to dance in the rain and jump in the puddles. They reveled in it, seeing it as if we were breaking some unwritten rule that frowned on such behavior. But don’t worry, I never took my kids out when there were storms with thunder and lightning in the area—only warm, summer rain.

LET’S GO OUTSIDE

So on this recent day, after the storms had passed, I told Kacey and her sister Riley that

we were going outside to play. Kacey looked at me as if I had lost my mind. Riley, who had taken part in our previous adventures in the rain, ran out of the house—quite the miracle for a 13-year-old. Kacey stood on the back patio, watching Riley and me with reluctance.

Riley grabbed a jump rope off the porch and began jumping, splashing in the water on the ground. At one point she handed me the jump rope and challenged me to a competition. Suddenly, the two of us were jumping and splashing in the rain. I kept an eye on Kacey, wondering if she would join in. It was, after all, her jump rope we were using.

“Do you want to join us?” I asked. She did. She stepped out into the rain, laughing at the concept of playing in the rain. Before long, she and I made our way to the swing set, where we sat on very wet swings and kicked our legs high in the air. Soon, the rain subsided and the sun began to peek out from behind the clouds.

LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS

As we continued to swing, a beautiful rainbow appeared in the sky over our neighborhood, which I captured in the picture above.

“See,” I said to Kacey, “even out of darkness and storms beauty can appear.”

All too often, we can tend to focus on and get bogged down by the storms surrounding us. In our faith, however, we are reminded that Christ is always with us and will lead us through those darker times. With his love and guidance, we will eventually discover the beauty after the rain.

TOP LEFT: MC KOZUSKO/SAM; TOP RIGHT: SUSAN HINES-BRIGGER

Susan Hines-Brigger

Created with TheTeachersCorner.net Word Search Maker

All too often, we can tend to focus on and get bogged down by the storms surrounding us.

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TOP RIGHT: AOOSTHUIZEN/FOTOSEARCH; PETE & REPEAT: TOM GREENE

After the Rain

By Susan Hines-Brigger

B

LIGHTENUp!

brainteasers | games | challenges

Created with TheTeachersCorner.net Word Search Maker

WORD FIND

V S I A U D A P O XMX GOOD N E S S C HNM E ND R CON V E N T U A L ON E S Y FMR K F GG Z E K C A P K C A B H S P NM A H E F I E NWA S WA C A S QONO O F C I T E T R N I S H KGQC V T L D T I Y U F T VME S TMEW I C L YOY PW T G L F F HH I I T LM L E A I S D S E J A R A I I I F A T Z D E I F VG L B P A Y R I T E M R T U J Y A A NW C OW E I C B U L E D E A E N L U R T Y E S O L F R E H G L H UWF F F ON L A Y O S MN Z I Q R I I E C P Z R K L P E E N T F S L T T F C F NA A F F A K S I Y S L I MS T A R G S S G R T DOOUQ I E O S L D S C C S O Z NC T I K I NDN E S S J E A R DHC P L A H OOW B A C K Y A R D H L H O S O G L R A F N O A S S I S I I T A L Y E GWO J T RMVMA X I M I L I AN KO L B E E L A I A K B A C K T O S C HOO L X B Q F M S S R E D A NOM E L V P A T I E N C E K WM Y M E D R O S E O F L I M A Z F C O P ASSISI ITALY

FIREFLIES

BACKYARD

GENTLENESS

CONVENTUAL

GRILLING

FAITHFULNESS

HOLY SPIRIT

BACK TO SCHOOL FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL BACKPACK

TRIVIA QUESTIONS

PEACE

LEMONADE

PSALMS

2: What was St. Clare’s mother’s name?

ROSE OF LIMA

3: Who wrote the poem “Breathing under Water”?

KINDNESS LOVE

CHARISM

GOODNESS

EDUCATION

HALLELUJAH

FAMILY

IMMACULATE PATIENCE HEART OF MARY

MAXIMILIAN KOLBE

PONTIFF RELIC

SELF CONTROL ORDINARY TIME SWIMMING PADUA TRANSFIGURATION

1: Which pope approved St. Francis’ order in 1209?

4: Where was St. Maximilian Kolbe from?

HINT: All answers can be found in the pages of this issue.

ANSWERS AND CAPTIONS: E-mail your answers and captions to: MagazineEditors@FranciscanMedia.org, or mail to: ATTN: Trivia St. Anthony Messenger, 28 W. Liberty St., Cincinnati, OH 45202

These scenes may seem alike to you, But there are changes in the two.

So look and see if you can name Eight ways in which they’re not the same.

(Answers below)

GET THE BOOK FUN FOR

ALL AGES!

Go online to order: Shop.FranciscanMedia.org For ONLY $3.99 Use Code: SAMPETE ANSWERS to PETE & REPEAT: 1) Pete is wearing sunglasses. 2) There are more ripples in the water around Pete’s feet. 3) Scruffy is running on the hill. 4) A cloud has appeared.

5) One ledge of the pool is wider. 6) Pete’s swim trunks have a white waistband. 7) There is a space between the tree leaves. 8) There’s an extra branch in the tree.

TOP RIGHT: AOOSTHUIZEN/FOTOSEARCH; PETE & REPEAT: TOM GREENE

SEND US YOUR best caption for this photo. The winner will get his or her caption published in an upcoming issue, a special gift from SAM, and, of course, bragging rights!

JOY

PETE&REPEAT

TOP LEFT: MC KOZUSKO/SAM; TOP RIGHT: SUSAN HINES-BRIGGER

ATTENTION WORDSMITHS:

StAnthonyMessenger.org | August 2019 • 55

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reflection

—Van Morrison

ARAGAMI123345/ISTOCK

Smell the sea and feel the sky. Let your soul and spirit fly into the mystic.

56 • August 2019 | StAnthonyMessenger.org

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CATHERINE PUTONTI, PhD

BIOINFORMATICS TRAILBLAZER AND MENTOR

RESEARCH, REDEFINED

At Loyola, Dr. Putonti designs computer programs that make studying bacteria and viruses faster and better. Loyola provides her with the resources to transform health care and STEM fields and to support more voices in science.

LEARN HOW LOYOLA IS CHANGING RESEARCH FOR GOOD LUC.EDU/Research Redefined

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6/28/19 11:43 AM

28 W. Liberty Street Cincinnati, OH 45202-6498

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The Timeless Miraculous Medal Watch will be sent to you in gratitude for your gift of $12 or more. Your donation will support the ministries of the Missionary Oblates as we serve poor and needy people in our missions around the world.

Thank you for your generous support!

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