Diocese of Fall River

The Anchor

F riday , September 18, 2009

Forty Days for Life begins September 23

Academics team up with online studies By Deacon James N. Dunbar

By Christine M. Williams Anchor Correspondent

ATTLEBORO — Gearing up for another 40 days of prayer outside an Attleboro abortion clinic, volunteers hope their peaceful witness will awaken the consciences of all who pass by. Last month, the group had the first report of a canceled abortion since 40 Days for Life came to Attleboro one year ago. A young woman drove up to those in vigil and told them she had been scheduled for an abortion but their witness caused her to change her mind and keep her child. She reportedly told those gathered, “Your prayers are very powerful. Don’t stop praying. They work.” Steve Marcotte and Ron Larose, the campaign’s co-coordinators, said they hope their petitions will continue to change hearts and that ultimately there will be no need for an abortion clinic in Attleboro. The nation-wide 40 Days for Life will be held from September 23 to October 1. In Attleboro, the campaign will kickoff with a prayer service at Angel Park across the street from the clinic September 26 at 3 p.m. Those gathered will then process to the National Shrine of Our Lady of La Salette, less than a mile away, where they will worship at the shrine’s monthly Pro-Life Mass at 4:30 p.m. Marcotte stressed that 40 Days for Life takes a Christ-like approach to women entering abortion clinics, giving them love and encouragement. While some at the vigil hold signs, no graphic images are used at the prayer gatherings. The campaign is built on a foundation of prayer, fasting and peaceful vigil. “We can’t judge these women. We don’t know their stories,” he Turn to page 18

FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS — James Sabra, left, senior class president and member of the class of 2010, places the new 2009 time capsule inside the cornerstone at Bishop Stang High School, North Dartmouth, during the school’s recent rededication and 50th anniversary celebration. Looking on, from left: two altar servers, Father Karl C. Bissinger, Bishop George W. Coleman, who presided over the ceremony, and Stang president and class of 1963 alumna, Theresa E. Dougall. Story on page 16. (Photo by Kenneth J. Souza)

Diocesan Teams of Our Lady celebrate 25 years of empowering marriage, family By Dave Jolivet, Editor

NEW BEDFORD — “Father, if it weren’t for this, I don’t know where my marriage would be today.” That was a statement made to Father Edward E. Correia of the significance of the Teams of Our Lady movement, a Christcentered international organization of married couples, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary in the Fall River Diocese this year. Father Correia, pastor of St. Michael’s Parish in Fall River and one of several priest and deacon spiritual advisors to the Teams, has been involved with the movement for 20 years. “The Teams of Our Lady is such a wonderful organization that brings spirituality and Christ into the vocation of marriage,” he told The Anchor. “The couples grow day-to-day with

each other, with other couples, and with the Lord. It helps make marriages stronger, and the fact that it’s been alive and well here for 25 years is evidenced by the fact that faithful couples continue to meet

each month, year after year.” The Teams of Our Lady movement was informally initiated in France in the late 1930s when a number of married couples began to meet under the watchful eye and loving direction of Father Henri Caffarel. The purpose was for the couples to support one another in the struggles and successes of married life. Eventually more couples became involved and on Dec. 8, 1947, the movement was formalized and recognized by the Vatican. According to the Teams of Our Lady USA website, the teams are made up of five to seven couples and a spiritual advisor, who “agree

to practice a spiritual direction that includes: daily, individual, couple and family prayer; regular reading and reflection on sacred Scripture; a monthly husband and wife discussion of family and spiritual matters; and an individual ‘rule of life’ for personal improvement.” The movement encourages spiritual growth of the couple and the family through prayer and study; open and growing communication between husband and wife; and developing a way of life to make their faith a “daily living experience.” The movement became very popular in Portugal in the ’50s, and spread to parts of the U.S. in the late ’50s. It was in Portugal where Father Gastão Oliveira, then parochial vicar at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish in New Bedford, was introduced to the movement. Father Victor Pinto enlightened Father Oliveira of the benefits couples were enjoying, and the New Bedford priest brought the idea home to his parish. Through Father Oliveira’s efforts, the Teams of Our Lady became a reality in the Fall River Diocese in 1984, with several teams established in New Bedford and Fall River. Turn to page 12

FALL RIVER — When Superintendent of Catholic Schools George A. Milot read an article in The Anchor about students in Worcester integrating online research with language studies, he telephoned the diocesan paper and said, “We’ve been doing that for a while in our diocesan schools, too.” As a matter of fact, Milot reported, “Students at Bishop Feehan High School in Attleboro have been studying Arabic and Chinese Mandarin using online technology for five years.” In a recent, sit-down interview, Milot and Dr. Donna Boyle, assistant superintendent for curriculum, talked about the priority of using technology, including use of the Internet, in all studies in curriculums in the diocesan high schools and elementary schools. “Technology is a tool and it must be viewed as such,” said Milot. “Its use is effective only if it increases learning. That’s its purpose,” he added. He said there is a common misunderstanding that going online alone will increase knowledge. “But it has no practical educational value unless it is integrated into what is being taught in the classroom and where directing the research skills of the students takes place, Milot explained. “We’re very much aware that most of our students are well versed in modern day technology and its communication systems, and use it for entertainment and so many things,” he said. “Some 15 to 20 years ago as part of the curriculum we were teaching students even in the elementary grades the basics of how to use computers and the programs they offered. We don’t need to teach those skills anymore. Most of our students have already mastered those. Watch a young student today and you’ll find him or her multitasking: studying, the iPod going, the TV on, using the laptop and texting at the same time,” Milot added. “Today, the role of our teachers is to help direct the computer skills the students already posTurn to page 18

News From the Vatican

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September 18, 2009

In year of crisis, pope urges generosity to mission agencies By John Thavis Catholic News Service

MAKE A JOYFUL NOISE — A man plays a horn during Pope Benedict XVI’s weekly general audience in the Paul VI hall at the Vatican. (CNS photo/Alessia Pierdomenico, Reuters)

German pope recalls Holocaust, other ‘barbarities’ of World War II

By Catholic News Service

VITERBO, Italy — Pope Benedict XVI said the memory of the Holocaust and other “barbarities” of World War II should lead people to press for an end to contemporary conflicts around the globe. The world’s religions in particular have a duty to fight against violence and extremism, the pope said September 6 during a visit to Viterbo, Italy. It was the second time the German pontiff had recalled the 70th anniversary of the start of World War II, which began when Germany invaded Poland Sept. 1, 1939. The pope’s remarks came in a long-distance greeting to participants of an interreligious peace encounter in Krakow, Poland.

“We cannot help but remember the dramatic facts that provoked one of the most terrible conflicts in history, causing millions of deaths and so much suffering to the Polish people; a conflict that saw the tragedy of the Holocaust and the extermination of other groups of innocents,” the pope said. “The memory of these events impels us to pray for the victims and for those who still bear the wounds in their bodies and their hearts. It should also be a warning against repeating these barbarities and lead us to intensify efforts to build a lasting peace in our own time, which is still marked by conflicts,” he said. The pope said the key to fu-

ture peace was the ability to transmit to younger generations a culture and style of life that is marked by love, solidarity and respect for others. In this sense, he said, the world’s religions must promote forgiveness and reconciliation against the “violence, racism, totalitarianism and extremism that disfigure the image of man’s Creator” and lead to attitudes of hatred and contempt. At the Vatican earlier in the week, the pope decried the absurdity of war and called on people to embrace forgiveness, peace and reconciliation. Speaking in Polish to pilgrims attending his general audience September 2, the pope said that the “human tragedies and the absurdity of war remain in people’s memories.” The pontiff was 12 years old and lived in Bavaria, in Germany, when the war began. “Let us ask God that the spirit of forgiveness, peace and reconciliation pervades the hearts of all people,” he said. “Europe and the world today need a spirit of communion,” which should be built upon Christ, his Gospel, charity and truth, he said. Two days after German troops invaded Poland from the north, south and west, France and Great Britain declared war on Germany. The war ended in 1945, leaving more than 60 million people dead, most of them civilians.

VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI asked Catholics to give generously this year to the Church’s missionary agencies, saying that young Church communities need the funding at a time of economic crisis. The pope made the comments in his message for World Mission Sunday, observed October 18 in most countries. The pope said missionary zeal has always been a sign of Church vitality. He asked all Catholics to pray for an increase in missionary passion and to support missionaries who work on the front lines of evangelization, often under hostile conditions. “I ask everyone, as a credible sign of communion among the churches, to offer financial assistance, especially in these times of crisis affecting all humanity, to enable the young local churches to illuminate the nations with the Gospel of charity,” he said. “I mention especially the local churches and the men and women missionaries who bear witness to and spread the kingdom of God in situations of persecution, subjected to forms of oppression ranging from social discrimination to prison, torture and death,” he said. Even today, he added, missionaries are put to death for their evan-

gelization work, joining the ranks of missionary martyrs through the centuries. Pope Benedict strongly defended the fundamental missionary task to call all people to salvation in Christ. “The task of evangelizing all people constitutes the essential mission of the Church, a duty and a mission which the widespread and profound changes in present-day society render ever more urgent. At stake is the eternal salvation of persons, the goal and the fulfillment of human history and the universe,” he said. The Church should make clear that it wishes to transform the world by proclaiming the Gospel of love and by spreading hope “contagiously” among all peoples, he said. He emphasized that the Church evangelizes not in order to extend its own power or dominion, but to serve humanity, “especially the suffering and the excluded.” The pope expressed gratitude to the pontifical missionary societies and encouraged their service of promoting missionary animation and formation, as well as channeling material help to young churches. “Through these pontifical institutions, communion among the churches is admirably achieved via the exchange of gifts, reciprocal concern and shared missionary endeavors,” he said.

HISTORIC SITE — Pope Benedict XVI visits the room where the conclave was born at the Palace of the Popes in Viterbo, Italy. After Pope Clement IV died in 1268, the cardinals meeting in Viterbo could not elect his successor. The election dragged on, lasting 33 months. It was not until city officials locked all of the cardinals in the meeting room, reduced their diet to bread and water and took the roof off the meeting hall that the cardinals elected Pope Gregory X. (CNS photo/Alessia Giuliani, Catholic Press Photo)

The Anchor

OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER OF THE DIOCESE OF FALL RIVER Vol. 53, No. 35

Member: Catholic Press Association, Catholic News Service

Published weekly except for two weeks in the summer and the week after Christmas by the Catholic Press of the Diocese of Fall River, 887 Highland Avenue, Fall River, MA 02720, Telephone 508-675-7151 — FAX 508-675-7048, email: theanchor@anchornews.org. Subscription price by mail, postpaid $14.00 per year. Send address changes to P.O. Box 7, Fall River, MA, call or use email address

PUBLISHER - Most Reverend George W. Coleman EXECUTIVE EDITOR Father Roger J. Landry fatherrogerlandry@anchornews.org EDITOR David B. Jolivet davejolivet@anchornews.org NEWS EDITOR Deacon James N. Dunbar jimdunbar@anchornews.org OFFICE MANAGER Mary Chase m arychase@anchornews.org ADVERTISING Wayne R. Powers waynepowers@anchornews.org REPORTER Kenneth J. Souza kensouza@anchornews.org Send Letters to the Editor to: fatherrogerlandry@anchornews.org

POSTMASTERS send address changes to The Anchor, P.O. Box 7, Fall River, MA 02722. THE ANCHOR (USPS-545-020) Periodical Postage Paid at Fall River, Mass.

September 18, 2009

The International Church

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Polish bishops warn Catholic politicians abortion support risks excommunication

PRAISE IN CUBA — A statue of the Virgin Mary and Child is carried through the streets of Havana during the feast of Our Lady of Charity of Cobre, patroness of Cuba, recently. (CNS photo/Enrique De LaOsa, Reuters)

U.S. priest buys high, sells low to help Guatemalan coffee growers

SAN LUCAS TOLIMAN, Guatemala (CNS) — In the 17 years since he started buying coffee from the hundreds of families who farm the hills overlooking Lake Atitlan, Msgr. Gregory Schaffer has seen the coffee industry’s highs and lows. The market peaked in the late 1990s and crashed in the early 2000s, causing thousands of farmers to abandon their lands and migrate in search of work. None of that affected the farmers selling to Msgr. Schaffer, a priest of the Diocese of New Ulm, Minn., who has worked in the San Lucas Mission for nearly 47 years. While small coffee farmers throughout Latin America have struggled to make ends meet growing the world’s second-most-traded commodity — behind petroleum — the indigenous coffee growers of San Lucas Toliman have received superior prices from Msgr. Schaffer. The $2.10 per pound they are paid is double what they might receive selling to middlemen and about 35 percent more than they would receive by selling both fairtrade and certified-organic beans. “We started this not by looking at the market. We started by asking the farmers what they thought their coffee was worth,” said Msgr. Schaffer, 74. “We asked, ‘How much do you need to have a decent life?’ That’s how we set our price.” Despite producing some of the world’s best coffees, small growers in Guatemala and throughout Central America largely live in impoverished conditions, mainly due to the low prices they receive for coffee. “These are some of the poorest people in the social scheme,” said Costa Rican coffee economist Rafael Diaz. “These communities suffer from chronic migration, poor health care and a low standard of

living. Because of the low price of coffee, they can’t pull themselves out of poverty.” San Lucas Toliman is a microscopic slice amid the multimilliondollar coffee market, but Msgr. Schaffer says his approach is one of few that rewards the farmer and the consumer. The majority of the coffee sold is sent to a diocesan office in Minnesota in 50-pound boxes. It can also be ordered from the mission’s Web site, www.sanlucasmission.org, or from www.juananacoffee.com. Because of the town’s climate and elevation, the coffee is very high quality. But while such coffee is normally sold for more than $11 per pound, San Lucas charges $7. “The key to what we’ve done here is to sell the best possible product at the lowest possible price to the consumer while paying the farmers the highest possible price,” Msgr. Schaffer said. The program, which started in 1992 with seven farmers, now includes coffee from some 650 families. Some families in the area started growing coffee just to get into the program. “People want to sell their coffee to the Church because Father Greg’s philosophy is to do everything possible to help the farmers,” said Julio Morales, one of the seven coffee farmers to start the program. “We’re not rich here, but we get paid better than others around here.” Msgr. Schaffer said he has seen a marked improvement in living standards among the farmers. “With higher prices, they’re able to educate their children. They can pay for health care. And they don’t have to worry about going hungry,” he said. “That’s the real goal.” The San Lucas Mission has been able to consistently pay a high price because it has taken advantage of a strong solidarity market in the United States. Churches, universi-

ties and high schools, which often use the coffee for fund-raisers, are the biggest buyers of the coffee. The second-largest source of the mission’s sales comes from visitors and volunteers who return to the U.S. with coffee stuffed into their suitcases. They often come to volunteer at one of the handful of other projects the mission runs. On a recent weekday, midwives were working in the mission’s hospital, and a recent high school graduate was finishing off a soccer field that will be put to use by the mission’s students. Minnesota resident Ray Busch, who first visited San Lucas in 1974, cleared plates from the dining hall recently and said he was planning to take 25 pounds of coffee home with him. “For me this is really a spiritual retreat,” said Busch, who said he contributes $400 monthly to the mission. “It’s really easy to bring coffee back and there’s really no shortage of places to distribute it,” Busch said. At home, he said, the coffee will be sold everywhere from his local diocese to his chiropractor’s office. The coffee, harvested by hand, comes from the steep hills around the town of San Lucas Toliman. It is washed three times, dried under the sun, and slowly roasted in steel drums over firewood. The process is so labor-intensive that the mission’s output has been hampered. With a grant, the mission is building new drying patios and buying new processing equipment that should allow it to double its production to 15,000 pounds per year and attract more growers. “We don’t have a problem with demand. The big thing is to get more people involved selling to us,” said Msgr. Schaffer. “The more people we can get in, the more we can help.”

WARSAW, Poland (CNA) — The Catholic bishops of Poland have issued a document on the value of healthy families and pro-family policies. At one point, they clearly warn Catholic politicians that they risk excommunication if they voice support for or acceptance of abortion. Discussing the duties of Catholic politicians specifically, the document said it is “absolutely not true” that a politician or government member “has to, or can, act against his conscience.” “When it comes to God’s law, everybody is equal, politicians included,” the Polish bishops said. The bishops said that anyone who publicly contradicts fundamental moral values, such as the commandment “Thou Shall Not Kill,” by voicing support or acceptance of abortion should be immediately excommunicated, Polskie Radio says. Father Andrzej Rebacz, head of the bishops’ Council for Family Affairs and the National Chaplain for Families, commented on the document. He cited Pope John Paul II’s warning about “very strong, organized attacks on marriage and the family” and said these attacks could destroy the “Christian spirit” of Europe. “These attacks include promotion of sex education at schools,” he added. “We have to remember who was the first to

introduce the idea of sex education.” Father Rebacz charged that sex education was developed by the Hungarian György Lukács, whom he described as a “communist ideologue.” The priest said Lukács thought promiscuity was the best method to fight the institution of marriage, “in order to fight Christianity.” Last year Polish Health Minister Ewa Kopacz, a self-described Catholic, was reported to have arranged an abortion for a 14-year-old. Catholic groups protested and brought up the question of whether she should be excommunicated.

FATHER ANDRZEJ REBACZ — The 100-page document, titled “To Serve the Truth about Marriage and Family,” is a compilation of Catholic doctrine on the value of family life. It was drafted by the bishops’ Council for Family Issues. Polskie Radio reports that the document discusses the duties of society towards the family as a crucial, fundamental part of a healthy society.

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The Church in the U.S.

September 18, 2009

Detroit Archdiocese, losing $42,000 a day, announces restructuring

DETROIT (CNS) — A major financial restructuring plan for the Archdiocese of Detroit, which is losing approximately $42,000 per day, calls for a 29 percent decrease in the number of employees, the sale of buildings, moving administrative support offices to a more cost-efficient property in the city, and the elimination of the subsidy for The Michigan Catholic, the archdiocesan newspaper. The six-county archdiocese will be reorganized into four regions for the delivery of programs, services and ministries to its 1.4 million Catholics under the restructuring plan announced by Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron. The archbishop, who was installed in January, said he had accepted the restructuring recommendations from two separate committees, comprised of laypeople and clergy, following a sixmonth study on the financial viability of the archdiocese. “The financial realities of our current circumstances are sobering; the resulting changes for the administrative structure of the archdiocese are significant,” he said. In addition to a decrease from 264 to 187 employees, other changes include the elimination of the subsidy for programming at the Retreat Center at St. John’s, the sale of the Print Shop building and the outsourcing of studio productions for the Catholic Television Network of Detroit. The Gabriel Richard building, down the street from the chancery and the workplace for 112 archdiocesan employees and the Catholic Youth Organization, also will be sold. After receiving the recommendations, the archbishop conferred with the archdiocesan finance council and the college of consultors, the priest council of advisers on administrative and financial issues. Then, after prayer and reflection, Archbishop Vigneron accepted the recommendations. “I believe the committee members have crafted a response that is true to and advances the mission I asked them

to consider in their deliberations: ‘To share Christ in and through the church,’” he said. Currently, the archdiocese loses approximately $1.2 million each month. In the fiscal year 2008-09, the archdiocese lost $14.5 million. The recommendations were designed to keep the archdiocese “cash-neutral,” and without the changes, the archdiocese faced exhausting its cash supply by 2011. The Detroit area has been one of the hardest hit by the faltering economy with the world headquarters of each of the Big Three automakers — Ford, Chrysler and General Motors Corp. — all within the archdiocese. The bulk of the work force within the archdiocese has ties to the auto industry. Ned McGrath, director of communications for the archdiocese, cited a confluence of circumstances that brought the cash crunch to a head. “Our investment portfolio took major hits in 2001 and 2008,” he said. “Additionally, we had property investments that ‘underperformed’ and hurt, rather than helped, the bottom line.” Beyond coping with increased expenditures for operations and benefits, McGrath said, the archdiocese also had to deal with rising costs for a number of major construction projects started in the last decade. In a letter to priests in the archdiocese, Archbishop Vigneron said the current employees “remain a dedicated, devoted work force supporting my ministry, the parishes and the presence of the Church in the archdiocese — all for the glory of Christ. They have my heartfelt gratitude and appreciation.” New job descriptions will be created for the remaining positions and current staff members will be considered for them. The goal is to have final selections made in midNovember with the new organizational operation in place by the beginning of 2010. Job placement workshops and incentives for those eligible for retirement will also be offered.

SISTER ACT — Father Brian Carpenter offers a blessing to his sister, Kimberly Carpenter, following his ordination Mass at Sacred Heart Cathedral in Rochester, N.Y. Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of New York, keynote speaker at the recent 67th Serra International Convention in Omaha, Neb., said the lay faithful of the Church have a duty to nurture vocations to the priesthood. (CNS photo/Mike Crupi, Catholic Courier)

Laypeople have duty to nurture vocations, says Archbishop Dolan

OMAHA, Neb. (CNS) — New York Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan, keynote speaker at the recent, 67th Serra International Convention in Omaha, said the lay faithful of the Church have a duty to nurture vocations to the sacramental priesthood. “Ordained priests have the duty to call forth the gifts of the lay faithful as they share in the role of Jesus of teaching, serving and sanctifying,” Archbishop Dolan said. “And the lay faithful have the duty to take care of vocations to the sacramental priesthood.” The archbishop is the episcopal adviser to the Serra Club, an international organization that promotes and fosters vocations to the priesthood and consecrated life. He was one of several speakers at the convention held at Omaha’s Qwest Center in late August and attended by more than 500 people.

The event opened with a Mass at St. Cecilia Cathedral with Omaha Archbishop George J. Lucas as presiding bishop. Archbishop Dolan said one way to start promoting religious vocations was to begin with emphasizing the vocation of marriage and family. “Only 50 percent of our Catholic young people are approaching the sacrament of matrimony,” he said. “Vocations to the priesthood and religious life come from vocations to lifelong, lifegiving and faithful marriages.” “There is a climate of fear, suspicion and discouragement when it comes to vocations to the priesthood and consecrated religious life,” he said. “Many boys or young men are afraid to publicly say, ‘I want to be a priest.’” During the late 1980s, Archbishop Dolan said, only 51 percent of Catholic parents said they would be happy if their son wanted to be a priest. Today, however, he believes that perception is changing because of Serra International and other similar groups. Mexican Archbishop Emilio Berlie Belaunzaran of Yucatan, another speaker at the convention, said the Church mission of salvation in the world is to “realize that the lay faithful participate in the priestly, prophetic and kingly mission of Christ.” Serra International has more than 1,100 Serra clubs in 46 countries. Thirteen of those countries, including the U.S., were represented at the convention. Serra International’s president, Cesare Gambardella of Italy, said the greatest trait of Serra is its internationality and its ties with the clubs of the world. Some of those attending the convention said they like to take

advantage of those connections. Patrick Ugbana, president of the Serra Club of Lagos in Nigeria, said he is inspired by the work of his fellow Serrans and noted that their work inspired him to attend the convention. He said eight new Serra clubs are forming in Nigeria and half of the members are under 35. “We want more young people to join,” he told the Catholic Voice, newspaper of the Omaha Archdiocese. “But I also want my older members to serve as long as possible because service to God never ends.” Alex Duncan, former president of Serra International, traveled from Glasgow, Scotland, to attend the convention. Duncan, a member of the Serra Club of Glasgow since 1984, said it is a challenge to foster vocations to the priesthood in a country where Catholics are a minority. Thomas Wong, a member of the Serra Club of Hong Kong for 15 years, said his club of 40 members is beginning to get some young people to join. Wong, a vice president of Serra International, said he sees growth in his part of the world, with five Serra clubs now active in Taiwan and a sixth club to be chartered there this month. Michael Hall, president of the Serra International Foundation and a member of the Serra Club of Stockton, Calif., said he was impressed with the convention’s liturgies and speakers, especially the talk given by retired Archbishop Elden F. Curtiss of Omaha. Hall said holding the convention in Omaha was a “tribute to Archbishop Curtiss, who has worked so hard for Serra International for so many years.”

September 18, 2009

The Church in the U.S.

STREET WISE — Jesuit Father Gregory Boyle, who founded Homeboy Industries in 1988 to provide hope for former gang members, is pictured in mid-August talking to a youth about a personal problem in Los Angeles. Father Boyle says the Los Angeles region will suffer if his anti-gang jobs program shuts down. (CNS photo/R.W. Dellinger, The Tidings)

Priest says LA will suffer if his anti-gang jobs program closes

By R.W. Dellinger Catholic News Service

LOS ANGELES — Both the city and the county of Los Angeles will suffer if a nationally acclaimed gang-intervention program has to shut down, even temporarily, said the Jesuit priest who founded the program more than two decades ago. Homeboy Industries, whose motto is “Nothing stops a bullet like a job,” dodged its own bullet of meeting the next payroll when the City Council voted in midAugust to negotiate a $340,000 contract with the organization, paying for it with money from a U.S. Justice Department gangreduction grant. “Homeboy is really a consequential place,” Jesuit Father Greg Boyle, who started Jobs for a Future in 1988 that morphed into Homeboy Industries, told The Tidings, Los Angeles archdiocesan newspaper. “There are 12,000 folks who walk through our doors here during the year — 8,000 gang members. The 55-year-old priest said Homeboy Industries serves as a steam-release valve on LA’s gang pressure cooker, by being a place where active gang members along with others getting out of prison who want to redirect their lives have a place to hang. He said young men and women from more than 700 different local gangs have used the servic-

es at Homeboy, which include case management, mental health counseling, job training and placement, legal services, 12step meetings, education classes and tattoo removal. “We’re just living from payroll to payroll,” said Father Boyle. “It’s a terrible way to live. Mainly it’s the recession. We built a new place and moved about two years ago, and now we run a program that’s commensurate with this bigger place. But to do that, you know, tripled our payroll to about $300,000 every two weeks or $9.5 million every year.” Then he ticked off the different programs that generate $3 million annually: Homeboy Bakery, Homegirl Cafe, Homeboy Silk Screen, Homeboy Maintenance, Homeboy Merchandise and, the latest enterprise, Homeboy Solar Panel Installers. But all are training programs and not profitmaking businesses, he said, and every month some 350 trainees need to be paid. About 40 percent of Homeboy’s funding comes from foundations. “But that has sort of evaporated,” he said. “Everybody says ‘not this year’ and a lot are even saying ‘not next year.’ So that’s a tough one.” Most of the rest is raised from individual donors and targeted fund raising, which have also fallen off significantly. Father Boyle is not a fan of

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s new Gang Reduction and Youth Development program. A key element of the program is street intervention, where workers rush out to gang shooting scenes to do rumor control and try to stop retaliatory acts of violence. “It’s buying into a gang-intervention model which I think is probably not good,” he said. “I think it keeps gangs alive. It provides them with oxygen. It says, ‘Gangs will always be with us, so we might as well get them to get along together.’” Father Boyle, who has celebrated 167 funeral Masses for gang members during 25 years as a Jesuit priest, said he believes hard-core street intervention romanticizes gangs. “People always raise the question, ‘My God, you’re against violence interruption!’” he said. “I take the longer view. I think the community could have been empowered to say to gang members: ‘We love you. We will refuse to demonize you, and there’s not a single good thing in your gang.’ “At Homeboy we do not work with gangs; we work with gang members,” he added. “And so you come here, we’ll help you start your life. We have no interest in saying, ‘Can we get these two gangs to get along?’ I’m sort of the lone voice on this. But I’m not going to say something that I think is unsophisticated.”

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The Anchor Lessons to be learned

The funeral rites of Senator Edward Kennedy generated a lot of controversy. Cardinal Sean O’Malley, in an entry on his weekly blog defending his participation in the funeral, told us very clearly why: “Needless to say, the Senator’s wake and Catholic funeral were controversial because of the fact that he did not publicly support Catholic teaching and advocacy on behalf of the unborn.” Because of the palpable disconnect between Senator Kennedy’s Catholic faith and his very public championing of abortion, there were, predictably, many issues raised that are relevant more than just to his funeral. That’s why it’s worthwhile to ask what we have learned from the funeral and the controversies it engendered. The first controversy was about whether Senator Kennedy should have even been allowed a Catholic funeral. There were many Pro-Lifers, locally and nationally, who thought that he should have been refused the Church’s burial rites. Some argued that the discipline of the Church’s canon law — “manifest sinners for whom ecclesiastical funeral rites cannot be granted without public scandal to the faithful” (canon 1184) — applied to him. They contended that he was a “manifest sinner” who obstinately persevered in at least formal cooperation in the sin of abortion, with no sign of repentance, until death. They also asserted that his funeral would cause public scandal to the faithful, leading others to the sinful conclusion that one can be a faithful Catholic and still support the destruction of innocent human life in the womb. Even conceding their plausible interpretations of the above, there is clear exception given in the same canon: “unless they have given some signs of repentance before their death.” The Church interprets this clause generously, and Senator Kennedy’s repeated calls for local clergy to come to his home over the last months of his illness, not to mention his letter to Pope Benedict in which he expressed regret for having been “an imperfect human being” and for “having fallen short through human failings,” certainly seem to meet that criterion. While his confessor may be the only one who knows whether Senator Kennedy repented specifically of his abortion advocacy and received absolution for it, it’s inarguable that he showed “some” signs of repentance. Therefore, he should have been allowed a Catholic funeral. This was, by the way, the position of the majority of Catholic Pro-Lifers, who were not seeking to deny him a funeral, but just to have his deplorable support for the destruction of the unborn not ignored in the way his funeral would be celebrated. One of the things that seemed to motivate those who sought to deny a funeral was a decades long frustration over the Senator’s lack of conversion for his support of abortion and over what they view as the failure of the Church adequately to bring him and others to repentance; the funeral would be one last and dramatic chance to teach unambiguously of what should have been taught and done before. This, however, was clearly not the occasion to make up for lost opportunities in the past. Cardinal O’Malley powerfully expressed in his blog, that he disagreed “in the strongest terms” with the position of “those who objected, in some cases vociferously, to the Church’s providing a Catholic funeral for the Senator.” He added, “We are a people of faith and we believe in a loving and forgiving God from whom we seek mercy.” Contrary to some modern misunderstandings, the cardinal implies, a Catholic funeral is not an event held to honor the deceased, or to celebrate his life, but to pray for him, and to beg God to be merciful to him. The more we are aware of someone’s failings, the more we should be motivated to pray. Otherwise we become no better than the older brother in the parable of the Prodigal Son (Lk 15:1-32). This brings us to the second controversy about the funeral from which we need to learn. There have been many, especially among those who thought highly of Senator Kennedy overall, who scolded as classless and un-Christian any post-mortem criticism of the Senator, even of his public actions. To do this, they said, was equivalent to casting the first stone (Jn 8:5); it violated the Biblical principle of not judging lest we be judged (Lk 6:37); and it was an affront to the dictum, which many erroneously think comes from the Bible, of never speaking ill of the dead. This controversy, however, is based on misconceptions of what Jesus and his Church teach. To condemn one’s actions is not necessarily — and certainly not in this case —to seek to put the person to death, in this life or in the next. To judge a person’s external actions in the light of the Gospel, moreover, is not the same thing as judging the person, which is precisely and uniquely what Jesus forbids. It should also be noted that Jesus’ prescription against judging means not just that we should never play the part of God and ascribe someone to hell, but also that we should never take on the role of God and pronounce someone in heaven, either. Catholic teaching is that except in the rare cases of a baptized infant or a canonized saint, we do not know in what state a deceased person is after death. Yet many people who mistakenly rebuked those who criticized Senator Kennedy’s abortion advocacy for supposedly judging the Senator’s soul themselves thought nothing of judging the Senator’s soul and deeming him in paradise. Since we do not know the eschatological status of most of our loved ones, we pray for them to the mercy of God — and pray more the more we love, and pray more the more we humbly admit that our loved one was not the immaculate Virgin Mary but a sinner, like us, in need of prayer. With regard to the Latin expression de mortuis nihil nisi bonum — “speak nothing but good about the dead” — Father George Rutler clarified in an article last week that the reason why the pagans promoted this principle was because they knew of no way the evil of the dead could be absolved. “The noble pagan tried to make the best of a bad thing, urging a social convention born of pessimism. The mercy of God changes pessimism to hope, and hope is the engine of honesty. In obedience to the Divine Mercy, speaking well of the dead may sometimes require not speaking good of the dead.” In other words, candidly speaking of the evil someone has done is sometimes, in the light of the redemption, the most merciful thing we can do, if it brings us and others to pray more for the deceased. Judas Maccabeus and his brothers, after all, would likely never have prayed insistently for their slain comrades unless they had discovered posthumously that they had stolen pagan amulets (2 Macc 12:3945). Father Rutler says that ultimately we should all remember Jesus’ straightforward teaching to the rich young man, “There is no one good but God alone” (Mt 19:17), and behave accordingly. This leads to the final controversy, the actual celebration of Senator Kennedy’s rite of Christian burial, which in a sense unites the two previous ones. The overall tone of the funeral liturgy — from the three eulogies, to the prayers of the faithful, to the homily, to the celebrity musicians, to the guest list, and to the nationally-televised gushing color commentaries — seemed to communicate that it was more a public, political apotheosis of Senator Kennedy than a humble, insistent prayer from the Church his mother for the forgiveness of his sins and the repose of his soul. This was probably not helpful to the Senator eschatologically, obviously scandalous to devout Pro-Lifers spiritually, and likely injurious to the Church both doctrinally and practically. On the last point, since lex orandi, lex credendi — “the way we pray indicates what we believe” — the overall impression left by the tone of the funeral will likely influence the way Catholics and non-Catholics understand the purpose of the Catholic funeral liturgy for quite some time. It will, moreover, doubtless impact what some Catholics ask for in the funerals of their loved ones; if pastors are unwilling to allow what they observed Senator Kennedy received, there will be wounds to pastors and parishioners both. This last controversy was totally avoidable; all that was necessary was to adhere to the letter and spirit of the Catholic funeral rite. The Senator, Pro-Lifers and the Church as a whole certainly deserved that the Senator’s funeral be an unambiguous expression of the Church’s faith.

September 18, 2009

The total happiness of man on Earth

Last week we looked at how St. John Vian- he tried to teach them how to climb up on that ney, the patron saint of priests, was an exam- divine see-saw by praying sincerely from the ple of “an existence made prayer.” The focus heart: “It’s not long, beautiful prayers that God of all his pastoral work in Ars was to help his wants,” he emphasized, “but those that come parishioners experience a similar transform- from the bottom of the heart, with a great reing union with God in prayer. He did that not spect for and true desire to please God.” just by his saintly example, but through his Since the interior loving glance of the heart homilies and catecheses. is so crucial to prayer, Father Vianney always What’s great about his teaching on prayer stressed that we will not be able to pray well is that it’s accessible to everyone, from little unless our heart genuinely seeks God and the children to senior citizens, from those with things of God. This is the fourth part of his little education to those with much. The Curé catechesis. Jesus had taught in the Gospel, of Ars was too humble ever to have thought of “where your treasure is, there will your heart writing a book-length systematic treatise on be” (Mt 6:21); the Curé of Ars taught as a prayer, but his thoughts — which flowed from result that the quality of our prayer depends his own interior encounter with God as well on the strength of our desire for God, heaven as directing well over 100,000 others in the and eternity. “The Christian’s treasure is not confessional — are easy to put into a synthe- on earth but in heaven,” he underscored, “and sis. Today, we’ll tackle what he taught about so then, our thoughts ought to be directed to prayer in general. Next Friday, we’ll focus on where our treasure is.” some of the concrete, practical tips he gives us He also highlighted, correlatively, that the about how to pray well. more we pray well, the more our heart will The first lesson St. John Vianney stressed seek heaven. “If we take up prayer again,” about prayer is that it is not meant to be just he said to those who had given up prayer and a repetition of words. “In praying do not heap naturally started to see their lives unravel as up empty phrases as the Gentiles do,” Jesus they sought increasingly lower worldly ends, said in the Gospel, “for they think that they “we will feel ourselves reborn in thinking will be heard about and desirfor their many ing the things of words. Do not heaven.” Using be like them, one of his fafor your Father mous analogies, knows what you he said, “Prayer need before you is like the fire ask him” (Mt that fills up the By Father 6:7-8). Prayer, in hot air balloons Roger J. Landry other words, is and makes them more than “sayclimb toward ing our prayers.” heaven.” Prayer, Vianney would often give a gentle correction for that reason, gives us a glimpse of eternity. to mothers who are normally the teachers of “When one is before God, the hours pass like prayer in the family: “There are some poor minutes,” he said from personal experience. women who imagine that the more they speak, “It’s a foretaste of heaven.” the more they pray!” He did not by any means Since heaven is not so much a “place” wish to disparage what Christian tradition but a state of eternal existence in God, the has called vocal prayers, but, rather, to stress saintly pastor taught that the reason why we that vocal prayers are meant to be a bridge to experience a foretaste of heaven in prayer, meditation and contemplation, not an end in the explanation of how “paradise is in the themselves. He pointed to a better way: “One heart of the spiritually perfect,” is precisely doesn’t have to speak much to pray well. We because “prayer is nothing other than a union know that the good God is there in the holy with God.” This is his fifth and most importabernacle; we open our heart to him, we take tant teaching on prayer. Prayer, he instilled, pleasure in his holy presence. This is the best brings about the “beautiful union” between prayer!” God and “his small creature.” This union This is his second lesson on prayer: prayer is nuptial. “Because they live for the good is an interior recognition of God’s loving God in their heart, there is no longer two,” glance and an interior look at him. With tears he described, echoing the words of Jesus of joy, he would tell the story of Louis Chaf- about marriage (Mt 19:6). “In this intimate fangeon, one of his simple parishioners, who union, God and the soul are like two candles would leave his hoe at the door of the church in which the wax melts together.” This union and then come in to pray before work. When is the means by which we are able to have an fellow farmers asked him what he was doing, “existence made prayer” — as Pope Benedict he replied, “I am looking at the good God and said of St. John Vianney — through maintainhe is looking at me.” Father Vianney would ing this prayerful, loving fusion throughout never cease to add, after telling the story, the day. “We should lose the presence of God “How beautiful this is, my children, how no more than we stop breathing.” beautiful!” This interior mutual exchange of Our prayer, he said ultimately, is meant to love in prayer is what tradition has generally imitate Jesus’ and be the “sweet union of a son called contemplation. He would urge his pa- with his father.” Because the “good God is our rishioners to follow Chaffangeon’s example, father and loves us very much,” he taught, “we saying, “Direct the look of your soul to the should pray like four-year-olds … who tell heart of God and remain there, without saying their mothers everything.” Prayer not only is a word.” Four months before he was continu- a great privilege, but is meant by God to be ing to make the same point: “You can pray for us a great happiness, a “sweet friendship,” by putting yourself quite simply in touch with a “stunning family bond,” a “bath of love in God. When one finds nothing more to say to which the soul is plunged.” him, but still knows that he is there — that in “Prayer is the total happiness of man on itself is the best of prayers.” earth,” St. John Vianney would declare late Prayer, therefore, begins with a dual in life, with words that show not only why movement of the heart: God’s loving search he was so happy in prayer and in life. “Oh, for us and our loving quest for him. This is what a beautiful life is the beautiful union the third point of St. John Vianney’s cateche- of the soul with Our Lord. Eternity will not sis on prayer. Prayer is not principally about be long enough to understand this happi“learning something,” but about “loving ness!” someone” and being loved. It is a heart-toHe understood a little of that happiness in heart dialogue. “God communicates himself this world and sought to have his parishioto us heart to heart,” he stressed. To those who ners experience it as well. Now from heaven, asked how they with all their problems and where he understands this happiness much weakness could love God at God’s level, he more deeply, he is doubtless interceding for us replied, “You do have a small heart, but prayer that we, too, will come to experience the full enlarges it and makes it capable of loving God. beauty of such a life of prayer. Prayer is a scale that lifts us toward the good Father Landry is pastor of St. Anthony of God and brings him down to us.” Therefore, Padua Parish in New Bedford.

Putting Into the Deep

September 18, 2009

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hen The Anchor asked me to write this article about my experience of the priesthood, I was at a loss about what to write. After all, as I write this, I have been a priest for less than a year, during which I have mostly done exactly what I did for the past 20 years of my life: study. The most time I have spent in a parish since I entered seminary is a couple months, and so I haven’t had so many of those rewarding experiences that priest so often reflect upon. I have never witnessed a marriage; though I carry the oil of the sick everywhere, only once have I used it; I have a mere three baptisms under my belt, and not even one confirmation. For me, the priesthood is still a daily surprise, so what aspect of the priesthood can I speak about? After much thought I realized that although I have not yet experienced many of the things people associate with the highpoints of the priesthood, I have experienced its heart — at Mass and in the confessional — and with those people I have met along the way, I have experiences the friendship of Christ. A priest offers sacrifice for

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ith some 60 million adherents, Lutheranism is the largest branch of Protestantism. Most Lutheran denominations belong to the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), founded in 1947 in Sweden and headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. Well over half the world’s Lutherans live in Germany and the countries of Scandinavia, where Lutheranism originally took root. A distinguishing feature of Lutheranism is its affirmation of both “evangelical” and “catholic” ideas: a passion for the biblical and preached Word and the proclamation of forgiveness through faith in Christ’s saving work, synthesized with a spiritual life centered on baptismal regeneration and belief in the Real Presence in the Eucharist. Traditional Lutheran worship is liturgical to a greater degree than that of most Protestants. The Lutheran Divine Service resembles the Catholic Mass from which it was adapted, minus the sacrificial vocabulary. On the altar of a typical Lutheran church is either a crucifix or a plain cross, candles, the Bible, and flowers. Ministers wear the historic chasuble for the Divine Service and the cassock with surplice and stole for other liturgical ceremonies. An ecclesiastical calendar determines the liturgical color of the altar frontal and vestments: blue or purple for Advent, white or gold for Christmas and Easter, purple for Lent, scarlet for Passiontide, red for Pentecost, green

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The Anchor

Priestly friendships

that started with getting to know, the sins of the people interceding being and living with humanity, for them with the Father as Jesus does for us on the cross. Ministe- but that culminates with the gift of his life for his friends, for all of rial priests are “other Christs,” us, on Calvary. As a priest I have who stand in for Jesus, offering experienced Jesus’ friendship so the sacrifice that Christ offers. More than just offering sacrifices, often offering the Eucharist and however, they also show the faith- hearing confessions. The immensity of the gift being offered ful why and what Jesus offers by preaching the good news of God’s desire for friendship with man. Year For Priests We priests are ordained Vocational Reflection to show people the love of Christ, which we do when we celebrate Mass, By Father showing the people the Ron P. Floyd symbol of Jesus’ love for us, his Body and Blood; when we hear confessions speaking Jesus’ words, “My by our friend Jesus for us on the friend go and sin no more”; when cross each time I celebrate the holy Mass always amazes me as celebrating the other sacraments, I think about what my hands are demonstrating that he is with us always; and in the friendships we touching and my tongue is speaking as I say Jesus’ words: “This is develop with those whose souls my Body, my Blood.” entrusted to us. This sacramental friendship St. Aelred of Riveaux tells us in turn manifests itself in our true friendship is the perfection everyday life. One of the most of love (caritas). A friend is one rewarding parts of being a priest who wants and does what is truly is offering the sacraments for the good for the other, no matter the people and then being with them personal sacrifice involved. Thus, as they live the new life they have Jesus on the cross is the model received. Sitting with people of true friendship — a friendship

around their kitchen tables talking about the faith as it affects their lives is one of the most life-giving experiences of my priesthood thus far. For so many faith can seem dead, a system of rules and factoids that are foreign to our experience of reality. A fundamental part of what it means to be another Christ as a priest is to show people that the offer of friendship with God given by our faith and in the sacraments is a living reality. I can’t count the number of times I’ve sat late into the night talking with the faithful, as Jesus talked to his disciples, explaining to them what God is doing in their lives. This is such a privilege for a priest, especially when people open their hearts to God’s voice and his actions in their lives. Of course, true friendship is not always easy, as Jesus’ friendship with humanity demonstrates. Being with people during their joys and when they are filled with enthusiasm for their faith is simple, but friendship also means calling them to task when they stray and being with them in those hard times when faith is not

easy. In all the difficult aspects of friendship, however, helping people to see that what is being asked of them is being asked out of love is essential. I remember once sitting with a dying man and his wife, both deeply in love with each other, and marveling at the strength of their faith while sharing in the profound sorrow of their impending separation. As a priest, another Christ, my friendship with them didn’t mean dismissing the reality of the sorrow, but showing them that Jesus weeps with them. It meant showing them the promises of the friendship Jesus offers, a promise that I make present to strengthen them when I offer the Mass. The friendships I have developed as a priest with the faithful, but also with those who are faithfully searching for God, have been an inspiration to my priesthood thus far, and I look forward to many more life long friendships in Christ with those whom I am sent to serve over the course of my life as a priest. I carry these friendships with me daily. Father Floyd, ordained in 2008, is parochial vicar at St. Patrick’s Parish in Wareham.

for the Sundays after Epiphany lished their own system of private and Pentecost, etc. Music – for the schools. They were latecomers to most part very good music – has the Protestant ecumenical movealways played a prominent part in ment that began a century ago. Lutheran worship. Luther himself And, most significantly, they manwas a musician of note (“A Mighty aged to avoid both the doctrinal Fortress Is Our God”), and not a laxity of the liberal Protestant few of Lutheranism’s thousands of mainline and the fundamentalism hymns were composed by Johann from which the evangelical moveSebastian Bach, a devout Lutheran ment emerged. whose biblically inspired music has been called “the fifth Gospel.” Lutherans make up The Fullness the third largest Protesof the Truth tant denominational family in this country, after By Father the Baptists and MethThomas M. Kocik odists. They are scarce in New England and the South, and strongest in the Midwest and Pennsylvania. The divisions in present-day The Evangelical Lutheran Church Lutheranism correspond to the in America (ELCA), with 4.8 milgeneral theological and political lion members, and the Lutheran divisions in American ProtestantChurch–Missouri Synod (LCMS), ism. From this perspective, the with 2.4 million, claim 80 percent ELCA fits comfortably with the of America’s nine million Luliberal mainline, while the LCMS therans. The ELCA was created looks like a branch of conservain 1988 after a series of mergers; tive evangelicalism. The ELCA German immigrants organized the ordains women and is squishy on much older LCMS in 1847. abortion, premarital sex, cohabitaWell into the twentieth cention, and homosexual conduct; just tury, American Lutherans were last month its leadership decided uncomfortable with their relation to permit homosexual persons in to other Protestants. Their relaxed “life-long, monogamous relationattitude toward drinking, smoking, ships” to serve as clergy and lay and dancing distinguished them leaders. ELCA Lutherans are in from Baptists and other sects of full communion with six other Puritan extraction. At a time when liberal denominations: the Episcomost American Protestants were pal Church, the United Methodist becoming strong advocates of Church, the United Church of public education, Lutherans estabChrist, the Reformed Church in

America, the Presbyterian Church USA, and the Moravian Church; these bodies agree to “pulpit sharing,” intercommunion, and common decision-making on important matters. Far less accommodating of modern secular culture is the defiantly orthodox and increasingly sectarian LCMS. Its original members were immigrants from Luther’s own province of Saxony who landed near St. Louis in 1839. These “Old Lutherans” opposed the merger of the Lutheran and Reformed Churches in their homeland. Here they built their own parochial school system from kindergarten to university, and today they operate hundreds of schools, including Valparaiso University in Indiana and Concordia Seminary in St. Louis. Insistence by some Missouri Synod leaders on biblical literalism caused a rupture in the mid-1970s, which eventually led to the formation of the ELCA. Some LCMS congregations have adopted the emotional and improvised style of worship commonly found in charismatic and nondenominational “Bible churches.” As the ELCA fades into the potpourri of liberal Protestantism and the LCMS edges toward evangelicalism, it remains to be seen whether Lutherans at both ends of the spectrum can or even want to maintain a distinct Lutheran

identity. In the struggle to hold the orthodox center, some Lutherans, especially those who style themselves “evangelical catholics,” have reached the conclusion that what makes Lutheranism Lutheran is ultimately unsustainable apart from Catholicism. As the Anglican C.S. Lewis keenly observed, in a divided Christianity, those at the heart of each division are all closer to one another than those at the fringes. The Lutheran Reformation, unlike other Protestants who thought they were restoring the true Church, never intended to be anything but a reforming movement within the one Catholic Church. A momentous achievement in the quest for Christian unity was the “Joint Declaration on Justification by Faith,” signed in 1999 by representatives of the LWF and the Catholic Church. It emphasizes that God accepts us by grace alone through faith in the Gospel and not on the basis of our merit; yet God’s saving action in Christ calls us to live a life of faith, hope, and charity. There are kinks to be worked out, to be sure, and other Lutheran differences with Rome remain; nevertheless, substantial consensus has been reached on the issue that sparked the Reformation. The everpresent question is whether there are compelling reasons in those remaining differences for maintaining the separation. Father Kocik is a parochial vicar at Santo Christo Parish in Fall River.

Lutheranism: ‘The just man lives by faith’

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here’s no doubt about it, Jesus had to be divine. His patience with his disciples proves it. If he had been merely human, he would have fired them (or worse) and found brighter and stronger people to take their place. This Gospel portrays one of the moments when no one would have blamed him for doing so. Were they really so dense? It seems they were. Jesus has just explained one of his most important teachings, one of the concepts that underlies the whole Gospel: “It’s not about status: it’s about service.” How many times he tried to put that across, by

The Anchor

Not clear on the concept

word and deed. Here he beand glorious. “I’m being gins with an argument from called to be a disciple of a his own redemptive life. He tells them, “I will suffer and die Homily of the Week at the hands of evil Twenty-Fifth Sunday men, though I am the in Ordinary Time Son of Man. Then I will rise again.” They By Father Andrew don’t understand this Johnson, OCSO and they’re afraid to let on that they don’t. How very human of them; can we agree that this triumphant messiah? Sign is a pretty common human me up,” they say. “King situation? David multiplied by a thouThe reality is, of course, sand? I could do that.” that they weren’t thinking Well, the thing is, there in a vacuum. They had a is triumph and there is glovery clear idea of what they ry. But only after Calvary. felt the Son of Man, the Only after total subjection Messiah, should be: mighty to the Father’s loving, re-

demptive will. But the disciples find that a complete mystery and they fall back to their accustomed level. Jesus must have seen them bickering as they walked along, and when he asks them what it was all about, it turns out they’re still talking about status rather than service. No more discourses from Jesus now; rather he takes a child, puts it before their eyes and says, “Here’s what you must love and become yourselves: a child. No influence, no possessions, no status. When you’re comfortable

with that, you’re ready to receive me, the Messiah.” We’re not told how deep this graphic teaching sank in. Not too deep, though, because they all fled when the true nature of the Messiah was revealed in Gethsemane and on Calvary. Really, in the end, Jesus’ patience with his disciples is such a sign of hope for us. He never gave up on them, and he won’t with us either, no matter how badly we fail. Not clear on the Gospel concepts? Cheer up. There’s still time and there’s still mercy. Father Johnson is chaplain at Charlton Memorial Hospital in Fall River.

Upcoming Daily Readings: Sat. Sept. 19, 1 Tm 6:13-16; Ps 100:1b-5; Lk 8:4-15. Sun. Sept. 20, Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Wis 2:12,17-20; Ps 54:3-4,6-8; Jas 3:16-4:3; Mk 9:30-37. Mon. Sept. 21, feast Matthew, Apostle, Evangelist, Eph 4:1-7,11-13; Ps 19:2-5; Mt 9:9-13. Tues. Sept. 22, Ezr 6:7-8, 12b,14-20; Ps 122:1-5; Lk 8:19-21. Wed. Sept. 23, Ezr 9:5-9; (Ps) Tb 13:2-4,6-8; Lk 9:1-6. Thur. Sept. 24, Hg 1:1-8; Ps 149:1-6,9; Lk 9:7-9. Fri. Sept. 25, Hg 2:1-9; Ps 43:1-4; Lk 9:18-22.

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n 2001, when chairman Leon Kass was organizing the President’s Council on Bioethics (which was recently and foolishly disbanded by President Obama), he sent the council members some interesting homework to read before their first discussion in 2001: Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story, “The Birthmark,” which doesn’t figure in too many high school American literature anthologies these days. Kass knew precisely what he was doing, however: he was asking those charged with advising the President of the United States about the management of humanity’s new genetic knowledge to think about today’s challenges through the prism of a story about beauty, hubris, and the lethal dangers of the Promethean quest for human perfection. In Hawthorne’s tale, Aylmer, a scientist, has married an exceptionally beautiful woman named Georgiana, whose face

The remarkable Rose Hawthorne

is marred (in Aylmer’s view) Born in Lenox, Mass., in by a birthmark. Eventually 1851, Rose Hawthorne spent convinced by Aylmer that the her childhood years in Liverbirthmark should be removed, pool, England (where her father Georgiana submits to a prowas U.S. consul), and Italy cedure, designed by Aylmer, that is supposed to eliminate what her husband regards as a blemish on her beauty. The birthmark disappears but Georgiana By George Weigel dies. Aylmer’s quest to make his wife perfect, as he understands perfection, has killed the women before coming home to Conhe sought to perfect. cord, Mass., in 1860. At age 20, I’d known about Kass’s Rose married George Parsons striking assignment to the Lathrop and the couple eventuBioethics Council for years. ally settled in Boston, where But it was only recently that his Lathrop worked at the Atlantic effort to get America thinking Monthly and Rose established seriously about the moral and her own reputation as a writer, human costs of striving for publishing short stories and physical perfection brought to poems. After five years of marmind another member of the riage, a son, Francis Hawthorne Hawthorne clan — Rose HawLathrop, was born; but the thorne, the author’s youngest lad succumbed to diphtheria child, whose cause for beatifiwhen just five years old. Rose cation is now underway. and George Lathrop were both

The Catholic Difference

received into the Catholic Church in 1891, 10 years after their son’s death. But their marriage became impossible; George Lathrop had problems with “intemperance” (as the New Catholic Encyclopedia delicately puts it), which led to his inability to keep a job. With her confessor’s permission, Rose began to live alone and, after taking appropriate training, started work with patients suffering from incurable cancer — a heart-breaking ministry of charity to which she devoted the rest of her life. After George Lathrop’s death in 1898, Rose Hawthorne became a Dominican Sister, establishing the Dominican Congregation of St. Rose of Lima, also known as the Servants of Relief for Incurable Cancer. A center for cancer patients was established in Hawthorne, N.Y., where Mother Mary Alphonsa, O.P., as Rose was known in

Oct. 2-4, 2009 ~ John Polce Retreat Oct. 8 & 22, 2009 ~ Grief Education Oct. 8, 15, 22, 29 ~ Journaling My Journey Nov. 3, 2009 ~ Remembering Our Loved Ones Nov. 13-15, 2009 ~ Knit Crochet, Embroider, Etc. Dec. 4-6, 2009 ~ Advent Retreat Dec. 31 - Jan. 1 ~ New Year’s Eve Retreat

religion, spent out her years, dying there in 1926. As Father Gabriel O’Donnell, O.P., the postulator for her beatification, once wrote, “service to Christ’s poor did not simply mean that this lady of culture, education, and social status would put on an apron and offer gifts from her abundance. She decided to live among the poor, to beg for them as they did for themselves, and to establish a home where they could live in dignity, cleanliness, and ease as they faced their final days on earth. There was to be no class system, no ‘upstairs/downstairs’ for her residents. She and her religious Sisters would be the servants. The residents would be the object of all their care and concern.” Rose Hawthorne saw in disfigured men and women suffering from horrible cancers what Aylmer could not see in the near-perfection of the beautiful Georgiana in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story: the face of Christ. The Rose Hawthorne Guild (600 Linda Ave., Hawthorne, N.Y. 10532) promotes the cause of Rose Hawthorne; a prayer asking cures and other favors through her intercession is available at http://www. hawthorne-dominicans.org/ guild/nl_gld.3.htm. It would not be misplaced to add a prayer for any future President’s Council on Bioethics in such intercessions. George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

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Monday 14 September 2009 committee. Greg Bettencourt, parish director of Faith Forma— Three Mile River — First tion, volunteered to head the anniversary of parish foundgroup. After several meetings, ing n a cardboard box, I came across an old greeting card. The card pictures a blue Reflections of a teddy bear holding a Parish Priest glittered numeral one. By Father Tim The message reads Goldrick “Baby is one year old today, so Teddy Bear has come to say a plan emerged. It included — Happy Birthday!” signed both spiritual and social mummy and daddy XOXOX events. and dated 6/23/47. It’s adI was pleased to see that dressed to me. the celebration would begin First birthdays are worth with the Liturgy of the Hours, celebrating. St. Nicholas of Evening Prayer. This is an Myra parish is one year old. official liturgy of the worldOur first birthday calls for a parish celebration, but how do wide Church. It’s based on the psalms of the Old Testament. you sing “Happy Birthday” to The same psalms are used on a church? the same day everywhere in Well, of course, form a

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The Anchor

September 18, 2009

The Ship’s Log

the world the Liturgy of the Hours is prayed. Not only that, but the assigned psalms are prayed at specified times of the day, regulated by the rising and the setting of the sun. It’s synchronized. Planet Earth is wrapped in constant prayer, and so it has been for millennia. We joined out voices to the chorus unending. Following Evening Prayer, folks gathered in the Parish Life Center for a period of storytelling. “Tell us about something you experienced in our first year as a parish. The story can be funny, serious, inspiring — something you think people would enjoy hearing.” Anyone could jump in. The presentations were very positive. After an hour, it was clear to all that, in the

Imitating Our Lady of Sorrows

priest on the Day of AtoneDuring this Year for ment (Yom Kippur), the most Priests, the laity are asked sacred day of the year for the to pray in a special, more Jewish people. On that day, intense way for their priests commemorating the second and for priestly vocations. time that Moses received the The mission of the Church Commandments from God, depends on the integrity of the people prayed in reparathese men, and the spiritual tion for their sins while the life of our children and grand-children will be deeply affected by the outcome of our prayers. Is there more, though, that we could be doing? In the case By Genevieve Kineke of women — who will never be called to holy orders — is high priest offered sacrifices there anything specific to our on their behalf. feminine genius that could Being both a descendent of contribute to the priestly Aaron and intimately familmission through which so iar with the Torah, Mary’s many graces flow? Perhaps a creation of this singular work glimpse into Jesus’ life could must have been deliberhelp us to discern our specific ate, indicating that she was calling. intensely aware of her Son’s During the Passion, when priestly mission. Having Jesus was stripped and clothed him in flesh, she then scourged, we learn that the tunic that he was wearing was collaborated lovingly with Joseph to teach him about “woven in one piece from top the law and the prophets, and to bottom and had no seam” formed him by means of the (John 19:24). The account domestic Church. Finally she of the soldiers casting lots provided for him the telling for this precious garment garment that would identify reminds us that the detail him for the ages as the priest was important enough to be who would offer the ultimate prophesied in the Scriptures. Doubtless his mother wove sacrifice. (As an aside, it is interesting that in the case of the linen fabric herself and Our Lord, neither she who created the seamless tunic, prepared the garment nor he and if we consider her nature who wore it were in need of we might imagine that she resuch atonement, and yet they flected as she sewed, particucontributed the essential elelarly on the 16th chapter of Leviticus which described the ments on which our redemption rests.) high priest’s garments. Such So what is the lesson for a tunic was worn by the high

The Feminine Genius

women today, and how can we benefit by such a reflection? If we consider her work, her teaching and her tears, it becomes obvious that Mary’s heart was intimately wrapped around the work of her Son. She joined her motherly care to his priestly work out of intense concern for the flock entrusted to him. No creature suffered as Mary did during the Passion, no human love matched hers for depth, and no finite oblation matched hers for its purity. She always knew that such darkness was on the horizon because of the Simeon’s prophecy after the birth of Jesus — and yet she lived a steadfast faith without shrinking from it. So in addition to our prayers, we must offer our sacrifices in a spirit of oblation, joining the hardships that come our way to the mission of priests everywhere. One need hardly look for extra suffering — given the hazards of loving in a fallen world. If we fearlessly embrace our obligations and endeavor to love whole-heartedly, our physical, emotional and spiritual sufferings can then be laid on the altar and transformed with the bread and wine into the very flesh of Christ — just as Mary did. Mrs. Kineke is the author of “The Authentic Catholic Woman” (Servant Books). She can be found online at www.feminine-genius.com.

opinion of parishioners, St. Nicholas Church is a parish alive; that the Holy Spirit is working among us; and that we have already become family to each other. Not only that, but people began to share hopes and plans for the future. I had intended to read the names of those who had been baptized during our first year, but there were just too many names. I noticed that the number of baptisms was twice the number of funerals, a sign of a growing parish. The major part of the first anniversary celebration took place on the closest weekend to the anniversary date. Saturday morning featured a parish festival. This was purposely a homespun event. There were no mechanical carnival rides, rented crafter tables, elaborate parades, or any of the other things often associated with feasts and festivals. We kept it simple with face painting, crafts, basketball throws, cotton candy making, and easy-to-win prizes. Oh, yes, and there was food. It was for us and by us — just a family celebration in the backyard, rain or shine. High school parishioner Matt St. George brought his Scout friends to the blessing of his Eagle Scout project, a meditation garden. Saturday evening, the Supper Club cooked up its “Famous Chicken Barbeque.” Following the barbeque, we provided our own stage entertainment. The weekend celebration climaxed with Sunday’s solemn Mass of Thanksgiving, followed by refreshments in the Parish Life Center. We would be lost without a parish center. I am forever grateful to my predecessor, Father Bill O’Connell, for his foresight in building it. During the socializing, images of persons and

events from the year past were projected on a massive screen. It was our “wedding album.” There is a saying in the Marriage Encounter Movement, “A wedding is a day; a marriage is a lifetime.” In a certain sense, the consolidation of two or more parishes operates on the same principle. Months of intensive work and planning go into preparing for the Big Day when two parishes become one. It’s after the “wedding,” when all the guests have gone home and we are alone, that the real work begins. This is the task of building the kingdom in whatever section of the Lord’s vineyard we may find ourselves and with whatever resources we have at our disposal. Relationships with our God and with each other need to be deepened. Staff members need to learn to work as a team. Finances must be addressed and bills paid, thus a parish finance council. A measurable and realizable parish longterm vision must be identified, thus a parish pastoral council. The issue of adequate and safe facilities and procedures must be addressed. New parish groups may need to be formed and existing groups reformed. Traditions need to be established and memories treasured. All the while, worship, prayer, study, spiritual growth, and outreach to the community, especially the poor and needy, must go on unabated. We have only just begun. Our parish church is one year old today, so all of us have come to say — Happy Birthday, Church of St. Nicholas. Signed, your founding pastor. XOXOX. But a teddy bear, he’s not. Father Goldrick is pastor of St. Nicholas of Myra Parish in North Dighton.

MEDITATION GARDEN BLESSING — An Eagle Scout project marking the first anniversary of St. Nicholas of Myra Parish involved the creation of a meditation garden. From left: Pastor Father Timothy J. Goldrick, Jackie Charlwood; Karen (Charlwood) St. George; Matt St. George, Eagle Scout candidate; and Paul St. George. The garden is dedicated to the memory of Ralph Charlwood.

10 By Kenneth J. Souza Anchor Staff

WEST HARWICH — While most people look to Christ to mold them into his own image, for the better part of the last three years Robert Johnson has spent every day molding Christ into a work of art. Johnson, 63, has been working on a life-sized crucifix, sculpted out of clay that will later be cast in bronze, to be installed on the lawn

The Anchor

Art at the service of faith

of the Our Lady of Life Perpetual Adoration Chapel at his home parish of Holy Trinity. “It’s been a labor of love … I work on it everyday,” Johnson said. “I met with Father Edward L. Healey Jr. several years ago. At that time he looked at the design I had and thought it was perhaps not traditional enough for the main church, however he did say he needed a crucifix for the new memorial wall

September 18, 2009

ly abstract work up to that point,” be ready to pack up the entire sculpoutside the chapel.” And so Johnson was encour- he said. “I took some courses and ture and ship it to Chelsea, Mass., aged to create a crucifix to be in- studied crucifixion through history where it will be cast in bronze using stalled alongside a new memorial and how it was done — the physi- an ancient method known as “the lost wax process.” wall donated by the family of Ray cality of it.” After sculpting a small model of “People might remember baby Fontaine. “It’s quite beautiful — it’s all the crucifix for Father Healey’s ap- shoes being bronzed where they granite, about a six-foot high wall proval, Johnson started building a just dip them,” he said. “Here they and it’s over 180 feet long,” John- life-sized armature or steel frame to do several different molds: they hold the various pieces of the sculp- do positives and negatives and go son said. It seems Johnson has always ture together. A combination of back and forth until eventually they been drawn to religious imagery Styrofoam and clay were then used have a clay-fired mold into which and artwork. A former professor at to “add bulk” to it and he used an they pour the bronze. It’s highly Cape Cod Community College for old beam for the upright portion of labor-intensive but it will give you 30 years who was trained in busi- the cross, opting to sculpt the hori- an exact duplicate right down to a fingerprint.” ness administration, JohnIf everything goes acson only started dabbling in cording to plan, Johnson said sculpture in his late 40s. the finished bronze sculp“The focus of my art has ture should be completed always been religious depicand installed in the chapel’s tions, right from the start,” memorial garden in time for he said. “I’ve found just a Holy Week next year, when wealth of imagery and spirihe hopes Father Healey can tual growth doing this. Just officially bless it. Part of the about every piece I’ve ever project also includes landdone has had a religious scaping the garden and the theme.” addition of a round concrete Johnson said it helps to patio, benches and lighting. have someone like his pas“This will be such a tor, Father Healey, who apbeautiful site and I really preciates and encourages hope that spiritually it will artistic expression. complement the work being “Father Healey uses the done everyday at the chapel expression ‘art at the serwhere we have 24-hour adovice of faith,’” Johnson said. ration,” Johnson said. “He’s working toward a new Although the crucifix crucifix for the parish hall, project has taken up a lot of which faces behind our alhis time, Johnson has still tar. He’s done a lot and we managed to remain active have beautiful statuary at our in the parish, serving as the church.” president of the parish’s St. In a recent parish bulletin, Vincent de Paul Society, Father Healey noted: “The which he boasts “has a great Catholic imagination has group of volunteers.” encouraged and supported He and his wife, Patricia, artistic expression throughwho married at Holy Trinity out the ages. In the smallest parish churches or the larg- ANCHOR PERSON OF THE WEEK — Robert Church in 1977, have also est basilicas, Catholics have Johnson molds a clay sculpture of Christ crucified. raised two sons, Adam and Andrew, in what he calls a sought and sponsored artistic “wonderful, active and very strong works that depict the persons, mys- zontal crossbeam himself. To help realize his vision of Je- parish,” so he enjoys giving someteries and tenets of the Christian faith. Some of these works have sus as a physically-thin but rugged thing back through his God-given become world famous. While the person, about five-feet-11-inches talent. When asked if there were any art in our own parish is not world tall, Johnson had male models pose artists who inspire him, Johnson famous, still it is at the same time in his studio. “I used a lot of different models, cited Renaissance sculptor Gianboth an essential expression of our mostly from the parish,” he said. “I lorenzo Bernini and, of course, Mifaith and a support to that faith.” Through Father Healey’s en- had a young fellow by the name of chelangelo, whose work adorns the couragement and with an endur- Nick Green who started with me walls of his home studio. “Some days I look at his work ing devotion to Holy Trinity Parish about two years ago posing for the dating back to when he first moved sculpture. It’s important because in and say to myself: ‘Forget it, just here from New Jersey in 1974, order to get the pose, you’ve got to put down your tools and go read a Johnson set out to research not only extend the body. You’ve got to see book. You’re never going to reach the intricacies of anatomical sculp- the muscles flex and bulge. It’s a that level,’” he said. “But it’s okay, ture, but also the harsh realities of realism I think I’ve achieved with I’m doing what I like and I’m havthis piece.” ing fun.” crucifixion. Now in the final stages of sculptTo nominate a Person of the “I started doing research because frankly I hadn’t done a lot of ana- ing the hair and facial features of Week, send an email to Fathertomical sculpting — I’d done most- the corpus, Johnson said he’ll soon RogerLandry@AnchorNews.org.

V-chips, etc. — Parental control technology in a multimedia age

WASHINGTON (CNS) — The Federal Communications Commission, under new chairman Julius Genachowski, gave notice in September that it intends to look at parental control technologies and how they are used in the multimedia age.

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The Anchor

September 18, 2009 One of those parental control devices is the v-chip, which has been part of the TV landscape throughout the decade. The v-chip allows TV users to block programs if they carry a particular TV Parental Guideline — the

rating — or a letter-based content advisory for sex, dialogue, violence or language. Helen Osman, communications secretary for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said that, from her review of the FCC’s report, “they in-

dicate that people are confused about what the different letters mean, and how to use those seems to be a pretty major concern. Maybe the FCC can give some guidance on that.” Osman has had experience with TV ratings and parental control technology in the form of the v-chip. “I know we used it when our kids

were in middle school, but they figured out the code quickly. It’s not a magic button,” she said. “I think the most effective tool for parents is the space between their two ears — their brains,” Osman added. “You can use the technology, but it’s only a tool. Having said that, I think it can be a useful tool.”

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I

The Anchor

Chapel by the sea

was six years old the first time I walked into St. Jude’s Chapel on Cape Cod. My family was taking its first vacation on the Cape, and the chapel is where we attended Sunday Mass. Though it was about a seven-mile drive, it was the closest church to the little beach community where we were staying. There was no question that we’d make the trip; my parents were deeply faithful to Sunday Mass and made sure we got there, at home or away. Something about St. Jude’s struck me and made it stick in my memory. It was so different from our suburban parish church at home, so much smaller and plainer, but beautiful in its simplicity. It was built in classic New England style: white clapboard outside, light-colored

Guest Column Claudia McDonnell walls inside, the tabernacle in the center of the simple altar. In those pre-Vatican II days, the altar stood against the sanctuary’s back wall. Two tall, slender columns rose on each side of the altar and stretched almost to the ceiling. They supported a decorative wood altarpiece with the words “Dominus Meus et Deus Meus.” My Lord and my God. That image stayed with me. I imagine that I must have asked my mother what the words meant. Seeing them above the altar, I sensed their importance. It was four years before we returned to the Cape, and by then Mass was celebrated in a public building in the beach community. We did not return to St. Jude’s. In the ’60s and ’70s, development on the Cape skyrocketed and the population boomed. In 1984 a new parish, Christ the King, was founded in Mashpee — the town where we stayed — and a large, handsome church was built. St. Jude’s Chapel, located several miles away, was moved and attached to the new church, on the left side at the rear, to be used for

EasternTelevision

adoration and quiet prayer and to serve as a reminder of local Catholic history. It was a joy to walk into it and to see again the words “Dominus Meus et Deus Meus.” This year when I went to the Cape, I learned a bit of St. Jude’s history. It was built to serve the local Portuguese community, many of them descendants of the first Portuguese who arrived at the Cape in 1836. At one time Mass had been celebrated for them in a private home and then, in the 1920s, in a former schoolhouse. In 1939, land was donated and St. Jude’s was built. It was dedicated in 1940. When I visit it now, I often see people stop in to pray. I am sure it’s a special spot for parishioners, some of whom might have attended Mass there in the old days. It’s special, too, for this true-blue New Yorker who likes to keep one foot in the Cape Cod sand. In St. Jude’s I remember my parents, and how they made a point of getting to Mass every Sunday. That makes an impression on children; at six I learned that the Mass was worth making an effort for, even in an unfamiliar place. With maturity comes the rest of the message: the Church really is universal. It is the same Christ in all the different tabernacles in churches and chapels all over the world. Those who seek him, find him, and even in a new place, they know they are at home. Perhaps that’s why I remembered St. Jude’s all those years. Perhaps I sensed a compelling contrast: the unchanging holiness of the Mass and the newness of this setting with its different kind of beauty. To this day, when I watch the priest elevate the host, I find myself saying, “Dominus meus et Deus meus,” and, often, remembering what I learned in a simple chapel by the sea. Claudia McDonnell is the Features Editor for Catholic New York, the weekly newspaper of the Archdiocese of New York. This article originally appeared in that newspaper’s August 27 edition.

September 18, 2009

Diocesan Teams of Our Lady celebrate 25 years continued from page one

Inez and Joe Varao, parishioners of Espirito Santo in Fall River, are responsible for the New England area Teams of Our Lady. “We’ve been married for 25 years and for 22 of those we have been involved with the Teams of Our Lady,” Inez told The Anchor. “Without it, I don’t think our marriage could have survived spiritually.” Varao said the Teams movement is growing in New England, particularly in the Brazilian community. “We wish it would grow larger in our diocese, but it is growing. “The Teams give couples the tools they need to keep Christ in their marriages. For Joe and me, it is the backbone of our marriage in an age where marriages are in crisis all over.” “The Teams of Our Lady are so special for the family,” said Octavio Canhoto, also a parishioner of Espirito Santo, who, along with his wife Rosa Maria, have been in the movement since 1986. “We were involved with Cursillo and Marriage Encounter as well, but the Teams offered that spirituality that wasn’t individual, but for the couple and the family,” he told The Anchor. “That’s why we have stayed with it all these years. The couples meet side-by-side, and we talk about family, children and we share our experiences, good and bad. “One of the most beautiful features of the Teams is that once a month we ask our spouse what we can do better for each other to make the marriage better. It’s ‘what can I do for you?’ instead of ‘what can you do for me?’ Based on that, we try to do something better each day for our spouse.” Father John J. Oliveira, pastor of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel in New Bedford, has been involved with the Teams for nearly 20 years. “Getting to know the couples and watching them grow in love and spirituality is very edifying,” he said. “I see them living out the sacrament of marriage through Christ and family. As a priest, being part of this is bringing the Church into the marriage. The Church always attempts to support married life. It’s important for the couple, the family, and society in general.” Maria Cabral and her husband Jose have been involved with Teams for 10 years, and they are the Sector Couple, responsible for all the teams in the diocese. “It’s been 10 years, but it should have been much longer,” she told The Anchor. “We were asked to join 25 years ago, but we hesitated for many years. It’s awesome, and after waiting so long to join I feel like I want to tell everyone about it.” Cabral said the movement is a great opportunity for a married couple to become more acquainted with each other after many years.

“Sometimes after many years of marriage, the feelings die away. Being part of the Teams brings the marriage commitment alive again. There is a yearning to sit and not be afraid to talk about what we like and dislike about each other. It’s not easy, but with the support of the other couples, who are going through the same thing, we learn to honestly and lovingly deal with each other.” The Cabrals are coordinating a 25th anniversary celebration to be held Sunday at St. Anthony’s Church in New Bedford. “We’re going to have a spiritual banquet followed by a physical banquet,” said Maria. The “spiritual banquet” of which she speaks is a 10:15 a.m. Mass to be celebrated by Bishop George W. Coleman. “We are so thrilled that the bishop accepted our invitation,” she said. Other invitees include the several priest and deacon spiritual advisors, diocesan teams, and teams from the New England region. “We’ve also invited the first Sector Couple from 25 years ago, Louisa and Agostinho Coelho, and the Super Regional Couple in charge of the movement in the U.S., Eileen and Ted Kosnik from Texas,” she said. A reception at the New Bedford Sports Club will follow. “The fact that the movement is very much alive after 25 years here is testimony to the couples involved,” said Father John Oliveira. “They want to preserve it and pass it on. Keep it alive and spread it.” “The priesthood and marriage are like two wedding rings together,” said Father Correia. “We support each other and there is a unity between the two sacraments. I wish more young couples would look into this.” “The Teams are good for all ages,” added Canhoto. “Young couples get so much out of this. I’m so delighted to see them side-by-side, hand-in-hand growing in spiritual-

ity together. With the Teams, they can help their marriage and their children grow in a healthy home environment. It’s beneficial not just for the families, but for the community as well.” Cabral knows first-hand that she waited longer than she should have to make the commitment. “Our goal is to increase the movement and have more couples involved,” she said. “Twenty-five years is great, and I want this to continue for another 100. I want to look down from heaven one day and say ‘look, it’s still going,’” she quipped. There are five active Teams in Fall River and five in New Bedford. Some of the spiritual advisors include Fathers Oliveira, Correia, Kevin Cook, Luis Cardoso, Henry Arruda, Freddie Babiczuk, and Roger Landry; as well as Deacons Abilio Pires and Eduardo Pacheco. In January 2003, Pope John Paul II addressed the international meeting of the Teams of Our Lady in Rome. “Father Caffarel taught the greatness and beauty of the vocation of marriage, and set forth the call to holiness integral to marital and family life. “He did not want anyone to join a team to become isolated but to learn how to give him/herself to others. I invite you especially to develop personal, marital and family prayer, without which a Christian risks being lost.” The Holy Father also acknowledged the dedication of the spiritual advisors. “I express my gratitude to the spiritual counselors who make themselves available. They bring their competence and experience. By means of their collaboration, priests and couples learn to understand, appreciate and help one another.” “I need the Teams of Our Lady like the Church needs Mass,” said Cabral. “And the movement brings us couples closer to Mass, which is the center of our faith.”

Diocese of Fall River TV Mass on WLNE Channel 6 Sunday, September 20 at 11:00 a.m.

Celebrant is Father Ron P. Floyd, a parochial vicar at St. Patrick’s Parish in Wareham

Losing the democratic process For 40 years Americans have used the democratic process to put their mark on abortions in their own communities. We have debated, protested, signed petitions, campaigned and litigated for and against legislation at every level of government and about every aspect of the abortion issue. It is not a perfect process and I have not always been happy with the results. But I take pride and comfort in the fact that it is “the American Way.” Therefore I look with great concern at the prospect of “health care reform” that will take away this process. At the moment there are many versions of “health care reform” being considered. Given the vagueness and use of code words, even legislators who read every one of the 1,000-plus pages, will have limited understanding of how it will be able to be implemented. In one House bill supported by the leadership and President Obama, the phrase “by the secretary” appears 179 times. For example: “deemed appropriate by the Secretary”; “defined by the Secretary”; “prescribed by the Secretary”; “required by the Secretary”; “developed by the Secretary”; “established by the Secretary.” In other words, the “democratic process” that permitted states and communities to determine at what age a teen-ager may have an abortion without parental knowledge in their community or what information a mother considering having an abortion must have or any other of the many issues, will be replaced by the Secretary of Health and Human Services and a “process” similar to the one that determined which car dealers would remain in business and which car dealers would not. Mary Wagner, East Sandwich A legacy injurious to the Church Congratulations to The Anchor for its article on The Kennedy legacy. It courageously, clinically, and non-effusively outlined the legacy with particular emphasis on its injurious effect on the Catholic Church. Generations of Catholic laity and clergy have been negatively influenced by his example with the result that we now have, as one previous correspondent has cogently observed, a Church consisting of those who are Catholics “therefore” and those who are Catholics “but.” The Catholic Church’s position of non-consequential action will only perpetuate a continuance of the condition it finds itself in today. Dick Tobin, Orleans Sending the wrong message Thanks for your words on Senator Kennedy’s legacy. You chose

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The Anchor

September 18, 2009

Our readers respond

your words carefully about those who have not done a good enough job preaching what it means to be a practicing Catholic. I was greatly disappointed that the Church was used to glorify a man who certainly had many times violated the Church’s teaching on life and marriage. Only God knows the state of his soul at the time of death. I know that he deserved a funeral and needs our prayers for eternal rest of his soul. How can we, however, defend the teachings of the Church on life among the members of our family and with others now that they can say, “See, abortion isn’t really that bad. I can be a practicing Catholic and believe that abortion is alright.” It is increasingly difficult to convince people the severity of the offense when we just glorified the chief spokesperson. Thanks for speaking out. Joe Sollecito, Bedford Moral issues take precedence Your editorial on the Kennedy legacy was excellent and long overdue. About three years ago, I left a parish which I had attended and loved for more than 20 years to join a neighboring parish. I just felt that the first parishes complete disregard of the moral issues mentioned by you in the editorial was taking a toll on my spiritual well-being. May all such pastors heed your call and mend their ways. Joan Cullinan, Hyannis A call for trust in God I was much saddened after reading the editorial “Senator Kennedy’s legacy” published in the September 4 edition of The Anchor. The editorial was in poor taste. Senator Kennedy was a parishioner in this diocese and regularly attended Mass whenever he was home on the Cape. No bishop, in Fall River or elsewhere, ever refused to give him Communion. And now that he is dead, The Anchor has decided to kick the proverbial dead dog. Shame on The Anchor. Senator Kennedy was a very flawed individual, just as King David was and we all are. He admitted that the “gift of faith has sustained, nurtured and provided solace to me in the darkest hours. I know that I have been an imperfect human being, but with the help of my faith, I have tried to right my path.” I’m not sure if any of us will have an easier time standing before God. Senator Kennedy did so much for the least of our brethren. What have we done? Senator Kennedy was not proabortion; there are always other options. But I believe he entrusted those who procured, obtained or performed abortions to the loving mercy of God. I have known women who have had abortions before

and after it was legal. I’ve never known one who was happy about that choice, though most have resigned themselves that at the time it seemed like the best choice. Senator Kennedy believed that for those women who chose to abort, rather than going to a back alley abortionist and facing infection and death, as did Dorothy Day, they should have access to a hospital (or clinic) and medical care. Senator Kennedy was Pro-Life, but he was also pro-choice; the death of an unborn child and its mother, as the result of an abortion, is greater than either one of those evils. Rather than The Anchor’s editorial position, I much more appreciated Theodore Cardinal McCarrick’s remarks at Arlington National Cemetery. The Cardinal was much more accepting, loving, forgiving, embracing and charitable than The Anchor. Senator Kennedy must surely be with God. The souls of the just are in the hands of God. He acknowledged many failings and shortcomings but confessed his sins openly and before all, rather than reserving them solely for the anonymity and seal of the confessional. We should all strive to be less judgmental and to trust more in the forgiveness of a merciful and loving God. John Miranda Raposo Swansea Senator was bellwether for revolt Thank you for the editorial entitled “Senator Kennedy’s legacy.” Your treatment of the subject was both a fair and honest assessment of the honorable Senator’s legacy. The senator was a bellwether for a generation of Catholics (clergy and laity) who revolted with indifference against the Church’s teaching in the 60s and 70s. Many would say that Pope Paul VI’s encyclical letter “Humanae Vitae” was the cause of this, but the seeds of this particular dissent go back to the Garden of Eden. It is noteworthy that his Holiness Paul VI predicted with amazing accuracy the outcomes of the last 40 years. I join with you in praying with sincerity that the Lord will remember all the good Senator Kennedy has done, and forgive him his sins. I pray also for a return to the understanding of the wisdom contained in Church teaching in our public square — the time has come for a return to faith and reason in the world. John F. Corkery Jr., Mansfield Charity demands truth The editorial on Senator Kennedy was dead on. Thanks again for courageously teaching the faith regardless of the cost. There is no

charity without truth. Deacon Steve Minninger Provincetown

The other side of the coin You may recall the Gospel story about Jesus encountering the woman caught in adultery, who was surrounded by a number of men who were about to stone her for her sins. Christ went to her aid. He often went to the aid of sinners. He told the men: “Let those among you who are without sin, cast the first stone.” As you know, one by one, the men dropped their stones and walked away. I guess that you could say that such actions are “Christ-like.” Once again, The Anchor editorial and many members of the hierarchy have shown that you are without sin, because you are always the one to cast the first stone. On the one hand, you say that you pray that the Lord will forgive Senator Kennedy for his sins; but then you imply that “pastors of the Church” should have denied Kennedy a “very public and panegyrical funeral rite.” He should be made to suffer “real consequences” for his work on “abortion, same-sex marriage and other evils.” Cardinal Sean O’Malley, on his blog, while talking of Senator Kennedy’s passing and funeral (in which he participated), said the following: “At times, even in the Church, zeal can lead people to issue harsh judgments and impute the worst motives to one another. These attitudes and practices do irreparable damage to the communion of the Church. If any cause is motivated by judgement, anger or vindictiveness, it will be doomed to marginalization and failure. ... Our ability to change people’s hearts and help them to grasp the dignity of each and every life, from the first moment of conception to the last moment of natural death, is directly related to our ability to increase love and unity in the Church, for our proclamation of the truth is hindered when we are divided and fighting with each other.” Your zeal for the Church is too tinged with judgment and vindictiveness. You are too quick to condemn. You talk of the dignity of every life, but strip many who disagree with you of their dignity with your pious judgments. Ed Scahill, Mashpee Catholic pols must bite the bullet I have read the many articles in both The Anchor and the Pilot from the cardinal, priests and lay people but none was more brilliantly portrayed about Sen. Kennedy than the article on page 6 in The Anchor. Though we are all

sinners we are not to be judges of who will get to heaven or hell but we should all realize, as Catholics, what we must do if we want to enter the kingdom of heaven. It must be very difficult for a politician to decide which way to vote his conscience or party and remain in the good graces of his leaders. But for a good Catholic politician there is only one way to vote on religious amendments and he must be tough enough to bite the bullet come hell or high water. I believe the article “Senator Kennedy’s legacy” might make us come to that conclusion. Al Laurino, Plymouth Confused by relativism My thanks to you for making straight the crooked life of Senator Kennedy. After watching the funeral services, my heart was heavy with confusion. I snapped the TV off and said out loud, “What has happened to my Church?” Relativism has infiltrated and clouded the thinking of some of our leadership. Where is “the Good Shepherd?” The sheep are being scattered. The Anchor is a sentinel for truth. Lillian Heffernan Falmouth A missed legacy Your editorial on Senator Kennedy’s legacy was a breath of fresh air. Your research on the 1971 letter that he wrote was exceptional. Just think of what could have been if he had written the pope an open letter saying that he was wrong about his support for abortion. What a legacy that would have been. Mike Briana, East Falmouth Thanks for the evaluation I just had to write to you and let you know what a marvelous commentary you offered to Catholics and non-Catholics regarding the legacy of Senator Kennedy in your September 4 editorial. I have read other commentaries on his legacy but they were for the most part, essentially, political in their focus. I just had to write and thank you so very, very much for humbly emphasizing the moral failings that were so evident to some of us as we evaluated the senator’s political contributions. I am the first to acknowledge my own sins and moral failings, however, they do not include ignoring the teaching of the bishops regarding marriage and the innocent unborn. Senator Kennedy’s failure to follow the moral instructions of the Church when it came to family life and abortion were, unfortunately, very politically consequential and, in my humble opinion, very destructive. David M. Bethune. Newport, R.I.

14

The Anchor

September 18, 2009

Take time daily for silent prayer to hear God’s voice, says pope

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — People need to carve time out of their busy day to dedicate to silent prayer or meditation in order to hear what God has to say, said Pope Benedict XVI. The faithful also have to remember not to become completely caught up in their daily activities

and concerns, forgetting that Jesus should be the focus of their lives, he said at his weekly general audience September 9. Continuing a series of audience talks about influential Christian writers from the Middle Ages, the pope focused his catechesis on the life of St. Peter Damian, an 11th-

century monk, cardinal and doctor of the Church. Living an austere, secluded life in a cloister, St. Peter Damian determined that “the hermetic life was the apex of Christian life” because it allowed one to be free from the ego and from worldly concerns, said the pope. Monastic life offers an imFALL/SPRING PROGRAMS portant lesson 2009 - 2010 to all Christians — that it is imDecember 11-13, 2009 - Advent Retreat; Ned portant to learn Coughlin, SJ how to achieve January 29-31, 2010 - The Graces of the Spiritual an inner silence Exercises; Damian Zynda in order to listen to God’s voice, February 5-7, 2010 - Yoga and the Art of Relaxhe said. ation; Nancy Plumer The faithful March 5-7, 2010 - Lenten Retreat: Reclaiming must take time Spiritual Wisdom; Don Bisson, FMS out of their day to seek out a April 1-4, 2010 - Holy Week Retreat; Edward quiet place, “a Salmon, SJ sort of sitting parlor, where God can speak October 9-16, 2009 ? June 18-25, 2010 ? August 6-14, 2010 ? August 20-27, 2010 ? to us,” he said. August 21-29, 2010 ? June 29-July 5, 2010 (6 Day Directed Retreat) One can learn God’s word and the

right path to take in life through quiet prayer and meditation, he said. St. Peter Damian taught that Christ must be at the center of monastic life; Christ must be heard in one’s voice, be served in one’s life and felt in one’s heart, said the pope. All Christians, not just contemplative religious, must cultivate this intimate union with Christ,

Pope Benedict said. “We shouldn’t let ourselves be completely absorbed by our daily activities, problems and worries, forgetting that Jesus must truly be at the center of our lives,” he said. The pope flew to the Vatican by helicopter from Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome, to lead the general audience in the Paul VI hall before about 8,000 pilgrims from around the world.

RetreatsatGlastonburyAbbey

FALL 2009

If today you hear His Voice harden not your hearts.

The monks of Glastonbury Abbey invite you to nourish your soul and refresh your spirit by giving yourself time to be present to your God and to relax in an atmosphere of prayer and rest. The Abbey, surrounded by lush woodlands and a short distance from the ocean, affords the opportunity to walk, soak up the sun, reflect and rest. Retreatants are welcome to share the prayer life of the monks at the communal celebrations of the Liturgy of the Hours and daily Eucharist. During the summer months, guests have the opportunity to attend a daily presentation focused on monastic and Benedictine themes. Come and experience a Benedictine approach to life - sit quietly ... ponder ... pray and be renewed!

Call to reserve your place: Retreat Secretary

Glastonbury Abbey Retreats

16 Hull Street, Hingham, MA 02043 Tel (781) 749-2155 Ext. 200 Fax (781) 749-6236 Web site: http://www.glastonburyabbey.org e-mail: retreats@glastonburyabbey.org Sept. 25-27, “Christian Contemplative Prayer Retreat” with Father Mark Serna, OSB sold out Oct. 9-12, “The Way of Meister Eckhart” with Martin Mullins, M.Sc., and Bro. Daniel Walters Oct. 23-25, “The Feminine Face of God: A Retreat for Women” with Sandra DeRome, Obl. OSB Oct. 30-Nov. 1, “Celtic Spirituality II Retreat” with Fr. Timothy Joyce, OSB, and harpist Dec. 4-6, “Men’s Spirituality Retreat” with Fr. Timothy Joyce, OSB Dec. 30-Jan. 1, “New Year’s Retreat” with Fr. Thomas O’Connor, OSB

September 18, 2009

15

The Anchor

U.S. bishops help parishes get ready for Respect Life Sunday

WASHINGTON (CNS) — “Every Child Brings Us God’s Smile” is the theme for the 20092010 Respect Life program, based on one of Pope Benedict XVI’s homilies during the feast of the Baptism of the Lord. Although the Respect Life program itself has been a year-round initiative since its establishment in 1972, U.S. Catholics across the country have used the month of October to focus on life and human dignity. Many parishes will hold a special Respect Life Mass October 4, the first Sunday of Respect Life Month. Materials are developed for the Respect Life program each year by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities. The topics addressed this year show the diversity of pro-life concerns, including: — “Why You Matter: A Reflection on Human Dignity” by Father John Bartunek, a member of the Legionaries of Christ; — “Assisted Suicide: Death By ‘Choice’” by Rita L. Marker, executive director of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide; — “The Difference Is the Difference: Sexual Difference and the Defense of Marriage” by Father J. Brian Bransfield, assistant general secretary of the USCCB; — “Contraception: The Fine Print” by Susan E. Wills, assistant director for education and outreach in the Pro-Life secretariat; — “Addressing Infertility With Compassion and Clarity” by Capuchin Franciscan Father J. Daniel Mindling, academic dean at Mount St. Mary’s Seminary in Emmitsburg, Md.; — “Where Do We Go From Here? The Challenge of Building a Culture of Life” by Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia,

chairman of the USCCB Committee on Pro-Life Activities. The 2009-2010 Respect Life packet also includes a collection of suggested prayers for Respect Life Sunday, a “Litany to Mary, Mother of Life,” a novena to Our Lady of Guadalupe and

a Holy Hour for life, as well as suggested preaching reflections for January 22, the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion. The Committee on Pro-Life Activities creates this package

annually to help spread the Catholic Church’s Pro-Life message to schools, religious education programs, and Catholic institutions and organizations. The folder also includes infor-

Sept. 26 - (Sat.) 10am-3pm

mation on how to order supplies for this year’s program and a CD with additional literature on the selected issues. Many supplies are available in Spanish and English.

Upcoming Events

A Day of Recollection: “We Are God’s Earthen Vessels” 2 Cor. 4:7-18. Presenter: Barbara Wright

Oct. 10 - A Day of Healing: Presenter: Dr. Joseph (Sat.) 10am-1:30pm Coyle, Ph. D. Christian Psychologist Oct. 24 - (Sat.) 10am-3pm

A Time of Healing: “A Day of Inner Healing.” Presenter: Dorothea Degrandis Sudol

Oct. 28 - Praise and Worship: Presenter: Father Tom (Wed.) 10am-3pm DiLorenzo Nov. 1 - Healing Service: Presenter: Father Joe (Sun.) 3pm McDermott Nov. 7 - (Sat.) 10am-3pm

A Day of Healing: “Seeing Yourself Thru God’s Eyes!!!” “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.” Jer. 1:5. Healing Your Self-Worth and Self-Esteem.” Presenter: Jacqueline M. Sitte, RN, CARN, LADC I, LRC

Nov. 18 - Praise and Worship: Presenter: Father Tom (Wed.) 10am-3pm DiLorenzo Nov. 21 - (Sat.) 10am-3pm

A Time For Healing: “Lord Jesus Heal Me To Maintain My Self-worth When I Have Failed You, Others, And/Or Myself.” Dan. 10:15-19 & Heb. 13:5-6. Presenter: Dr. Hugh Boyle Jr., Ed.D., Christian Psychologist

Nov. 22 - A Time of Healing: Presenter: Frank Kelly (Sun.) 2pm

For required registration for each event and for further information please call 1-508-947-4704

My Father’s House P.O. Box 22, 39 North Moodus Rd. Moodus, CT 06469 . 860-873-1581 Website: www.myfathershouse.com Email: sbsheldon@sbcglobal.net

September 28 - October 6

9-DAY PILGRIMAGE TO IRELAND visit “ANNE, A LAY APOSTLE.” Contact Mary Alice at (860) 873-8767 for more information. THR. SEPT. 24 Fr. George Zeck, Healing & Deliverance Priest 10:00 AM - 2 PM will speak at the Holy Spirit Breakfast. See website for flyer and sign-up. FRI. OCT. 9 - OUR LADY’S FIAT weekend with the First SUN. OCT. 11 Training Team - Learn to truly listen & obey. * EVERY 1ST SUNDAY Catholic 12-STEP Healing Program with Fr. Bill (after the 1:30 Mass) & his team. Each Meeting will include teaching, 3:00-4:30 PM sharing & prayers for Healing; open to everyone (not just AA). WEEKLY HOLY SPIRIT BREAKFAST with Mass * EVERY THURSDAY at 11:30 and continuing the study of St. Paul with the 10:00 AM - 2 PM encyclicals of Pope Benedict XVI includes lunch. * EVERY 1ST MONTHLY DISCIPLESHIP/PATRICIAN THURSDAY Meeting - MEN & WOMEN. Why not join us this 7:00-9:00 PM month? * EVERY 2ND ST. MONICA’S PRAYER GROUP to pray for our THURSDAY children, family, and loved ones before the 7:30-8:30 PM Blessed Sacrament. * EVERY 3RD HEALING MASS with Fr. Bill McCarthy and THURSDAY team, see our Website for exact date and 6:30 PM further details. * EVERY 4TH PRAYER CENACLE with OUR LADY, QUEEN OF TUESDAY the HOME — using the book of Our Lady’s Message 7:00 PM of Mercy to the World. Check out our website at www.myfathershouse.com for upcoming Parish Missions

Call us to have your family reunion here. Lodging & meals available.

Youth Page

16

September 18, 2009

Bishop Stang commemorates 50 years with anniversary Mass, rededication By Kenneth J. Souza Anchor Staff

NORTH DARTMOUTH — Standing on the sidewalk in front of the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary near the entrance to Bishop Stang High School, Father Horace J. Travassos, pastor of Our Lady of Grace Parish in Westport, fondly recalled standing very near the same spot 50 years earlier. At the time, Father Travassos was a student at Coyle High School in Taunton and he had taken advantage of a day off from school to catch a rare glimpse of Cardinal Richard James Cushing, who was slated to be present at the dedication of the Fall River Diocese’s first regional Catholic high school. “But when we arrived here, Cardinal Cushing didn’t show up,” Father Travassos said, disappointedly. “He had sent a representative in his place.” Father Travassos’ connection to Stang wouldn’t end there — years later he would teach English and Latin at the school named after the first bishop of the diocese, Bishop William Stang. Such were the shared stories and memories offered by past and present students, staff and faculty members during Bishop Stang’s 50th anniversary rededication ceremony and Mass. Members of the Stang family returned to the school September 9 for a blessing and rededication of the cornerstone and a Mass celebrated by Bishop George W. Coleman at nearby St. Julie Bil-

T

his week, as I lay in bed with a fever and sore throat, my creative juices seemed to dry out. I had absolutely no idea what the subject of this article would be. Nothing inspired me. Nothing spoke to me. Nothing jumped out at me. Perhaps the headache blocked any creative thought I may have had. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. The well has gone dry. Back to school? Done it. Christian service? Done it. Respect? Done it. Or so I thought. The subject came to me as I watched President Obama’s speech on health care reform. Don’t stop reading. This article is not about health care reform or the need to serve those less fortunate than others. We can simply re-read the Beatitudes and the corporal and spiritual works of mercy for that. But as the title suggests, it is about respect. Respect for others. Respect for our leaders. Respect for our neighbors. Respect for opinions that differ from our own. It’s about respect and how too many of us seem to either ignore the need for it or have

The new 2009 time capsule contained 2009 coins; a uniform seal and swatch of a uniform kilt; the school’s mission statement; a mini campaign booklet; lists of the current students, faculty and staff members; a Blue Ribbon School invitation and booklet; St. Julie’s prayer; an issue of “Maroon and

and member of the class of 2010. “These capsules are to be reopened at Bishop Stang’s 100th anniversary in 2059,” said President Theresa E. Dougall, a member of the class of 1964. “Some of you here today will be part of that 100th anniversary celebration.” During an anniversary Mass at

St. Julie Billiart Church immediately following the rededication, Bishop Coleman spoke of the importance of Bishop Stang High School during his homily to a packed congregation that included the entire student body. “Today we thank God for all that has been accomplished over the last half-century and we pray that he continue to send the Holy Spirit upon all of Stang’s students, faculty and friends as they look to the future,” Bishop Coleman said. “We remember today in a special way Bishop James L. Connolly, who was inspired to undertake the building of a new Catholic high school. We remember those who contributed generously to the project, the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur who staffed the school for many years, and the dedicated teachers and staff who have taught and guided the young people in the school. “There is no doubt that God has been present in the hearts and minds of thousands of Bishop Stang students and faculty over the past half-century.” Among the many former graduates of Bishop Stang present for the Mass were several priests and deacons who currently serve the Fall River Diocese. Father Marcel H. Bouchard, pastor of Corpus Christi Parish in East Sandwich, offered some personal reflections as a member of the school’s second graduating class. Turn to page 19

forgotten what it is. atic of a growing and distressing Like most of the country, problem with our society — an I was appalled when South increasing disrespect and intolerCarolina Representative Joe ance for those who think and Wilson blurted “You lie!” as the believe differently from us. president gave his speech. To With so many humans on the call it a disrespectful act is an planet, it is impossible to think understatement. Without getthat everyone would ever think ting into details of where Wilson stands on health care reform — for he is entitled to his opinion and there is a time and place for it to be debated — but it is the By Crystal Medeiros way he communicated his opinion that troubles me. It lacked the respect due the president and his fellow or believe the same things. But colleagues in Congress, not to instead of amicably disagreeing mention the principles on which with others and debating or disthis country was founded. What cussing like mature young adults message does this send to our and adults, we are resorting to young people? How do we teach childish name calling, dirty mudour young people to respect slinging, and vicious back biting others when those chosen to be because we think more people our leaders act so immaturely will listen. We have become a and inappropriately? And I’m finger-pointing, judgmental and sure Wilson wasn’t the first nor accusatory society. How did this will he be the last. I’m not going start? Who is to blame? How do to spend the time in this article we fix it? debating health care reform, but What happened to respect? Wilson’s outburst is symptomWhat happened to forgiveness?

To be honest, I’m not sure how we stop this avalanche of negativity from spilling over into the behaviors of our young people especially since our national media has an endless appetite for such bad behavior. But perhaps we can begin with the most basic rule. Christ said, “Do unto others whatever you would have them do to you” (Matthew 7:12). This is the golden rule. If one were to look at the headlines or news reports of the last few months, however, it seems as if this rule has become a little tarnished. I implore our young people this year to respect those around you. Still voice your opinions and discuss issues in a manner that would make not only your parents proud but you proud as well. Don’t lower yourself to the level some of our leaders have for you can grow above and beyond it with your faith and your trust in God. To the adults, I would implore the same thing. Is it natural to let our emotions get the best of us sometimes? Absolutely. We must

remember, however, that we continuously set examples for our young people. They look to us as their mentors and if we are throwing sand at each other in the sand box how can we expect our kids not to do the same? My great-grandmother in her broken English mixed with Portuguese used to tell us, “Be kind to everyone. Treat everyone with respect because you never know if that person is Jesus.” This is advice that her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren have always tried to live by and it is good advice. But I’d like to make one little correction to what my great-grandmother said — I can hear her spinning in her grave as I write this — respect those around you, follow the golden rule, because we all have Christ inside of us. Respect — find out its importance for all of us. Crystal is assistant director for Youth & Young Adult Ministry for the diocese and youth ministry coordinator at St. Lawrence Martyr Parish in New Bedford. cmedeiros@dfrcec.com.

liart Parish. Bishop Coleman presided first over the blessing and replacement of the school’s 1959 cornerstone into which two time capsules were placed — one with memorabilia from the school’s original dedica-

liart, founder of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, who originally staffed the school. The 1959 time capsule was placed into the cornerstone by Louise Buckley Mitchell, member of the class of 1973.

Gray”; plans for Phase I of the school’s new capital campaign; and a reprint of the school’s website home page. The 2009 time capsule was placed into the cornerstone by James Sabra, senior class president

READY FOR ANOTHER 50 ­— Bishop George W. Coleman addresses current and former students, staff and faculty members during Bishop Stang High School’s recent rededication and 50th anniversary celebration September 9, while school chaplain Father Jay Mello, third from right, looks on. (Photo by Kenneth J. Souza)

tion, the other with items from this year’s golden anniversary. Among the 1959 time capsule contents: dedication pamphlets; 1959 coins; copies of The Anchor and New Bedford Standard-Times; the school brochure; and medals of the Sacred Heart, Blessed Virgin, St. Joseph and St. Julie Bil-

No respect, no respect

Be Not Afraid

O

17

The Anchor

September 18, 2009

Deconstructing the alleged right to redefine marriage

ften today those seeking to redefine marriage demonize supporters of traditional marriage as “racists.” Sexual orientation, however, is not genetic like skin color and homosexuality is not hard-wired by DNA. So states Dr. Francis Collins, former director of the Human Genome Project and current director of the National Institute of Health. Labelling supporters of traditional marriage in this way effectively avoids rational debate over the real issues at hand: the nature and purpose of marriage, and whether any harm has come from legalized same-sex unions. Marriage is a public institution. Public institutions serve the common good. Marriage is not primarily about individual rights. The individual rights associated with marriage came about secondarily because the state has an interest in maximizing the common good and, therefore, an interest in encouraging men and women to marry. The ban against interracial marriage was unjust because it kept a man and woman apart. Lifting this ban strengthened marriage as the gender-based public institution it is. A “race-neutral” definition of marriage did not divorce marriage from its intrinsic relationship to the bearing and rearing of children. A gender-neutral definition of marriage certainly does. Critics note that heterosexual couples may choose not to have

or may be unable to have children. definition of marriage. They do Therefore, they claim, marriage not, however, possess a moral mandate to demand its implehas nothing to do with children. But this argument is similar to mentation without considering the the following: “My elderly father consequences. Marriage is intimately associno longer drives so he keeps his car garaged. There are also many ated with parenthood. The United people who collect antique cars Nations Convention on the Rights and never drive them. Therefore, of the Child has recognized that cars have nothing to do with driv- every child has a birthright “to know and be cared for by his or ing.” This is obviously flawed reasoning. The fact that some cars are not used for transportation does not change the primary purpose for which cars were invented or the primary function cars continue to Michelle Cretella, M.D. serve. Similarly, throughout history marriage has always been a social institution that binds a man to his chil- her parents in so far as possible.” dren and their mother. Marriage Same-sex marriage decimates this celebrates and unites the diversity right. Canada, for example, has of the two genders and regulates eliminated in law every child’s sexual behavior. In this way mar- right to a mother and father as a riage promotes the stability of the direct consequence of legalized natural family and yields unparal- same-sex marriage. This is beleled benefits for men, women and cause children in same-sex homes the children they rear. These ben- are always deliberately denied eiefits then spill over to the whole ther a mother or a father. Step-families, adoptive famiof society. This fact remains unchanged even in the face of child- lies and even single-parents are celebrated as loving responses to less couples. Since marriage is a public in- tragic failures of the natural famstitution, altering its definition ily. This is quite different from will have far reaching effects im- claiming that it is good intentionpacting thousands of laws and ally to create motherless or fatherall Americans. As citizens, those less families through adoption, with homosexual attraction are surrogacy and/or artificial reproat liberty to seek a gender-neutral ductive technology. The desire of

Guest Column

Cincinnati archbishop says Sister who endorses ordination of women cannot teach

By Tricia Hempel Catholic News Service

CINCINNATI — A decision deemed to be a personnel matter in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati has garnered international attention for Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk and the woman religious he has determined can no longer teach Religious Education on behalf of the archdiocese. Sister Louise Akers, a 66-yearold Sister of Charity, met with the archbishop in early August at her request to discuss the fact that in April the archdiocesan Office of Catechesis and Evangelization removed her from its list of approved teachers and speakers for archdiocesan programs and events. The private meeting was first reported in the National Catholic Reporter in August. The two discussed Sister Louise’s public support for the ordination of women in the Catholic Church; her name and photo had appeared on the website of the Women’s Ordination Conference, and she was listed as an advisory board member for the group. The

archbishop told Sister Louise that she needed to publicly dissociate herself from this group and rescind her support of women’s ordination in order to receive permission to teach and lecture in the name of the local church. In 1994 Pope John Paul II issued a document saying that because Jesus chose only men as his Apostles the Church is not authorized to ordain women. He also said the position was a definitive, ordinary Church teaching that must be firmly held by Catholics and is not subject to change. According to the “Catechism of the Catholic Church,” “Only a baptized man validly receives sacred ordination. The Lord Jesus chose men to form the college of the 12 Apostles, and the Apostles did the same when they chose collaborators to succeed them in their ministry. The Church recognizes herself to be bound by this choice made by the Lord himself. For this reason the ordination of women is not possible.” Sister Louise removed her name and photo from the website

following the meeting but has said she cannot publicly withdraw her support for the ordination of women. For that reason, her permission to teach has been revoked. “Questions have been raised about the role of a diocesan bishop and the teaching of catechetics in his diocese,” Archbishop Pilarczyk told The Catholic Telegraph, the archdiocesan newspaper, September 3. “It is a bishop’s responsibility to provide authentic and orthodox Catholic teaching in his diocese. Persons who are not in accord with the teaching of the Church should not expect to be allowed to teach catechetical leaders or others in the name of the Church.” Her public position, he noted, is in defiance of the Church’s teaching. “We hire people to teach what’s in the ‘Catechism of the Catholic Church,’” he explained. “As a result, Sister Louise may not teach in the name of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati or at any venue for which the archdiocese is responsible.”

adults to bear and parent children must be subordinated to what is in children’s best interests. To insist that motherless or fatherless families are inherently good for children flies in the face of over three decades of science. This is precisely why France rejected same-sex marriage. America is a country that was founded on the right to religious freedom. Orthodox Christians, Jews and Muslims will have this freedom severely restricted if samesex marriage is legalized. In 2006 two families from Massachusetts filed a federal Civil Rights lawsuit to require schools to notify parents and allow them to opt-out their elementary-school children when homosexual-related subjects were taught. The federal judges dismissed the case, ruling that because same-sex marriage is legal in Massachusetts, schools have a duty to normalize homosexual relationships to children, regardless of parental religious beliefs. Catholic Charities of Boston was ordered to reject Catholic doctrine and start placing children in same-sex homes or give up their state license to place children for adoption altogether. Catholic Charities surrendered its license. A Methodist church in New Jersey lost the tax-exempt status on a piece of property belonging to the church because the pas-

tor declined to rent it out for the celebration of a same-sex union, something that church deems morally unacceptable. More recently, New Jersey based e-Harmony, an on-line Christian dating service, was forced to establish a branch exclusively for those with homosexual attraction. Basically this Christian organization was successfully sued to promote and participate in arranging liaisons it believes are immoral despite the fact that there are other avenues available to homosexuals wishing to meet on-line. A California physician was successfully sued for refusing to artificially inseminate a lesbian. The physician told the lesbian that it was against her moral conscience to artificially inseminate single women regardless of sexual orientation. The doctor referred the lesbian to another physician who performed the procedure. The lesbian still sued for discrimination and won. Make no mistake. Same-sex marriage is not about “live and let live.” Same-sex marriage is about a radically intolerant cultural revolution that is already having some very un-American effects in this country. Dr. Michelle Cretella serves on the Board of the American College of Pediatricians and on the Advisory Board of the Rhode Island Chapter of the National Organization for Marriage.

The Anchor is always pleased to run news and photos about our diocesan youth. If schools or parish Religious Education programs have newsworthy stories and photos they would like to share with our readers, send them to: schools@ anchornews.org

18

The Anchor

September 18, 2009

Forty Days for Life set to kick off

Diocesan academics team up with online technology

said. “We can’t leave them alone. They’re facing decisions that I can’t even fathom.” Two prior 40 Days for Life campaigns have been held in Attleboro — one last fall and a second during Lent this year. Faithful Pro-Lifers have prayed outside the clinic for 10 years and continue to pray between campaigns. Larose said that the increased presence during the past year has led to more complaints filed with local police. “There’s definitely a very strong awareness that we are there, and we are not going away,” he said. The first 40 Days for Life was conducted in College Station, Texas in 2004. Since then 139 communities in 43 states have participated in their own campaigns. Those communities have seen drops in the abortion rate and increased Pro-Life activity. The first nationally coordinated 40 Days for Life was held in fall 2007. Two years later, the campaign has a record-breaking number of participants. More than 200 cities in 45 states, plus cities in Canada and Denmark, will launch the campaign this fall. In Massachusetts, the campaign will be held in Attleboro, Methuen, Springfield and Worcester. Marcotte said the effects of the campaign, nationally and locally, have been “miraculous.” “The fruit that has come from this is incredible,” he said. “We really feel that the Lord has been behind this.” Marcotte encouraged everyone to pray for the success of the campaign and to discern whether God is asking them to pray outside an abortion clinic. During the 40 days, there will be someone standing vigil from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day of the week. Those who would like to participate can

sess to where they can find the particular source needed to learn any of the studies they are into, and how to analyze what they’ve found for particular projects,” Boyle pointed out. “You can find anything in the world on the Internet, good and bad, important and unimportant, including how many calories there are in the donuts one has for breakfast … and perhaps inspire a change to a bagel,” Milot said comically. “So guidance is very important.” Mary Ann Miskel, academic principal at Bishop Stang High School in North Dartmouth, agreed. “What is key in teaching students to use this technology is guiding and directing them in every curriculum area to use appropriate Internet resources for their studies and in writing papers or developing projects,” she stated. Because the primary source of research is the Internet, all 800 students currently enrolled at Stang have access to computers in the classroom, in the computer lab, and to portable laptops as well. How the diocese’s Catholic school students meet the challenges of tomorrow might be measured by what they’re learning in new language skills. “The realization that Arabic and Chinese Mandarin are the languages needed in tomorrow’s marketplace finds Bishop Feehan High School in its fifth year of offering those language skills as an elective,” said Ann Perry, academic vice principal. Teachers are also taking the classes. “My husband is involved in international work and knowledge of those languages is becoming not just useful but necessary,” Perry said. Because Arabic and Chinese I and II are electives and do not fulfill a language requirement, French and Spanish are still be-

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sign up on the group’s website. Those who cannot travel to the clinic can participate by signing up on the group’s online prayer calendar. Individuals or groups can sign up for a specific day and time that they will offer prayers for the campaign. It is a great way for entire congregations to participate and offer prayers for the success of the campaign, he said. Phil Grimes, a participant in all three Attleboro campaigns, encouraged everyone to pray about their contribution. If someone is being called to serve, he or she should come to the clinic and “let God do the work,” he said. “It’s a commitment you make,” he said. “To be there makes the ones who can’t speak have a voice.” Darlene Howard, member of the campaign team, said she and her husband committed to participating as a family. For the first campaign, she prayed outside the clinic every day. It was difficult, she said, but added “Most of us can find an hour.” Howard acknowledged that going to pray outside an abortion clinic could be daunting to some. “I know it is intimidating. The first time I went I was nervous,” she said. On her first visit, she was reassured when she found that the vigil was a safe environment with a peaceful atmosphere. People of all ages, from children to the elderly, participated. She and others simply prayed the rosary and someone held a sign that read, “Pray to end abortion,” she said. Howard added that she is glad she overcame her concerns about praying outside the clinic. “When there’s the possibility that you could save a baby, it’s all worth it,” she said. For more information, visit www.40daysforlife.com/attleboro.

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ing taught. “However there are only a few students taking fifth-year French at Feehan. While Spanish has taken over as the global language of today, it too is not as popular as it once was,” she reported. The study of Arabic began with an Internet link to the University of Cairo in Egypt. “However, we currently use the Rosetta Stone program,” Perry explained. Feehan is also offering a course in American Sign Language, which involves using video software as a study aid and for assessment of one’s skills. Internet sources are key to creating projects in important studies such as theology, but also to advanced, animated, instructional PowerPoint videos with voiceovers, that can involve cartoon characters, Perry reported. Bishop Connolly High School in Fall River is the only diocesan high school using a wireless Internet system that caters to the use of laptops, reported Principal Michael Scanlon. “Approximately a third of our students own laptops, which they bring to school to take notes and research pretty nearly everything, and because it’s a wireless system they can use it anywhere on campus, outside, in the cafeteria, the gym, wherever they are,” he said. The school also has banks of computers readily available at hand at all times. What’s important, he said, “is that we teach them how to evaluate and compare sources to determine what’s true and what’s false, and especially links that are discipline specific. For example, they are taught what search engine offers for English courses, such as the Boston Public Library. There are online sources for every study. And there are many online sites for the religion curriculum.” Chris Myron, vice principal of academics at Coyle and Cassidy

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High School in Taunton, where its 649 students at the various grade levels are involved in using Internet technology in their studies, called it “an exciting time.” As teachers and students advance in incorporating technology and academic skills “we foresee at a future point of doing away with textbooks,” he told The Anchor. “So much is now available online in every area of social studies, English, languages, religion, and the sciences.” The freshman honors biology curriculum is studied nearly totally online, and will be the ordinary study means in religion classes. “We’ve created a Professional Learning Center for teachers, where they can advance to a higher level in developing the knowledge and skills needed for them to better teach and direct students — who, in turn will be better capable of using online resources and applications. We assess at various quarterly periods how they and the students are doing and what they’re comfortable with,” Myron reported. In each study area and in every cycle students have different needs, and the goal is to excel, he added. Every room is equipped with computers for Internet access, and there is some wireless access too. At Pope John Paul II High School in Hyannis, Principal Christopher Keavy says the traditional concept that the Internet is a prime research vehicle for receiving information “can also be a website where students can upload information that can be assessed by his fellow students, teachers, or others outside the school.” At JPII High School, students “can on Web 2.0 add content of their studies, their projects, what they have created for all the world to see,” Keavy added. He indicated that what he called “social media tools” such as Facebook and Twitter have educational applications, which offer commentary plus information. “We are taking part in the Skype Project, which offers free international phone service to students studying such world or foreign languages such as French, Spanish and Latin, which we have here at Pope John Paul II High School,” Keavy reported. It was set in place by one of the schools teachers, who is a native of France, Keavy explained. “I see such a program as real value because it can produce new learning experiences from our students to other students the world over,” Keavy said.

September 18, 2009

Around the Diocese 9/18 9/19

Award-winning contemporary singer/songwriter Anne DiSanto will perform tonight in the great room at Holy Cross Church, 225 Purchase Street, South Easton, beginning at 7:30 p.m.

Benedictine Sister Paula Hagen, founder of the MOMS Ministry, will lead a mini retreat September 19 beginning at 8 a.m. at St. Pius X Parish Life Center, 5 Barbara Street, South Yarmouth. All women, spiritual friends and companions are welcome to join Sister Hagen for a morning of prayer and reflection. For more information call Tricia Mullaney at 508-362-1583 or email Beth Davis at beth_gdb@comcast.net.

9/20

Our Lady of Purgatory Church, 11 Franklin Street, New Bedford, will host an annual Homecoming Maharajan and Heritage Festival September 20 beginning with a Maronite Catholic Mass at 11 a.m. at the Horseneck Holy Ghost Grounds, Dartmouth. For tickets or information, email mahrajan2009olop@yahoo.com or call 617-803-4087.

9/20

Father Joel Grissom, SM, will give a day of recollection at Cathedral Camp, 167 Middleboro Road, East Freetown, on September 20, sponsored by the Legion of Mary of the Fall River Diocese. The day retreat is open to men and women, members and non-members alike. For more information call 508-995-2354.

9/24

The District 1 Fall River Diocesan Council of Catholic Women will hold its first meeting of the 2009-2010 season September 24 at 7 p.m. at St. John the Baptist Parish Hall, 945 Main Road, Westport. Guest speaker will be Claire Sullivan, who will discuss “Serving Our Sisters and Brothers in Honduras.” For information, call 508-673-6145.

9/25

A weekend retreat will Father William Petrie, SSCC, will take place September 25-27 at Sacred Hearts Retreat Center, 226 Great Neck Road, Wareham. For directions and more information, call 508-563-3364.

9/26

“40 Days for Life” will hold an official kick-off on September 26 at 3 p.m. starting at Angel Park, across the street from 152 Emory Street, Attleboro, and will culminate at the National Shrine of Our Lady of La Salette. The event is open to the public. For information, visit www.40DaysforLife.com/Attleboro or email 40dflattleboro@comcast.net.

9/26

St. Julie Billiart Parish, 494 Slocum Road, North Dartmouth, will celebrate its 40th anniversary with a Septemberfest Fair September 26 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Rain date will be September 27. The event will include crafters, food, bake sale, country auction, farm stand, children’s games, face painting, parish yard sale, and more. Eucharistic Adoration in the Diocese

ACUSHNET — Eucharistic adoration takes place at St. Francis Xavier Parish on Mondays 9:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.; Fridays 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m.; and Saturdays 8 a.m. to 2:45 p.m. Mondays end with Evening Prayer and Benediction at 6:30 p.m.; Saturdays end with Benediction at 2:45 p.m. BREWSTER — Eucharistic adoration takes place in the La Salette Chapel in the lower level of Our Lady of the Cape Church, 468 Stony Brook Road, on First Fridays following the 11 a.m. Mass until 7:45 a.m. on the First Saturday of the month, concluding with Benediction and Mass. BUZZARDS BAY — Eucharistic adoration takes place at St. Margaret Church, 141 Main Street, every first Friday after the 8 a.m. Mass and ending the following day before the 8 a.m. Mass. EAST TAUNTON — Eucharistic adoration takes place First Fridays at Holy Family Church, 370 Middleboro Avenue, following the 8:30 a.m. Mass until Benediction at 8 p.m. FAIRHAVEN — St. Mary’s Church, Main St., has a First Friday Mass each month at 7 p.m., followed by a Holy Hour with eucharistic adoration. Refreshments follow. NEW BEDFORD — Eucharistic adoration takes place 7 to 9 p.m. Wednesdays at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, 233 County Street, with night prayer and Benediction at 8:45 p.m., and confessions offered during the evening. NEW BEDFORD — There is a daily holy hour from 5:15-6:15 p.m. Monday through Thursday at St. Anthony of Padua Church, 1359 Acushnet Avenue. It includes adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, Liturgy of the Hours, recitation of the rosary, and the opportunity for confession. SEEKONK ­— Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish has eucharistic adoration seven days a week, 24 hours a day in the chapel at 984 Taunton Avenue. For information call 508336-5549. OSTERVILLE — Eucharistic adoration takes place at Our Lady of the Assumption Church, 76 Wianno Avenue on First Fridays following the 8 a.m. Mass until Benediction at 5 p.m. The Divine Mercy Chaplet is prayed at 4:45 p.m.; on the third Friday of the month from 1 p.m. to Benediction at 5 p.m.; and for the Year For Priests, the second Thursday of the month from 1 p.m. to Benediction at 5 p.m. TAUNTON — Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament takes place every First Friday at Annunciation of the Lord Church, 31 First Street, immediately following the 8 a.m. Mass and continues throughout the day. Confessions are heard from 5:15 to 6:15 p.m., concluding with recitation of the rosary and Benediction at 6:30 p.m. TAUNTON — Eucharistic adoration takes place every Tuesday at St. Anthony Church, 126 School Street, following the 8 a.m. Mass with prayers including the Chaplet of Divine Mercy for vocations, concluding at 6 p.m. with Chaplet of St. Anthony and Benediction. Recitation of the rosary for peace is prayed Monday through Saturday at 7:30 a.m. prior to the 8 a.m. Mass. WEST HARWICH — Our Lady of Life Perpetual Adoration Chapel at Holy Trinity Parish, 246 Main Street, holds perpetual eucharistic adoration. For open hours, or to sign up call 508-430-4716. WOODS HOLE — Eucharistic adoration takes place at St. Joseph’s Church, 33 Millfield Street, year-round on weekdays 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. No adoration on Sundays, Wednesdays, and holidays. For information call 508-274-5435.

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The Anchor Bishop Stang commemorates 50th with Mass, rededication continued from page 16

“Those were the early days of two minutes between classes, silence in the halls, square corners, no traffic jams, and student councilors giving detentions,” Father Bouchard said. “It was the days of woolen ties pulled right up to the collars and woolen skirts below the knee. There were 40 desks in each classroom and they were all filled. Those were days of firsts — the first class, the first football championship, the first prom and the first graduation.” But what really separated Bish-

op Stang from other schools, according to Father Bouchard, was its commitment to providing a well-rounded, faith-based Catholic education. “From the very beginning, Bishop Stang High School has worked at fulfilling the first sentence of its current mission statement, that is: ‘To be a community rooted in and dedicated to spreading the message of Jesus Christ as handed down through the teachings of the Catholic Church and the charism of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur,’”

he said. “This is the foundation that we’re still building upon.” For President Dougall, the golden jubilee is an opportunity for the school to not only remember its past, but build on that solid foundation. “Over these 50 years, so many people have laid the foundation, brick by brick, on which this school’s mission and traditions have been built,” she said. “Our school today is strong because each and every person involved with Stang over the years has left a small piece of their heart here.”

OWOSSO, Mich. (CNA) — James Pouillon, 63, a Pro-Life activist known as the “Sign Man” was gunned down September 11, as he stood across the street from Owosso High School holding his Pro-Life sign. According to Owosso Police Chief Michael Compeau, Pouillon, was shot several times by a 33 year-old male driving by in a car. The shooting took place shortly after 7:30 a.m. and caused officials to place the high school in lock down. Owosso Police have taken the unidentified 33-year-old into custody and are saying he is also connected to the death of Mike Fuoss, 61, whose shooting was reported to police also on September 11, just after Pouillon’s slaying. Fuoss was found dead from multiple gunshot wounds just after 8 a.m. at his business Fuoss Gravel, but police officials are still unsure about when he was murdered. Neighbors in the mid-Michigan town of 16,000 told the news media that all three of the people knew

each other. One neighbor said that after the Pouillon’s shooting an oxygen tank and the sign that the wellknown activist typically carried could be seen laying on the ground. The sign had a photograph of an unborn child in the womb with the word “Life” across the bottom. Father Frank Pavone of Priests for Life issued a statement on the slaying, saying, “We do not know the motive yet. But this is a time to console one another, and to renew our determination to organize peaceful protests. It is no time for fear. And I am waiting to hear the abortion advocates condemn this killing.” The American Life League also expressed its condolences, and said it is “heartbroken over the loss of a true Pro-Life hero, gunned down on the day Americans across the

country mourn the violent deaths of 3,017 people.” Troy Newman, president of the Wichita, Kansas-based Operation Rescue, said that his organization is “stunned by Jim’s murder.” Pro-Life groups across the country have been receiving death threats by mail, over the phone and via email in the past several months. “We have received literally hundreds of death threats in the past three months. Our office has been vandalized three times. Just yesterday, the FBI was in our office and picked up a stack of threatening letters that we received,” Newman reported. “We denounce violence in the strongest terms. The bloodshed must stop both inside and outside of the abortion clinics.”

Pro-Life activist and business owner murdered in Michigan

In Your Prayers Please pray for these priests during the coming weeks Sept. 21 Rev. George Pager, Founder, Sacred Heart, New Bedford, 1882 Rev. George Jowdy, Pastor, Our Lady of Purgatory, New Bedford, 1938 Rev. William H. Crane, SM, Superior at the National Shrine of Our Lady of Victories, Boston, 1988 Sept. 23 Rev. Antoine Charest, SM, Former Assistant, St. Jean Baptiste, Fall River, 2001 Sept. 24 Rev. Joseph E.C. Bourque, Pastor, Blessed Sacrament, Fall River, 1955 Sept. 25 Rev. Robert J. Woodley, S.J. Missionary, Taunton, New Bedford, Fall River, 1857 Sept. 26 Rev. John J. Donahue, Assistant, St. William, Fall River, 1944 Rev. Flavius Gamache, SMM, Former Pastor, St. Peter, Dighton, 1996 Rev. John C. Martins, Former Pastor of St. Anthony of Padua, Fall River, 2008 Sept. 27 Rev. John W. Greene, S.J., Former Teacher at Bishop Connolly High School, Fall River, 1991

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The Anchor

September 18, 2009

At least the uniforms were retro

T

he Patriots season opener last Monday night was a “Legacy Game.” The National Football League is celebrating the 50th anniversary of the old American Football League, with which it merged in 1970. A half century ago there were eight original AFL teams: the Buffalo Bills, Boston Patriots, Denver Broncos, Dallas Texans (now the Kansas City Chiefs), the Titans of New York (N.Y. Jets), Oakland Raiders, San Diego Chargers, and the Houston Oilers (Tennessee Titans). Throughout the season, the Legacy Games will feature two of these teams, head-tohead, wearing throwback uniforms from the early ’60s. Monday’s game in Foxboro was one of those. The Pats wore red jerseys with the good old white helmet adorned with Pat Patriot on either side. The Bills’ helmet featured a Buffalo more reminiscent of a U.S. nickle than their current super sonic bison bolting across their head ware. It was nice to see those old uniforms. As I’ve mentioned in previous columns, I was one of the few kids in my neighborhood who actually gave a hoot about the AFL. I was a Boston Patriots fan, pure and simple. All others were followers of the N.Y. Football Giants. In our Saturday tackle football games in South Park in Fall River (now Kennedy Park), I was the only young gridder with a white Pat Patriot helmet — and darned proud of it. Even though the Boston Patriots were horrible back then, they were my team. The first time I ever set foot in Fenway Park was in November 1967 to see the Boston Patriots get bopped by the Kansas City Chiefs 33-10. It was quite a thrill anyway. As far as the NFL went, I was a Green Bay Packers fan. I guess even as a lad I just couldn’t root for any team coming from the Big Apple. I would look forward to watching the AFL games on Sunday afternoons more than the prestigious NFL game of the week. And when the Patriots By Dave Jolivet were on, which were only the road games since they couldn’t have sold out a phone booth, I was in my glory — win or lose, or lose, or lose. But I digress. Back to Monday’s throwback night. The only things retro about it were the uniforms and the helmets. Even the officials were clad in throwbacks, and there were a couple of officials I wanted to “throw back” for some new ones after horrible calls against Vince Wilfork and Adalius Thomas. Everything else was new millennium state of the art: — the game took place before nearly 70,000 crazies at the ultra-modern Gillette Stadium, part of the mammoth Patriots Place — a city within a city. This is light years from where the Pats called home during their 50-year existence: Nickerson Field, the former Boston Braves Field; Harvard Stadium; Fenway Park; Alumni Stadium on the Boston College campus; and Foxboro/Schaefer/Sullivan Stadium; — the cost of one ticket for Monday’s New England Patriots game could probably have bought a fan season tickets for the Boston Patriots; — the game was a prime time, nationally televised event watched by millions on ESPN, a network dedicated totally to sports; — I watched the contest at my neighbor’s house, on his 42-inch wide-screen plasma TV with surround sound; — And I expected the Patriots to win, and win big. As a lad, a Bills-Patriots game would have been played before a paid crowd of 15,000, each paying $7 to get in. It would have appeared during supper time on NBC when most of the country would have been watching Mark Lindsay on the “Paul Revere and the Raiders Show.” The TV would have been a 20-inch black and white Zenith. And I would have expected the Pats to lose, and lose big. Maybe next for the next Legacy Game, I should try to get more in the spirit of things. I’ll put on a pair of striped bell bottom jeans, wear a Nehru jacket, watch on a 19-inch set and adjust the colors to black and white. It will be just like the old days. It’ll be fun. Nah. I like comfort foods and nostalgia, but there’s something to be said for wide screen TVs that are so clear it hurts your eyes. It’s also nice to realistically expect the Pats to win each week. Throwback uniforms and helmets are good enough. Although throwback prices for game tickets would be nice.

My View From the Stands

READY TO LEAD — The Diocesan Council of Catholic Women recently held a ceremony at Holy Trinity Church in Fall River, to install officers for the 2009-2010 season. From left: Susan Santos, recording secretary; Rita Paskavitch, treasurer; Pauline Vezina, president; Gina Desmarais, president-elect; and Vera Araujo, corresponding secretary. The oath of officers was administered by District 1 moderation, Father Horace J. Travassos.