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News Briefs
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NEWS BRIEFS Oct-9-2006
By Catholic News Service
U.S.
Archbishop says cost cutting, strategic planning aim of USCCB changes
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The purpose in restructuring the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and downsizing its staff is not just to cut costs but to help it plan better and work better, said Archbishop Michael J. Sheehan of Santa Fe, N.M. As USCCB secretary, Archbishop Sheehan heads the bishops' Committee on Priorities and Plans, which is overseeing the reorganization. The committee's proposals are to be debated and voted on when the bishops meet in Baltimore in mid-November. The goal of the reorganization is "not just the cost-saving thing, but to implement strategic planning. It's about strategic planning," the archbishop said in a telephone interview with Catholic News Service a month before the meeting. He said the recommendations of the USCCB Task Force on Activities and Resources, overwhelmingly approved by the bishops in 2004, set the framework for the reorganization. At the core of those recommendations, he said, was "reorganizing the conference in such a way that the focus is on priorities -- what are the top priorities that the bishops want to work on -- and to set the priorities for five years at a time."
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U.S. bishop supports trade preference bill favoring Haiti
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The head of the U.S. bishops' Committee on International Policy said the House of Representatives should pass a preferential trade bill to help stimulate economic growth in Haiti. Economic stability in Haiti is vital for political stability, said Bishop Thomas G. Wenski of Orlando, Fla., in a letter to House members. The bill would help Haiti's struggling textile industry by opening up U.S. markets and it would encourage foreign investment in Haiti, he said in a letter sent before the House recessed Sept. 29 for midterm elections. The measure is expected to be taken up again after the House reconvenes Nov. 13. Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and one of the poorest in the world. Its history also has been marked by political violence, dictatorial rule and coups against elected governments. Bishop Wenski's letter and a separate letter to Rep. William Thomas, R-Calif., thanking him for introducing the trade preferential legislation, were released at the end of September in Washington by the U.S. bishops' Department of Communications.
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Faith formation crucial in this secular age, bishop says in pastoral
ORANGE, Calif. (CNS) -- With a pastoral letter issued in four languages and a short, professionally produced film released on DVD, Bishop Tod D. Brown of Orange has kicked off a new effort to help Catholics make an ongoing commitment to their faith formation. "The increasing secularity of our times can become a slippery slope that weakens our commitment to Christ," the bishop said in his 11-page letter titled "Learning, Living and Loving Our Faith." The letter -- in English, Spanish, Vietnamese and Korean -- was published Sept. 17 to mark National Catechetical Sunday. An approximately 30-minute film on the opportunities for education and service available in the Orange Diocese, produced and directed by filmmaker Miles England, accompanied the letter and was played in many parishes during the launch weekend. It was only the third pastoral letter issued in the 30-year history of the Orange Diocese.
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Catholics urged to lead way in defeating stem-cell, cloning proposal
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (CNS) -- Catholics have a moral obligation to treat the least among them the way they would treat Christ himself, Missouri's Catholic bishops said in a pastoral letter calling for defeat of a proposed state constitutional amendment on embryonic stem-cell research and cloning. The amendment, slated for the Nov. 7 ballot, would take away state and local governments' authority to regulate and ban human cloning and embryonic stem-cell research. Such research always results in the killing of innocent human life. "The stage of human life at which the killing takes place makes no difference," the bishops said in the letter, released Sept. 30 during the Missouri Catholic Conference's annual assembly at the Capitol in Jefferson City. "No matter how big or small we are, we all begin our unique journey of life as a human embryo," they said. "Killing is killing, no matter how young or old the victim. And no human life, at any stage of its development, may ever be taken for the sake of someone else's gain."
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Archbishop criticizes Pakistan's religious 'intolerance and violence'
DENVER (CNS) -- Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf calls on others not to discriminate against Muslims, but he discriminates against non-Muslims in his own country, said Archbishop Charles J. Chaput of Denver. The archbishop, a member of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, co-wrote an opinion piece in The Denver Post with the commission's vice chairwoman, Elizabeth H. Prodromou, after Musharraf delivered a speech at the United Nations calling for "enlightened moderation" to bridge a growing divide between Islamic and Western governments. In the Sept. 19 speech Musharraf said that to build such bridges "it is imperative to end racial and religious discrimination against Muslims and to prohibit the defamation of Islam." The president's "action plan suggests it is Western countries that must change their behavior toward Muslims, and not the other way around," Archbishop Chaput and Prodromou wrote in the Sept. 28 issue of the Post. "Musharraf fails to address the urgent need to bring 'enlightened moderation' to his own country, where intolerance and violence is aimed at both Muslims and non-Muslims," they said.
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Web site provides teachers with questions, answers on church history
MOBILE, Ala. (CNS) -- Religious education teachers drilling their students on church history now have the resources of a veteran teacher to use in their classes. Sacred Heart Brother Malcolm Melcher taught high school religion for 40 years before he retired, and for 30 of those years saved material he composed for use in drills, quizzes, tests and other exams. He has made many of his old tests and answers available to religion teachers on a Web site. Now he has added to the collection more than 1,600 questions and answers on church history. The church history information is available at www.boshf.org/churchhistorybank. The other area he maintains on the Web, www.boshf.org/moraltheologybank, contains more than 600 questions in a multiple-choice and free-response format. To obtain password access, religion teachers must send a letter of application to Brother Melcher at: 2609 Springhill Ave., Mobile, AL 36607. Letters must be written on official school letterhead and include the applicant's current teaching assignment, signature and e-mail address.
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WORLD
Pope tells Canadian bishops sinfulness can lead to culture of blame
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- When individuals lose sight of their own sinfulness, it is impossible to promote real reconciliation and establish true justice in society, Pope Benedict XVI told bishops from Western Canada. In fact, he said, when people cannot see their own need for forgiveness, they cannot forgive others, so they create a culture where people turn immediately to a court to assign blame. The fact that people sin against God and against each other "is part of the truth about the human person," the pope said in an Oct. 9 speech to bishops from British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. The church leaders were in Rome for their "ad limina" visits, which bishops make to the Vatican every five years to report on the status of their dioceses. Pope Benedict said he was pleased by the bishops' reports on efforts to promote the sacrament of reconciliation within their dioceses. "While this sacrament is often considered with indifference, what it effects is precisely the fullness of healing for which we long," the pope said.
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Pope adds explanatory note to controversial remarks on Islam
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI has added an explanatory note to his controversial remarks on Islam, saying the text provoked misinterpretation and "understandable indignation" among Muslims. The explanation appeared Oct. 9 in a footnote in the Vatican's online version of the speech on faith and reason given by the pope in Regensburg, Germany, in mid-September. In his speech, the pope spoke briefly about religion and violence, quoting the 14th-century Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Paleologus, who said: "Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." In the new footnote, the pope re-emphasized a point he has made several times since delivering the speech -- that he did not share the emperor's views on Islam.
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Prominent Northern Ireland politician meets with Irish archbishop
BELFAST, Northern Ireland (CNS) -- Two days before Northern Ireland's political leaders were to meet to discuss restoration of a power-sharing government, a prominent Protestant politician met with Archbishop Sean Brady of Armagh, Northern Ireland. Archbishop Brady and the Rev. Ian Paisley, founder and leader of the Democratic Unionist Party and the Free Presbyterian Church, discussed areas of social concern. Several other members of Parliament from Rev. Paisley's party and several other Catholic leaders joined the meeting at the Stormont government buildings in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Oct. 9. British and Irish commentators saw the move as significant partly because it signaled that Rev. Paisley is willing to work with Catholics. The Northern Ireland peace process has been in a stalemate because the Democratic Unionist Party refuses to join in a power-sharing executive with Sinn Fein, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army, a paramilitary group now observing a cease-fire.
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Pope offers thanks for witness given by committed Catholic couples
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI offered thanks to God for the witness given by Catholic couples whose commitment to each other in marriage remains strong in both joy and sorrow. "God himself is the author of matrimony," the pope said Oct. 8, commenting on the day's Mass readings, which recounted the creation of man and woman and Jesus' statement that "what God has joined together, no human being must separate." Speaking to pilgrims gathered in St. Peter's Square for the midday recitation of the Angelus, the pope said the readings caused him to offer special prayers for Christian spouses. "With them, I thank the Lord for the gift of the sacrament of matrimony, and I exhort them to remain faithful to their vocation in every season of life, 'in joy and in sorrow, in sickness and in health,' as they promised during the sacramental rite," he said. The pope prayed that Catholic couples, strengthened by the grace of the sacrament, would "build a family open to life and able to face together the many and complex challenges of our age."
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PEOPLE
Cardinal injured, priest killed in weekend car accident in Italy
BALTIMORE (CNS) -- Cardinal William H. Keeler of Baltimore suffered a broken ankle and a retired priest of the Diocese of Harrisburg, Pa., was killed in an Oct. 7 automobile accident in Italy. Another Harrisburg diocesan priest, Msgr. Thomas H. Smith, who was driving the vehicle through the city of Terni, broke several ribs. Information about the accident was not released until Oct. 9 so that relatives of the deceased priest, Father Bernard Quinn, 78, could be notified. Cardinal Keeler and Msgr. Smith, pastor of St. Joseph Parish in Lancaster, Pa., were hospitalized in Italy. According to an Associated Press report, Father Quinn was in the back seat of the vehicle and Cardinal Keeler in the front passenger seat when a car struck the passenger side. Baltimore archdiocesan communications director Sean Caine said the three priests were friends and vacationed together often.
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American brother elected to general council of Capuchin Franciscans
DENVER (CNS) -- Brother Mark Schenk has become the first lay friar in the history of the Capuchin Franciscans to serve on the order's general council. The Kansas-born Brother Mark had been provincial vicar of the Denver-based Capuchin province of Mid-America since 2000. His parents, Bernard and Mary Jo Schenk, live in Great Bend, Kan. As one of eight general councilors or definitors of the religious community known formally as the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, Brother Mark will live at the order's general headquarters in Rome and be involved in all the major decision-making of the order. He also will serve as a traveling liaison between the order's general minister and various provinces and other divisions of the order. Brother Mark previously served in Rome as undersecretary-general of the order, 1988-94; secretary-general pro tem, 1994-95; and information systems manager, 1997-2000. There are 11,000 Capuchins serving in more than 100 countries. About two-thirds of the members are priests and the rest are brothers, also called lay friars.
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Pope Benedict views movie about Pope John Paul I
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- After getting a sneak preview of an Italian television movie about Pope John Paul I, Pope Benedict XVI described his predecessor as "a master of truth and an impassioned catechist." Pope John Paul I was elected Aug. 26, 1978, and died Sept. 28, 1978. RAI, the Italian state television network, has prepared a movie about his life and brief pontificate. While already airing advertisements, RAI has not announced when it will broadcast the movie. The producers and actors screened the film Oct. 8 for Pope Benedict and other Vatican officials in the small movie theater of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. Pope Benedict said the film echoed what many Catholic faithful remember about Pope John Paul: his simplicity, his joy and commitment to evangelization and his emphasis on "the beauty of Christian love, the only force able to defeat violence and build a more fraternal humanity."
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Priest, 105, credits God for his positive outlook
COLLEGEVILLE, Minn. (CNS) -- With a twinkle in his eyes, a spring in his gestures and a cheerful, calming smile, Benedictine Father Angelo Zankl shines with his sunny perspective on life. "It is a great, great thing!" said the monk of St. John's Abbey in Collegeville about his long life in an interview with the St. Cloud Visitor, newspaper of the Diocese of St. Cloud. He turned 105 in April, so his perspective comes with much experience. In his lifetime there have been many changes. For example, he was 20 months old when Wilbur and Orville Wright made their historic Kitty Hawk, N.C., airplane flight. And through life's changes, he has kept going with great energy. He celebrated the 80th jubilee of his ordination as a priest in June. One object of his enthusiasm is God, whom Father Zankl credits as the one who provides a positive outlook on life.
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Priest band goes rock-rock-rocking on heaven's door
MISSION, Kan. (CNS) -- If that pulsing beat and those screaming guitars are driving you crazy at night, think twice before calling the cops on those rock-star wannabes jammin' out down the street. You might just find your pastor singing lead. That's right. Four priests of the Archdiocese of Kansas City -- three of them pastors -- and a layman studying for the permanent diaconate have been putting in the after-hours lately, rehearsing for their next gig. In fact, the three pastors -- Fathers Ken Kelly, Mark Mertes and John Reynolds -- are celebrating the 15th anniversary of their combination oldies-rock group called the Priest Band. The group's first gig was at a parish appreciation dinner and ice cream social at St. Joseph Parish in Olpe, said Father Mertes, pastor of Holy Cross Parish in Overland Park. Now joined by the associate pastor of Cure of Ars Parish in Leawood, Father Kent O'Connor, and a diaconate candidate, Carl Parry, the Priest Band is rehearsing for several scheduled appearances in the upcoming months.
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Copyright (c) 2006 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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