Nov. 11, 2022

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At a glance

things you need to know this week

HONOR AND PRAY FOR VETERANS

A meaningful way to honor our nation’s veterans this Nov. 11 is to attend a tribute Mass. Many parishes hold a special Veterans Day Mass where you can pray for all veterans and those dearest to you. Check your parish website for details. Not able to attend? Pray at home with this special prayer and video from the USCCB: www.usccb.org/resources/prayer-veterans-day

PUBLISHER

EXPERIENCE HEALING THIS ADVENT

How will you prepare spiritually for the birth of Christ? In a new release from Ave Maria Press, “Behold: A Guided Advent Journal for Prayer and Meditation,” Sister Miriam James Heidland of the Society of Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity guides readers toward healing familial wounds through meditations about the members of the Holy Family. Each of the four weeks of Advent has a different focus: motherhood, fatherhood, childhood, and stable (manger). For more information and to order: www.avemariapress.com/behold

VISIT A BASILICA

November features feast days that honor three famous basilicas in Rome: St. John Lateran (Nov. 9) and the Basilicas of St. Peter and St. Paul Outside the Walls (Nov. 18). Did you know we have two basilicas in the Diocese of Charlotte? Explore their architectural beauty and learn more about their historical significance to Catholicism in western North Carolina. The Basilica of Mary, Help of Christians – better known as Belmont Abbey Basilica – is in Belmont, a few miles west of Charlotte. St. Lawrence Basilica is located at 97 Haywood St. in downtown Asheville.

CELEBRATE THE PRESENTATION OF MARY IN THE TEMPLE

FEED THE POOR IN HONOR OF ST. ELIZABETH OF HUNGARY

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Tradition holds that the Blessed Virgin Mary was consecrated to be raised and educated in the Temple due to a promise St. Anne made to God while she went through a long period of infertility. Though not biblically based, it is found in an apocryphal text and in private revelation. The Church celebrates this feast Nov. 21. Ways to celebrate include presenting Mary with flowers, praying the rosary devoutly and attending Mass. Learn more about the feast: www.catholicnewsherald. com/faith.

Diocesan calendar of events

ENTERTAINMENT

FILM SCREENING OF ‘A PLACE AT THE TABLE – AFRICAN-AMERICANS ON THE ROAD TO SAINTHOOD’ 2 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 19, MACS Fine Arts Center, 7702 Pineville-Matthews Road, Charlotte. Come for an afternoon of fun, music and refreshments. Six incredible Black men and women are on the path to canonization. Hosted by Our Lady of Consolation Church for the entire Diocese of Charlotte as it celebrates its 50th anniversary. For details, email OLCcharlotte@rcdoc.org. More information on page 15A.

LECTURES

DEMENTIA EDUCATIONAL SERIES 10-11 a.m. Monday, Nov. 14, 21 and 28, virtually and in-person at St. Matthew Church, 8015 Ballantyne Commons Pkwy., Charlotte. Series will cover general information about Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia, plus information on caregiving and effective communication strategies. To register to attend at St. Matthew, visit tinyurl. com/HLBB1114. For virtual registration, visit www.us02web.zoom.us/webinar/

register/WN_skIaEsFQTR6hEeNGwFiXIQ. For more information, contact Sandra Breakfield at 704-370-3220 or sandrab@ ccdoc.org.

PRAYER SERVICES

IGBO-LANGUAGE MASS : Noon Sunday, Nov. 20, at St. Mary’s Church, 812 Duke St., Greensboro

SAFE ENVIRONMENT TRAINING

PROTECTING CHILDREN: Protecting God’s Children (Protegiendo a los Niños de Dios) workshops educate parish volunteers to recognize and prevent child sexual abuse. For details, contact your parish office. To register for online training, go to www.virtus.org. Upcoming workshops:

CHARLOTTE: 6 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 15, St. Thomas Aquinas Church, 1400 Suther Road

FRANKLIN: 9 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 12, St. Francis of Assisi Church, 299 Maple St. (Sección en español)

Consider donating to a Catholic organization that provides food for the hungry in honor of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, patroness of Catholic charities and the Secular Franciscan Order. As the daughter of the king of Hungary, St. Elizabeth could have led a life of ease, but she chose to live simply and brought bread daily to hundreds of the poorest in the land. She suffered many sorrows, dying at 23 on Nov. 17, 1231. Because of her popularity among commoners throughout Europe, she was canonized just four years later. Learn more: www.catholicnewsherald.com/faith

SUPPORT GROUPS

EVENING FOR THE SEPARATED & DIVORCED 7 p.m. Nov. 17, in the New Life Center, St. Matthew Church, 8015 Ballantyne Commons Pkwy., Charlotte. The Office of Family Life of the Diocese of Charlotte and St. Matthew Church in Charlotte invites all separated and divorced to come for an evening of support and healing. This event has proven to be powerful for participants to experience deeper healing. Divorce Healing Coach Carolyn Klika will offer support, a deeper sense of belonging, and fellowship with others who have walked the path of separation and divorce. For registration, go to www. aboundingjoyministry.com/events.

RACHEL’S VINEYARD: Are you or a loved one seeking healing from the effects of a past abortion? Rachel’s Vineyard weekend retreats are offered by Catholic Charities for men and women in the diocese. For details, contact Jessica Grabowski at 910-5852460 or jrgrabowski@rcdoc.org, or Lorena Haynes at 828-585-0483.

Upcoming events for Bishop Peter J. Jugis:

NOV. 13-17

USCCB Fall General Assembly Baltimore, Md.

NOV. 21 – 6 P.M. Sacrament of Confirmation St. Eugene Church, Asheville NOV. 22 – 10 A.M. SEPI Board Meeting

— Annie Ferguson

St. Martin de Porres:

First black saint of South and Central America

On Nov. 3 the Church celebrated the feast day of St. Martin de Porres, a Peruvian Dominican brother whose life of charity and devotion led to his canonization as the first black saint of the Americas.

Martin de Porres was born in Lima, Peru, in 1579, the son of the Spanish nobleman Don Juan de Porres and the former Panamanian slave Ana Velazquez. His father at first refused to acknowledge the boy publicly as his own because Martin, like his mother, was black. Though Martin’s father later helped to provide for his education, his son faced difficulties because of his family background.

But Don Juan’s son showed great gifts at a young age. Martin served as apprentice to a doctor, and before the age of 13 he had begun to learn the practice of medicine. The young man also spent hours in prayer and practiced forms of physical mortification for the good of his soul and others.

During these years Martin had also become a member of the Dominican Third Order, which promoted the group’s spiritual practices among laypersons. He lived in their quarters and did manual work to earn room and board. But a law preventing people of mixed race from joining religious orders kept him from entering the Dominican order as a religious brother until 1603.

Before his full admission to the order, Martin had earned the nickname of “the saint of the broom” for his diligence in cleaning the Dominicans’ quarters. After becoming a religious brother, he worked in the order’s infirmary serving the sick, a job he performed until his death.

He also had the task of begging for alms that the community would use to feed and clothe the poor. Meanwhile, he established

Daily Scripture readings

NOV. 13-19

Sunday: Malachi 3:19-20a, 2 Thessalonians 3:7-12, Luke 21:5-19; Monday: Revelation 1:1-4, 2:1-5, Luke 18:35-43; Tuesday (St. Albert the Great): Revelation 3:1-6, 14-22, Luke 19:110; Wednesday (St. Margaret of Scotland, St. Gertrude): Revelation 4:1-11, Luke 19:1128; Thursday (St. Elizabeth of Hungary): Revelation 5:1-10, Luke 19:41-44; Friday (The Dedication of the Basilicas of Sts. Peter and Paul, St. Rose Philippine Duchesne): Revelation 10:8-11, Luke 19:45-48; Saturday: Revelation 11:4-12, Luke 20:27-40

an orphanage, as well as an orchard from which those in need could freely take a day’s supply of fruit.

Victims of medical misfortune began to suspect miracles behind some of the deeply prayerful physician’s cures. Others claimed he had appeared to them supernaturally behind locked doors or under otherwise impossible circumstances. Martin reportedly also had the gift of bilocation, and some of his contemporaries said they encountered him in places as far off as Japan even as he remained in Lima.

Others, meanwhile, marveled at his serenity and generosity.

“Many were the offices to which the servant of God, Brother Martin de Porres, attended,” testified Brother Fernando de Aragones. “Each of these jobs was enough for any one man, but alone he filled them all with great liberality, promptness and carefulness, without being weighed down by any of them.”

“It was most striking, and it made me realize that, in that he clung to God in his soul, all these things were effects of divine grace.”

Martin also loved

animals. The saint refused to eat meat, and he ran a veterinary hospital for the sick creatures that seemed to seek out his help and protection. Portrayals of the saint often include cats, dogs and even the rats to whom he showed compassion.

Many residents of Lima already spoke of Brother Martin de Porres as a living saint before his death at age 60 on Nov. 3, 1639. But his canonization did not occur until 1962, under Pope (later St.) John XXIII. He is known as a patron of interracial harmony and care for the poor.

Pope Francis

Peace requires ‘gentle power of dialogue’

For there to be peace, people need to expand their horizons, engage in dialogue and work with each other in a way that sets aside selfishness and ambition, Pope Francis said.

Reflecting on his recent visit to Bahrain during his weekly general audience Nov. 9, the pope said, “I sensed this need in Bahrain and I hoped that religious and civil leaders throughout the world might be able to look beyond their own borders, their own communities, to care for the whole.

This is the only way to confront certain universal issues, such as that God is being forgotten, the tragedy of hunger, the care of creation, peace,” he said.

The world needs to reject confrontation and walk the path of encounter, he said, especially when it comes to “the insanity of war of which battered Ukraine is a victim, and of many other conflicts that will never be resolved through the infantile logic of artillery, but only with the gentle power of dialogue.”

Pope Francis told people at the audience why he decided to visit a Muslim-majority nation when there are so many countries in the world with a predominately Christian population. The answer, he said, can be summed up in three words: dialogue, encounter and journey. The opportunity for “the longdesired journey” Nov. 3-6 came thanks to an invitation by Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, who was sponsoring a forum on dialogue between the East and the West, in order to “discover the richness that other peoples, traditions and beliefs possess,” the pope said.

“The cause of peace necessitates this, and dialogue is ‘the oxygen of peace,’” he added. This approach is greatly needed in today’s world, he said, and the Bahrain forum “encouraged the choice of the path of encounter and the rejection of confrontation.” The trip to Bahrain also focused on the need for encounter, he said, because without offering the other a heartfelt welcome, “dialogue remains empty” and “remains on the level of an idea rather than reality.”

NOV. 20-26

Sunday (Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe): 2 Samuel 5:1-3, Colossians 1:12-20, Luke 23:35-43; Monday (The Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary): Revelation 14:1-3, 4b-5, Luke 21:1-4; Tuesday (St. Cecilia): Revelation 14:14-19, Luke 21:5-11; Wednesday (St. Clement I, St. Columban, BI. Miguel Agustin Pro): Revelation 15:1-4, Luke 21:12-19; Thursday (St. Andrew DungLac and Companions, Thanksgiving Day): Revelation 18:1-2, 21-23, 19:1-3, 9a, Luke 21:2028; Friday (St. Catherine of Alexandria): Revelation 20:1-4, 11-21:2, Luke 21:29-33; Saturday: Revelation 22:1-7, Luke 21:34-36

NOV. 27-DEC. 3

Sunday (First Sunday of Advent): Isaiah 2:1-5, Romans 13:11-14, Matthew 24:37-44; Monday: Isaiah 4:2-6, Matthew 8:5-11; Tuesday: Isaiah 11:1-10, Luke 10:21-24; Wednesday (St. Andrew): Romans 10:9-18, Matthew 4:18-22; Thursday: Isaiah 26:1-6, Matthew 7:21, 24-27; Friday: Isaiah 29:1724, Matthew 9:27-31; Saturday (St. Francis Xavier): Isaiah 30:19-21, 23-26, Matthew 9:35-10:1, 5a, 6-8

Interreligious dialogue does not “water down” the faith, he added, because the only way to have real and fruitful dialogue is when each person remains firmly rooted to and true to his or her own identity.

“Thinking about the people of Bahrain’s journey, their daily experience of dialogue, let us all feel called to expand our horizons” with hearts that are open, not hardened and closed tight, “because we are all brothers and sisters,” Pope Francis said.

“If you dedicate yourself to getting to know others, you will never be threatened, but if you are afraid of others, you make the threat,” he said.

— Catholic News Agency

Our diocese

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In Brief

Belmont Abbey College launches new suite of master’s programs

BELMONT — Belmont Abbey College has added three master’s degrees to its academic offerings: Master of Business Administration (MBA), Master of Leadership (MA in Leadership), and Master of Strategic Analysis. These new graduate degrees, in addition to the existing Master of Health Administration (MHA) and Master of Science in Nursing (MSN), are part of the college’s objective to prepare students to create a better world for themselves and their communities and equip them to lead without compromising their values, the college noted in a recent release. The new graduate degrees are designed to be completed within one year.

“As a Catholic academic institution, we believe in providing quality education with a moral foundation that will help solve societal problems. We are thrilled to offer degrees that are dedicated to producing the kinds of organizational leaders the world needs,” said the school’s provost, Dr. Travis Feezell.

In its release, the college noted the crossdisciplinary online MBA program aims to equip students in key business areas such as managerial finance, strategic marketing management, and corporate governance and law. The MA in Leadership program at Belmont Abbey prepares students to lead organizations ethically and effectively while demonstrating the concept of servant leadership. Guided by Benedictine values, this program encourages and inspires leaders and other business stakeholders to see challenges and opportunities, to judge them according to the ethical social principles illuminated for Christians by the Gospel, and to act as leaders who serve God in all things.

The MS in Strategic Analysis degree supports its students’ work within organizations in their journey to search for and live in response to truth – specifically, understanding and engineering the evaluation, management and improvement of decisions and outcomes.

For more information, go to www.bac.edu/ academics/majors-degrees.

— Spencer K.M. Brown

St. Vincent de Paul Society holds Shoes for Children drive

SWANNANOA — St. Margaret Mary Parish’s St. Vincent de Paul Society – which is dedicated to feeding, clothing, housing and healing people and families – recently partnered with GB Shoes of Asheville and schools in the community to provide $60 gift cards and 20% off coupons to benefit 50 local children in need of shoes. Two of the schools expressed a need for snacks and for emergency clothing for children who have accidents. The parish’s aid agency was able to give both schools $300 gift cards. Last year some of the children and their families did not have transportation to GB Shoes in Asheville, so this year school counselors also arranged a time to take the kids shopping for new shoes.

— Terry F. Foley

Demonstrating God’s love for 75 years

Pennybyrn retirement community celebrates diamond anniversary

ANNIE FERGUSON arferguson@charlottediocese.org

HIGH POINT — Born from a spirit of gratitude, Pennybyrn retirement community celebrated its 75th anniversary Nov. 7 with Mass followed by a brunch. Presided over by Monsignor Patrick Winslow, vicar general and chancellor of the Diocese of Charlotte, the Mass was attended by concelebrating clergy, residents, consecrated religious and a small choir.

Grateful to U.S. soldiers who protected the United Kingdom during World War II, the sisters of the Poor Servants of the Mother of God were inspired to serve in the United States. They arrived in High Point from London on Nov. 15, 1947, to build a hospital. Providence led them to start a convalescent center instead, and

that ministry has grown exponentially over the years.

“It’s an incredible privilege to be here at this time and to think that this place has continued for all these decades,” said Sister Lucy Hennessy, mission leader and chair of the board of directors at Pennybyrn. “The sisters who came here prior to me put down very deep roots, faith, and hope.”

RECOGNIZING A LASTING LEGACY

In his homily, Monsignor Winslow commented on the beautiful weather for the day’s celebration. “Yet it seems as though Sister Lucy could make the sun shine even if the rest of High Point is under a cloud,” he said, endearing himself to the congregation who clearly had a deep love for Sister Lucy and the other Servants of the Mother of God:

Pennybyrn’s 75-year legacy of care

Seventy-five years ago, five sisters of the Poor Servants of the Mother of God were sent by their London congregation to High Point at the request of North Carolina Bishop Vincent Waters. Inspired to open a hospital in the U.S. because of the kindness shown to them by American soldiers in Europe during World War II, the sisters left everything that was familiar to them to serve God in North Carolina. They arrived Nov. 15, 1947.

Before leaving, the pioneers – Sisters Mary Patrice, Anne Christina, Maria Benignus, Ellen Fitzgerald and Mary Monica – learned they would have nowhere to live

due to a limit on funds permitted to leave their home country after the war.

Knowing the Lord would provide, they embarked on the journey anyway. The pastor of the newly established Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish in High Point helped secure a home for the sisters: Penny House, originally built by State Sen. George Penny in 1927, on Greensboro Road in High Point. Later, Penny gifted the house to the sisters, and it has served as their convent ever since.

Realizing the home was larger than what they needed to live, the sisters converted the first floor of the building into a

Sisters Mona Comaskey, Gabriella Hogan and Loretta O’Connor, who each provide pastoral care to the residents.

On a more serious note, Monsignor Winslow turned to the topic of combating evil, which he said begins in the heart, not somewhere out in the world.

“An antidote maybe not necessarily seen as fighting evil but truly, truly is – is the love and the faith and the conviction of these religious women who have come to serve the people here. Because they are reaching out, as they reach these ages, they understand where it all starts and where it all ends,” he said.

The sisters’ work has grown into a 71-acre Life Plan Community with 450 residents and 460 staff members. In July,

convalescent center with 22 beds and they lived in a guest house. The center became known as Maryfield after it was licensed as a nursing home in the 1950s. It moved to a separate building behind the house in 1965. The sisters remained in Penny House and still live there today.

The Poor Servants of the Mother of God continue in the tradition of their foundress, Mother Magdalen, caring for their residents with the guidance of a board of directors and ambassador council comprised of people from the community. Their mission: to share God’s love by nursing the sick and comforting the dying.

PAUL CAMPBELL | CATHOLIC NEWS HERALD

The sisters of the Poor Servants of the Mother of God were joined by the Sisters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul, visiting clergy and the president/CEO of Pennybyrn Rich Newman for a brunch after a Mass celebrating the 75th anniversary of the founding of Pennybyrn Nov. 7. From left are Sister Christie Kunnel, Father Jim Solari, Sister Lucy Hennessy, Father Philip Kollithanath, Monsignor Patrick Winslow, Sister Mona Comaskey, Rich Newman, Sister Loretta O’Connor, Sister Gabriella Hogan and Sister Agnes Maria.

Make ‘All Things New’ part of your Advent

ANNIE FERGUSON arferguson@charlottediocese.org

CHARLOTTE — Two priests who are also brothers have combined their preaching talents to write a series of books reflecting on the Scriptures, starting with the readings we will hear at Mass during Advent. The first book in the series, “All Things New: Volume 1, Advent,” was just released in time for Advent. The series was penned by Father Michael Mitchell and Father Jason Mitchell. Father Michael serves as parochial vicar at St. Gabriel Church in Charlotte, and his brother serves in the Diocese of Erie, Pa.

The brothers – who grew up the first and second of 10 children – were ordained together in 2011. Soon the idea was hatched for a series of books reflecting on the Scriptures, using their different approaches and style of homilies.

Recalls Father Michael, “Father Jason and I were in the habit of often discussing together our Sunday homilies. We would help each other with ideas and get ready for the coming Sunday.”

Over time, the brothers noticed that they approached the Scriptures differently, based on the four primary ways of interpreting Scripture (what’s known as “hermeneutics”). Father Jason’s homilies focus on looking at the Scriptures literally and allegorically, whereas Father Michael’s homilies focus on interpreting the Scriptures from the moral and anagogical (mystical or spiritual) viewpoints. The complementarity of their approaches inspired the brothers to collaborate.

Designed to enrich readers spiritually for years to come, “All Things New” will cover the entire three-year cycle of readings used at Masses. Each book gives the reader the daily Mass readings and four 5-minute reflections for the various seasons in the liturgical year: Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter and Ordinary Time.

“This is a great daily prayer support for anyone who likes to do a morning meditation on Scripture,” said Father Michael. “It was awesome to write together.”

“The series will run until we complete the lectionary,” he noted. “At our current rate, we should be done in about five years with the project. Volume II on the Christmas season is set to publish next summer.”

The brothers said they hope the first book is a great aid to all, including pastors during the busy Advent season.

“It does a good job of helping the reader to get a glimpse of the depth and mystery of the Holy Bible,” Father Michael said. “Father Jason and I both feel that preaching during the Catholic Mass should be a sacred moment to reveal the Scriptures to the faithful. A homily should start from the Bible text and not so much from the personal anecdotes of the clergyman. The Biblical story can then be used to enlighten our life today and to hear what God is saying to us that very Sunday.”

He added, “We hope this will be a refreshing take on Scripture that will allow a person to understand the Advent season, especially how the prophets of the Old Testament prophesied about the coming of the Messiah.”

Order your copy today

“All Things New: Volume 1 Advent,” published by Spirit of Wisdom Press, is available at Catholic book shops and Amazon.com. For more information, go to www.spiritofwisdompress.com

Bishop Jugis greets Catholic Heritage Society members

CHARLOTTE — Bishop Peter Jugis celebrated Mass and joined members of the Catholic Heritage Society for dinner at St. Vincent de Paul Church Oct. 30. The Catholic Heritage Society is the Diocese of Charlotte’s way of recognizing parishioners who have alerted the diocese of their intent to leave a bequest to their parish, school, agency, the diocese or the diocesan foundation.

Membership also includes those who have established an endowment with the foundation. The society now has over 1,500 members. For more information about the Catholic Heritage Society, bequests or endowments, contact Gina Rhodes in the diocese’s Development Office at gmrhodes@ rcdoc.org or 704-370-3364.

Pray for our future priests with Mary’s Sons kneelers

CHARLOTTE — People are invited to pray for three men expected to be ordained priests for the Diocese of Charlotte next June using special kneelers now making their way to parishes across western North Carolina over the next eight months. The special kneelers, or prie-dieus, are commissioned each year for the ordinands by the Mary’s Sons apostolate. Journals also accompany the kneelers so people can convey their well-wishes to the future priests. The kneelers, pictured here at St. Bernadette Church in Linville, will be given to the new priests – Deacons Christopher Brock, Chinonso Nnebe-Agumadu and Peter Rusciolelli – at their June 17, 2023, ordination at St. Mark Church in Huntersville.

Parishes hosting the kneelers include:

n Nov. 7-14: St. Frances of Rome Church in Sparta n Nov. 18-21: St. John Baptiste de LaSalle Church in North Wilkesboro n Nov. 21-28: St. Aloysius Church in Hickory n Nov. 28-Dec. 5: St. Joseph Church in Newton n Dec. 12-19: St. Francis of Assisi Church in Lenoir n Dec. 19-26: Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Monroe

Dates and times for additional parish visits will be published in upcoming print editions of the Catholic News Herald and online at www.catholicnewsherald.com. Learn more about Mary’s Sons at www.maryssons.org

PROVIDED BY ROBYN MAGYAR

— SueAnn Howell

Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre welcomes new members

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Ten people from the Diocese of Charlotte recently became members of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, during a special investiture Mass Oct. 29 at St. Matthew Cathedral. The newly invested knights and dames are: Jane Brock, Katie Matlak, Peggy Metty, Beau Braden, Brooks Braden, Chris Frank, Bruce and Marilyn Mlakar, and Bryan and Joann Somerville. Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori served as the investing officer and Mass celebrant. The Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem was founded by the pope during the Crusades when the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem – built upon the site of Christ’s crucifixion, death and resurrection – came under attack. Today,

members of the order still defend and support the Catholic presence in the Holy Land through their financial contributions. There are approximately 30,000 members in 40 nations. Members are required to travel regularly on pilgrimage to the Holy Land. The global amount of aid they send to support the work of the Latin Patriarchate and the other Catholic institutions in the Holy Land exceeds $10 million annually. Knights and ladies wear capes featuring a thick red Jerusalem cross that has four miniature crosses in each corner of the main cross. The five crosses represent the five wounds of Christ. Learn more about the order’s work at www.holysepulchre.net — SueAnn Howell

PHOTO

PHOTO PROVIDED

PHOTO PROVIDED

Father Michael Mitchell

Father Jason Mitchell

Conference renews catechists’ commitment

HICKORY — A record number of more than 600 catechists from various parishes across the Diocese of Charlotte participated in the annual Diocesan Catechetical Conference held Nov. 5 at the Hickory Metro Convention Center. It was the first diocese-wide conference for faith formation teachers since 2019, as the 2020 and 2021 conferences were canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The event was an opportunity for faith formation teachers to gather for professional development, prayer, updates on faith formation programming and fellowship with one another. The day-long program – themed “Faith is more precious than gold” to coincide with the diocese’s 50th anniversary – began with Mass offered by Bishop Peter Jugis, who commended the teachers for their commitment to teaching children to “choose Jesus.” Keynote speakers included Father Julio Domínguez, vicar of Hispanic Ministry, and Dr. John Bergsma of Franciscan University. The conference, organized by the diocesan Education Vicariate, also had educational talks in English and Spanish.

Your DSA contributions at work

Professional development opportunities for parish catechists is funded in part by the annual Diocesan Support Appeal. Learn more about the DSA and how to donate online at www.charlottediocese.org/dsa

Father Richard Kramer, a visiting priest, blesses worshipers of the new St. Edmund Campion Anglican Catholic community with holy water during Mass Oct. 23. The new community in Hendersonville is part of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter, created by the Vatican to welcome Anglicans into the Catholic Church yet keep alive their unique prayers, music and other traditions.

PHOTO BY LEXI HARRIS

New Anglican Catholic community finds welcome in Hendersonville

SUEANN HOWELL sahowell@charlottediocese.org

HENDERSONVILLE — For former Anglicans seeking to practice the Catholic faith in the rite they love, the St. Edmund Campion Church community is a godsend. This new community celebrates the sacraments in the “Ordinariate Form,” an Anglican style liturgy, once a month in the chapel at Immaculate Conception Church. Led by Deacon Joshua Johnson, a convert studying for the priesthood, the community of 60 members is the latest example of how Catholic bishops and dioceses around the world are welcoming rites of many traditions.

The St. Edmund Campion community is comprised of Catholics who maintain their distinct Anglican tradition within the Roman Catholic Church and is part of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter. Based in Houston, Texas, the ordinariate is a type of diocese spanning the United States and Canada – one of only three ordinariates in the world, besides Our Lady of Walsingham in the United Kingdom and Our Lady of the Southern Cross in Australia.

missal uses language derived from the classic books of the Anglican liturgical tradition that is fully Catholic in content and expression.

Deacon Joshua Johnson was raised Baptist but discovered the Methodist and Anglican traditions in his young adulthood. It was during his time of studying in seminary at Duke School of Divinity for the United Methodist Church that he felt the pull toward Catholicism.

“In seminary I began to have a deeper encounter with the Catholic Church, reading the Church Fathers and about the Church councils,” Deacon Johnson recalled. “I had an experience very similar to (Cardinal) John Henry Newman. And when I became a United Methodist minister, I became very conflicted.”

Deacon Johnson was ordained a deacon Oct. 19 and is expected to be ordained a priest for the ordinariate next June.

African American Affairs Ministry:

Celebrating Black Catholics

Our goal is to showcase the work, contributions, traditions and culture of Black Catholics to the Church and to society, and to propose diocesan responses to racism and other social injustices. Our mission is to:

• Raise the consciousness of all Catholics about African history, culture, tradition, spirituality and contributions to the Church

• Evangelize through training, outreach, resourcing, consciousness raising and networking

• Communicate and implement National Black Catholic Pastoral Plans and other programs and initiatives from the National Black Catholic Congress

• Be agents for social justice Ministry programs include:

• Open Wide Our Hearts

• Responding to the Sin of Racism

• Responding with Social Justice

• Building Intercultural Competence for Ministers

• Black Catholic Spirituality -A Historical Perspective with Dr. C. Vanessa White

Our programs are open to everyone. Interested? Contact Rosheene Adams, diocesan coordinator, at rladams@rcdoc.org.

The ordinariates were created by the Vatican to welcome Catholic converts from the Anglican Church.

Father Christian Cook, pastor of Immaculate Conception Parish, said he felt called to welcome Anglican converts shortly after arriving at the parish in 2019 because, “As Pope Benedict wrote in ‘Anglicanorum Coetibus,’ (the apostolic constitution released in 2009 that paved the way for Anglicans to join the Catholic Church), the Holy Spirit is the principle of unity. Unity is both an invisible spiritual communion but is also visible to society and the spiritual community.”

Father Cook says it was also important to him to support the small community of believers in bringing stability. “And I had a desire to show visible unity among Catholics as the Catholic Church has seven different rites – Latin, Byzantine, Maronite and the like – and Catholics in the United States are not largely exposed to this fact,” he said.

The ordinariate form is a blend of traditional Anglican and Latin Rite prayers that comprise the liturgy. Ordinariate communities celebrate Mass using “Divine Worship: The Missal,” a book of liturgical texts created by the Vatican in 2015. This

Some years ago, he felt called to start a community near his home in the mountains of western North Carolina to evangelize others. “This shows the deep desire of the Church to welcome back our separated brethren. Pope Benedict established these ordinariates in a response to those who desired to come into the Catholic Church. It’s the first time the Catholic Church has welcomed and incorporated traditions from one of the Protestant communities. It is an acknowledgement that the Holy Spirit was active in our lives before we became Catholic, and impelled us to the fullness of truth in Christ’s holy Catholic Church.”

He loves the Anglican liturgical traditions, noting, “It’s such a great gift to pray the prayers that have brought Anglicans comfort over hundreds of years, and to know that our prayers are in harmony with the Catholic Church.”

St. Edmond Campion Church celebrates Mass once a month in the chapel at Immaculate Conception Church. The next Mass is scheduled for 4 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 19, the Vigil of Christ the King.

— Catholic News Agency contributed.

Learn more

Learn more about the new St. Edmund Campion Community at www. saintedmundcampion.com. Questions? Email Deacon Joshua Johnson at dcn.joshua. johnson@ordinariate.net.

PHOTOS BY SERGIO LOPEZ | CATHOLIC NEWS HERALD

St. Charles Borromeo and Carlo Gesualdo: Murder, music and sorrow

CHRISTINA L. REITZ, PH.D. Special to the Catholic News Herald

In November, the Church celebrates the feast day of St. Charles Borromeo, whose contributions to the Council of Trent are noteworthy. The saint also had an interesting family tree: His uncle was Pope Pius IV and his nephew was Carlo Gesualdo, a composer who became infamous as a murderer.

and Gesualdo was not charged.

His second marriage was only marginally more successful. He was physically abusive and unfaithful with a mistress who was accused and convicted of witchcraft. His second wife was terribly unhappy and went to great lengths to avoid living with him. Highly unstable, Gesualdo was a masochist who hired men to stay in his vicinity and ferociously beat him several times a day. What is most interesting is his relationship to his uncle, the future St. Charles Borromeo, who was canonized in 1610. The composer died shortly afterwards in 1613, and his final wishes included a church to be built in his late uncle’s honor. Additionally, the composer commissioned a painting in 1609: “Il Perdono” (“The Pardon”), for its Santa Maria delle Grazie chapel. At the top of the painting is Christ, and counterclockwise to Him is Our Blessed Mother and St. Francis, to whom Gesualdo had a strong devotion. In the bottom left of the painting, Gesualdo kneels penitentially next to Borromeo, who is presenting him to Christ.

The fame of Gesualdo’s music lies primarily in his secular madrigals, which are extremely dissonant – so much so that nearly 200 years after they were composed, the famous English historian Charles Burney found them impossible to understand. Gesualdo also published three volumes of sacred music, all after 1600, in a style that is less dissonant than his secular music. A fine example is “O vos Omnes,” with a text from Lamentations 1:12, that Gesualdo wrote 10 years before his death in 1613. There are five voice parts – soprano, alto, tenor, quintus (or tenor II) and bass – with a scoring that focuses on the lower ranges to provide a darker sound. Also standard is the text painting with harsh intervals on “dolor” (sorrow).

ntroducing the Lillian Congdon Transitional Rehab CenterI

COMING SOON!

Gesualdo, prince of Venosa, had incredible religious figures on both sides of his family. Besides his great-uncle the pope and St. Charles Borromeo, for whom he was named, he had a paternal uncle who served as dean of the College of Cardinals and later as archbishop of Naples.

Despite these holy family relations, Gesualdo led a troubled, inglorious life. He married his cousin at a young age and, when he discovered she was being unfaithful, he surprised his wife and her lover in an amorous moment. He killed them both on the spot. A widely publicized investigation of the sordid incident determined that the killing was justified,

Although it is only speculative, some scholars have viewed such works as “O vos Omnes” as evidence of Gesualdo’s remorse. The translation “O all ye that pass by the way, attend and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow” certainly gives one pause.

One may think it would be easy to become a saint if two of your uncles were archbishops and your great-uncle was a pope, yet Gesualdo shows us that holiness is not genetic.

Online

At www.catholicnewsherald.com : Listen to “O vos Omnes” by Carlo Gesualdo, the nephew of St. Charles Borromeo.

The Lillian Congdon Transitional Rehab Center is Pennybyrn’s new, soon-to-be-completed, stateof-the-art facility serving all Piedmont Triad residents and surrounding areas. It will offer outpatient rehabilitation services in addition to our existing inpatient offerings. At Pennybyrn, we take a multidisciplinary approach to healing and recovery by incorporating a personalized plan that includes physical, occupational and speech therapy. Therapy services are available seven days a week, and progress is monitored daily.

The Lillian Congdon Transitional Rehab Center will have 24 private, one-bedroom suites. Each will have a bathroom with a walk-in shower. The brand-new facility will feature fine dining, a stateof-the-art gym, Kore Balance for assessments, Never2Late for cognitive training and standing tolerance, outdoor therapeutic space, POCket Pro for exercises at home and more.

“Il Perdono” (“The Pardon”) by Giovanni Balducci, circa 1609

Marian Pilgrimage

A specially commissioned statue of Mary, Mother of God is visiting more than 100 locations across the Diocese of Charlotte during the anniversary year. Upcoming visits include:

IMMACULATE CONCEPTION CATHOLIC CHURCH

Nov. 10-13 1024 W. Main St., Forest City, N.C. 28043

ST. CHARLES BORROMEO CATHOLIC CHURCH

Nov. 13-16 728 W. Union St., Morganton, N.C. 28655

ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI CATHOLIC CHURCH Nov. 16-20 328-B Woodsway Lane N.W., Lenoir, N.C. 28645

ST. BENEDICT THE MOOR CATHOLIC CHURCH & GOOD SHEPHERD CATHOLIC MISSION

Nov. 20-23 1625 E. 12th St., Winston-Salem, N.C. 27101 105 Good Shepherd Dr., King, N.C. 27021

ST. ALOYSIUS CATHOLIC CHURCH Nov. 30-Dec. 4 921 2nd St. N.E., Hickory, N.C. 28601

CHRIST THE KING CATHOLIC CHURCH DEC. 4-7 1505 E. MLK Jr. Dr., High Point, N.C. 27260

For more information about these pilgrimage stops, go to the Diocese of Charlotte’s 50th anniversary website, www.faithmorepreciousthangold.com

A Year of Jubilation

Sisters of Mercy celebrate decades of charity

ANNIE FERGUSON arferguson@charlottediocese.org

BELMONT — The familiar tones of a five-part “Regina Caeli” filled Queen of the Apostles Church over the summer as the congregation celebrated the jubilees of nine Sisters of Mercy. Affectionately called “The Big Regina,” the musical antiphon has been a part of every significant occasion and feast day of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Belmont-based religious community.

Hearing the “Regina” again was bittersweet for some, including Sister Martha Hoyle.

“When people started going out into the community more, singing it became less frequent, and then there are those who have gone to the Lord,” she said. “It’s going to become a part of our history, not our present. For me it was such a gift to hear it, and we all remembered our parts. People were really getting down with it!”

The jubilee Mass and reception were held on June 18 to honor the sisters’ lengths of service, ranging from 25 to 70 years. Sister Martha, a 50-year jubilarian, says that 2022 has been an entire year of celebration, noting a beautiful reception at St. Francis of Assisi, her parish in

Mocksville, and the many friends and family members who have honored her years of service to the Lord.

“You feel very humbled by it because what did you as a person do to earn something so special? It’s another gift from God to make you feel loved and worthy of this,” she said. “I’ve been so blessed as a Sister of Mercy. Everything I’ve done, whether I wanted to do it or not, turned out to be such a gift. The time has gone so fast. It seems that all of a sudden I’m finding out I’ve been here 50 years. I’m like, ‘Wait a minute. I’m too young to be this old. What happened?’ I hope that I have given back as much as I have been given.”

Noting that she and Sister Jill Weber professed their vows on the same day 50 years ago, she expressed her admiration for all her fellow jubilarians. “I feel very humbled,” Sister Martha said. “There is so much faith and talent in this group of celebrants.”

SHARING A JUBILEE WITH THE DIOCESE

The Sisters of Mercy have left an indelible mark on the Diocese of Charlotte, caring for the sick and those who have disabilities, educating future nurses, leading parochial schools and contributing countless other corporal and spiritual works of mercy.

Celebrating their 50th jubilees the same year as the diocese’s 50th anniversary is something truly special for Sister Martha, Sister Jill and Sister Soledad Aguilo. Sister Martha remembers fondly Bishop Michael Begley, the first bishop of the diocese.

“The early days were really exciting,” she said. “Bishop Begley was such a part of our community. He brought this wonderful personality, and he was a very human person.”

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PHOTOS PROVIDED BY SISTER PATRICIA PEPITONE, SISTER MARTHA HOYLE AND ARCHIVES OF THE SISTERS OF MERCY OF THE AMERICAS

JUBILATION

FROM PAGE 8A

To illustrate the bishop’s affability, Sister Martha shared this anecdote: “The funniest thing that ever happened to me was when I was running late one day. Bishop Begley was there for a celebration at the motherhouse, and as I was barreling down the steps and came out, he was coming up the hall and –bam! And I thought, ‘I’m done, I’m out, it’s over.’ And he said, ‘I’m sorry I was in your way.’ He laughed, and I was like, ‘Oh.’ And he instantaneously became my favorite person.”

Reflecting back, she added, “Everything was new. He was the right person for that particular time because he was a shepherd. He looked beyond the trappings of the office and reached out to people. He laid a good foundation.”

LIVING OUT HER VOCATION

Besides serving the people of her parish, Sister Martha volunteers as a nurse at A Storehouse for Jesus, a Christian ministry in Mocksville offering goods and services to the poor. In the past, she has cared for AIDS patients and continues to care for anyone in need.

Growing up in nearby Cooleemee, Sister Martha and her family were members of the Methodist Church. She felt called to convert to the Catholic faith in the late 1960s when she was a student at Mercy School of Nursing.

“Nursing was my gift. If you take that – whatever your gift is – and use it with your gift of vocation, then it only deepens and enriches the experience and helps you keep from becoming self-important,” she says. “You’re not doing this for you; you’re doing this for God in the tradition of someone like Catherine McAuley, our foundress, or the sisters who built Mercy Hospital.”

Sister Martha also shared her advice to young women discerning a religious vocation.

“You listen, and then your heart tells you which is right,” she advised. “After all the places I visited, coming home to Belmont was right. Good, bad or indifferent – it was right.”

She added, “It’s like any relationship. It’s going to have its ups and downs, but you have to work on a vocation just like you would on any relationship. Don’t throw it away at the first bad time. Keep the prayer lines open, find someone who can guide you and direct you that you trust spiritually, and just listen. Be open to new things and still be surprised when they happen. It’s part of the fun!”

Prayer for the 50th anniversary

The 50th anniversary year will bear great spiritual fruit if we ask God for the graces we hope to receive. Please offer the 50th anniversary prayer daily for many graces to be poured on our diocese during this jubilee anniversary:

Heavenly Father, accept our humble prayer of praise and gratitude as we joyfully celebrate 50 years as the Diocese of Charlotte. Throughout our history the faithful of western North Carolina, under the watchful care of esteemed bishops and abbots, have been nurtured by Your providential hand. Confident that You invite Your children to implore Your constant blessings, we pray that You continue to pour forth Your heavenly grace upon us. With filial affection and devotion, we further ask that You look kindly upon the prayers we seek through the intercession of our venerable patroness, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, who with motherly attention tends to the needs and concerns of the Church. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, forever and ever. Amen.

Prayers & Devotions

The 50th anniversary theme, “Faith More Precious Than Gold” (1 Peter 1:7), encourages use of the Church’s tried-and-true prayers, devotions and sacramentals, which for centuries have brought people closer to God. Let us confidently ask for the graces we hope to receive from God as we celebrate the founding of the Diocese of Charlotte. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us!

November prayer intention

For the faithful departed. May the Lord give eternal rest for all the faithful departed of the Diocese of Charlotte who lived and served faithfully united to the Church of God. Saint

of the Month St.

Feast day: Nov. 24

Agnes Le Thi Thanh

(Clockwise, from top) Several Sisters of Mercy celebrated milestone anniversaries in 2022. Pictured are (seated) Sisters Jacqueline Laster, Monica Perez and Mary Andrew Ray; (standing) Sisters Jill Katherine Weber, Martha Elizabeth Hoyle, Doris San Agustin, Francis Jerome, Mary Louise and Soledad Aguilo. Sisters Martha Hoyle, Jill Weber Soledad Aguilo pause during celebrations of their 50th jubilees earlier this year. Sisters Maria Goretti Weldon, Jill Weber, Martha Hoyle and Donna Marie Vaillancourt are pictured on the day of Sister Martha and Sister Jill’s temporary profession of vows in Sharbel Hall at Sacred Heart Convent in Belmont.

Living stones

The legacy of Black Catholics in America

Important dates in black Catholic American history

1565-1899

Blacks, both slave and free, help to found St. Augustine, Fla., the oldest town in the U.S. In 1693 Spain offers freedom in Florida to slaves who convert to Catholicism.

Until 1763, these freed slaves live in a community northeast of St. Augustine. Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose, or Fort Mose, established in 1738, is the first free black town in the U.S.

1781

Gov. Don Felipe de Neve recruits 11 families to settle on the Porciuncula River – now Los Angeles. The settlers are all Catholic, a mix of Africans, Spanish and American Indians. Meanwhile, Maryland’s black Catholic population grows to 3,000 as a result of Jesuit evangelization in the region.

1829

Women from Baltimore’s Haitian refugee colony begin to educate local children in their homes and in 1829 found the Oblate Sisters of Providence. The first superior is Elizabeth Lange, born in Cuba of Haitian parents. A later archbishop dismisses the need for an order of black religious, but the sisters find advocates among the Redemptorists and in St. John Neumann, then archbishop of Philadelphia.

1839

Bishop S.C., slave apostolic imported Though in “question me.”

The history of African American Catholicism began with the arrival of Spanish settlers in the 16th century in Florida. In fact, on the first page of the 16th-century baptismal registers are the names of Black infants who were baptized into the Body of Christ along with white infants in St. Augustine Church. Although the history of American Catholics is intertwined with the history of people of color, from the colonial period until today, African American Catholics have been too often the forgotten factor in the history of the Church in America.

A WITNESS TO THE SPIRIT

One evening in Paris in 1954, a renowned African American jazz pianist walked off the stage during a performance, cutting short her tour. Mary Lou Williams had reached a high point in her career as musician, composer and jazz pianist before she returned to New York and went into seclusion. In a nearby Catholic church she found shelter, and she found God. In 1956, Mary Lou Williams entered the Catholic Church.

She had been born Mary Elfrieda Scruggs in Atlanta in 1910. Growing up in Pittsburgh, she was recognized as a child prodigy with remarkable musical gifts.

Encouraged by the priest who received her into the Church, Williams began composing religious music in a jazz idiom: three Masses and a cantata in honor of St. Martin de Porres. She began to work for the needy and to teach young students.

She was artist-in-residence at Duke University in North Carolina when she died in 1981. At the time of her death, she left a legacy of art and beauty. Even more, she left the example of how the artist’s performance can be channeled into prayer and how music might become the witness of the spiritual.

At some point, everyone must call a halt and evaluate the meaning of one’s life. The wisdom of Mary Lou Williams was to step back, to listen and to evaluate. This is the turning point in one’s life journey. This is when all of us can look back and see God’s intervention in ourselves, in our community, and in our world.

LAYING THE FOUNDATION

About 40 miles southwest of Charleston, S.C., stands a small church built in honor of St. James the Greater. This church is a witness to the faith of Black Catholics who persevered in their Catholic faith without priest or Church for almost 40 years.

Before the Civil War, this small community known as Thomson’s Crossroad and later as Catholic Crossroad was the site of several plantations. The plantation owners and many of their slaves converted to Catholicism in the 1830s, and a church was erected and dedicated to St. James the Greater by Bishop John England of Charleston in 1833.

The church burned down in 1856, and the plantation owners moved away after the Civil War. But the Black Catholics remained and so did their faith, thanks to the fidelity and zeal of a former slave, Vincent de Paul Davis, who owned a general store where he taught children their prayers and acted as godfather to the many infants who were carried to Catholic churches, often at a distance, to be baptized. The old baptismal register now located at St. Anthony Church in Walterboro, S.C., reveals several pages of names of people who were baptized with Vincent de Paul Davis as their sponsor.

Around 1892 the community of some 60 Black Catholics was “discovered” by a Pallotine priest from Charleston, Father Daniel Berberich, who celebrated Mass with them twice a month. By 1894 a new church was built. Three years later a parochial school was added, with a local teacher, and by 1901 there were two lay teachers. The present church was constructed in 1935.

Catholic Hill, its unofficial name, is a reminder to us all that a church is built of living stones. In this instance, they were those whose faith had been able to withstand time and neglect. The history of Black Catholics is an ongoing saga of how Black laypeople built our Church and made firm its foundation even when others had forgotten them. Today St. James the Greater is

On the road to sainthood?

Diocese invited to film, concert and talk exploring African Americans up for canonization

SUEANN HOWELL sahowell@charlottediocese.org

CHARLOTTE — The Catholic Church has no African American saints, but that could soon change – and Our Lady of Consolation Parish is inviting the community to a special event to learn about six Black Catholics under consideration for canonization.

Set for Saturday, Nov. 19, the event will kick off in the afternoon with a musical collaboration between the parish men’s choir and the student choir from Charlotte Catholic High School, followed by the main event: screening of the critically acclaimed documentary “A Place at the Table – African Americans on the Path to Sainthood.”

The film, crowdfunded in 2021, highlights the exceptional lives of six deceased African American Catholics who are at various stages of review for possible canonization.

Our Lady of Consolation, a historically Black parish in Charlotte, is sponsoring the event as a tribute to the Diocese of Charlotte’s 50th anniversary this year and to raise awareness of African Americans’ contributions to the Church during Black Catholic History Month in November.

The event will begin at 2 p.m. at the MACS Fine Arts Center on the campus of Charlotte Catholic High School, the new venue for use by Catholic schools and organizations across the diocese.

“We’d like the event to be a ‘wow moment’ for people who may not be aware of the full, rich spectrum of Catholicism and the pivotal role that African Americans play in the Church – and what better time to do this than during the diocese’s 50th anniversary?” said Dr. Evelyn Anderson, a physician and parishioner of Our Lady of Consolation Church who co-chaired the event planning committee.

Get your tickets

Tickets are $5 and may be purchased online at www.ourladyofconsolation. org. A limited number of tickets will be available at the door. The event runs from 2-5:30 p.m., Saturday, Nov. 19, at the MACS Fine Arts Center at Charlotte Catholic High School, 7702 Pineville-Matthews Road, Charlotte, N.C. 28226. Film starts at 3 p.m.

“It’s going to be a whole afternoon that will be fun and informative and will invite people out to learn and be a part of something new,” she said.

In the African tradition, African drummers will welcome participants into the space, and special seating is reserved for “honored elders.” A taped interview with Redemptorist Father Maurice Nutt, a priest of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, will also be on tap. Nutt penned a book about Sister Thea Bowman, who is among those under consideration for sainthood. Sister Thea once visited Winston-Salem as part of a local Catholic awareness program organized by the Winston-Salem Vicariate. At the April 30, 1989, program at the Benton Convention Center, she discussed the role of African Americans in the Church. (Read more about the six Black Catholics up for sainthood on page 16A.)

“Our hope is to use this afternoon as a way to educate not just our parishioners but the whole diocese and the community,” Anderson said. “We want to give people something to think about … for consideration and discussion in their own homes.”

1842

Bishop John England of Charleston, S.C., defends the American domestic slave trade, arguing that Pope Gregory’s apostolic letter refers only to slaves imported by the Spanish and Portuguese. Though claiming he is not personally favor of slavery, he says it was a “question for the legislature and not for me.”

Founded by Henriette Delille and Juliette Gaudin in New Orleans, the Sisters of the Holy Family become the second religious order for black women. Biracial and of African descent, the founders are free people of color. The order ministers to poor blacks, educating and tending the sick. During an outbreak of yellow fever, the nuns heroically nurse the sick and are thus granted public recognition. But they are not allowed to wear their habit in public until 1872.

Arriving in New York from Haiti in 1787 with his owner, Jean Bérard, Pierre Toussaint is apprenticed to a New York hairdresser. He becomes a friend to the city’s aristocracy by dressing the hair of wealthy women. When Bérard dies penniless, Toussaint financially

supports Bérard’s wife, nursing her through emotional and physical ailments. She grants him his freedom in 1807. His stable income allows him to buy freedom for his sister and his future wife, and to be generous with many individuals and charities, including an orphanage and school for black children. He cares for the ill when yellow fever sweeps the city and opens his home to homeless youth, teaching them violin and paying for their schooling.

FROM

still a mission and still a spiritual home for the local Black community.

Catholics, both white and Black, are accustomed to thinking of African American Catholics as recent converts. In fact, any ministry in the African American community will reveal many Blacks whose Catholicism goes back to the dark days of slavery. Many have left the Church because of neglect or outright hostility. Others felt that they were unwelcome and undernourished. Today, being Black and Catholic means shining the beacon of hope in the darkness of discouragement, the searchlight of faith in the darkness of misunderstanding. Daniel Rudd, the Black Catholic leader of the 19th century, described the Black Catholic community’s task “to be a leaven for the race.”

GOD’S MAN OF HOPE

There is no other way to describe Augustus Tolton than as a man of hope. He had learned to hope in the face of incredible odds. Born a slave in Missouri in 1854, the second of three children of Martha Chisley Tolton and Peter Paul Tolton, both slaves and both Catholics, he

escaped from slavery with his mother, sister and brother during the Civil War. His father had run away to join the Union Army in St. Louis, where he soon died.

Martha Tolton crossed the Mississippi River with her three children in a rowboat to Illinois, where she joined many other Blacks who had fled slavery to a free state. Growing up in poverty, Augustus soon developed a desire to become a priest.

With the support of two priests in Quincy, Ill., one of whom was a Franciscan, he looked for a seminary where he could study, but no American seminary was willing to accept an African American as a student.

Hoping against hope, with the help of the minister general of the Franciscans, Augustus Tolton found a place at Urban College in Rome, the seminary attached to the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, where students from Africa were already enrolled. When the time came for Tolton to be ordained, the cardinal prefect of the

congregation announced that if Americans had never seen a Black priest it was time for them to see one.

After his ordination in 1886, Father Tolton was sent home to Quincy, where he had a triumphal return. Later, however, he suffered petty persecution by a fellow priest in a nearby parish. In 1889 Father Tolton moved to Chicago, and with the support of the archbishop, began a Black parish with the name of St. Monica.

That same year St. Katharine Drexel began the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, whose vocation was to evangelize Blacks and Native Americans. Drexel used the enormous fortune left to her by her father for her work. In 1890 Father Tolton wrote to her asking for financial help in the construction of his parish in Chicago. His letters reveal the great simplicity of this very holy man and the sense that he had of the burden God had given him in the service of African Americans. In an 1891 letter to Drexel, he wrote: “I for one cannot tell how to conduct myself when I see one person at last showing their love for the colored race. One thing I do know and that is it took the Catholic Church 100 years here in America to show up such a person as yourself. ... In the whole history of the Church in America, we can’t find one person that has sworn to lay out their treasury for the sole benefit of the colored and Indians. As I stand alone as the first Negro priest of America, so you Mother Catherine stand alone as the first one to make such a sacrifice for the cause of a downtrodden race. Hence the South is looking on with an

Important dates in black Catholic American history, continued

1875

Although James Healy and his nine siblings – all fathered by a Georgia plantation owner – are officially slaves, their father brings them north for education and freedom.

Three of the Healy brothers – James, Patrick, and Alexander – become the first African American priests in the U.S., although they do not identify with being black and never speak out on behalf of blacks. Bishop John Fitzpatrick of Boston, a friend of their father, encourages the boys to attend Holy Cross College in Worcester, Mass. James studies for the priesthood in Paris and is ordained bishop of Portland, Maine, in 1875. His brother, Patrick Francis Healy, a Jesuit who conceals his African origins for much of his career, becomes president of Georgetown University in 1874 (ironic because Georgetown admitted no black students until the mid-1900s). James would not ally himself with black Catholic leaders nor agree to address meetings of black Catholics, once citing St. Paul’s admonition that there shall be no Greek nor Jew in Christ.

1889In January 1889 almost 100 black Catholic men meet with President Grover Cleveland on the last day of the first black Catholic lay congress in U.S. history. Daniel Rudd, a journalist from Ohio and founder of the American Catholic Tribune, becomes a leader of black laity. Fiercely proud of the Catholic Church, Rudd claims the Church is the one place of hope for black people.

Rudd recruits delegates to the first Black Catholic Congress, hoping to “let them exchange views on questions affecting their race; then uniting on a course of action, behind which would

stand the majestic Church of Christ.” The delegates’ statement calls for Catholic schools for black children, endorses temperance, appeals to labor unions to admit blacks, advocates better housing, and praises religious orders for aiding blacks. Rudd also helps organize the first lay Catholic congress of the entire U.S. in 1889, where he insists that blacks be treated as part of the whole, not as a special category. At the fourth Black Catholic Congress in 1893, Charles Butler decries prejudice and discrimination within the Catholic Church, asking, “How long, O Lord, are we to endure this hardship in the house of our friends?” The congress calls attention to the Church’s failure in its mission “to raise up the downtrodden and to rebuke the proud.”

1909

The fraternity of the Knights of Peter Claver is established by the work of Josephite priests as a parallel to the Knights of Columbus. It soon develops chapters for women and young people.

1916

Led by Thomas Wyatt Turner, the Committee for the Advancement of Colored Catholics forms during World War I to care for black Catholic servicemen, neglected by both the Knights of Columbus and the black YMCA. After the war, the group broadens its focus. Its advocacy gives birth to a new national forum for black Catholics. Its purpose: “Collection of data concerning colored Catholics, the protection of their interests, the promotion of their welfare, and the propagation of the faith among colored people.”

The U.S. bishops, despite requests from Rome to act on behalf of blacks during the race riots and lynchings of 1919, avoid the topic at their first annual meeting. In response, the committee publicly urges the bishops to denounce discrimination and consult with black Catholics, saying, “at present we are neither a part of the colored world (Protestant), nor are we generally treated as full-fledged Catholics.”

angry eye, the North in many places is criticizing every act. Just as it is watching every move I make. I suppose that is the reason why we had no Negro priest before this day, they watch us just the same as the Pharisees did our Lord.”

He went on to express his great hope for the future: “I really feel that there will be a stir all over the United States when I begin my church. I shall work and pull at it as long as God gives me life, for I see that I have principalities to resist anywhere and everywhere I go.”

Father Tolton did not know that the Healy brothers, former slaves from Georgia, were the first Black priests in America. Still Father Tolton, whom everyone knew to be Black, did leave a model of holiness and service that would inspire the many African American priests who would follow him. He died suddenly in 1897. His life was a witness to one man’s untiring hope; we are a witness to his undying faith.

The story of the first Black priests in the United States is in many instances a tragic one. Still, it is also a story of courage and perseverance. In fact, this alternating experience of tragedy and courage, discouragement and achievement is the story of everyone who takes up the cross daily to follow Christ. Evangelization in our Church today for African Americans means recalling the story of the Black saints in our country who blazed a trail before us.

LEAVEN IN THE WORLD

In 1964, a small African American woman named Lena Edwards, already a living legend, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Lyndon B. Johnson. She was an indefatigable worker in the cause of health and healing, especially for the poor and the forgotten.

Born in 1900 into a Black, Catholic, middle-class family in Washington, D.C., she was still in high school when she developed a desire to become a physician. She attended Howard University in Washington, D.C., a traditionally Black university, where her father was a professor in the dental school. In 1924 she graduated from the medical school at Howard and began her medical practice in Jersey City, N.J., with her husband, also a physician.

Dr. Lena Edwards became a specialist in obstetrics and gynecology, serving on the staff of the Margaret Hague Maternity Hospital for almost 30 years before accepting a teaching position back in Washington, D.C., at Howard University Medical School.

Edwards was as fervent a Catholic as she was a physician. She raised six children, one of whom is an Atonement Friar, almost single-handedly. A Franciscan tertiary, she attended Mass daily and personally lived a life of voluntary poverty. Besides her participation in civic affairs, she worked for interracial justice as a member of the Catholic Interracial Council. She served just as faithfully in community affairs related to the welfare of the poor and to minorities. In her teaching she stressed the need for physicians to be as concerned about the social conditions of their patients as with their medical needs.

At 60, Edwards gave up her teaching and went to Texas to practice medicine among migrant workers. Using her own funds and money from other sources, she began a maternity hospital, trained a staff, and started a credit union.

Eventually forced to give up her work among the migrant laborers because of ill health, she returned to New Jersey where she continued her community work, her talks and conferences, as well as her financial support of many college students, including the establishment of a scholarship for women medical students at Howard University.

Edwards died in 1986 at the age of 86, leaving the memory of a courageous lay woman who lived out her mission to “exercise (Christ’s) apostolate in the world as a kind of leaven,” as stated in the Vatican II document on the laity.

WALKING WITH CHRIST

Walking with Christ on the streets of Washington in December of 1978, one of Washington’s true men of God died. Llewellyn Scott was born in Washington, D.C. in 1892. As a boy he had been stricken with rickets, a bone disease caused by a deficiency in Vitamin D. It crippled him so badly that he could not walk.

Thanks to the interest of the wife of the Army surgeon general, the young boy was given medical treatment. Scott was finally able to walk for the first time at the age of 10. He was enrolled in a parochial school, became a Catholic, and was finally able to catch up on his schooling.

In time, he graduated from Howard University and served in the Army in World War I. He briefly taught school in North Carolina and in the District of Columbia, and then became a social worker.

Everything changed, however, at the beginning of the Great Depression in 1930. He acquired property in the heart of Washington and opened the Blessed Martin de Porres Hospice to provide shelter and food for homeless men, funded at first with a donation from Dorothy Day and his own life savings. The hospice was open to all but especially to Black men, who often were unable to find assistance elsewhere. Scott finally gave up his government job and devoted all of his time and effort to the service of homeless men.

Scott was a short, unprepossessing man, soft-spoken and nonthreatening. He was someone in whom men could confide and to whom one could talk. His hospice was openly Catholic and always had a chapel and a space for prayer. Scott, who like Edwards had great devotion to St. Francis, was received by three popes and received annual donations from the archbishop of Washington, and in his own quiet way was active in the civil rights movement. He marched with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. shortly before King’s murder in Memphis.

Scott died from leukemia in 1978 aged 86. For some he was simply an ordinary man; but for all he was a man who did extraordinary things. He touched the lives of many across the country, and he turned the lives of some completely around. All this was done without an imposing staff, without programs, without forms and paperwork, without fanfare –he simply walked with Christ on the streets of Washington.

THE GIFT OF BLACKNESS

More than 30 years ago on his visit to the shrine of the Ugandan martyrs, Pope Paul VI launched a challenge to the people of Africa to bring to the Catholic Church their precious and original gift of “blackness.” The challenge has reached all the sons and daughters of Africa, even today.

Our spiritual gifts have been the lives and works of countless people who have walked, and walk still, in the sight of God. Despite the violence of chains, ropes and whips; despite the pettiness and the rejection, they have built up the Church and made her holy.

— “The History of Black Catholics in the United States,” by Benedictine Father Cyprian Davis. Copyright © 2002 Claretian Publications. Reprinted by permission from the August 2002 issue of U.S. Catholic magazine, www.uscatholic.org.

1916

The Georgia legislature introduces a bill prohibiting whites from teaching black students. Although the law eventually fails, a community of black sisters is formed to teach. In 1922 the sisters relocate to New York where they start a soup kitchen and begin educating local children. In 1929 they affiliate with the Franciscan Third Order, becoming the Franciscan Handmaids of the Most Pure Heart of Mary. Still active in Harlem, their ministries have spread elsewhere in the United States.

1920

The Society of the Divine Word in Greenville, Miss., with the blessing of Pope Benedict XV, opens St. Augustine’s, the first seminary for blacks. Some American bishops are still not convinced of the merit of a black priesthood.

1931

Xavier University in New Orleans is established by the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament and becomes the first black Catholic university in the U.S.

1958

American bishops denounce racial prejudice as immoral for the first time in their document “Discrimination and Christian Conscience.”

1965

Many Catholic clergy and women religious join the march in Selma, Ala., marking the Church’s foray into the civil rights struggle for racial equality.

1966

Father Harold Perry, SVD, is ordained auxiliary bishop of New Orleans, becoming the second black bishop in U.S. history.

1968

Prior to the meeting of the Catholic Clergy Conference on the Interracial Apostolate in 1968, Father Herman Porter of the Rockford, Ill., diocese invites all U.S. black Catholic clergy to a special caucus. More than 60 black clergy gather to discuss the racial crisis and decide to form a permanent organization. They send a statement to the bishops strongly criticizing the Church but clear in its expression of their devotion and hope. It lists nine demands for the Church to be faithful in its mission to blacks and to restore the Church within the black community. The caucus remains active today.

1979

The U.S. bishops issue a pastoral letter on racism, “Brothers and Sisters to Us,” reiterating opposition to the persistent evil of racism and calling attention to the relationship between racial and economic justice.

1985

The National Black Catholic Congress is re-established in 1985 as a coalition of black Catholic organizations. In 1987, NBCC renews the tradition of gathering black Catholics from across the country. The first renewed congress, Congress VI (the first five took place in the 1800s), takes place in May of 1987 in Washington, D.C. NBCC holds a national congress every five years, and each event attracts growing numbers of attendees.

1990

The National Black Catholic Clergy Caucus designates November as Black Catholic History Month.

2001

The first National Gathering of Black Catholic Women, organized by the National Black Sisters Conference, is held in Charlotte, N.C. More than 300 women religious from across the U.S. attend.

2018

In November, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops approves a new pastoral letter – “Open Wide Our Hearts: The Enduring Call to Love” – examining the “persistent” history and presence of racism in the nation. In the letter, the bishops invite all people of faith to conversion – to open minds and hearts to Christ’s love for all people and to the experiences of those who have been harmed by the evil of racism. By our baptism, we are members of Christ’s Body and sharers in His mission, they emphasize, and like Christ, we must care for all members of our communities, honoring each person as unique, sacred and created in God’s image. The bishops acknowledge, “All too often, leaders of the Church have remained silent about the horrific violence and other racial injustices perpetuated against African Americans and others.” Reflecting on these realities, the bishops implore us to find ways to actively work against the evil of racism and seek racial justice.

What is Black Catholic History Month?

On July 24, 1990, the National Black Catholic Clergy Caucus of the United States designated November as Black Catholic History Month to celebrate the history and heritage of black Catholics. November is significant because two important black saints are commemorated within the month: St. Martin de Porres’ feast day (Nov. 3) and St. Augustine’s birthday (Nov. 13). With All Saints and All Souls’ Day, we also remember the saints and souls of Africa and the African Diaspora.

African American Catholics by the numbers

There are 3 million African American Catholics in the United States.

Of Roman Catholic parishes in the United States, 798 are considered to be predominantly African American. About 76 percent of African American Catholics are in diverse or shared parishes, and 24 percent are in predominantly African American parishes.

As of October 2022, there are 12 living African American bishops, including one cardinal and one archbishop, seven of whom remain active. Two U.S. dioceses are headed by African American bishops.

— USCCB

Other upcoming Black Catholic History Month programs

n St. Eugene Parish’s Racial and Ethnic Equity Ministry will host an adult education program outlining the life and the cause for canonization of Sister Thea Bowman, one of six Black American Catholics on the path to sainthood, at 10:15 a.m. Sunday, Nov. 13. St. Eugene Church is located at 72 Culvern St. in Asheville.

n A Holy Hour for Racial Healing will be offered starting at 10:15 a.m. Sunday, Nov. 13, at St. Peter Church in Charlotte. It will be led by Deacon Clarke Cochran and is sponsored by the parish’s Social Justice Ministry. St. Peter Church is located at 507 S. Tryon St.

What is the diocese’s African American Affairs Ministry?

On May 17, 1985, a group of 10 people calling themselves the Committee for Concerned Black Catholics met to discuss issues and concerns that were particular to Black Catholics in the diocese. They urged thenBishop John Donoghue to coordinate efforts of Black Catholics in the diocese.

In July 1985, the ministry was officially begun as the Diocesan Committee on Black Catholic Ministry and Evangelization, and was a part of the diocesan Ministry for Justice and Peace. In 1989 it became a separate office to address and serve the needs and concerns of Black Catholics in the diocese.

Since then, the African American Affairs Ministry has grown. Its main goal is to make visible the work, contributions, traditions and culture of Black Catholics to the Church and to society, and to propose adequate diocesan responses to racism and other social injustices.

— www.charlottediocese.org

Black Catholic Americans eyed for sainthood

Sainthood causes for six African American Catholics have been opened with the Church:

n Venerable Father Augustus Tolton, priest for the Archdiocese of Chicago

Father Augustus Tolton was born a slave in 1854 on a plantation near Brush Creek, Mo. His father left to try to join the Union Army during the Civil War. In 1862, his mother escaped with her three children by rowing them across the Mississippi River and settling in Quincy, Ill.

Young Augustus had to leave one Catholic school because of threats; he found a haven at St. Peter Parish and School, where he learned to read and write and was confirmed at age 16.

He was encouraged to discern his vocation to the priesthood by the Franciscan priests who taught him at St. Francis College, now Quincy University, but could not find a seminary in the United States to accept him. He eventually studied in Rome and was ordained for the Propaganda Fidei Congregation in 1886, expecting to become a missionary in Africa. Instead, he was sent back to Quincy, where he served for three years before coming to the Archdiocese of Chicago in 1889.

He spearheaded the building of St. Monica Church for black Catholics, dedicated in 1894, and died after suffering heat stroke on a Chicago street on July 9, 1897.

n Venerable Mother Henriette Delille, founder of New Orleans religious order and “Servant of Slaves” A free woman of color living in New Orleans in the 19th century, Delille wanted to be a religious, but legal and social restraints 20 years before the abolition of slavery and the Civil War prevented local communities from accepting her. Therefore, she and two other free women sought to form their own. The Church gave them permission to form a pious society that took no vows and whose members were free to withdraw as they wished. They aided the poor, the sick, the elderly, the helpless, the lonely and the uninstructed who needed care.

Hundreds more women soon followed them in consecrating themselves to God’s service as Sisters of the Holy Family, and Delille was named their leader. Known as the “Servant of Slaves,” Delille died in 1862.

n Servant of God Mother Mary Elizabeth Lange, founder of the Oblate Sisters of Providence Elizabeth Clarisse Lange’s parents were refugees who fled to Cuba from the revolution taking place in their native Saint Dominque (present-day Haiti). Her father was a gentleman of some financial means and social standing. Her mother was a Creole. However, in the early 1800s young Elizabeth left Santiago de Cuba to seek peace and security in the United States. Providence directed her to Baltimore, where a great influx of French-speaking Catholic San Dominguios refugees was settling.

She was a courageous, loving and deeply spiritual woman and a strong, independent thinker and doer. Although she was a refugee, she was well educated and had her own money. It did not take long to recognize that the children of her fellow refugees needed education. She determined to respond to that need in spite of being a black woman in a slave state long before the Emancipation Proclamation. She used her own money and home to provide free education to children of color, and eventually founded the Oblate Sisters of Providence, the first Black Catholic order in the United States.

Lange’s extraordinary faith enabled her to persevere against all odds. To her black brothers and sisters she gave of herself and her material possessions until she was empty of all but Jesus, whom she shared generously with all by being a living witness to His teaching. She died in 1882.

n Venerable Pierre Toussaint, brought to New York as a slave and later a well-known philanthropist Coming to New York from Haiti in 1787 with his owner, Jean Bérard, Pierre Toussaint was apprenticed to a New York hairdresser. He became a friend to the city’s aristocracy by dressing the hair of wealthy women, and when Bérard died penniless, Toussaint financially supported Bérard’s wife and nursed her through emotional and physical ailments. She granted him his freedom in 1807.

His stable income allowed him to buy freedom for his sister and his future wife, and to be generous with many individuals and charities, including an orphanage and school for black children. He not only provided money, but manifested genuine care and concern for the afflicted. He cared for the ill when yellow fever swept the city and opened his home to homeless youth, teaching them violin and paying for their schooling. His wife shared in his philanthropic efforts, and their home became a shelter for orphans, a credit bureau, an employment agency and a refuge for priests and poverty-stricken travelers. In his later years, Toussaint still worked to help others. One of his clients advised him, “Toussaint, you are the richest man I know. Why not stop working?” He replied, “Then I should not have enough to help others, madam.” Two years after his wife’s death, he died in 1853 aged 87.

n Servant of God Julia Greeley, former slave who consecrated her life to Jesus and aided the poor

She was born a slave in Hannibal, Mo., sometime between 1833 and 1848. Her right eye was destroyed in childhood by a slave master’s whip as he beat her mother. Freed by Missouri’s Emancipation Act in 1865, Greeley worked for the family of William Gilpin, Colorado’s first territorial governor, who brought her to Denver in 1878. After leaving the Gilpins’ service, Greeley found odd jobs around the city. She joined the Catholic Church at Sacred Heart Parish in 1880. She was a daily communicant, and in 1901 she became an

active member of the Secular Franciscan Order. The Jesuit priests at her parish recognized her as the most fervent promoter of devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Despite her own poverty, Greeley spent much of her time collecting food, clothing and other goods for the poor. She would often do her work at night, so as to avoid embarrassing the people she was assisting. Though she was earning only $10-$12 a month cleaning and cooking, she used much of it to help other people who were poor.

She died on June 7, 1918 – the Feast of the Sacred Heart. After her death, her body lay in state at her parish church for five hours, during which a constant stream of people came to pay their last respects to the wellknown, well-loved woman.

n Servant of God Sister Thea Bowman, leading advocate for African American Catholic heritage and awareness

Sister Thea Bowman, a Franciscan Sister of Perpetual Adoration, was nationally known for her efforts to encourage African American Catholics to be proud of their heritage and their faith. A convert to the faith, Bowman was the granddaughter of slaves and the only African American member of her order, transcending racism to leave a lasting mark on Catholic life in the United States in the late 20th century.

Born in a small town in Mississippi in 1937, Bertha Bowman was raised a Methodist but fell in love with Catholicism from the teachers at her school, the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration. She converted to Catholicism, and at 15, she joined the order and took the name Thea, meaning “of God.”

She was sent to La Crosse, Wis., where she studied and taught until 1961, when she returned to her hometown to teach at her old school before going on to pursue doctoral studies in English at The Catholic University of America. Bowman later taught there and at Xavier University in New Orleans.

After 16 years as an educator at the elementary, secondary and university level, she was invited by the bishop of Jackson, Miss., to become a consultant for intercultural awareness. She dedicated her life to building up the black Catholic community and sharing the Gospel message.

She was instrumental in the creation of many Catholic multicultural and African American projects, such as the first edition of “Lead Me, Guide Me,” an African American Catholic hymnal. She co-founded the Institute for Black Catholic Studies at Xavier University, and she helped found the National Black Sisters Conference in 1966.

In 1984, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Confined to a wheelchair, Bowman gave a historic address to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in 1989, and she continued to inspire others with her love and joy, even amid her suffering, until her death the next year at 52.

She was posthumously awarded an honorary doctorate in theology from Boston College, the first to any African American woman.

— Sources: Catholic News Agency, www.catholiconline.com, www.AmericanCatholic.org, www. catholic.org, EWTN, The Catholic Encyclopedia, Wikipedia

More online

At www.catholicnewsherald.com : Read more about black Catholics throughout history, including popes, saints and notable Black Catholic leaders such as St. Charles Lwanga and Companions, St. Moses the Black, the Scillitan martyrs and St. Josephine Bakhita

Steps to sainthood

ésar Hurtado

Trabajo y dignidad

Es posible que en estos últimos días hayan notado una baja sensible en nuestro material compartido a través de la página de Facebook de Catholic News Herald en Español.

Primero de todo, como dirían nuestros hermanos anglos, y antes que nada, como decimos los hispanos, les ofrezco una disculpa.

Afortunadamente, tras una larga espera, pude viajar con mi esposa a México para disfrutar de la vida que ofrece, su cultura, su gente y, especialmente para mí, su increíble comida.

Fueron diez días maravillosos en Guadalajara, Jalisco, San Luis Potosí y Ciudad de México. Esperamos sinceramente poder retornar para conocer más de la riqueza cultural de esta maravillosa tierra, pero sobre todo para integrarnos con su gente amable y divertida que conoce bien cómo expresar el idioma del amor de muchas maneras.

Lo que también pude volver a ver es la profunda diferencia económica que separa a los pobres de los ricos, un hecho muy común en nuestros países latinoamericanos.

Con alegría pude ser testigo del esfuerzo e imaginación con que los mexicanos y mexicanas de todas las edades trabajan para conseguir el pan de cada día.

Es claro para todos que el trabajo dignifica, pero, ¿qué hace que un trabajador sienta que rebaja su condición para ofrecer un servicio?

En mi opinión, lo indigno es el salario. Lo indigno son las condiciones. Lo indigno es el acoso. Lo indigno es la cruda realidad de llegar al extremo de lo servil para poder ganar una “propina” adicional que pueda nivelar la pobre, a veces miserable, remuneración que se recibe por el trabajo desempeñado.

En 2020, durante la fiesta de San José Obrero, día del trabajador, el Papa Francisco rezó por todos los trabajadores, “para que a nadie le falte el trabajo y que todos sean justamente remunerados y puedan gozar de la dignidad del trabajo y la belleza del descanso”.

“Toda injusticia que se comete contra un trabajador es un atropello a la dignidad humana, incluso a la dignidad de lo que hace la injusticia: bajas el nivel y terminas en esa tensión de dictador-esclavo. En cambio, la vocación que Dios nos da es tan bella: crear, recrear, trabajar. Pero esto puede hacerse cuando las condiciones son correctas y se respeta la dignidad de la persona”, subrayó el Papa Francisco.

Es triste, penoso, ver rebajada la condición de un hombre o mujer que hace lo imposible por ganar unas monedas adicionales necesarias para proveer lo mínimo necesario para mantener a su familia.

Pero la dignidad del pueblo mexicano está allí, presente, latente, vigilante, respaldada por un pasado glorioso, un presente incierto y un futuro, espero de corazón, glorioso.

CÉSAR HURTADO es gerente de medios hispanos de la Diócesis de Charlotte.

Ministerio Hispano envía mensajes por Adviento

CÉSAR HURTADO rchurtado@charlottediocese.org

CHARLOTTE — Con ocasión del advenimiento de la temporada de Adviento, el Padre Julio César Domínguez, vicario episcopal del Ministerio Hispano de la Diócesis de Charlotte, envió una carta pastoral a los feligreses en la que invita a la reflexión por la celebración de la Fiesta de Cristo Rey y a la preparación espiritual “para celebrar con alegría el nacimiento de Nuestro Señor Jesucristo”.

El Padre Domínguez sugiere que una buena confesión y la asistencia a un retiro de Adviento son ocasiones propicias que facilitan la reflexión.

También recomendó que las familias consigan una Corona de Adviento y enciendan las velas pidiendo “por la venida de nuestro Señor a sus corazones”.

Levantar un nacimiento y poner el árbol de navidad, aconseja, ayudará a que los hijos vean que ya se acerca la Navidad. De igual manera, el organizar o participar en Novenas y Posadas, abrazar devociones marianas, asistir a familiares o amigos a pasar una feliz Nochebuena, hará que nuestra entrega al Niño Dios sea plena.

MÁS MENSAJES

Cada domingo de Adviento se publicará un mensaje de reflexión y motivador por las redes sociales de Catholic News Herald. El 27 de noviembre, la reflexión estará a cargo del Diácono Enedino Aquino, coordinador del Ministerio Hispano del vicariato de Greensboro. Los domingos 4 y 11 de diciembre contaremos con la participación de Ibis Centeno y el Diácono Darío García, coordinadores de los vicariatos de Salisbury y Hickory.

El domingo 18 de diciembre, previo a la Navidad, estará a cargo del Diácono Eduardo Bernal, coordinador del vicariato de Charlotte.

“Deseamos que tengan un maravilloso tiempo de oración, los encomiendo en mis oraciones”, finalizó el Padre Domínguez.

El siguiente es el texto completo de la carta:

Queridos hermanos en Cristo,

Que la gracia y la paz de parte de nuestro Señor Jesucristo esté con todos ustedes y con aquellos con los cuales ustedes comparten día a día la alegría del Evangelio.

Con la próxima llegada de este maravilloso tiempo de Adviento, quiero unirme de una manera muy especial a ustedes, sobre todo en la oración por esta maravillosa diócesis a la cual pertenecemos. Los invito a todos ustedes a tomarse un espacio de su vida para entrar en la reflexión y poder prepararnos así, para celebrar con alegría el nacimiento de Nuestro Señor Jesucristo.

Quisiera darles algunas ideas que son bien tradicionales para poder vivir mejor el Adviento y sobre todo para tomarlo como parte de nuestra preparación. Como ustedes saben, la fiesta de Cristo Rey cae en este año el 20 de noviembre y la siguiente semana sería ya el primer domingo de Adviento. A continuación, les doy una lista de lo que podríamos hacer como preparación espiritual:

n Una buena confesión, investiga si en tu parroquia o en alguna parroquia cercana tendrán el servicio penitencial para que aproveches. Si no lo tienen entonces haz cita con tu párroco para hacerla.

n Busca un retiro de Adviento, generalmente en las parroquias lo hacen. Anima a los líderes parroquiales a que ofrezcan uno para que muchos puedan beneficiarse.

n El Adviento es tiempo de oración, consigue tu corona de Adviento y organízate en casa para que cada día haya ese momento especial en el cual prendan la vela y pidan por la venida de nuestro Señor a sus corazones.

nCrea un nacimiento en tu casa, eso ayudará a que tus hijos vean que ya viene Navidad. Sé muy creativo, lean el Evangelio e imaginen cómo sería el pueblo de Belén y la cueva donde nació nuestro Señor.

n Pon el árbol Navideño, pero desde el inicio propón a la familia que las esferas sean puestas día a día (del 27 de noviembre al 24 de diciembre) con cada buena obra que realicen. Por ejemplo, papá puede ofrecer su día de trabajo, mamá puede ofrecer la comida que preparó, el niño puede ofrecer arreglar su cuarto, etc. Sean creativos y sugieran día a día algo diferente para poder poner la esfera en el árbol como regalos al niño Dios al momento de la cena. Deja la magia de las luces navideñas hasta el mero día de Navidad (24 de diciembre

en la vigilia) y haz la proclamación: Jesús luz del Mundo (Mateo 4,1416).

n Participa u organiza una posada en la cual se rece el rosario, se lean las profecías de la próxima llegada del Mesías y también los capítulos del Evangelio que hablen de su venida. Recuerden, en la posada no se muestra al niño Dios, pues todavía estamos preparándonos para su venida.

n Haz un análisis de tus familiares, amigos o conocidos y mira quien no tendrá los medios económicos o la compañía para pasar una feliz Nochebuena y ojalá que puedas darle espacio en tu casa. Hay muchos hombres y mujeres que vienen de sus países a trabajar y al no tener familia pasan su Navidad solos, sumidos en la nostalgia. n La Novena de Navidad es bien tradicional en algunos países. Puedes encontrar estas novenas en sitios católicos como corazones. org o catholic.net. Ya desde el 16 prepara bien tu corazón para esto. n Las devociones marianas son muy importantes en estas fechas. Procuremos acompañar a María en estos días en que como mujer embarazada esperaba la venida del Mesías, el misterio de ser madre de Dios, la alegría de su corazón, la preocupación que sentía de donde nacería, el tratar de entender cuál sería la misión de su hijo, etc.

Podría seguir con una lista de cosas y sugerencias, pero creo que he resumido las esenciales y espero que me ayudes a sugerir estas ideas a todas las personas que conozcas, para que todos juntos como comunidad cristiana podamos prepararnos a la venida del Señor y preparar una digna morada al Señor en nuestros corazones. Que tengan un maravilloso tiempo de oración, los encomiendo en mis oraciones.

En la extensión del Reino, Reverendísimo P. Julio C. Domínguez, Vicario Episcopal Ministerio Hispano.

Más online

En www.facebook.com/CNHEspañol : El texto de la carta ha sido grabado en video y publicado en esta red social.

FOTO ARCHIVO CATHOLIC NEWS HERALD El Padre Julio Domínguez, vicario episcopal del Ministerio Hispano de la Diócesis de Charlotte, envió un mensaje a la feligresía con motivo del inicio del tiempo de Adviento. Cuatro de los coordinadores de diferentes vicarías preparan sus video mensajes que serán publicados en las redes sociales de Catholic News Herald en cada uno de los cuatro domingos de este tiempo de preparación para la llegada de Dios hecho hombre.

Informarán sobre riesgos de diabetes

CÉSAR HURTADO rchurtado@charlottediocese.org

CHARLOTTE — La Pastoral de Salud del Vicariato de Charlotte anunció que, con la colaboración de la organización Cabarrus Health Alliance (CHA), llevará a cabo una jornada de prevención de diabetes especialmente dirigida a la colectividad hispana.

Maribel García, coordinadora de la Pastoral de Salud, dijo que la promotora Lupita Nava, que participa en la parroquia Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe en Charlotte, realizó las coordinaciones con Emma Zelaya de CHA para que la actividad se realice en esa parroquia el lunes 28 de noviembre, de 6 a 7:30 de la tarde.

“Lo que generalmente sucede es que nosotros, los hispanos, que en muchas ocasiones no contamos con seguro de salud ni tenemos acceso a servicios médicos, no reconocemos los síntomas de esta enfermedad y los tratamos aisladamente”, explicó García.

De esta manera, dijo, que si una persona se siente con pocos deseos de realizar sus labores, lo explica diciendo, por ejemplo, “es que soy flojo o floja”. “También, a veces, si tienes sed permanente y sientes la necesidad de tomar mucha agua, lo explicas como que comiste muy salado u otra cosa”, añadió.

Sin embargo, cuando se suman algunos de los síntomas, que pueden ser aumento de la sed, necesidad de orinar frecuentemente, aumento del apetito, fatiga, visión borrosa, hormigueo en los pies o las manos, infecciones frecuentes y llagas que tardan en cicatrizar, es más fácil determinar que se trata de diabetes.

“Lamentablemente, en ocasiones la enfermedad ya se encuentra bastante avanzada y debe ser controlada con medicamentos”, dijo García.

¿QUÉ ES LA DIABETES?

Los Centros de Control y Prevención de Enfermedades de Estados Unidos (CDC), definen a la diabetes como una enfermedad crónica que afecta la forma en que el cuerpo convierte los alimentos en energía.

Nuestro cuerpo descompone los alimentos en azúcar (glucosa) y los libera en la sangre. Un órgano llamado páncreas produce una hormona llamada insulina, que permite que el azúcar en la sangre entre a las células del cuerpo para que la usen como energía.

Si tenemos diabetes, el cuerpo no produce una cantidad suficiente de insulina o no puede usar correctamente la insulina que produce. Cuando no hay suficiente insulina o las células dejan de responder a la insulina, queda demasiada azúcar en la sangre y, con el tiempo, esto puede causar problemas de salud graves,

ENFERMEDAD PELIGROSA

A lo largo de su vida, los adultos en los Estados Unidos tienen probabilidades del 40% en general de presentar diabetes tipo 2. Pero si usted es un hispano o latino adulto en los Estados Unidos, sus probabilidades son de más del 50%, y es posible que le aparezca a menor edad.

Las complicaciones de la diabetes también afectan más fuertemente a los hispanos. Los latinos tenemos tasas más altas de insuficiencia renal causada por la diabetes, así como de enfermedades del corazón, ceguera y pérdida de la vista

relacionadas con la diabetes, asegura en su portal de internet los CDC.

PREVENCIÓN

García asegura que conocer si uno tiene mucha azúcar en la sangre le puede ahorrar problemas y hasta salvar la vida.

Por esta razón, durante la jornada de prevención de diabetes se ofrecerán exámenes de glucosa gratuitos a todos los participantes.

“El evento se realizará en la parroquia Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, pero

En esta imagen de archivo se muestra el primer curso sobre prevención de diabetes que realizó la Pastoral de Salud del Vicariato de Charlotte en la parroquia San Gabriel. Los participantes, que fueron capacitados en temas de salud, nutrición y prevención de diabetes durante un año, recibieron además electrodomésticos para cocinar alimentos saludables e implementos para realizar ejercicios físicos.

todos los hispanos de la diócesis están invitados”, dijo García.

Para mayores informes o registrarse, por favor llame a Emma Zelaya al (704) 9201337 o escriba un correo a Emma.Zelaya@ cabarrushealth.org.

Más online

En www.cdc.gov : Puede encontrar información detallada en español sobre los peligros de la diabetes.

San Miguel mostró su orgullo por herencia hispana

CÉSAR HURTADO rchurtado@charlottediocese.org

GASTONIA — Con un festival que incluyó actividades al aire libre e interiores, la parroquia San Miguel cerró las festividades por el Mes de la Herencia Hispana en Estados Unidos.

La fiesta se realizó el pasado sábado 29 de octubre y fue coordinada por una comisión organizadora integrada por miembros de los diferentes movimientos apostólicos, bajo la dirección del Padre José Juya, vicario parroquial y coordinador del Ministerio Hispano del Vicariato de Gastonia.

“Ha sido una excelente oportunidad para reencontrarnos después de dos años de pandemia en que debimos suspender la realización de este festival que conmemora nuestra herencia latina, muestra nuestra cultura y sirve de referente para nuestros hijos, para que no se olviden de sus raíces y estén orgullosos de ellas”, dijo la señora Reina Granadino, feligresa de la Iglesia San Miguel e integrante del equipo organizador.

La fiesta dio inicio alrededor de las seis de la tarde con un desfile de banderas alrededor de la iglesia, en el que también se mostraron carros alegóricos decorados con diferentes motivos hispanos.

Luego, el desfile ingresó al gimnasio de la escuela, donde el Padre Lucas Rossi, párroco, y el Padre Juya dieron un breve mensaje y bendijeron los alimentos que se iban a ofrecer.

En los extremos del gimnasio se colocaron mesas decoradas por las comisiones de los diferentes países expositores, entre ellos Estados Unidos, México, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Ecuador, República Dominicana, Perú, Puerto Rico y Colombia.

Se ofrecieron alimentos a la venta por un precio simbólico y los fondos recaudados fueron destinados como donación a la parroquia.

En una zona central se presentaron diversos bailes folklóricos representativos de los diferentes países participantes.

La señora Granadino agradeció la participación mayoritaria de la comunidad y señaló que, con la bendición de Dios, esperan retornar por completo a la normalidad de las actividades que realizaban regularmente antes de la pandemia.

“Estamos trabajando y, primero Dios, volveremos a realizar el Festival de la Hispanidad el próximo año 2023”, finalizó.

El gimnasio de la escuela San Miguel en Gastonia vio colmada sus instalaciones por feligreses que deseaban celebrar el Mes de la Herencia Hispana compartiendo su cultura, bailes y gastronomía. El párroco, Padre Lucas Rossi, y el vicario parroquial, Padre José Juya, dieron la bendición al evento que se inició con un desfile de banderas y paso de carros alegóricos.

FOTOS CORTESÍA PARROQUIA SAN MIGUEL

ARCHIVO | CATHOLIC NEWS HERALD

Conferencia renovó compromiso de catequistas

HICKORY — Un número récord de más de 600 catequistas de varias parroquias de la Diócesis de Charlotte participó en la Conferencia Catequética diocesana celebrada el 5 de noviembre en el Centro de Convenciones Hickory Metro. Fue la primera conferencia de este tipo en toda la diócesis para maestros de formación en la fe desde 2019, ya que las conferencias de 2020 y 2021 se cancelaron debido a la pandemia de COVID-19. El evento fue una oportunidad para que los maestros se reunieran por su desarrollo profesional, la oración, actualizaciones sobre la programación de formación en la fe y el compañerismo entre ellos. El programa de un día de duración, con el tema “La fe es más preciosa que el oro” coincidente con el lema del 50 aniversario de la diócesis, comenzó con una Misa ofrecida por el Obispo Peter Jugis, quien elogió a los líderes de formación en la fe por su compromiso de enseñar a los niños a “elegir a Jesús”. Los oradores principales incluyeron al Padre Julio Domínguez, vicario del Ministerio Hispano, y al Dr. John Bergsma de la Universidad Franciscana. También se realizaron charlas educativas en inglés y español, entre ellas “Formación Continua” a cargo del Diácono Eduardo Bernal y “Espiritualidad Cotidiana” a cargo de Ibis Centeno. Sus charlas grabadas se publicarán en las redes sociales de Catholic News Herald.

¡Viva Cristo Rey del Universo!

La celebración de la Solemnidad de Nuestro Señor Jesucristo, Rey del Universo, cierra el Año Litúrgico en el que se ha meditado sobre todo el misterio de su vida, su predicación y el anuncio del Reino de Dios.

Este año la fiesta se celebra el domingo 20 de noviembre, una semana antes del primer domingo de Adviento, tiempo de preparación para recibir la llegada del niño Jesús.

La Solemnidad de Cristo Rey fue instaurada por el Papa Pío XI el 11 de diciembre de 1925. El Papa quiso motivar a los católicos a reconocer en público que el mandatario de la Iglesia es Cristo Rey.

¿POR QUÉ JESUCRISTO ES REY?

Desde la antigüedad se ha llamado Rey a Jesucristo, en sentido metafórico, en razón al supremo grado de excelencia que posee y que le encumbra entre todas las cosas creadas. Así, se dice que reina en las inteligencias de los hombres porque Él es la Verdad y porque los hombres necesitan beber de Él y recibir obedientemente la verdad. Reina en las voluntades de los hombres, no sólo porque en Él la voluntad humana está entera y perfectamente

Lecturas Diarias

19:11-28; Jueves (Santa Isabel de Hungría): Apocalipsis 5:1-10, Lucas 19:41-44; Viernes: Apocalipsis 10:8-11, Lucas 19:4548; Sábado: Apocalipsis 11:4-12, Lucas 20:27-40

sometida a la santa voluntad divina, sino también porque influye en nuestra libre voluntad y la enciende en nobles propósitos.

Reina en los corazones de los hombres porque, con su supereminente caridad y con su mansedumbre y benignidad, se hace amar por las almas de manera que jamás nadie, entre todos los nacidos, ha sido ni será nunca tan amado como Cristo Jesús.

Durante el anuncio del Reino, Jesús nos muestra lo que éste significa para nosotros como Salvación, Revelación y Reconciliación ante la mentira mortal del pecado que existe en el mundo. Jesús responde a Pilatos cuando le pregunta si en verdad Él es el Rey de los judíos: “Mi Reino no es de este mundo. Si mi Reino fuese de este mundo mi gente habría combatido para que no fuese entregado a los judíos; pero mi Reino no es de aquí” (Jn 18, 36). Jesús no es el Rey de un mundo de miedo, mentira y pecado, Él es el Rey del Reino de Dios que trae y al que nos conduce.

LA GUERRA CRISTERA

En México, entre 1926 y 1929, se desató un conflicto

NOVIEMBRE 20-26

Domingo (Cristo, Rey del Universo): 2 Samuel 5:1-3, 2 Colosenses 1:12-20, Lucas 23:35-43; Lunes (Presentación de la Virgen María): Apocalipsis 14:1-3, 4b-5, Lucas 2:1-4; Martes (Santa Cecilia): Apocalipsis 14:14-19, Lucas 21:5-11; Miércoles: Apocalipsis 15:1-4, Lucas 21:12-19; Jueves (Día de Acción de Gracias): Sirácides 50:24-26, 1 Corintios 1:3-9, Lucas 17:11-19; Viernes: Apocalipsis 20:1-4, 11–21:2, Lucas 21:29-33; Sábado: Apocalipsis 22:1-7, Lucas 21:34-36

armado llamado la Guerra Cristera.

El Presidente Plutarco Elías Calles promulgó una legislación anticlerical que redujo el número de sacerdotes, prohibió las manifestaciones públicas de fe, obligó al clero vestir de civil, sólo permitía celebrar Misa una vez a la semana, y expropió las propiedades de la Iglesia, entre otras medidas.

Miles de católicos se levantaron en armas para defender su fe, siendo miles de ellos encarcelados y ejecutados. Se estima que fueron 250 mil personas las que perdieron la vida en esa guerra en ambos bandos.

Durante la Guerra Cristera, el ejército católico se consagró a Cristo Rey y por ello fueron llamados “Los Cristos Reyes” o “Cristeros”. “¡Viva Cristo Rey!” era el grito de resistencia y la jaculatoria de los mártires.

Entre los más de 20 mártires de la Guerra Cristera se encuentra José Sánchez del Río, el niño cristero, canonizado por el Papa Francisco en octubre de 2016. José solo tenía 14 años cuando fue apresado y asesinado durante el enfrentamiento.

— Condensado de ACI Prensa

NOVIEMBRE 27-DICIEMBRE 3

Domingo (Primer domingo de Adviento): Isaías 2:1-5, Romanos 13:11-14a, Mateo 24:37-44; Lunes: Isaías 4:2-6, Mateo 8:5-11; Martes: Isaías 11:1-10, Lucas 10-21-24; Miércoles (San Andrés): Romanos 10:9-18, Mateo 4:18-22; Jueves: Isaías 26:1-6, Mateo 7:21, 24-27; Viernes: Isaías 29:17-24, Mateo 9:27-31; Sábado (San Francisco Javier): Isaías 30:19-21, 23-26, Mateo 9:35-10:1, 6-8

FOTOS POR SERGIO LÓPEZ | CATHOLIC NEWS HERALD

¿En camino a la santidad?

Diócesis

invita a película, concierto y conversatorio sobre afroamericanos candidatos a canonización

SUEANN HOWELL sahowell@charlottediocese.org

CHARLOTTE — La Iglesia Católica no tiene santos afroamericanos, pero esto podría cambiar pronto, y la parroquia Nuestra Señora de la Consolación está invitando a la comunidad a un evento informativo especial sobre seis católicos negros que están siendo considerados para su canonización.

sobre la hermana Thea Bowman, quien se encuentra entre las personas que están siendo consideradas para la santidad y realizó una visita a WinstonSalem. (Lea más sobre los católicos afroamericanos que aspiran a la santidad en la página 16. Esta información se ofrece solo en inglés).

Oración Para el 50 Aniversario

Peregrinación Mariana

Una estatua especialmente encargada de María, Madre de Dios, está visitando más de 100 lugares en toda la Diócesis de Charlotte durante el año del aniversario. Las próximas visitas incluyen:

IGLESIA

CATÓLICA INMACULADA CONCEPCIÓN

10-13 de noviembre 1024 W. Main St., Forest City, N.C. 28043

IGLESIA CATÓLICA SAN CARLOS BORROMEO

13-16 de noviembre 728 W. Union St., Morganton, N.C. 28655

IGLESIA CATÓLICA SAN FRANCISCO DE ASÍS

16-20 de noviembre 328-B Woodsway Lane N.W., Lenoir, N.C. 28645

IGLESIA CATÓLICA SAN BENEDICTO EL MORO Y MISIÓN CATÓLICA DEL BUEN PASTOR 20-23 de noviembre 1625 E. 12th St., Winston-Salem, N.C. 27101 105 Good Shepherd Dr., King, N.C. 27021

IGLESIA CATÓLICA SAN LUIS GONZAGA

30 de noviembre-4 de diciembre 921 2nd St. NE, Hickory, N.C. 28601

IGLESIA CATÓLICA CRISTO REY 4-7 de diciembre 1505 E. MLK Jr. Dr., High Point, N.C. 27260

Para obtener más información sobre estas paradas de peregrinación, visite el website del 50 aniversario de la Diócesis de Charlotte, www. faithmorepreciousthangold.com

Programada para el sábado 19 de noviembre, la velada comenzará con una colaboración musical entre el coro de hombres de la parroquia y el coro de estudiantes de Charlotte Catholic High School, seguida del evento principal: la proyección del aclamado documental “Un lugar en la mesa, Afroamericanos en camino a la santidad”.

La película, financiada colectivamente en 2021, destaca las vidas excepcionales de seis católicos afroamericanos ya fallecidos que se encuentran en diversas etapas de revisión para una posible canonización.

Nuestra Señora de la Consolación, una parroquia históricamente negra en Charlotte, patrocina el evento como tributo al 50 aniversario de la Diócesis de Charlotte este año y para crear conciencia sobre las contribuciones de los afroamericanos a la Iglesia durante el Mes de la Historia Católica Negra en noviembre.

El evento se llevará a cabo a las 2 p.m. en MACS Fine Arts Center, en el campus de Charlotte Catholic High School, un nuevo escenario para uso de las escuelas católicas de la diócesis.

“Nos gustaría que el evento fuera un ‘momento asombroso’ para las personas que quizás no conocían todo el espectro del catolicismo. Y qué mejor momento para hacerlo que durante el 50 aniversario de la diócesis”, dijo la Dra. Evelyn Anderson, médico y feligresa de la Iglesia Nuestra Señora de la Consolación, quien copresidió el comité de planificación de esta actividad.

“Será una tarde completa, divertida e informativa, e invitará a la gente a aprender y ser parte de algo nuevo”, dijo.

También se ofrecerá una demostración de tambores africanos y una presentación, durante el intermedio, del Padre redentorista Maurice Nutt, sacerdote de la Arquidiócesis de Nueva Orleans. El Padre Nutt obtuvo su doctorado en homilética y escribió un libro

“Nuestra esperanza es utilizar esta tarde como una forma de educar no solo a nuestros feligreses sino a toda la diócesis y la comunidad”, dijo Anderson. “Queremos darle a la gente algo en lo que pensar… para que lo consideren y lo discutan en sus hogares”.

Entradas a la venta

Las entradas tienen un costo de $5 y pueden ser compradas online en www.ourladyofconsolation.org o en el evento, programado para el sábado 19 de noviembre a las 2 de la tarde, en MACS Fine Arts Center en Charlotte Catholic High School, 7702 Pineville-Matthews Road, Charlotte, N.C., 28226.

Padre Celestial, acepta nuestra humilde oración de alabanza y gratitud mientras celebramos con alegría los cincuenta años de la Diócesis de Charlotte. A lo largo de nuestra historia, los fieles del oeste de Carolina del Norte, bajo el cuidado de estimados obispos y abades, han sido alimentados por tu mano providencial. Confiamos en que invitas a tus hijos a implorar tus constantes bendiciones, te pedimos que sigas derramando tu gracia celestial sobre nosotros. Con afecto y devoción filial, te pedimos además que veas con buenos ojos las oraciones que pedimos por la intercesión de nuestra venerable patrona, la Santísima Virgen María, que con atención maternal atiende las necesidades y preocupaciones de la Iglesia. Te lo pedimos por nuestro Señor Jesucristo, tu Hijo, que vive y reina contigo en la unidad del Espíritu Santo, Dios por los siglos de los siglos. Amén.

Oraciones y devociones

El tema del 50 Aniversario, “La fe es más preciosa que el oro” (1 Pedro 1:7), alienta el uso de las oraciones, devociones y sacramentales probados y verdaderos de la Iglesia, que durante siglos han acercado a las personas a Dios. Pidamos con confianza las gracias que esperamos recibir de Dios al celebrar la fundación de la Diócesis de Charlotte. Santa María, Madre de Dios, ruega por nosotros.

Intención de oración de noviembre

Por los fieles difuntos. Que el Señor dé el descanso eterno a todos los fieles difuntos de la Diócesis de Charlotte que vivieron y sirvieron fielmente unidos a la Iglesia de Dios.

Santa del mes

Santa Inés

Le Thi

Thanh

Fecha de la fiesta: 24 de noviembre.

Our nation

NCEA reports quicker academic recovery from pandemic for Catholic schools

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The National Catholic Educational Association says Catholic schools have recovered more quickly from the pandemic than its public school counterparts. The successes, according to the NCEA, go across the board when looking separately at Black students, Hispanic students, students from low-income households, and students who qualify for free and reduced-price meals. The scores were first reported in October by the National Assessment of Educational Progress, colloquially known as “The Nation’s Report Card.” The numbers tracked the progress, or lack thereof, in math and reading by both fourth graders and eighth graders. While Catholic schools’ scores are generally better than those of their public school counterparts – Annie Smith, NCEA vice president of data and research, said eighth graders pre-COVID-19 were about 5% better in math and 6% better in reading – the new numbers, based on testing conducted in 2021, showed a wider separation between the two. Catholic schools’ scores have pretty much bounced back to the levels

they had achieved prior to the coronavirus pandemic’s onset in March 2020. The only area that is still not up to par is eighth-grade math, which is still five points behind pre-pandemic levels. Even so, said NCEA president Lincoln Snyder, those numbers are 15 points ahead of the comparable figures reported by public schools. “It wasn’t a surprise to me at all,” Snyder told Catholic News Service in an Oct. 28 phone interview. “We’ve been monitoring testing data, really, throughout COVID.”

Minn. bishop expresses outrage over Catholic cemetery damage

ROCHESTER, Minn. — Bishop Robert E. Barron of Winona-Rochester expressed outrage Nov. 2 over the desecration of several graves and the columbarium at the diocese’s Calvary Cemetery in Rochester “with hateful and obscene graffiti” on Halloween night. He assured his prayers for families “of those whose final resting places were so dishonored.” The diocese “will cooperate with police in assuring that those responsible are brought to justice,” he added in a statement issued on All Souls’ Day, when the Catholic Church “honors our beloved dead. Cemetery staff is working diligently to repair the damage and restore the grounds,” Bishop Barron said, and he pledged to bless and reconsecrate “this sacred space” once the staff’s task is completed. May the souls of the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace,” Bishop Barron added. Arson, vandalism and other destruction have taken place at more than 100 Catholic sites across the United States since May 2020.

INDIANAPOLIS — The Thomas More Society, a not-for-profit, national public interest law firm based in Chicago, has submitted an amicus curiae, or friend-of-the-court brief, to the Indiana Supreme Court supporting the state in a suit challenging its recently passed abortion law. The lawsuit was filed Aug. 30 by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of Planned Parenthood Northwest, Hawaii, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky Inc., et al. It claims the new law protecting most unborn lives violates rights, privileges and protections granted in the state’s constitution. In an Oct. 31 news release, Peter Breen, vice president and senior counsel of the Thomas More Society, quoted from the brief. “Nothing in the language, history, or interpretation of the Indiana Constitution supports a right to abortion,” he said, “especially in light of Indiana’s prohibition of abortion going back to 1835, 16 years before the relevant part of that constitution was adopted.”

The law in question was enacted by the Indiana General Assembly and signed into law by Gov. Eric Holcomb Aug. 5. It bans most abortions except in cases of rape, incest and specific medical conditions. “This law passes the constitutional litmus test,” said Breen. Following the lawsuit being filed a preliminary injunction on the law was issued Sept. 22, a week after the law went into effect. This action set the state law to its status prior to the ban, again allowing abortions in the state up to 22 weeks gestation.

USCCB elections, ‘Faithful Citizenship’ discussion, prayer are on agenda

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The fall general assembly of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops will find the bishops voting on a new president and vice president and how to proceed in disseminating their quadrennial document on Catholic participation in public life. The agenda for the Nov. 14-17 gathering also incorporates more time for prayer and reflection with opportunities for wider engagement and interaction with each other to build fraternity. Public sessions are scheduled for the afternoon of Nov. 15 and all day Nov. 16. USCCB leaders will be elected from a slate of 10 candidates nominated by their fellow bishops. They will choose a new president and vice president who will each serve a three-year term beginning at the conclusion of this year’s general assembly. At that time, Archbishop José H. Gomez of Los Angeles and Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron of Detroit will complete their terms as president and vice president, respectively. In addition, the bishops will vote on chairmen-elect for six standing USCCB committees: Canonical Affairs, Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, Evangelization and Catechesis, International Justice and Peace, the Protection of Children and Young People and Religious Liberty.

Indiana’s new abortion law passes ‘constitutional litmus test,’ says brief

— Catholic News Service

world

Pope’s November prayer intention: ‘For children who suffer’

VATICAN CITY — During the month of November, Pope Francis is asking people to pray for children who are suffering because of poverty, war and exploitation. “Let us pray for children who are suffering, especially for those who are homeless, orphans and victims of war. May they be guaranteed access to education, and may they have the opportunity to experience family affection,” the pope said in a video released Oct. 31. In the video message released by the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network, the pope explained his November prayer intention: “For children who suffer.” “An abandoned child is our fault,” the pope said in the message. “Each marginalized child, abandoned by his or her family, without schooling, without health care, is a cry! A cry that rises up to God and shames the system that we adults have built,” he insisted.

Russian ambassador confirms pope helped facilitate prisoner exchanges

VATICAN CITY — Russia’s ambassador to the Vatican confirmed Pope Francis helped facilitate recent prisoner exchanges with Ukraine and said the Vatican is ready to act as a mediator between Ukraine and Russia. The Italian news agency Askanews reported the ambassador, Aleksandr Avdeyev, said the exchanges of prisoners occur in accordance with the lists of military prisoners of the Armed Forces of Ukraine; the lists are handed over by Pope Francis. “In this case, we highly appreciate the personal actions of the pontiff, who is carrying out a very important humanitarian mission that allows hundreds of people to return to their families,” Avdeyev said. Returning to the Vatican from Bahrain Nov. 6, Pope Francis told reporters traveling with him that the Vatican is “constantly attentive” to what is happening in Ukraine, and that the Secretariat of State continues to do what is possible and has worked behind the scenes to help arrange prisoner exchanges. The pope also told reporters he thinks the cruelty of the attacks on Ukraine and its civilians are the work of mercenaries, not Russians, who are “a great people” and have a strong “humanism.”

Irish priest’s comments about transgenderism, gays result in suspension

DUBLIN — A spokesman for Ireland’s deputy prime minister referred to Pope Francis’ famous line “Who am I to judge?” after a priest said the politician would go to hell if he did not repent for being gay. The spokesman for Deputy Prime Minister Leo Varadkar told reporters Nov. 2 that Varadkar respects the right of Father Seán Sheehy “to express his religious beliefs freely” but “profoundly disagrees with Father Sheehy’s views.” It was the latest in a string of comments by the priest and replies that prompted media coverage and resulted in the retired priest – who often covers for priests on vacation – being removed from his duties in the diocese. During a homily in County Kerry Oct. 30, Father Sheehy called homosexual sex sinful and described transgenderism as “lunatic.” About 30 parishioners walked out after Father Sheehy described sin as “rampant.” Bishop Ray Browne of Kerry apologized for the controversial homily, saying the views expressed were not representative of Christianity. In a statement posted on the diocesan website Nov. 1, Bishop Browne said he was aware of “the deep upset and hurt” caused. He apologized to all who were offended.

— Catholic News Service

Pope Francis touches a baby’s head as he leaves an audience Oct. 29 at the Vatican with members of the young adult section of Italy’s Catholic Action.

Pope Francis: Parishes are essential places for growing in

CINDY WOOTEN Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — The COVID-19 pandemic has weakened many parishes, but that community “in the midst of homes, in the midst of people,” is still an essential place for nourishing and sharing faith, Pope Francis told Italian young adults.

The parish is “the normal environment where we learned to hear the Gospel, to know the Lord Jesus, to serve with gratuitousness, to pray in community, to share projects and initiatives, to feel part of God’s holy people,” the pope told leaders of the young adult section of Italian Catholic Action, a parish-based program of faith building and social outreach.

faith, community

life is vocation, following Jesus; and that faith is a gift to be given, a gift to witness.”

Part of that witness, he said, is to show concretely how faith leads to charity and a desire for justice.

In the neighborhood, town and region, “our motto is not ‘I don’t care,’ but ‘I care!’” the pope said.

The “disease of not caring” can be “more dangerous than a cancer,” he told the young people. “Human misery is not a fate that befalls some unfortunate people, but almost always the result of injustices that must be eradicated.”

Pope Francis urged the young people not to be frustrated or put off by the fact that in their parishes “the community dimension is a bit weak,” something “which has been aggravated by the pandemic.”

Meeting thousands of young adults Oct. 29, Pope Francis said he knows that in most cities and towns the parish church is not the center of religious and social life like it was when he was growing up, but “for our journey of faith and growth, the parish experience was and is important, irreplaceable.”

With its mix of members, the pope said, the parish is the place to experience how “in the Church we are all brothers and sisters through baptism; that we are all protagonists and responsible; that we have different gifts that are all for the good of the community; that

Learning to see each other as brothers and sisters, he said, does not begin with some parish meeting or activity, but with each person through prayer and, especially, through the Eucharist celebrated and shared in the parish.

“Fraternity in the Church is founded on Christ, on His presence in us and among us,” the pope said.

“Thanks to Him we welcome each other, bear with each other – Christian love is built on bearing with each other – and forgive each other.”

Who is the greatest among us?

The one who is least among all of you is the one who is the greatest.” (Lk 9:48)

God’s ways are not our ways. Whether we see this in the prophets like Isaiah or in Jesus’ words and actions, it comes to us as both helpful and a challenge. It is helpful because it calls on us to discern the trends and movements of our society and of our world.

The challenge is one of conversion – to discern properly what is good and just, and then to act, putting Jesus’ values and actions first in the way that we live our lives.

So often in the Gospels, we see the disciples arguing about who is the greatest. This happens in our culture and in most cultures and historical periods. Like young children, we like to play “king of the mountain.” Like barnyard chickens, even as adult men and women, we vie for our place in the “pecking order.” Someone has to be on the bottom, we think. How can those people think that they are like us? And so, the disciples tried to prevent a person, who was not one of their company, from casting out demons in Jesus’ name (see Lk 9:49). But God’s ways are not our ways. Jesus tells us, “Do not prevent him, for whoever is not against you is for you.” (Lk 9:50).

God’s ways are often surprising in a wonderful way. God choose a diminutive Albanian woman to join an Irish congregation of sisters and be sent to teach girls in India, and then, called her to form the Missionaries of Charity and pick up the dying off the streets of Calcutta. She and her sisters and brothers helped them either to recover or to die in dignity surrounded by love. We now call her St. Teresa of Calcutta. For St. Teresa of Calcutta, the Christ she received in the Eucharist was the Christ that she met in the poorest of the poor. This is true, for Jesus said, “Whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me.” (Mt 25:31-46) Do I see Jesus in the distressing disguise of the poor, the sick and the dying?

God’s ways are not our ways. Too often we want power and riches and glory. Too often we want to be with those whom we feel comfortable with and who agree with us. When we see someone or some group foster what is right and good, even when we disagree about other things, can we join them in fostering that good? Thus, Pope Francis has worked with the Imam of Al-Azhar, the leading Islamic theology school in Egypt, to foster peace, work against war, and call for reconciliation among nations and peoples. They have also joined together, along with the Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople, to work to limit climate change and its terrible consequences, especially for the poor nations and peoples.

Let us pray for the grace of conversion, that God’s ways may become our ways.

JESUIT FATHER JOHN MICHALOWSKI is the parochial vicar at St. Peter Church in Charlotte.

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‘The young need to spend time with the elderly, talk with them and the elderly members need to be with the young.’

Jesuit Father John Michalowski

‘God’s ways are often surprising in a wonderful way.’

St Matthews Catholic Church New Life Center Room 132/125

GOD’S LOVE

the Poor Servants of the Mother of God announced that they will be turning Catholic sponsorship of Pennybyrn over to the Diocese of Charlotte with local management and ownership remaining the same. Sister Lucy explains: “‘Demonstrating God’s love for the lives we touch’ is our mission. That’s key, and the staff knows it, too – at least enough to say the mission, but they hopefully know it in their fingertips! The staff members have a great spirit. They really do. I am called the mission leader, but I tell them we are all mission leaders.”

SPIRITUAL SUSTENANCE

Also on campus is a Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration Chapel, where roughly 100 people from neighboring parishes have taken turns (except during the pandemic) keeping vigil every day and night since the Feast of Corpus Christi on June 5, 1994.

Longtime Pennybyrn residents Ken and Sally Hughes, who helped plan and fund the Adoration Chapel, attended the anniversary Mass. The couple moved to High Point in 1968, two miles from Pennybyrn, and have been involved with the community and the sisters ever since.

“It’s a joy for the sisters to have been here this long,” said Ken Hughes. It’s a great place to be. I would have not chosen anyplace else other than here.”

The Adoration Chapel and Mass in the main chapel have been great sources of spiritual fortification for the sisters, residents, staff members and the wider community.

These fonts of spiritual renewal

complement the pastoral care of the sisters as they care for residents and their families in a gentle manner.

“The sisters enjoy a very strong prayer life here,” added Sister Lucy. “It is a retirement center, but it’s also very much a prayer center as well. That fits very well into living out my religious life. The rhythm of the prayers is as important as the rhythm of the service that we render here.”

In a statement, Bishop Peter Jugis

thanked God for the sisters’ seven decades of service and compassionate care. “Jesus Christ is at the center of the consecrated religious life. The sisters of the Poor Servants of the Mother of God brought the Lord with them to High Point and the Triad by the witness of their lives as consecrated religious,” he said. “They created a Christcentered ministry of care for the sick, following the example of Jesus who loved the sick and cured them.”

PAUL CAMPBELL | CATHOLIC NEWS HERALD Sister Lucy Hennessy; Monsignor Patrick Winslow; Rich Newman, president and CEO of Pennybyrn; and Sister Mona Comaskey talk with Pennybyrn resident Mary Mahler, who celebrated her 75th wedding anniversary with her husband Peter Sept. 15, the same day as Pennybyrn’s 75th anniversary. The Mahlers donated the stainedglass windows in the Pennybyrn chapel.