ST. PEDRO:
SISTINE CEILING:
AFTER SANDY:
Local family attends canonization of teenage martyr
Prayer service brings out artist’s ‘unique expressive intensity’
Churches open doors as New Yorkers cope with rolling disaster
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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO Newspaper of the Archdiocese of San Francisco
www.catholic-sf.org
SERVING SAN FRANCISCO, MARIN & SAN MATEO COUNTIES
NOVEMBER 9, 2012
Cardinal decries pressure on Chinese church
Welcoming immigrants at ‘heart of discipleship’
CINDY WOODEN CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE
VATICAN CITY – Over the past five years, relations between the government of China and the Catholic Church unfortunately have been marked by “misunderstandings, accusations” and new “stumbling blocks” to religious freedom, said the prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples. Cardinal Fernando Filoni, congregation prefect, said, “Control over persons and institutions has been honed and sessions of indoctrination and pressure are being turned to with ever greater ease.” In an article published in late October in Tripod, a publication of the Holy Spirit Study Center in Hong Kong, the cardinal, who spent nine years in Hong Kong as a Vatican diplomat monitoring the situation of the church in China, issued a call for dialogue with China’s communist government. SEE CHINA, PAGE 21
$1.00 | VOL. 14 NO. 35
MICHELLE MARTIN CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE
(PHOTO COURTESY BEN DAVIDSON/ST. RITA SCHOOL)
Honoring loved ones on the Day of the Dead St. Rita School marked Dios de Los Muertos, the Day of the Dead, Nov. 2 with a shrine in front of the school office in Fairfax. Pictured are sixth grader Estefany Oxlaj, with a photo of her favorite auntie Silvia in a decorated frame, and sixth grader Randy Sanchez, with a framed picture of his auntie Eloisa.
CHICAGO – The treatment of immigrants in the United States violates the biblical and ethical norms that God requires of his people, according to speakers at a Nov. 2 conference on the ethics of immigration held at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. “An Ethical Perspective on the Accompaniment of Immigrants: A Faith Response” was sponsored by the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Office for Immigrant Affairs and Immigration Education, Catholic universities, religious communities and the Catholic Conference of Illinois. The conference was set against a backdrop of roughly 400,000 deportations SEE IMMIGRANT, PAGE 21
1 pastor, 2 parishes: New model of community stresses collaboration GEORGE RAINE CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO
When Father John Sakowski celebrates Mass these days, he always inserts an intention: “For St. Thomas and St. Monica, to work in collaboration for the people of God.” It’s for good reason. Years ago, the San Francisco parishes that bear those saints’ names, St. Thomas the Apostle Church on Balboa Street and St. Monica Church on Geary Boulevard, and their schools, may well have had a friendly Richmond District rivalry, but those days are gone – particularly now that Father Sakowski is the pastor of both of them. A demographic sea change from the once-heavily Irish and Italian
‘The big word is collaboration. I use it every day, 17 times.’ FATHER JOHN SAKOWSKI Richmond that filled those parishes years ago, the dramatic fall off in Mass attendance and a supply-demand imbalance in priests brought about a reality from which there was no escape, particularly in the Geary corridor: One pastor would have to serve two relatively small parishes – 400 families at St. Monica and some 350 at St. Thomas. It’s a first-of-its kind model for the Catholic Church in San Francisco, established here in 1776. On July 1, Father Sakowski, a 60-yearold former structural engineer ordained only seven years ago, succeeded Father
John Greene, pastor at St. Monica for 13 years, when he was transferred to be pastor at St. Robert Church in San Bruno. Father Sakowski continues as pastor at St. Thomas the Apostle, the parish he has guided since July 1, 2010. “I met with the parish councils, with the school boards and I spoke at Masses at the two parishes,” said Auxiliary Bishop William J. Justice, the vicar for clergy, “and I said this is a new opportunity. And I was very clear with them that we are not merging the parishes. It’s a new model. The pastor of both parishes is the same person.”
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He added, “What was said also was that once this all gets going it would not be surprising if they began to share some things with each other,” perhaps a religious education program, for example, he said. The bishop heard only one complaint in this process. Someone at St. Monica opined during a visit that the bishop is “going to work the pastor to death.” He said, “I hope not.” Father Sakowski is actually part of a team. He is joined by Sister Noreen O’Connor, a sister of St. Joseph of Carondelet, who is pastoral associate and director of religious education at both St. Thomas the Apostle and St. Monica, a veteran administrator, SEE COMMUNITY, PAGE 21
INDEX On the Street . . . . . . . . .4 National . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 World . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10 Opinion. . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Faith. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Calendar. . . . . . . . . . . .26