December 7, 2012

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Thousands expected for Guadalupe pilgrimage Dec. 8

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO Newspaper of the Archdiocese of San Francisco

SERVING SAN FRANCISCO, MARIN & SAN MATEO COUNTIES

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$1.00 | VOL. 14 NO. 32

DECEMBER 7, 2012

Pope calls for world authority as ‘moral force’ FRANCIS X. ROCCA

CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

(CNS PHOTO/PAUL JEFFREY)

Syrian refugees flee to Lebanon A refugee family from Syria, whose members asked not to be named because of fears about their security should they return to their home country, are pictured in a rented tent Nov. 22 made from a billboard canvas in the village of Jeb Jennine, in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. The U.N. predicts Lebanon will have 300,000 Syrian refugees by June.

Some followers question Day sainthood cause VALERIE SCHMALZ CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

The U.S. bishops voted unanimously Nov. 13 to support the sainthood cause of pacifist and Catholic convert Dorothy Day, but many of those in the Catholic Worker Movement she founded view canonization with skepticism and even hostility.

“I don’t think she would want to be canonized,” said Aida Figuerroa, who lives at the Catholic Worker House in Redwood City, citDorothy Day ing Day’s oft-quoted, “Don’t call me a saint. I don’t want to be dismissed so easily.”

“I am glad that she gets the attention for her commitment to the very poor,” said Larry Purcell, execu-

VATICAN CITY – The world authority envisioned by two popes as a way to ensure global peace and justice would not be a superpower, but primarily a moral force with limited jurisdiction, Pope Benedict XVI said.

The pope made his remarks Dec. 3 to a plenary session of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, which was scheduled to meet for three days to discuss the theme of “political authority and global governance.”

In his address, Pope Benedict recalled that Blessed John XXIII had called for the “construction of a world community, with a corresponding authority,” to serve the “common good of the human family.”

The pope also cited his own 2009 encyclical “Caritas in Veritate,” in which he called for a “true world political authority” to ensure international cooperation, peace and environmental protection.

The church offers “principles of reflection, criteria of judgment and practical guidelines” for such an organization, but no concrete legal or SEE POPE, PAGE 13

Indian martyr who resisted torture praised as example for all

tive director of the Redwood City Catholic Worker House, one of three Catholic Worker houses in San Mateo County. “I am concerned that the canonization process will sanitize her life and will not emphasize how categorically she opposed the empire of the United States and how the empire is expanded and maintained with massive military might.”

Right after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, the Catholic Worker newspaper’s banner headline read: “We continue our Christian pacifist stand,” leading to the marginalization of the movement until the Vietnam War era.

New York Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, who is leading her sainthood cause, said Day shows the Catholic Church’s commitment to the dignity of human life and social justice.

BANGALORE, India – The life of Blessed Devasahayam Pillai, an 18th-century Catholic layman who was martyred for refusing to refute his faith despite being brutally tortured, was held up as an example for all Christians to embrace. “(India) can rejoice as this great martyr is now only a step away from being a declared saint,” Bishop Peter Remigius of Kottar told Catholic News

SEE DAY, PAGE 13

SEE PILLAI, PAGE 13

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INDEX On the Street . . . . . . . . .4 National . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9 Opinion. . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Faith. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Calendar. . . . . . . . . . . .22

2 ARCHDIOCESE

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

NEED TO KNOW RIORDAN PRESIDENT NAMED: San Francisco contractor and Riordan board trustee Joseph Conti was named president of Archbishop Riordan High School Nov. 30. Conti, who has served as chairman of the board of trustees since 2010, has been on the board of trustees since 2004. A national search is also under way for a new president and Conti may apply for the position, said Vicki Terheyden, Riordan director of communications.

Conti played a leadership role in establishing the 2005 capital campaign and in converting the Marianist residence to dormitories for boarding school students, Terheyden said.

SUPPORT FOR STAR HOME: Salesforce.com founder and CEO Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne are spearheading a drive to keep Catholic Charities CYO’s Star Community Home in San Francisco open another year. Challenging both the general public and Salesforce.com employees, the Benioffs have pledged $250,000 to CCCYO to cover one third of the cost of keeping the home open for one more year, CCCYO announced. Last holiday season, the Benioffs challenged San Francisco to help find homes for some of the city’s homeless in time for the holidays. CCCYO rose to meet the challenge and, with help from Salesforce.com employees who volunteered their time, the Star Community Home opened in a converted convent at Star of the Sea Parish, providing shelter for 12 single moms and their families.

CALL FOR INTERCHURCH UNITY: The churches of North America and Latin America must come together to respond to common challenges, Canadian Cardinal Marc Ouellet said in Vatican City Dec. 4 in advance of the international congress “Ecclesia in America.” “The valuable heritage of Christian faith, which is at the origin of the American ‘New World’ and inspires the life of its people, is now subject to erosion caused by waves of secularization and the impact of a global culture increasingly distant from and hostile to the proliferation of ‘sects,’ and needs to be revitalized, reformulated and brought up to date,” he said. The cardinal added that interplay across churches of different latitudes “already occurs within the providential ‘laboratory’ created by the increasingly important Hispanic presence in the United States and Canada.”

Together the churches must confront such issues as immigration, urban violence, drug trafficking and threats to the culture of life and to the family, he said.

LIVING TRUSTS WILLS

Immaculate Conception feast entwined with US history VALERIE SCHMALZ CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

December 8 is the feast of the Immaculate Conception and a holy day of obligation for the universal church.

The feast is a particularly special day for American Catholics because Mary as the Immaculate Conception is the patron of the U.S. — an honor declared by Pope Pius IX in 1847, following a vote by all the U.S. bishops in 1846.

Seven years later, Dec. 8, 1854, Pope Pius IX infallibly declared as dogma that Mary was conceived without original sin. That formalized a devotion to the Immaculate Conception that began more than 1,000 years earlier, a devotion that is enmeshed with American history from the time the first Europeans arrived.

“From the time the first missionaries set foot on American soil, regardless of their nationality they were naming different natural wonders and cities in honor of the Immaculate Conception,” said Geraldine Rohling, archivist for the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C. “The Mississippi River was consecrated to the Immaculate Conception” by Jesuit missionary Father Jacques Marquette, noted Rohling. In 1672, Father Marquette and Louis Joliet were the first Frenchmen to explore the great American river.

In the Spanish colonies, the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception was established as a holy day of obligation in 1552.

“One of the earliest chapels in what is now the U.S. was that of the Convento de Inmaculada Concepcion in St. Augustine, Florida, in 1573,” Marianist University of Dayton, Ohio, notes on its website.

In 1792, Baltimore Bishop John Carroll, America’s first bishop and an influential voice in the formation of the new nation, dedicated the Baltimore diocese,

PROBATE

(PHOTO BY DENNIS CALLAHAN/CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO)

The Annunciation is depicted in a painting at Old St. Mary’s Cathedral, San Francisco. The church was one of the first in the U.S. dedicated to the Immaculate Conception after Pope Pius IX declared the dogma in 1854. which at that time comprised the entire U.S., to the Immaculate Conception.

The dogma of the Immaculate Conception had been a core belief of Catholics for centuries, beginning in the seventh century when the idea first began to be discussed. It was made a solemnity in 1708, said Laura Bertone, interim director of worship for the Archdiocese of San Francisco.

The Catholic Church teaches Mary was conceived without

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original sin because God – being God – knew she would accept the invitation to be the mother of the Christ child. That is why the angel Gabriel says to her, “Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with you,” Bertone said.

“Mary is the example of a humanity that is completely restored. A humanity in which human liberty is completely subject to grace that leaves us really free.

That is why the church proposes Mary to us as a mirror by which we can see what we will look like when God’s grace gets done healing us,” said Father James Garcia, pastor of St. Anthony of Padua/Immaculate Conception in San Francisco. Immaculate Conception, now Immaculate Conception Chapel, was founded as an Italian parish church 100 years ago this year.

In the Archdiocese of San Francisco, the first cathedral was St. Mary’s of the Immaculate Conception which is now known as Old St. Mary’s, located at California and Grant streets in San Francisco. The church’s cornerstone reads ”Dedicated to the Almighty God under the title of St. Mary, Ever Virgin, conceived without sin, July 17, 1853.” The church was formally dedicated Dec. 24, 1854, making it one of the first churches dedicated to the Immaculate Conception after the dogma was declared, said Jeffrey Burns, archivist of the Archdiocese of San Francisco.

St. Brigid School in San Francisco is run by the Congregation of the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. The founder, Carmen Sallés, was canonized Oct. 21.

St. Carmen taught that children should be educated following the model of Mary in the Immaculate Conception, said Immaculate Conception Sister Encarnación Ortega. “Just as Mary was preserved from sin at her conception, Carmen Sallés dreamed of education as the means to prevent sin and to empower the youth to make good choices in their lives,” said Sister Encarnación.

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone Publisher George Wesolek Associate Publisher Rick DelVecchio Editor/General Manager EDITORIAL Valerie Schmalz, assistant editor George Raine, reporter Tom Burke, On the Street/Calendar

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ARCHDIOCESE 3

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

Slight school enrollment boost reverses 12-year trend GEORGE RAINE CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

The number is very small, but enrollment in elementary schools in the Archdiocese of San Francisco increased by 22 students this year over last, the first year-over-year increase in 12 years.

Compared with many years of consecutive declines, it’s something to celebrate, said Maureen Huntington, superintendent of the Archdiocese of San Francisco Department of Catholic Schools. “It’s going to be a tiny percentage but it is change,” she said. “It is in the opposite direction.”

A punishing economy led families to pull children from Catholic schools, even with tuition assistance and other incentives over the years, and Huntington believes the upward tick in enrollment reflects a slightly improving economy, with most of the improvement coming in San Mateo County. The county had a stronger economic foundation to begin with, compared with the inner city of San Francisco, and is benefitting to a greater degree in the recovery.

“The most stable will feel the influences of positive change first,” she said.

There are 17,291 students in the archdiocese’s elementary schools, in San Francisco, Marin and San Mateo counties. There were 16,568 last year. That is a difference of 723 but excluding the 701 pupils in preschools, as the archdiocese does in a new report, the difference is plus 22.

The difference in high school enrollment in the three-county archdiocese is even smaller. There are 7,838 students, 10 fewer than the 7,848 last year. Annual changes of plus

ALLIANCE FUNDRAISING PROGRESSES

(PHOTO BY DENNIS CALLAHAN/CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO)

Students are pictured at Star of the Sea School, San Francisco, Nov. 30. There are 17,291 students in the archdiocesan elementary schools this year, a slight increase over the previous year. or minus 10 or 12 for high school enrollment annually is typical, said Huntington.

The larger numbers of students year-over-year in San Mateo do stand out: Plus 59 at Our Lady of Angels School in Burlingame; plus 50 at Our Lady of Mount Carmel School in Redwood City; plus 86 at Sacred Heart Schools and plus 89 at St. Matthias Preschool in Redwood City. The change is from K-8 20112012 to pre-K-8 in 2012-2013.

Among the enrollment increases in San Francisco Catholic schools are the plus 29 at St. Monica School; plus 52 at St. Philip School, and plus 43 at St. Thomas the Apostle.

In Marin County, St. Raphael School in San Rafael is up 24; St.

Patrick School in Larkspur is up 19 and Our Lady of Loretto School in Novato is up 18.

The declines include minus 38 at Church of the Epiphany School and minus 28 at St. Charles Borromeo School, both in San Francisco.

Of the increase of 22 elementary school students, Huntington added, “We have hit bottom and now we are going up. Even though it is a tiny, little up, it is an up.”

The number of students in preschool is encouraging, too, said Huntington. It is actually more than the 701 the archdiocese is reporting, in part because two preschools opened after the Sept. 30 reporting deadline.

Huntington said the actual number is about 750, which is healthy in part

The Alliance of Mission District Catholic Schools, a consortium of five K-8 schools in San Francisco’s Mission District, has received a $15,000 grant from the Joseph R. McMicking Foundation. The grant puts the alliance closer to its goal of matching a $45,000 grant from the Crescent Porter Hale Foundation. The campaign, which has raised $22,500 so far, continues until Dec. 31. For more information contact Gustavo Torres, grant writer/development officer at the alliance at (415) 614-5546, ext. 11, or gtorres@ missiondolores.org.

because tuition is relatively high, on average approximately $1,000 per month.

Otherwise, the archdiocese said the Catholic-to-non-Catholic split among students remains around 80 to 20 percent. Some schools, like St. Raphael in San Rafael, where it’s 92 percent Catholic, have even greater splits.

Ethnicity in elementary schools is 59 percent white; 20 percent Asian; 17 percent multiracial; 1 percent Native American and 2 percent African-American. In high schools it is 55 percent white; 19 percent Asian; 21 percent multiracial; 4 percent African-American, and 1 percent Pacific-Islander. (Hispanic is now a cultural designation.)

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4 ON THE STREET WHERE YOU LIVE

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

Many hands make this ‘the most wonderful time of the year’ TOM BURKE CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

St. Mary’s Hospital Auxiliary raised more than $11,000 at a three-day holiday boutique in November. “The members of the auxiliary boutique committee work all year making handcrafted items to sell,” said Arlene Fife, a longtime auxiliary member as well as a St. Mary Medical Center’s Mary former principal of Poppingo and boutique chief Our Lady of Mercy Pauline McArdle School, Daly City. An event raffle found winners for 45-yard-line 49er tickets and a silent auction found winning bids for items including San Francisco Opera tickets and San Francisco Giants tickets. Proceeds benefit the new Women’s Health Center at St. Mary’s. Boutique committee members included Vikki Murphy, Anita Fernandes, Mary Perata, Anne Hoehner, Ellenann Hughes, Doris Gibson, Cecilia Bermunez and Pauline McArdle.

REMEMBERING OTHERS: Charity was at the heart of Halloween and Thanksgiving at Notre Dame School in Belmont as students reached out to the less fortunate. A food drive managed by the fifth grade, Trick or Treat So All Can Eat, sent more than 1,800 pounds of food to families helped by the St. Vincent de Paul Society of San Mateo County. The campaign is an annual tradition at Notre Dame and benefits St. Vincent de Paul Homeless Help Centers of South San Francisco and San Mateo. In Cassandra Chen November, students held a $5 Drive to benefit victims of Hurricane Sandy raising more than $1,200 for the American Red Cross and efforts on the East Coast. “These events give students an opportunity to form a lifelong dedication to community service and develop compassion for those in need,” said school media person, Kristine Coon.

GENEROUS RESPONSE: San Francisco’s St. James School Student Council members sponsored a bake sale to raise funds to help people impacted

by Hurricane Sandy raising almost $400. Student Council members donated the baked goods and sold them at recess. Among those pitching in were students Gianni Martinez and Francisco Vega and Dominican Sister Elizabeth Lee, an instructional assistant at the school.

LONG-ARMED OUTREACH: The St. Vincent de Paul Society of San Mateo County has pulled out all

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REUNION: St. Matthew School class of 1962 gathered October 27 to mark the 50th anniversary of their grammar school graduation.

Classmates traveled from as far away as Missouri, Texas, Colorado, Oregon and Nevada to join in the festivities. Pictured from left, are Tom Prussing, Angela Harrington Norton, Patti Hopkins and Jamie Casey. Patti’s children are all St. Matt’s grads and her granddaughter, Emma Sperry, is now a fifth grader there.

“We give the holiday socks at Christmas time and on New Year’s Eve as a New Year gift to our homeless guests along with a special meal,” said SVdP media person Jodie Penner. At Thanksgiving and Christmas, St. Gregory Parish and in particular its confirmation candidates gather donations and put together gift baskets for distribution by St. Francis of Assisi SVdP conference in East Palo Alto. During Christmas week, the SVdP Homeless Help Center in San Mateo serves a full Christmas meal with dessert for about 170 people. They also host an annual Christmas Giving Tree. “For most of our guests it will be the only gift they receive and they look forward to it all year,” Jodie said. To donate or volunteer, contact Jodie at (650) 373-0622 or www.svdp-sanmateoco.org.

COME HOLY SPIRIT: San Francisco Auxiliary Bishop Robert W. McElroy confirmed 20 students from St. Rita School and religious education program Oct. 28 in the Fairfax church. St. Rita eighth grader Francesco Cico, pictured here with Bishop McElroy, was among those receiving the sacrament. stops in getting assistance to those in need. At St. Timothy Parish, San Mateo, more than 45 families had special Thanksgiving meals thanks to the parish SVdP conference and the generous donations of parishioners. Students and faculty at St. Timothy School helped fill the baskets through a food drive with many parishioners of all ages helping sort and pack donations, organize delivery lists and drive the bulging parcels to their destinations. This year, again, Nativity Parish put together holiday gift bags for homeless SVdP clients. Schools including Nativity School participate in a Holiday Sock program where new white tube socks are filled with wrapped candy, toiletries and goodies, and tied up with ribbon.

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ONE DAY GOES A LONG WAY: Students at Mercy High School, Burlingame did a Saturday of giving with the group My New Red Shoes, which gives new shoes, clothing, and school supplies to low-income children at the start of each school year. The gifts are wrapped in handmade bags and the Mercy, Burlingame students sewed 50 bags toward the organization’s goal of 5,000. The homemade bags communicate to the kids that there is a personal touch, thought, time, and energy behind the gift, said Mercy’s Jessica Mueller. Cards made by the volunteers that wish the kids good luck and positive thoughts on their first day of school are also in the bags. For more information on the effort, contact Becca Moos, becca@mynewredshoes.org or www.mynewredshoes.org.

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ARCHDIOCESE 5

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

Simbang Gabi begins Dec. 15 – Christmas novena growing in archdiocese A great way to prepare for Christmas is to participate in Simbang Gabi, the Filipino tradition of the Christmas novena that is well on its way to becoming an archdiocese-wide tradition, drawing Catholics without regard to ethnicity.

More than two dozen parishes in all three counties of the Archdiocese of San Francisco are participating in the novena, with both evening and early morning services available beginning Dec. 15 and ending the morning of Dec. 24. For more information on Simbang Gabi near you, go to catholic-sf.org.

The tradition of an early morning Mass followed by refreshments originated in the Philippines with the The parol, a starSpanish missionaries in shaped lantern, the 17th century, said Nellie symbolizes the Hizon, one of the organizChristmas star. ers and a parishioner at St. Stephen Parish. The morning novena of Masses begins Dec. 16 and ends Dec. 24. In an accommodation to modern life, the novena now also begins the evening of Dec. 15 and ends Dec. 23 in about half the churches.

Each Simbang Gabi celebration features the parol, a star-shaped lantern that symbolizes the Christmas star.

“When Simbang Gabi began at St. Stephen in 1996, there were only a few parishes celebrating the full nine days,” said Hizon. Today, Simbang Gabi has evolved into a multi-parish celebration with groups of parishes and different ethnic groups, including Burmese and Hispanics, collaborating and hosting the novena on different days, Hizon said.

“It is noteworthy that these collective efforts, the strong community involvement in Simbang Gabi, thrive and succeed amid a culture that values private practice of religion or worship,” said Hizon.

Thousands expected for Guadalupana pilgrimage the accounts of GuadaThe annual Guadalupana lupe, sensitively written pilgrimage venerating Our and steeped in tenderness.

Lady of Guadalupe takes In them the Virgin Mary, place Dec. 8, with marchers the handmaid ‘who glorigathering at 5 a.m. at All fied the Lord’ (Luke 1:46), Souls Church, South San reveals herself to Juan Francisco.

Diego as the mother of the Marchers will pray the true God. As a sign, she rosary along the 12-mile gives him precious roses, route, stopping first at Holy and as he shows them to Cross Catholic Cemetery, the bishop, he discovers the Colma; then on to Holy blessed image of Our Lady Angels Church, Colma; imprinted on his tilma.”

St. John the Evangelist The pope said the event Church, San Francisco; and “meant the beginning finally St. Mary’s Catheof evangelization with a dral. vitality that surpassed all At the cathedral the expectations.” The word marchers will reenact Our (CNS PHOTO/MIKE CRUPI, CATHOLIC COURIER) Lady’s appearance to St. This digital image of Our Lady of Guadalupe is of Christ sent through his mother resonated with the Juan Diego near Mexico a reproduction of the image left on the tilma central elements of indigCity on Dec. 9, 1531. St. of St. Juan Diego in 1531. The traveling misJuan Diego, an indigenous sionary image was photographed in Pittsford, enous culture and gave the people the definitive means Mexican convert to CaN.Y., Oct. 28. of salvation, he said. tholicism, reported to the After the reenactment, church authorities that he the marchers will gather before the Our Lady received a miraculous gift of roses from the of Guadalupe sculpture in the cathedral and vision of a young girl he recognized as the then celebrate Mass at 2 p.m. with Auxiliary Blessed Virgin.

Bishop William J. Justice.

St. Juan Diego was canonized in 2002, the Cathedral parishioner Pedro Garcia, who first saint indigenous to the Americas. Pope founded the event with his wife Marta 18 years John Paul II called him “a simple, humble” ago, said the march is expected to draw thouman who accepted Christianity without giving sands of people. He said that in the past years up his identity as an Indian. participants have come from throughout CaliIn his canonization homily July 31, 2002, fornia, and from Mexico.

Pope John Paul II said, “It is moving to read

SAINT RITA CHURCH Advent 2012 Lecture Advancing the Second Vatican Council

SCRIPTURE SEARCH Gospel for December 9, 2012 Luke 3:1-6 Following is a word search based on the Gospel reading for the Second Sunday of Advent, Cycle C: the historical setting of John the Baptist. The words can be found in all directions in the puzzle.

REIGN TETRARCH ABILENE WORD ZECHARIAH REPENTANCE VOICE

CAESAR GALILEE PRIESTHOOD JOHN THE JORDAN WRITTEN PREPARE

JUDEA HIS BROTHER ANNAS SON OF BAPTISM BOOK SMOOTH

Cardinal William Levada, S.T.D. Archbishop Emeritus, Archdiocese of San Francisco Prefect Emeritus, Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith

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6 ARCHDIOCESE

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

CCCYO Season of Caring: Ruth’s story CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

For Ruth, a shy fourth grader, her greatest blessings are her mom and life itself.

Her greatest challenge is that she misses her dad. She is very sad and hopes he comes back soon.

The three were together until four years ago, when Ruth’s dad was deported. He had come to the U.S. from Mexico first to Atlanta 16 years ago and later moved to San Rafael, where he became a painter. He sent for Ruth’s mom, Fidela, and she joined him in 2000. In 2002, Ruth was born.

Ruth talks to her dad every day, sometimes twice a day. They usually talk for 20 to 30 minutes. “She still cries and misses her dad,�

Fidela said.

But it has not been possible to reunite the family.

Ruth’s dad has tried repeatedly to come back across the border but has failed every time, Ruth’s mom said.

One time, he was robbed and beaten and had to be hospitalized.

The family is trying to find legal way to reunite: Ruth’s dad is trying to get a visa.

Meanwhile, mother and daughter

~

18-40~

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have moved in with a family and share a room in order to save money and send some of it to Ruth’s dad so he can come back.

Fidela said they pray to God every day that Ruth’s dad will return. “God has kept him safe,� she said.

Fidela works in a taqueria and is the family’s sole provider. She said things are very difficult financially and she saves every penny she can.

Fidela has been able to maintain a stable home life in part because of the assistance of Canal Family Support Program in San Rafael, a project of Catholic Charities CYO in the Archdiocese of San Francisco.

Through program staff, Ruth and Fidela responded to questions emailed

by Catholic San Francisco.

Fidela initially contacted the program to find safe child care but found the service beneficial to Ruth in other ways too.

Ruth was initially struggling in school and was so shy that she had great difficulty making friends.

Through the program’s academic support and her own tenacity, Ruth’s school work has shown dramatic improvement, specifically in reading comprehension and math. Canal Family Support has provided Ruth’s family with broader support as well, including occasional food baskets collected in collaboration with local parishes.

Ruth has also been matched with a big sister through Big Brothers Big Sisters of the North Bay, which partners with CCCYO to provide on-site mentoring. Today Ruth is a blossoming fourth

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grader who looks forward to coming to the program each day. She has many friends and can be seen laughing, talking, playing and enjoying being a kid. She will stay in the program until fifth grade when she will successfully transition to middle school and an after-school program that will help her continue to flourish.

Fidela said the program has been a godsend for Ruth, who was very depressed before she became part of the group and began to make friends and do better in her school work. Fidela could not help Ruth with homework because she does not speak English. “She is doing better in school,� Fidela said. “She gets really anxious taking tests, and gets overwhelmed with sadness about the situation with her dad.�

Fidela said she prays that Ruth “will be smart, successful and have a beautiful life.�

Ruth is very affectionate and attentive and has a great heart, Fidela said. “She is a wonderful child,� she said. “Sometimes she looks serious and worries a lot.�

Ruth said she would like to be a teacher and have a family someday.

Ruth has made a lot of good friends and enjoys playing together on the play structures at school, outside and at each other’s houses. Her favorite activity is tetherball but she also likes checkers.

Ruth and her friends talk about how school is going, about games and about new apps for their phones.

SEE SEASON OF CARING, PAGE 7

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ARCHDIOCESE 7

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

SEASON OF CARING: Ruth’s story

Msgr Labib Kobti presents Holy Land Pilgrimage April 15-25, 2013 Visit holy sites of Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Nazareth, and Cana Float on the Dead Sea, sail on the Sea of Galilee, break bread and dance with local Christians

Ruth, left, is pictured at Catholic Charities CYO’s Canal Family Support Program’s Kids Club after-school program at the Pickleweed Park Community Center, San Rafael. Zully, another girl who attends the club, is on the right.

FROM PAGE 6

Ruth enjoys art activities and has asked for art supplies for Christmas.

For Christmas, Fidela plans a simple dinner with her daughter or with a close friend.

Ruth is excited about Christmas. She said she and her mom will go to church and then open presents. They will have a mole dinner that her mom will make, although her dad used to be the one to make the traditional dish.

Fidela said she feels much more comfortable knowing Ruth is in a safe place.

She said she is blessed to be part of the Canal Family Support Program’s Kids Club after-school program. “God bless Kids Club,” she said, adding that she tells her husband how much the service has helped them.

This is one in a series of Advent Catholic Charities CYO Season of Caring stories.

Catholic Charities CYO is making a difference in the lives of 35,000 abused and neglected children, homeless families, disabled adults, at-risk youth, and lonely seniors every year. For ways to help, visit cccyo.org/ seasonofcaring or call (415) 972-1291.

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8 NATIONAL

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

A goat for Christmas? Options for non-consumerist gifts PATRICIA ZAPOR

A movement started in the 1960s by Canadian Mennonites promotes the idea of a ‘Buy Nothing Christmas,’ encouraging simple handmade gifts, gift-able items to swap and ready-to-print coupons.

CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

WASHINGTON – Should the Christmas shopping crowds, costs and commercialism be at odds with how one is trying to observe Advent and the celebration of the birth of Christ, there’s a burgeoning world of alternative ways of gift-giving that are vying for attention.

– Angel trees or giving trees set up in churches, schools or even restaurants and other commercial businesses around the country are an increasingly popular way to direct resources to needy individuals, usually children, in the local community.

– About 500 Catholic organizations host sales of handicrafts from around the world through Catholic Relief Services and its partner, SERRV, a nonprofit fair trade and development organization, benefiting both the hosting church and impoverished craftspeople around the world.

– Then there are alternative gift programs, in which one buys a gift that benefits someone in greater need, whether in a far-off land or at the social service program across town. In return, the buyer receives just a card about the donation to pass along to someone on their gift list.

– If those options don’t seem quite right, a movement started in the 1960s by Canadian Mennonites promotes the idea of a “Buy Nothing Christmas,” encouraging simple handmade gifts, an “abundance swap” where gift-able items are traded, and ready-to-print coupons for babysitting, back massages or desserts. Its materials may be found at www.buynothingchristmas.org.

In Los Angeles, members of St. Paul the Apostle Parish have for more than a decade been able to write checks after Mass on the first Sunday of Advent to an assortment of local and national service organizations. Recipient organizations this year include Meals on Wheels, a tutoring program for homeless children and Homeboy Industries, which gives youths an alternative to gang involvement.

Claire Henning, pastoral associate at St. Paul, said parishioners who participate in what they call Inspired Alternative Christmas Gifts write checks directly to the organizations, so she couldn’t report what the level of donations works out to be for the recipient charities.

She personally donates money to Homeboy Industries, she told Catholic News Service, and sends gift cards noting the donation in their name to several people.

“People feel very positively about it,” she said.

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Parishioner Donald Sagristano selects paper ornaments from a Giving Tree at Sts. Philip & James Church in St. James, N.Y., Nov. 28. to nieces and nephews who are now grown up,” Henning said. “That generation is very appreciative of that kind of outreach.”

Such programs have caught on all around the country, with each parish creating its own options for gift-giving. But international organizations also offer an easy way to do it, through their websites.

How about donating money in the name of the brother-who-has-everything to ensure a program for children with Down syndrome in Cuba can keep operating? Catholic Relief Services, the U.S. bishops’ overseas relief and development agency, offers that as one of the alternative gifts one can support with a few clicks on its site, www.crs.org.

Or maybe this is the year to buy – in the name of that college-age niece who doesn’t need clothes but wants to save the world – a goat or a sheep for a struggling family in a developing country.

Save the Children, www.savethechildren.org, and Heifer International, www.heifer.org, are a few of the charities that would be happy to match your money with a family in need of a farm animal, knitting supplies or a clean cooking stove.

Save the Children and CRS also both offer sales of handicrafts made by the beneficiaries of their programs.

Courtney Lare, economic justice program officer at CRS, oversees CRS online direct sales and its Work of Human Hands consignment sales.

She said about 500 parishes and other organizations hold such sales once a year or more.

Fair trade coffee and chocolate are the biggest sellers, she said. “And Haitian wall art, especially since the earthquake, is very popular, as are Christian goods like olive-wood ornaments and Nativities.” Handicrafts are provided through SERRV and include everything from inexpensive jewelry and Christmas ornaments to hand-knotted Tibetan rugs and other home decor.

Although the weak economy has meant the

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number of participating groups hasn’t grown the past few years, Lare said sales are up. Sales range from about $600 for a first-time effort to the more than $40,000 a year that a parish in Ohio sells over a year, Lare said.

For charitable gifts that stay close to home, the angel tree or giving tree model is popular. For these, names of needy people and suggestions for gifts they could use are handed out in late November or early December, with the information often written on angel-shaped ornaments.

The gifts are returned to the church or a service agency, where volunteers distribute them to the recipients.

The angel trees benefiting a program run by Catholic Social Services of Baldwin County, Ala., are all over the county, said Colleen McNorton, Catholic Social Services director.

A local online newspaper, the Mullet Wrapper, advertised angel trees being hosted by restaurants in Gulf Shores and Orange Beach, for example.

“Usually they’re in churches, sometimes in schools,” McNorton said. “Oh, and the Grand Hotel in Point Clear.”

The range of locations will help the program give gifts to 5,200 Baldwin County children this year, she said. The population of Baldwin County, which is in the Mobile archdiocese, is about 186,000.

Families in need of help getting gifts for children register with Catholic Social Services, which screens for financial need, she said.

A squadron of more than 150 volunteers, along with the agency’s staff of 12, does the sorting and matching donations with requests, McNorton told CNS. “It’s a well-oiled machine,” she said of the operation based in a house-sized “Christmas building.” “It reminds me of a Santa’s workshop from a Christmas movie. The only thing missing is Santa’s workbench.”

And in a nod to the age of online shopping, the Archdiocese of Washington this year will provide gifts for about 490 children who receive services from Catholic Charities, many through an online arrangement that works like a gift registry.

Jackie Ogg, outreach director, said the children who receive gifts are in various Catholic Charities programs, such as refugee resettlement, the Kennedy Institute for people with developmental disabilities and low-income housing.

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WORLD 9

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

Is capitalism Catholic? A priest defends the markets FRANCIS X. ROCCA CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

VATICAN CITY – Father Robert Sirico has been courting controversy for most of his adult life.

In the early 1970s, he was a radical activist in California, campaigning for left-wing causes with the likes of Jane Fonda and her then-husband, Tom Hayden. Later in the decade, he returned to the Catholic faith of his childhood and eventually became a priest.

But if he found inner peace, he did not cease stirring things up. He had, by then, discovered the works of Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek and other economists of the “Austrian school,” who expounded the virtues of free-market capitalism.

As Father Sirico recounts in a new book, “Defending the Free Market: The Moral Case for a Free Economy,” he concluded not only that the free market was the most efficient system for the distribution of resources and their transformation by human creativity; he also decided that capitalism was essentially compatible with the principles of justice, peace and charity in Catholic social teaching.

That belief was and remains unconventional within the church, and it has earned Father Sirico, 61, and his Michigan-based think tank, the Acton Institute, fervent fans and detractors.

At the U.S. bishops’ general assembly in November, Bishop Earl A. Boyea of Lansing, Mich., proposed that the committee on international justice and peace retain Acton as an expert consultant. But retired Archbishop Joseph A. Fiorenza of Galveston-Houston accused Acton of insufficient regard for the church’s social magisterium. The archbishop said Acton had dismissed the 1891 encyclical “Rerum Novarum,” and

Father Robert Sirico says white-collar workers now do not face the ‘savage capitalism’ of the 19th century, and applying principles of the church’s social teaching today is a matter of prudential judgment that allows for a range of legitimate approaches, including market-based solutions. particularly the document’s affirmation of workers’ right to unionize, as “time-framed” and “not applicable today.”

Father Sirico says Archbishop Fiorenza’s criticism was based on a misunderstanding of remarks the priest had made earlier in the year. “’Rerum Novarum’ is applicable today because it articulates timeless truths of the Catholic faith and the insight and the expertise that the church has into the human condition,” Father Sirico said, but “there are features of any encyclical that are bound by its historical context.” The document’s very title refers to “new things” in the period’s social and economic life that Pope Leo XIII wrote the encyclical to address, the priest said.

“The church consistently has taught that workers have a right to organize,” Father Sirico said, yet it does not follow that white-collar workers in 21st-century America face problems comparable to those of factory workers under late 19th-century “savage capitalism.”

That argument exemplifies Father Sirico’s more general insistence that applying principles of the church’s social teaching is a matter of prudential judgment, allowing for a range of legitimate approaches, including market-based solutions.

Father Sirico said he co-founded Acton in 1990 to “help bring sound

economics to good intentions,” a mission that includes advising theologians and religious leaders. Even with the best intentions, he said, “ignoring economic realities” can lead to the “unintended harm of other people.”

For instance, he argues, the church’s teaching that all people should have access to good health care does not necessarily translate into support for government health insurance. Making the government the main health care provider, he said, “cuts out the knowledge base (of) a competitive pricing market,” raising the costs of services.

Father Sirico also suggests that dangers to religious freedom – such as the Obama administration’s requirement that the health insurance plans of Catholic institutions cover contraception and sterilizations, in violation of the church’s moral teaching – are inherent in “welfare-state” social service programs under government control.

While not denying the moral failures of capitalism, Father Sirico cites Blessed John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI to argue that the “problem with capitalism is not the economic

system as such but the distorted values that may be present among actors in a market economy.”

“The church doesn’t uphold or endorse or canonize any economic model,” Father Sirico said, making it clear that in his own value system, faith trumps economic philosophy.

He calls the work of Ayn Rand, one of the most popular and influential proponents of free-market economics, a “false gospel” of “radical individualism.”

On the other hand, Father Sirico cheers the recent decision by the U.S. bishops to endorse the sainthood cause of Dorothy Day, whose holiness he finds manifest in her service to the poor and her reverence for the sacraments. Never mind that the founder of the Catholic Worker movement hardly shared his enthusiasm for the benefits of capitalism.

His arguments for a free-market economy and market-based approaches to social problems are not articles of faith, Father Sirico says, but merely contributions to the church’s larger effort to serve the common good.

“What’s happening right now in the Catholic Church in the United States, and to some extent around the world, is that there is a new way to speak about Catholic social teaching, and that’s exactly what Catholic social teaching allows us to do,” he said.

“On issues of life, on issues of marriage, those are critical nonnegotiables,” he said. “On the other questions, you see bishops, you see laypeople, you see academicians having this vibrant debate.”

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10 WORLD

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

TWEETING POPE REACHES OUT TO NEW KIND OF FOLLOWERS

VATICAN CITY – To celebrate the launch of his new Twitter account, Pope Benedict XVI will tweet the answers to a handful of questions in a rare question-andanswer exchange on the social media site.

Starting Dec. 12, the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the pope will send messages in eight languages, including Arabic, from eight different Twitter accounts. The pope’s Twitter account @Pontifex is the English feed while the other language accounts use an extension of the main handle. For example, the Spanish feed is @ Pontifex_es.

The pope’s first tweets will respond to four or five questions about the faith sent on Twitter via the hashtag #askpontifex. The first question came in during the news conference announcing the initiative. It was in Spanish and asked: “What is the core of the message of the Gospel and how can we help to share it?”

The Q-and-A exchange will be offered just once, and the rest of the news feeds will excerpt general audience talks, Angelus addresses or other important speeches. Each tweet will be crafted by a Vatican official and the pope will approve each one. Even though he won’t be sending the tweets, the messages “are pearls of wisdom coming from the heart of the pope’s teaching and coming from his own mind and ideas,” said Msgr. Paul Tighe, secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. ©CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

Irish bishop, pro-lifers fear abortion may widen MICHAEL KELLY CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

DUBLIN – An Irish bishop and pro-life activists insisted that any legislation to provide abortion in limited situations would inevitably lead to widespread abortion.

“If abortion is introduced, even on a very limited basis, it becomes widespread,” Bishop William Murphy of Kerry said during a radio interview Nov. 29.

Days earlier, Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny promised “swift action” after a report by a study group recommended that the government introduce legislation to provide for abortion in limited circumstances.

In practice, abortion is illegal in Ireland. However, a controversial 1992 Supreme Court judgment – known as the X case – found that there is a constitutional right to abortion where there is a substantial risk to the life of the mother, including the risk of suicide, up to birth.

Six successive governments have not acted on the issue. However, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2010 that Ireland must clarify when women can access abortion under the 1992 ruling.

The expert group was charged in January with advising the government in response to the European Court ruling.

The Pro Life Campaign, Ireland’s largest pro-life lobby, has said that it does not support legislation or statutory regulations on abortion in line with the expert group report.

Cora Sherlock, the campaign’s deputy chairwoman, described the

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1992 Supreme Court decision as “deeply flawed.”

Instead, the Pro Life Campaign is advocating for guidelines for medical professionals to consider.

She said the organization consistently has supported women receiving the medical treatment needed during pregnancy as well as for practical steps to protect the life of the unborn child.

“On the one hand, Ireland’s Prime you have abortion Minister Enda where there is never Kenny an intention to save the life of the baby,” she said. “The only intention is to end the life of the baby, and there’s no treatment being given to the mother.

“On the other hand, you have medical treatment which may have the unwanted side effect of ending the life of the unborn child. But that is an unwanted side effect. It is not something that anyone wishes for, and it is deeply regretted when it happens.

“That is what the majority of people in this country have said in consistent independent opinion polls that they support, and that will not be achieved through legislation or regulation,” Sherlock said.

Ireland has been gripped by the issue of abortion in recent weeks after a 31-year-old woman, Savita Halapanavar, died while being treated for a miscarriage. Her husband claims that she was denied the termination of her pregnancy because of Ireland’s ban on abortion and the decision led to her death.

However, medical professionals have pointed out that current Irish law allows for intervention to save the life of a mother even if it results in the unavoidable and unintentional death of an unborn child.

In his radio interview, Bishop Murphy accused campaigners seeking to legalize abortion of attempting to “hijack” the tragedy.

“The suggestion that, because of this country’s pro-life ethos, pregnant women are denied medical treatment is simply not true,” he said.

The bishop warned that if the government adopted legislation based on the results of the X case, unlimited access to abortion would be introduced to Ireland.

“That will be the crack in the dam or the beginning of the slippery slope,” he added.

Pro-life activists want the government to move to overturn the 1992 judgment.

“The most important option, not contained in the report, is to reverse the Supreme Court decision of 1992, which would allow for abortion up to birth,” said attorney Caroline Simons, who advises pro-life groups.

“If people do not want to introduce such an abortion regime in this country, this is the only political option, and it has to be confronted,” she told Catholic News Service.

Doing so would mean ultimately putting the question of overturning the X case to the people by way of a constitutional referendum.

Simons said she supports medical guidelines rather than legislation.

“These guidelines can explain the underlying principles of medical care in Ireland and, in particular, that women in pregnancy should receive all essential medical treatment needed to safeguard their lives, even where this unavoidably results in the death of the baby, but where the duty of care to preserve the life of the baby as far as practicable is also upheld,” she said.

“The X case is being presented by those who support abortion as very restrictive. The reality is that the X case does not provide for a duty of care to preserve the life of the baby in the course of medical interventions to safeguard the life of the mother,” she explained.

The issue is proving contentious for Kenny. Reports from a Nov. 28 meeting of senior leaders within his political party indicate that many legislators would defy the government and refuse to support an abortion law.

The Irish Parliament is planning to discuss the issue in January. A motion calling for legalized abortion, introduced by an independent member of Parliament, was expected to be defeated in a vote in late November.

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WORLD 11

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

Prefect: Reading council as break from tradition is heresy

POPE MAKES NEW RULES TO STRENGTHEN CHARITIES’ CATHOLIC IDENTITY

VATICAN CITY – Warning that Catholic charitable activity must not become “just another form of organized social assistance,” Pope Benedict XVI issued new rules to strengthen the religious identity of Catholic charities and ensure that their activities conform to church teaching.

Released Dec. 1, the pope’s apostolic letter on the “service of charity,” issued “motu proprio” (on his own initiative), directs bishops in overseeing charitable works in their dioceses.

Charities approved by the church or supported by church funds “are required to follow Catholic principles in their activity and they may not accept commitments which could in any way affect the observance of those principles,” the pope wrote.

The staff members of such charities must therefore “share, or at least respect, the Catholic identity” of their agencies, and exemplify “Christian life” and faith. Bishops are to provide these employees with “theological and pastoral formation” through special courses and “suitable aids to the spiritual life.”

To ensure that charitable agencies reflect “Christian simplicity of life,” each bishop is to set their salaries and expenses at levels “in due proportion to analogous expenses of his diocesan curia.”

Catholic charities are forbidden to “receive financial support from groups or institutions that pursue ends contrary to the church’s teaching,” or to “accept contributions for initiatives whose ends, or the means used to pursue them, are not in conformity with the church’s teaching.”

When “the activity of a particular charitable agency is no longer being carried out in conformity with the church’s teaching,” the pope wrote, the responsible bishop must inform his flock and “prohibit that agency from using the name ‘Catholic.’”

The document is the Vatican’s latest measure aimed at reinforcing the religious identity of Catholic institutions. In May 2012, the Vatican issued rules strengthening its control over Caritas Internationalis, a confederation of 164 Catholic relief, development and social service agencies around the world, including Catholic Relief Services in the United States.

In the letter, the pope praised Caritas for its “generous and consistent witness of faith and its concrete ability to respond to the needs of the poor.”

CAROL GLATZ CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

VATICAN CITY – Traditionalist and progressive camps that see the Second Vatican Council as breaking with the truth both espouse a “heretical interpretation” of the council and its aims, said the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

What Pope Benedict XVI has termed “the hermeneutic of reform, of renewal in continuity” is the “only possible interpretation according to the principles of Catholic theology,” Archbishop Gerhard Muller said in remarks published Nov. 29.

“Outside this sole orthodox interpretation unfortunately exists a heretical interpretation, that is, a hermeneutic of rupture, (found) both on the progressive front and on the traditionalist” side, the archbishop said.

What the two camps have in common, he said, is their rejection of the council: “the progressives in their wanting to leave it behind, as if it were a season to abandon in order to get to another church, and the traditionalists in their not wanting to get there,” seeing the council as a Catholic “winter.”

A “council presided over by the successor of Peter as head of the visible church” is the “highest expression” of the Magisterium, he said, to be regarded as part of “an indissoluble whole,” along with Scripture and 2,000 years of tradition.

The doctrinal chief ’s remarks were published in the Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, to present the seventh volume of “The Complete Works of Joseph Ratzinger.” The volume collects both published and unpublished notes, speeches, interviews and texts written or given by the future pope in the period shortly before, during and just after Vatican II. Archbishop Muller specified that by “continuity” Pope Benedict meant a “permanent correspondence with the origin, not an adaption of whatever has been, which also can lead the wrong way.”

©CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE

Progressives reject the council ‘in their wanting to leave it behind’ and traditionalists ‘in their not wanting to get there.’

ARCHBISHOP GERHARD MULLER The term “aggiornamento” or updating – one of the watchwords of the council – “does not mean the secularization of the faith, which would lead to its dissolution,” but a “making present” of the message of Jesus Christ, he said.

This “making present” is the “reform necessary for every era in constant fidelity to the whole Christ,” he said.

“The tradition of apostolic origin continues in the church with help from the Holy Spirit,” he said, and leads to greater understanding through contemplation and study, intelligence garnered from a deeper experience of the spiritual, and preaching by those who through the “apostolic succession have received an assured charism of truth.”

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12 WORLD

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

In eastern Congo, citizens remain on run, terrified CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

KINSHASA, Congo – As Congolese rebels initiated what appeared to be a partial withdrawal from the city of Goma, a Catholic organization said the region’s civilians remained either on the run or terrified that their community would be the next target for a rebel attack.

“We abandoned our homes unable to bring food with us. We fled into the forest with only one objective in mind, our safety. And we don’t have any idea of when or how we will return home,” a Congolese identified by a pseudonym, Paluku, told Jesuit Refugee Service.

Paluku fled his home in Masisi, northwest of Goma, Nov. 25 following the outbreak of fighting between the Congolese army and an ethnic Mai-Mai militia group; he currently is in hiding.

“We don’t have anything to eat or drink. Above all, the women and children are in a state of shock. And we don’t have any idea of when we’ll finally have peace,” Paluku was quoted as saying. “Today we fled from the Mai-Mai militias; tomorrow it may be from M23.”

JRS has reported that the Mai-Mai rebels have aligned themselves with M23 rebels in eastern Congo. On Nov. 25, intense fighting with government troops forced JRS to suspend services in Masisi.

“When we heard gunfire, we witnessed the mass flight of the population of Masisi. In the beginning, many sought safety in the parish, then they began fleeing toward Nyabiondo. People had a look of fear in their eyes,” a staff member was quoted as saying on the JRS blog.

The current crisis provoked a declaration of “profound concern” and shock and indignation from presidents of African bishops’ conferences and presidents of African Caritas organizations, gathered at a Caritas Internationalis meeting in Kinshasa Nov. 22. The bishops called for respect of the whole Congolese national territory and for an end to the illegal exploitation of natural resources, citing this as “the main cause of this war.”

Humanitarian agency sources reported that since the M23 rebellion started last April – when ethnic Tutsi members rebelled against the Congolese army, backed by neighboring Rwanda – some 650,000 civilians have been forced to flee their homes. Congo’s bishops have called for an end to “balkanization” of the Congo, referring to interference from neighboring countries such as Rwanda and Uganda.

(CNS PHOTO/GORAN TOMASEVIC, REUTERS)

A woman walks with fighters as Congolese rebels prepare to withdraw from Mushake, near Goma, Congo, Nov. 28. As rebels initiated their partial withdrawal, Catholic organizations said the region’s civilians remained either on the run or terrified that their community would be the next target for a rebel attack.

The presidents of the African bishops’ conferences called for an end to the illegal exploitation of natural resources, citing this as ‘the main cause of this war.’

A coalition of Canadian nongovernmental organizations that work in Congo called for new strategies in the country, citing the boldness of rebels and the failure of the army to restore order. Included in the coalition were the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace; l’Entraide Missionnaire, a group founded by Catholic missionaries; Carrefour Foi et Spiritualite Bordeaux-Cartierville, a Catholic resource center; the ecumenical organization Kairos; and the United Church of Canada.

The coalition said that, given the U.N.-documented meddling of Rwanda and Uganda in the crisis, Canada should review its bilateral relations with these countries and impose sanctions against these governments for their support of this movement.

The organizations also called on Canada to demand

a cease-fire and respect for humanitarian law from all parties and to deliver humanitarian assistance to the displaced.

A representative of Development and Peace, Serge Blais, interviewed on Radio Canada Nov. 25, said that the current situation is a result of policies that were at best misguided in the integration of former rebels into the Congolese army and the failure to try to bring to justice war criminals. The ethnic Tutsis who currently make up the M23 rebel group are mainly members of Laurent Nkunda’s National Congress for the Defense of the People, which launched an uprising in North Kivu in 2008.

Analysts say that the rebels used their integration into the Congolese army to consolidate their hold over North Kivu, with the backing of Rwanda.

Several Congolese human rights and women’s organizations have spoken out since the most recent outbreak of hostilities. A network of various Christian-inspired human rights organizations called on the U.N. Security Council to prosecute all warlords responsible for crimes of genocide who are hiding in Rwanda and Uganda and asked all humanitarian agencies to respond to the current crisis in an appropriate way.

In West Bank, Palestinians see UN vote as positive step JUDITH SUDILOVSKY CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

JERUSALEM – In the West Bank, church bells rang at the midnight announcement that the U.N. General Assembly had voted to grant Palestinians observer status.

Young and old Catholic Palestinians joined others in Ramallah, where the announcement was celebrated into the wee hours of the morning.

“We were very happy when this announcement was made,” said Father Firas Aridah, whose Jifna village parish is 5 miles from Ramallah. “We saw that our dignity may be hurt, but it will be healed.

We are not abandoned. People are with us. We have rights just like everyone else, and we can live in calm and peace.”

At last, he told Catholic News Service Nov. 30, Palestinians were seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

Father Aridah said Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ U.N. victory, just weeks after clashes between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, was very important for the Palestinian leader, demonstrating that he could unite his people without resorting to violence.

“Gaza was celebrating with us. Everyone can now look to President Abbas as the one who will unify Gaza and the West Bank, and they know that he did not use guns (to achieve the vote), he used diplomacy and peaceful demonstrations,” said Father Aridah.

In a Nov. 30 statement, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which includes churches in Israel and the Palestinian territories, described the U.N. vote as “an incentive for peace” that marked a “significant shift to meet the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians.” The patriarchate congratulated Abbas, calling him a “moderate man and a man of peace.”

Bernard Sabella, a Catholic member of the Pales-

(CNS PHOTO/MARKO DJURICA, REUTERS)

A Palestinian man reacts during a rally in the West Bank city of Ramallah Nov. 29. The U.N. General Assembly approved a resolution Nov. 29 to grant Palestine observer status, implicitly recognizing a Palestinian state. tinian Parliament and retired professor of sociology at Bethlehem University, said the U.N. vote could herald “some more serious thinking on the part of Israel” regarding Palestinian-Israeli negotiations.

“It is not enough for us Palestinians to celebrate and be happy about it, there are also the Israelis (to consider),” he said.

Though the vote left him feeling “a little optimistic,” he said it remained to be seen what would happen following the Israeli elections in January.

Observers predict the election of a right-wing government.

Sabella said although the strong vote served to boost Abbas’ standing among Palestinians – who had lost some respect for him because of the stagnation in the negotiations with Israel – its overall ramifications remained uncertain.

“We have to wait and see if President Abbas will

go to Gaza when he returns from New York and really put the reunification effort into effect. That is the real hope and expectation,” he said.

Abbas leads Fatah, which controls the West Bank. Rival Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in 2007 following its Palestinian legislative election victory in 2006. Hamas initially formed a national unity government with Fatah. Following a week of internal fighting in which it is estimated that at least 118 people were killed and more than 550 were wounded, Hamas took control of Gaza, expelling Fatah officials. The rift has plagued the Palestinians ever since.

Sabella praised Abbas for mentioning Gaza specifically in his speech at the U.N., in effect sending a message to Gazans and others that he was there as their representative to also speak about their pain.

The U.N. vote was also significant in that it indicates an international interest in supporting a “pragmatic Palestinian leadership,” Sabella said.

“The international community is saying something that everyone is seeing, which is (the need for) a twostate solution, and Israel is refusing to see that.”

In an interview with Vatican Radio, Franciscan Father Pierbattista Pizzaballa, custos of the Holy Land, said that “even the Israelis, the majority of them, at least according to the polls that I’ve read in the newspapers, took this step for granted, and they don’t see it so negatively, like the Israeli government is.”

“Everybody is aware that the solution of two peoples and two states, as complicated as it is, is the right path that needs to be taken. And the sooner begun the better it will be,” he said.

Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal told Vatican Radio the U.N. vote was “a step forward.”

“We mustn’t be afraid,” he added. “We have to overcome this mutual mistrust and say: We can live in peace, two states, side by side, like the Holy Father has called for more than once.”

FROM THE FRONT 13

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

POPE: Moral force FROM PAGE 1

(PHOTO BY VALERIE SCHMALZ/CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO)

Larry Purcell, executive director of Redwood City Catholic Worker House, where he has been for nearly 40 years, is pictured with volunteers Aida Figueroa and Susan Crane. Crane recently served a 15-month prison sentence after cutting through the fence of a naval base in Washington state to protest U.S. nuclear arms policy.

DAY: Followers have mixed views on sainthood

the saint I believe she was, not because it matters to Dorothy Day but because it will help to amplify and spread her message and show us how to live more “She dedicated her life to aiding and advocating faithfully the radical message of Jesus,” said Ellsfor the poor, leading a life characterized by volunberg, who edited “The Duty of Delight: The Diaries tary poverty, works of mercy and Scripture,” said Cardinal Dolan, “Her life, of course, like Saul on the of Dorothy Day” (Image Books, 2008).

“What was so distinctive about her, what was so road to Damascus, was radically changed when she different from everyone else was how outspoken became introduced to Jesus Christ and his church.” and courageous she was in defending life in all the Before her conversion to Catholicism, Day had ways it is threatened and violated by and large by had an abortion, a common-law marriage, and a most Catholics,” Ellsberg said in a telephone interchild out of wedlock. In 1932, Day met Frenchman view from upstate New York. immigrant and former Christian Brother Peter But some Catholic Worker volunteers say they are Maurin, who proposed they found the Catholic worried that the canWorker newspaper. Its onization process will philosophy of pacifism, mean her life story will voluntary poverty , be hijacked for a pro-life decentralized economconservative agenda. “I ics based on ethical think they’ll focus just treatment of the worker, on parts of her, focus care for the poor, and maybe on Dorothy Day small-hold property as this pro-life icon,” ownership quickly took said Peter Stiehler, who concrete form with with his wife founded Catholic Worker hospithe San Bruno Catholic tality houses and farmWorker House 17 years ing communes. Today ago.

Catholic Worker houses “What we are trying number about 200 and to do here is to follow the Catholic Worker the example of Dorothy newspaper still sells for ROBERT ELLSBERG Day in service to the a penny.

Editor ‘The Duty of Delight: The Diaries of Dorothy Day’ poor and we think that After her converthe church’s position is sion, Day “became an clear on pro-life issues apostle – an icon – of and that they don’t need everything wrong with Dorothy for that,” said what she did before Eric DeDode of the and of everything right Kelly Avenue Half Moon about the dignity of the Bay Catholic Worker human person and the House. “What they need sanctity of human life,” Dorothy for is her nonCardinal Dolan said. violent peacemaking, Day, who died Nov. 29, her support for ending 1980, was arrested many war, and her support times for civil disobedifor economic justice for ence. She was jailed in ERIC DEDODE those who struggle.”

1917 for demonstrating Kelly Avenue Half Moon Bay Catholic Worker House Ellsberg said Day before the White House completely supported the church’s teaching of the for women’s right to vote, refused to participate in sanctity of human life from conception to natural civil defense drills during the Cold War and was death, but kept her own abortion private so it would last jailed at age 75 for demonstrating with the farm be “a kind of exploitation” to make that the most workers. salient fact of her story.

Day was a devout Catholic who attended Mass “She certainly supported church teaching on daily, discussed her practice of frequent confesabortion and it was not a major theme in American sion and the disarray caused by sexual immorality society or in the church until the last decade or so in her diaries. She fasted for peace at the Second of her life,” said Ellsberg, saying she signed a letter Vatican Council. protesting the legalization of abortion. “She felt she She was one of two Americans chosen to receive had a comprehensive pro-life position.”

Eucharist from Pope Paul VI in 1967 during her a “Her whole life was affirming life. She would agree visit to Rome to participate in the International with Cardinal (Joseph) Bernardin who spoke about Congress of the Laity. the seamless garment approach to the affirmation Orbis Books editor Robert Ellsberg, who met of life,” said Ellsberg. “If that were really widely acDay when he was 19, and is viewed as the foremost cepted or characteristic of the church’s prolife activcontemporary literary expert on Day, backed New ity and message, I think that Dorothy Day would be York Cardinal John O’Connor when he proposed a very appropriate icon for that message.” her sainthood cause originally. Day was declared a Servant of God by Blessed John Paul II in 2000, Catholic News Agency and Catholic News Service opening her sainthood cause. contributed to this article.

“I am all in favor of recognizing Dorothy Day as FROM PAGE 1

‘I am all in favor of recognizing Dorothy Day as the saint I believe she was, not because it matters to Dorothy Day but because it will help to amplify and spread her message and show us how to live more faithfully the radical message of Jesus.’

‘What we are trying to do here is to follow the example of Dorothy Day in service to the poor and we think that the church’s position is clear on pro-life issues and that they don’t need Dorothy for that.’

political recommendations, Pope Benedict said in his address.

Yet the pope stipulated that the proposed body would not be a “superpower, concentrated in the hands of a few, which would dominate all peoples, exploiting the weakest.” The authority in question, he said, “must be understood, first and foremost, as a moral force, a power to influence in accordance with reason, that is, a participatory authority, limited by law in its jurisdiction.”

The council’s president, Cardinal Peter Turkson, told Vatican Radio that the agenda for the plenary session would include the topic of global financial governance as a response to the world financial crisis.

In October 2011, the council called for establishment of a “central world bank” to regulate the global financial industry and the international money supply as a step toward the world authority envisioned

by Blessed John and Pope Benedict.

Pope Benedict’s address also touched on threats to human dignity from different forms of materialism in contemporary culture.

“The man of today is considered primarily from a biological point of view, or as ‘human capital,’ a ‘resource,’ a cog in a productive and financial machine that dominates him,” the pope said.

“New ideologies – such as the hedonistic and egoistic one of sexual and reproductive rights, or that of a disorderly financial capitalism that transgresses politics and dismantles the real economy – contribute to make the employee and his work seem ‘minor’ goods and to undermine the natural foundations of society, especially the family,” he said.

PILLAI: Inspired by Job FROM PAGE 1

Service Dec. 3, a day after 400,000 people attended the beatification ceremony in Nagercoil, in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.

“It was a wonderful event and the people were really excited,” the bishop said.

Cardinal Angelo Amato, prefect of the Congregation for the Saints’ Causes, presided during the ceremony.

Father Antony Gabriel, vice postulator of the canonization process, described Blessed Pillai as a “true martyr.”

Born in an upper-caste family in 1712 and named Neelakandan, Blessed Pillai became a trusted soldier of the Hindu king, but later incurred his wrath for embracing Christianity. While incarcerated, Blessed Pillai shared his woes and frustration with Eustachius Benedictus de Lannoy, a Dutch Catholic military officer who had been imprisoned following the war between the Dutch East India Company and the Indian state of Travancore, Father Gabriel explained.

De Lannoy narrated the biblical story of Job to his prison mate, after which Blessed Pillai began reading the Bible.

When Blessed Pillai approached Catholic officials asking to embrace Christianity, church officials were “hesitant and discouraged him,” Father Gabriel said.

“Because he (Pillai) was a royal official, they feared that this might anger the (Hindu) king,” he explained.

Blessed Pillai persisted, however, and was baptized in May 1745. He was given the name Devasahayam, a Tamil rendering of the biblical name Lazar, meaning “God has helped.” He began preaching and converted his wife and others.

“This made the Brahmins (upper-caste priestly class) angry, and the chief of army also conspired against him,” Father Gabriel said.

In 1749, Blessed Pillai was arrested again and was sentenced to death. However, just before he was sent to the gallows, the Hindu king canceled the execution order. Blessed Pillai remained imprisoned for three more years, enduring torture and public beatings and ridicule for refusing to renounce his faith.

“Meanwhile, people had noticed his strong faith and started becoming Christians,” Father Gabriel said.

“That was why he was secretly taken to a jungle and shot dead.”

While his body was thrown into the jungle 11 miles from Nagercoil, Christians later discovered his remains and buried them in front of the altar in St. Francis Xavier Church, now the Kottar diocesan cathedral.

14 OPINION

At bishops’ meeting, a needed debate over economic justice

S

trong, vigorous debates are good and necessary.

Without intelligent, open-minded debate from time to time, groups risk becoming narrowminded, passionless and even wrong.

Bold, respectful debate over serious issues, can bring clear vision and passionate action to the mission of any wellmeaning organization. And that is especially true for the Catholic Church.

From its very beginning the church has been debating. In its earliest years, there was a hotly debated issue over whether or not Gentile conTONY MAGLIANO verts to Christianity needed to observe the Mosaic Law – including male circumcision. Finally, the apostles and other church leaders at the Council of Jerusalem decided that such observance was largely unnecessary.

If those Christian forces pushing for Gentile male circumcision had not been successfully challenged with passionate debate, church membership would have been far less appealing, especially to most Gentile males.

Unfortunately, today the necessary art of debate is largely ignored. It’s as though most people would rather accept an easy, shallow “peace,” instead of engaging in the hard work of deep prayer, serious study and respectful debate which is necessary for the development of genuine unity and true peace.

At their recent meeting (Nov. 12-15) in Baltimore, the U.S. Catholic bishops engaged in a rare event: a heated debate.

The debate was over a proposed document on the economy titled “The Hope of the Gospel in Difficult Economic Times.”

Many of the older bishops who were involved with the highly challenging and prophetic 1986 pastoral letter “Economic Justice for All: Catholic Social Teaching and the U.S. Economy” voiced strong opposition to the proposed newer and far weaker document.

They criticized its failure to make a strong connection with 120 years of Catholic social teaching – including “Economic Justice for All” which teaches that “All human beings, therefore, are ends to be served by the institutions that make up the economy, not means to be exploited for more narrowly defined goals.”

Also of concern to many of the more seasoned bishops was that the new document failed to address the root causes of economic injustice like greed in the lending industry, the government’s refusal to regulate financial institutions, the lack of tax fairness, increased middle class burdens and heartless huge congressional budget cuts to programs aiding the domestic and global poor.

That the U.S. bishops engaged in intense debate was actually a positive sign that they were struggling – like all committed believers – to gain a fuller understanding of the will of God. The global economy is a mess. And countless people are hurting. But even before this Great Recession, 1.4 billion fellow human beings were struggling to survive in extreme poverty, largely because uncontrolled capitalism overwhelmingly serves the rich and breeds selfishness.

The world’s suffering masses need the bishops to take the lead in strongly and prophetically proclaiming a message of economic justice for everyone, especially for the poor.

And then the rest of us, along with the bishops, need to boldly put that message into action.

The bishops’ debate and rejection of a watereddown economic statement is over.

Now is the time for bishops, parishioners, students and all concerned to take the debate to that still highly relevant and powerful document “Economic Justice for All,” which challenges us to accept that “The time has come for a new American experiment – to implement economic rights, to broaden the sharing of economic power and to make economic decisions more accountable to the common good.”

MAGLIANO is an internationally syndicated social justice and peace columnist.

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

LETTERS What is to be feared from discussion?

I have to wonder what is going on in our church.

We teach that primacy of conscience, assuming always that one has an informed conscience, is to be respected to the point that we are obligated to follow our conscience, even if we might be wrong.

So, here we have Father Roy Bourgeois, a faithful Maryknoll priest these last 45 years, who has served God’s people in the missions, been jailed and tortured for standing up for human rights and religious freedom, and then came back to found School of the Americas Watch, calling for an end to U.S. sponsorship of terrorism in Latin America. Sounds pretty solid, don’t you think?

So, Father Roy came to the conclusion that, as a matter of conscience, he needed to speak out in favor of the ordination of women, despite the “curious” statement by Pope John Paul II that even the discussion of that issue was “grounds for excommunication.” When “discussion” of anything is forbidden, albeit things which are clearly immoral, I have to wonder what someone is afraid of. Scripture clearly states that the one sin which cannot be forgiven is “grieving the Holy Spirit” and I think said Holy Spirit might legitimately grieve that the hierarchy of our church is so closed to what might actually be intended to answer our serious clergy shortage: a call

by God for women in the priesthood (for which there is a clear precedent in the early church). So, despite our clear church teaching on the primacy of conscience, the hierarchy excommunicates and laicizes a priest who clearly loves the church, his priesthood and his people. They can hardly believe that he has an “uninformed” conscience. They must be terribly afraid.

Sue Malone Hayes San Francisco Editor’s note: Priestly ordination “has from the beginning always been reserved to men alone,” Pope John Paul II said in the 1994 apostolic letter “Ordinatio Sacredotalis.”

Letter falsely impugned Republicans Eugene Benson of Novato (Letters, Nov. 2) asks why Catholic San Francisco prints unsubstantiated charges that Republicans promote repugnant policies that are brutal to the poor. Here’s why: History shows that those who refuse to confront wrongdoing will falsely impugn those that do.

Publications that never opposed the Berlin Wall falsely impugned President Reagan as a dangerous warmonger. Those that never oppose a brutal dictator who murdered thousands of innocent men, women and children with chemical weapons of mass destruction and also proven to have a nascent nuclear program relentlessly impugned President Bush for liberating 31 million Iraqis, who then prudently executed the unrepentant murderer.

Likewise today Catholic publications fail to question welfare policies that perpetuate dehumanizing generational dependency on a godless government.

Instead they are quick to falsely impugn earnest Republican efforts to truly help the needy based on Judeo-Christian values that enhance God-given human dignity. CSF wrongly impugned Republicans by publishing a letter Oct. 19 that falsely called GOP efforts brutal to the poor.

Catholic San Francisco has greatly improved its format and content. Hopefully it will improve its policy for letters and publish this one.

Mike DeNunzio San Francisco The writer chairs the San Francisco Republican Assembly and was appointed a San Francisco Commissioner on Aging-Adult Services by three Democratic mayors.

Carrying out all the biblical injunctions In the Nov. 23 issue, you printed three letters that disagreed with (letter writer) David DeSantis’ mild dissent from our being tied to the Republican Party with its allied position against abortion (Nov. 16). This brings to mind an earlier letter from Don Farbstein (Oct. 5) in which he wrote, “Pro-life

means more than being against abortion. To be pro-life means consideration of the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness for each person. It means excellent and affordable health care, housing and education for all, jobs with fair wages and working conditions, a safety net for the needy, the elderly and veterans, fairness in taxation, regulation of safety in transportation, food, chemicals and the environment, regulation of corporations and financial institutions, and a humane treatment of our immigrants. In selecting a candidate or political party, Catholics need to consider all aspects of what constitutes being pro-life.”

While I respect the church position on abortion, I do so recognizing that there is no direct connection between that position and biblical injunctions. We do, however, have clear injunctions to be concerned for the poor, for widows, for children, and for those in ill health. We are also warned about accumulation of wealth. Let’s evaluate candidates for the harmony of their positions with ours in carrying out all the biblical injunctions.

Don Elliott San Mateo

We need more opinions, not fewer Virginia Hayes (Letters, Nov. 30) suggested George Weigel’s column is omitted from CSF because of his stance on unions.

Ann Coulter, a conservative author, was recently banned from speaking at Fordham University (a Catholic institution).

I hope you haven’t come to this politically correct censorship: Ms. Hayes suggested unions advertise with you, so that might be a motivation to drop his column?

Say it ain’t so.

A union saved my job when I first arrived in San Francisco in 1972, so I am eternally grateful.

Ms. Hayes said “never mind the distinction between public and private unions.” There is a huge difference between the two, namely in public collective bargaining; no one represents the taxpayers against the unions. Please don’t say public officials because they are elected through funds from the unions, in a vicious cycle. That is exactly what George Weigel wrote about in Wisconsin because the public pensions are unsustainable at their current levels. Ms. Hayes probably missed the election 50 miles south of us in San Jose, where the public pensions were changed just like they were in Wisconsin. Same thing in San Diego, and Stockton went bankrupt partly because of unfunded liabilities to pensions. Something has to change or we too will become a Greek tragedy, but “killing the messenger,” George Weigel, is not the answer.

We need more opinions, not fewer.

By the way, I now do research and development and subscribe to three different publications daily, CSF is still my favorite resource for inspiration and guidance.

Tom C. Johnson San Francisco

Let us observe a solemn, thoughtful Advent Catholic San Francisco’s recent comments on the coming of the Advent season were thoughtful and edifying. There is an old adage: Deeds speak louder than words. One would hope that pastors in their parishes and heads of Catholic institutions would have the good sense and desire to keep a solemn, thoughtful Advent, free of any Christmas celebrations. The wonderful season of Christmas begins with Midnight Mass and extends through Twelfth Day (Epiphany). It contains ample time for joyful Christmas parties and other celebrations of the birth of the savior.

Vivienne Beasley in a recent letter made a compelling point of the importance of signs – in her case, clerical collars – in keeping Christianity in the awareness of the public square. A clear reflection of the sense of the Advent and Christmas seasons would be such a sign.

Gordon M. Seely Belmont

LETTERS POLICY EMAIL letters.csf@sfarchdiocese.org WRITE Letters to the Editor, Catholic San Francisco, One Peter Yorke Way, San Francisco, CA 94109

NAME, address and daytime phone number for verification required SHORT letters preferred: 250 words or fewer

OPINION 15

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

The greatest meeting of all time

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ust a few weeks ago, we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council. Accordingly, there has been a good deal of commentary from historians, theologians and even from the handful of bishops and experts who actually participated in the council five decades ago. I was particularly struck by an observation made by Father John O’Malley, the Jesuit historian who penned, some years ago, an influential book called “What Happened at Vatican II?” The Second FATHER ROBERT Vatican Council, he said, BARRON was the largest meeting in the history of the world.

Indeed, some 2,600 people – bishops, theologians, observers and advisors – gathered for months-long sessions between 1962 and 1965; they were setting agendas, debating, arguing, voting and resolving. In a word, they did all the things that people typically do at business meetings.

‘Almost sacred importance’

I will confess that Father O’Malley’s insight produced quite an “aha!” moment in me. I came of age in the years just following Vatican II. I went to first grade in 1965, the year the council ended, and my Catholic formation and seminary training all took place from the early ‘70s to the mid-‘80s of the last century. This means that I was thoroughly immersed in a “Vatican II” culture. Now, one of the marks of that period of ecclesiastical history (and this is why Father O’Malley’s remark was so illuminating to me) was a preoccupation, even an obsession, with meetings. At the diocesan level, at the parish level, at seminaries, in regard to schools and hospitals, etc., Catholics met. As many have observed, bureaucracies burgeoned everywhere in the church after Vatican II, and what are bureaucracies but structures established to facilitate meetings? When I was a seminarian, I was

Listening, wondering, doubting and discussing were all appropriate during a conciliar meeting, but those activities were not necessarily helpful in the actual accomplishment of the church’s mission of declaring the lordship of Jesus. invited by the leaders of my home parish to get a taste of parish life. Did they send me to a soup kitchen, or into the school, or to the sacristy, or on a Communion call? No, they asked me to take the minutes at a meeting of the parish staff !

Father O’Malley helped me to see that, for the generation of church people that formed me, the defining event of their lives was indeed a giant meeting, and hence the meeting became for them something of almost sacred importance.

Meeting never an end in itself

Don’t get me wrong. I completely understand the importance, even the necessity, of meetings.

From time to time, every group or organization has to pause, gather, assess and discuss its work. Otherwise, it will not adequately fulfill its mission or purpose. A meeting is the matrix for this process, and hence the virtues of a meeting include open-mindedness, mutual respect, and honest dialogue. But a meeting is never an end in itself. Its purpose is to clarify mission and strategy so as to enable the members of an organization to return to their work with renewed vigor and focus. The open-mindedness and dialogue, which are indeed prime virtues of a meeting, are not necessarily the virtues attendant upon action. Would you expect the passionate sales representative for the Ford Motor Co. to be open to discussing the value of Toyota’s latest model with his customer? Would you expect a Catholic evangelist to be in an attitude

of wondering whether Christianity is really the best religion?

Post-meeting return to action

In an article explaining why he had quit the editorial board of the journal Concilium, whose stated purpose was the perpetuation of the spirit of Vatican II, Joseph Ratzinger said that it is not in the best interest of the church to perpetuate the spirit of any council. Only 20 times in its 2,000-year history, he wrote, has the Catholic Church held a council – and thereupon hangs a tale. Indeed, there have been key moments when the church had to pause and interrogate itself in regard to some basic matters of belief and practice. At the council of Jerusalem in the first century, for example, the nascent Christian community had to decide whether and how non-Jews could become followers of Jesus; at the Council of Nicea in the fourth century, the church had to determine, with some precision, just who Jesus is; at the Council of Trent in the 16th century, the church had to formulate a response to the powerful challenge offered by the Protestant reformers, etc. Those “meetings,” those gatherings during which the church paused, threw itself into question, and came to crucial determinations, were necessary. But it was, with a certain sigh of relief, that the Catholic community turned from those moments, for it was eager to get back to its basic work and form of life. Listening, dialoguing, wondering, doubting and discussing were all appropriate during a conciliar meeting, but those activities were not necessarily helpful in the actual accomplishment of the church’s mission of declaring the lordship of Jesus.

I think it is plausible to argue that the Vatican II generation was beguiled by the ethos and style of the greatest meeting in human history.

And this goes a long way toward explaining why that generation was compromised in its capacity to evangelize with confidence.

FATHER BARRON is the founder of the global ministry Word on Fire and the rector/president of Mundelein Seminary, Mundelein, Ill.

Catholic Democrats must hold party accountable

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urnout was abysmal at a “Catholics for Obama” event, originally intended to be a rally at Regis University in Denver before the election. The event drew 45 people prompting a shift in gears from “rally” to “discussion group.”

The Catholics for Obama vote was not so abysmal at the polls, however. As low key as Catholic support of the president may have been before the election, President Barack Obama won the Catholic vote by a 2 percent margin, and according to a Fox News Poll, CHRISTOPHER he claimed 42 percent of STEFANICK the votes among Catholics who go to weekly Mass, 57 percent of whom voted for Gov. Mitt Romney.

Catholic Democrats would, no doubt, consider this a victory for the principle that man “has a right to … medical care,” and that health care is not a privilege (Blessed John XXIII, “Pacem in Terris,” 11). They might consider it a victory for clean energy and the principle that “all governments must commit to protect nature” (Pope Benedict XVI, June 9, 2011). They might consider it a victory for immigrants, whose dignity the church has always defended, and who, when they “cannot find employment in their country of origin to support themselves and their families … have a right to find work elsewhere in order to survive. (And that) sovereign nations should provide ways to accommodate this right” (U.S. and Mexican bishops’ joint pastoral letter, “Strangers No Longer”). They might also see it as a victory for the laborer and

for unions, which are a “natural human right” (Blessed John Paul II quoting Leo XIII in “Centesimus Annus,” 7). And, perhaps, if they are convinced that the Republican Party is the party of war hawks, they consider President Obama’s victory a victory for peace on earth.

One doesn’t have to be a card-carrying Republican to enter the kingdom of heaven. And while there’s room for disagreement on how to implement all of the above, there’s no doubt that, at least in principle, there are some important priorities of the Democratic Party that overlap with the priorities of the Catholic Church and those of the Gospel.

That is, in part, why Catholic immigrant cultures in America have tended to be overwhelmingly Democrat. As a descendent of Irish Catholic immigrants it would’ve been hard to find a Republican among them 50 years ago. And after working for four-and-a half-years at a Catholic Church in the East Los Angeles area, it’s rare to find a Republican among them today. The closer a group is to its immigrant groups, the more it seems to lean Democrat. There is clearly the impression that they are the party for the immigrant.

Some maintain that the above reasons for voting for a pro-choice candidate outweigh the issue of abortion. They will certainly have the opportunity to present that case to the 50 million-plus lives claimed since Roe v. Wade.

I can only presume that the 42 percent of weekly Mass attendees who voted for President Obama despite his pro-choice stance aren’t rejoicing in the victory this election means for the pro-choice movement, gay marriage or the attacks certain to come upon the Catholic Church, in particular, and religious liberty, in general, thanks to the federal Health and Human Services contraceptive man-

date. And if they’re not happy about those very overt platforms of this administration, I wish they’d speak up and hold the Democratic Party accountable.

In the United States we tend to “do politics” in the same way that we root for football teams. Instead of scrutinizing our political leaders we pick our team and cheer them on. We forgive too much.

We swallow every position of the platform no matter how gravely it conflicts with our consciences – “Go team!”

We can’t do that if we’re to be part of the kingdom of God. If we put the kingdom of God first, there are certain things we simply can’t tolerate, overlook or forgive from our politicians – regardless of what side of the party line we’re on. Along those lines, one shouldn’t assume the Republican Party will remain pro-life or that they will actually do anything other than campaign on life-principles to get our votes. I heard more talk about the economy than ethical issues by far in the last Republican campaign. Will Republicans hold their elected officials accountable when they slack on these issues to get more votes in 2016?

So, my simple plea to the 42 percent sitting with me every Sunday is this: Please speak up. If your vote was for the noble principles of the Democratic Party and not the destruction of life, marriage and religious liberty, you didn’t make those priorities known to our elected officials on Nov. 6.

You have a grave obligation to make it known now.

We all do.

STEFANICK is director of youth outreach for YDisciple.

Visit him at RealLifeCatholic.com. ©DENVER CATHOLIC REGISTER

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

SUNDAY READINGS

Second Sunday of Advent John went throughout the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

LUKE 3:1-6 BARUCH 5:1-9 Jerusalem, take off your robe of mourning and misery; put on the splendor of glory from God forever: wrapped in the cloak of justice from God, bear on your head the miter that displays the glory of the eternal name. For God will show all the earth your splendor: you will be named by God forever the peace of justice, the glory of God’s worship. Up, Jerusalem! stand upon the heights; look to the east and see your children gathered from the east and the west at the word of the Holy One, rejoicing that they are remembered by God. Led away on foot by their enemies they left you: but God will bring them back to you borne aloft in glory as on royal thrones.

For God has commanded that every lofty mountain be made low, and that the age-old depths and gorges be filled to level ground, that Israel may advance secure in the glory of God. The forests and every fragrant kind of tree have overshadowed Israel at God’s command; for God is leading Israel in joy by the light of his glory, with his mercy and justice for company.

PSALM 126:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6 The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.

When the Lord brought back the captives of Zion, we were like men dreaming. Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with rejoicing.

The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.

Then they said among the nations, “The Lord has done great things for them.” The Lord has done great things for us; we are glad indeed.

The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.

Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like the torrents in the southern desert. Those who sow in tears shall reap rejoicing.

The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.

Although they go forth weeping, carrying the seed to be sown, They shall come back rejoicing, carrying their sheaves.

The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.

PHILIPPIANS 1:4-6, 8-11 Brothers and sisters: I pray always with joy in my every prayer for all of you, because of your partnership for the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the

day of Christ Jesus. God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer: that your love may increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value, so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God. LUKE 3:1-6 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the desert. John went throughout the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah: A voice of one crying out in the desert: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths. Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill shall be made low. The winding roads shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”

John the Baptist’s sincere call to repentance

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ohn the Baptist had one purpose in life – to prepare people for the coming of the Lord. And everywhere he went, he preached the same sermon. It was short and to the point – “The kingdom of heaven is at hand. The Christ will soon appear; therefore, get ready.”

The climax of the message was a clear call to repentance. Repentance was the way to prepare for the coming of Christ.

In our language and culture, the word “repentance” has an ominous sound. We tend to associate it with hellfire-and-damnation preachers, who manipulate people by fear and guilt. This approach to religion has a sad and somewhat lengthy DEACON history with some fundaFAIVA PO’OI mentalist Christians. When Halley’s comet appeared in 1682, a preacher named Cotton Mather told the people of Boston that it was a sure sign of the wrath of God. And thousands cringed in fear.

SCRIPTURE REFLECTION

POPE BENEDICT XVI WHEN SHARING THE FAITH, KEEP IT SIMPLE, JOYFUL

Christians need to keep the Gospel message simple and live what they teach with love and joy, Pope Benedict XVI said Nov. 28 in Vatican City. The best place to start is with one’s own family, he said, learning to spend time together, listening and understanding one another, and “being a sign for each other of God’s merciful love.” Addressing some 5,000 pilgrims, he said “it’s necessary to recover simplicity, to return to the essentials.”

The first condition is to establish that people can legitimately talk about God because God himself speaks to humanity, he said.

Most of us, however, want little or nothing to do with that kind of belief, and rightly so. John the Baptist was not that kind of preacher. He was serious about his mission. He was sincere in his call to repentance. But his message did not generate a state of hysteria. He did not manipulate people with fear and guilt. The fact is, he appealed to their sense of reason. The Greek translation of “repent” is “to change one’s mind.” And that is what John the Baptist was urging his listeners to do – to change their minds, their points of view and their attitudes. He was proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. This concept was known in certain sectors of Judaism and was a way to prepare for the coming day of the Lord and final judgment.

Inspired by Isaiah’s prophetic words, John urges us to “prepare the way of the Lord, to make straight his paths.” This involves some major changes in the highway of our lives, a total conversion. For me, I look at things I do and say, and recognize ways that I can change. I still remember the time that I told my youngest child to tell a caller that I was not there. I heard him tell the caller: “My daddy said he’s not here.” I realize that I need to change the winding road and the rough ways of my life. I need to try to see with the eyes of

Jesus. Only then can I change my own blindness to the poor, the neglected and the homeless. I need the forgiving heart and the humility of the Lord, so that I can forgive those who do wrong to me. I need to reduce my arrogance, pride and sense of self-importance. I need to pray for the grace, love and mercy of God to help to change me.

John the Baptist proclaims God’s salvation as a gift that extends beyond the limits of Israel, embracing “all flesh” and all people. What Isaiah promised in Isaiah 40:3-5 is fulfilled in the proclamation and ministry of John the Baptist. What John the Baptist promises in today’s reading will later be fulfilled in and through the life and ministry of Jesus.

During this season of Advent, we – in much the same way as did the Israelites – are reminded to look ahead and prepare ourselves for the redemption coming to us from the hand of God. Before GPS devices became so popular, our road trips involved meandering. Now, thanks to GPS, we are guaranteed smooth travel and few wrong turns. I like to think of the Eucharist as the “GPS” of our Advent journey toward our eternal glory.

DEACON PO’OI serves at St. Timothy Parish, San Mateo.

LITURGICAL CALENDAR, DAILY MASS READINGS MONDAY, DECEMBER 10: Monday of the Second Week of Advent. Is 35:1-10. Ps 85:9ab and 10, 11-12, 13-14. Lk 5:17-26.

OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE 16th century December 12

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 11: Tuesday of the Second Week of Advent. Optional Memorial of St. Damasus I, pope. Is 40:1-11. Ps 96:1-2, 3 and 10ac, 11-12, 13. Mt 18:12-14.

Under this title, Our Lady is the patron of Mexico, the United States and all of the Americas, as well as the protector of unborn children.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 12: Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Zec 2:14-17 or Ps 1:1Rv 11:19a; 12:1-6a, 10ab. Jdt 13:18bcde, 19. Lk 1:26-38.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 14: Memorial of St. John of the Cross, priest and doctor of the Church. Is 48:1719. Ps 1:1-2, 3, 4 and 6. Mt 11:16-19.

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 13: Memorial of St. Lucy, virgin and martyr. Is 41:13-20. Ps 145:1 and 9, 10-11, 12-13ab. Mt 11:11-15.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15: Saturday of the Second Week of Advent. Sir 48:1-4, 9-11. Ps 80:2ac and 3b, 15-16, 18-19. Mt 17:9a, 10-13.

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

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Working too hard: What begins as virtue ends as escape

here are dangers in overwork, no matter how good the work and no matter how noble the motivation for doing it. Spiritual guides, beginning with Jesus, have always warned of the dangers of becoming too taken-up in our work.

Many are the spouses in a marriage, many are the children in a family, many are the friends, and many are the churches, who wish that someone they love and need more attention from was less busy.

But it is hard not to be over-busy and consumed FATHER RON by work, particularly durROLHEISER ing our generative years when the duties of raising children, paying mortgages, and running our churches and civic organizations falls more squarely on our shoulders. If you are a sensitive person you will wrestle constantly with the pressure to not surrender yourself to too many demands. As Henri Nouwen once described this, our lives often seem like over-packed suitcases with too much in them. There is always one more task to do, one more phone call to make, one more person to see, one more bill to pay, one more thing to check on the Internet, one more leaky faucet to tend to, one more demand from some church or social agency, and one more item that needs to be picked up from the store. The demands never end and we are always conscious of some task that we still need to do. Our days are too short for all that needs to be done.

And so we give ourselves over to our work. It begins in good will and innocence but it invariably transmutes into something else. Initially we give ourselves over to all these demands because this is what is asked of us, but as more and more time goes by that commitment becomes less and less altruistic and more self-serving.

First off, though we are generally blind to this, our work soon becomes an escape. We remain busy and preoccupied enough that we have an inbuilt excuse and rationalization so as not to have to deal with relationships be that within our own families, our churches, or with God. Being weighed down constantly with work and duty is a burden but it is also the ultimate protection. We do not get to smell the flowers, but we do not have to deal either with the deeper things that lurk under the surface of our lives. We can avoid the unre-

I

solved issues in our relationships and our psyches.

We have the perfect excuse! We are too busy.

Generally too our society supports us in this escapism. With virtually every other addiction, we are eventually sent off to a clinic, but if we are addicted to our work, we are generally admired for our disease and praised for our selflessness: If I drink too much, or eat too much, or become dependent on a drug, I am frowned upon and pitied; but if I overwork to the point of neglecting huge and important imperatives in my life, they say this of me: “Isn’t he wonderful! He’s so dedicated!”

Beyond providing us with an unhealthy escape from some important issues with which we need to be dealing, overwork brings with it a second major danger: The more we over-invest in our work the greater the danger of taking too much of our meaning from our work rather than from our relationships. As we become more and more immersed in our work, to the detriment of our relationships, we will naturally begin too to draw more and more of our meaning and value from our work and, as numerous spiritual writers have pointed out, the dangers in this are many, not least among these is the danger that we will eventually find it harder and harder to find meaning in anything outside of our work. Old habits are hard to break. If we spend years drawing our identity from working hard and being loved for being anything from a professional athlete to a dedicated mum, it will not be easy to simply shift gears and draw our meaning from something else.

Classical spiritual writers are unanimous in warning about the danger of overwork and of becoming overly preoccupied with our work. This is in fact what Jesus warns Martha about in the famous passage in scripture where she, consumed with the very necessary work of preparing a meal, complains to Jesus that her sister, Mary, is not carrying her share of the load. In a rather surprising response, Jesus, instead of chastising Mary for her idleness and praising Martha for her dedication, tells Martha that Mary has chosen the better part, that, at this moment and in this circumstance, Mary’s idleness trumps Martha’s busyness. Why? Because sometimes there are more important things in life than work, even the noble and necessary work of tending to hospitality and preparing a meal for others.

Idleness may well be the devil’s workshop, but busyness is not always a virtue.

OBLATE FATHER ROLHEISER is president of the Oblate School of Theology, San Antonio, Texas.

Celebrating the beauty of order

n the corridors of the U.S. Capitol’s House of Representatives, a colorful painting contains William Jennings Bryan’s quotation, “Our government conceived in freedom and purchased with blood can be preserved only by constant vigilance.” It echoes Christ’s parable of the wise virgins who kept their lamps filled with oil in anticipation of the bridegroom.

Scripture reminds us constantly to keep vigilance and be prepared. Why emphasize this? It is to be prepared to meet God. FATHER EUGENE This principle is sound, HEMRICK but it does cause tensions.

We know we should be on our toes, but every so often we are tempted to ease up and release the tension. How, then, do we fulfill the biblical call for preparedness and deal with the tensions it causes?

What should we be thinking?

To prepare means to put things in order ahead of time. It calls for asceticism, which helps put order in one’s life. This causes tension because it calls for constant alertness and often denying ourselves some of the comforts of life. On the other hand, maintaining orderliness is of the essence to true happiness.

When we respond to this God-given gift, heartfelt happiness results. When order is missing, we become out of order, resulting in lack of peace of mind.

Advent is a wonderful opportunity to check on how well-ordered we are in fighting what threatens that order. For example, pornography is one of the worst diseases of our times. When we succumb to it, it creates shame and guilt. We realize we are not ordered to God’s desire for us.

Other things that can disorder us are perpetual conflicts at work or in our homes, or losing hope in a world that is hopelessly locked in wars. The list of things that make us ill-disposed is endless. When ill-disposition arises, kindness – which is to be welldisposed – is jeopardized.

To maintain a good disposition is to maintain our spirit of kindness – to keep the inspiration of love alive within us. And how do we accomplish this? One way is to practice the spiritual practice of prayer.

Each morning, make a short one-line prayer that addresses something that is causing you ill disposition and making your life disorderly. Repeat the prayer throughout the day, reminding yourself to head off the disorder before it can get a hold on you.

The order and subsequent peace of mind this practice can generate could make this Advent the best ever for you. ©CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

Which eucharistic prayer to use, and sporting a Roman collar

Q.

What determines which of the eucharistic prayers is used at Sunday Mass? When I try to follow along in my missalette, I often lose my place at this point, because I am trying to figure out which eucharistic prayer the celebrant has chosen. Is it simply up to him? (Superior, Wis.) The Roman Missal contains four general eucharistic prayers, another two on the theme of reconciliation as well as a eucharistic prayer for Masses for various needs and occasions, which has four variations. In addition, there are three eucharistic prayers for Masses with children, but those are now published in a separate volume.

To answer your question, the choice of which one to use is left pretty much to the priestFATHER celebrant’s discretion. There are, KENNETH DOYLE however, in No. 365 of the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, some guidelines that help the priest decide which prayer might be most appropriate – with respect, at least, to the four basic options.

The Eucharistic Prayer 1 (sometimes referred to by its former title, the “Roman Canon”) is especially appropriate on major feasts, since it provides for references to that feast to be included in the prayer itself. It is also suitable on feast days of those saints who are mentioned by name in the prayer.

Eucharistic Prayer 2 is the briefest of the four options and for that reason is often used for weekday Masses.

Eucharistic Prayer 3 is “preferred on Sundays and festive days,” and Eucharistic Prayer 4, which is the lengthiest of the four, “gives a fuller summary of salvation history.” (I tend to use this one when I am celebrating with a congregation that is especially in touch with biblical theology or, sometimes, as a change of pace with a weekday congregation.)

For your purposes, in trying to find quickly in your missalette the particular prayer the priest has chosen, I would suggest that if you turn first on weekdays to Eucharistic Prayer 2 and on Sundays to Eucharistic Prayer 3, the odds will be with you.

In our diocesan newspaper, I have noticed pictures of deacons in what I have always considered to be “priests’ collars.” I am curious as to when this practice started and why. (Harrisonburg, Va.) There are two categories of Roman Catholic deacons. Those referred to as “transitional” deacons are those who are on their way to becoming priests. They are normally ordained to the diaconate one year before priesthood.

On the other hand, permanent deacons are not on the path to the priesthood. They often have full-time jobs in secular professions and many of them are married.

Deacons of either type are members of the clergy. They can preach at Mass and administer the sacraments of baptism and matrimony.

Transitional deacons, as far back as my seminary days in the 1960s and probably beyond, have customarily worn clerical attire when going out to parishes for diaconal ministry.

The permanent diaconate was restored to the Catholic Church in the early 1970s, and I am assuming that your question probably relates to permanent deacons, since there are some 15,000 of them in the U.S. but only a few hundred transitional deacons.

Permanent deacons most often do not wear clerical collars. In fact, national guidelines for deacons say that “because they (permanent deacons) are prominent and active in secular professions and society, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops specifies that permanent deacons should resemble the lay faithful in dress and matters of lifestyle.”

The guidelines go on to say, however, that each bishop has the prerogative of determining the proper attire for permanent deacons within his own diocese.

A.

QUESTION CORNER

Q. A.

Send questions to askfatherdoyle@gmail.com or 40 Hopewell St., Albany, NY 12208

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

During Advent, first the fast, then the feast MARCELLINO D’AMBROSIO

Christmas cards speak about it. Christmas carols sing about it. Even the angels at Bethlehem proclaimed it. “Peace on earth.”

The coming of the Messiah obviously has something to do with the advent of peace.

But we need to examine the biblical notion of peace. It is not quite the peace that some have in mind. It is not niceness or political correctness.

It is not solely the absence of war.

It is rather the right relationship between people that flows from the right relationship with God. Pope Paul VI said that “if you want peace, work for justice.” Justice, however, is not just fair laws and political rights, but the interior justice that the Bible calls righteousness.

The world is obviously not at peace, because human hearts are not at peace. We are all pulled in opposite directions by competing desires.

So, before the Prince of Peace can usher in a season of tranquility and refreshment, the forerunner must come with his stern message of warfare. The enemies of peace will not lie down of their own accord. They must be put down.

Peace is a fruit of victory.

The warfare, of course, is not against flesh and blood, but against sin and idolatry, the terrorists that make peace impossible.

Father Hans Urs von Balthasar, a Swiss theologian, said we must take sides with the truth against ourselves. The Holy Spirit that the Messiah offers to us will empower us to live in perfect harmony (Romans 15:6). He comes not only as light but as a cleansing fire.

In the light of the Spirit, we must honestly and fearlessly look at our lives and give him permission to burn away the impurities. This may hurt a bit, but his is a refiner’s fire, and his aim is to make us pure gold.

This is why the joyous season of Christmas is preceded by a sober season of violet, the color of repentance. The Greek word in the New Testament translated as “repentance” is “metanoia.” This literally means a “change of mind” or a transformation of thinking. Repentance starts with allowing our values to be more

ple: first the fast, then the feast. The world’s approach is quite different: first the feast, then the hangover.

The Puritans recognized that holiday merriment distracted people from the true meaning of Christ’s birth. Their solution was to completely ban the holiday and its associated festivities. The Catholic approach is not to ban it but to use it.

Wouldn’t it be great if this year’s Christmas list was filled with gifts that had something to do with the Prince of Peace, whose birth we celebrate? And what if we disciplined ourselves to precede every visit to the shopping mall with a visit to the Blessed Sacrament?

And maybe as we deck the halls, we should devote at least equal attention to clothing ourselves with the virtues that will please God even more than the holly and the ivy.

Let’s do it right. Preparing the way for the Prince of Peace means getting everyone in the family to go to confession this Advent. Daily prayer is a must. Fasting from the din of radio, TV and Internet and more time in God’s word can go a long way toward driving out the darkness and burning off the dross in our lives.

And try this little custom to promote true peace on earth and good will. In our house, the creche scene is set up early in Advent but the manger remains empty. We get some bagged straw from the craft shop. As often as anyone does a hidden work of penance or charity, he or she may place a piece of straw in the manger to prepare a comfortable place of rest for the infant king. The goal? To fill the manger by Christmas Eve.

In the light of the Spirit, we must honestly and fearlessly look at our lives and give him permission to burn away the impurities.

CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

(CNS PHOTO/DEBBIE HILL)

Israeli Arab Saed Khoury, 8, from Nazareth, lights a candle in the Church of Nativity on Christmas Day in 2010 in the West Bank town of Bethlehem. Marcellino D’Ambrosio says the coming of the Messiah obviously has something to do with the advent of peace, but we need to examine the biblical notion of peace. influenced by God’s truth than the babble of television.

But a change of mind must lead to a change of life. John the Baptist is adamant: Repentance is incomplete without action. To the pious Pharisees and Sadducees who present themselves for baptism, he declares, “Produce good fruits as evidence of your repentance.”

Every tree that does not bear fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. Sterile fruit trees are worthless. A change of mind without a change of life is no change at all.

So what has our society done with Advent?

It has turned it into the shopping days before Christmas. As if we weren’t already distracted from the things of God, now it’s time to totally drown out the still, small, voice with the “fa-la-lala-la” of Christmas carols.

Between the frenzy at the mall and the party at the office, it is easy to get anesthetized, numbed to the true reason for the season.

The Christian attitude toward holidays is sim-

D’AMBROSIO writes from Texas. He is co-founder of Crossroads Productions – www.crossroadsinitiative. com – an apostolate of Catholic renewal and evangelization.

Advent advice: ‘Be still, and know that I am God’ DANIEL S. MULHALL CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

Family life can be so hectic during the Advent season. There is so much more to do: presents to buy and wrap, people to visit, concerts and plays to attend, parties to throw. Advent frequently passes by unnoticed, except for the lighting of a few candles on the wreath. A time set aside for spiritual preparation becomes instead a time for physical preparation for Christmas.

This is not a modern phenomenon. Throughout history, writers have encouraged people to stop, slow down and focus on what is truly important.

Perhaps the author of Psalm 46 offers the best advice: “Be still, and know that I am God!” Here are a few suggestions that families can follow during this Advent season to make the season blossom like roses in December.

Bless one another. When someone sneezes, people customarily say, “Bless you.” The reason we say is lost in history, yet the custom continues. However, blessings can be a powerful way of praying for one another, not just an automatic response.

This Advent, practice saying “bless you” instead of “thanks” – and really mean it. Take a moment to say a short prayer for the other person.

In families with children, create a blessing ritual.

For example, when a child goes to bed, place a hand on the child’s head and shoulder and ask for God’s blessing on the child, and then ask the child to do the same for you. You can also make the sign of the cross on the forehead, eyes, mouth, heart, ears, with or without holy water.

Enjoy each other’s company. Modern technology provides us with wonderful tools. These tools,

(CNS PHOTO/DEBBIE HILL)

Israeli Children wearing traditional Ukrainian clothing sing Christmas carols during a 2007 performance in Lviv, Ukraine.

however, can control our lives. At least one night a week and one day a weekend, declare “tech free” time. Turn off the gadgets and do things together.

Play a board game or take a hike. What is important is that you strengthen the family bond and experience how God is present with you.

Also, look for ways to shift the focus from me to we, from mine to ours, and from more to enough.

Teach selflessness, not selfishness.

Tell the story. Advent is a great time for listening to and telling stories. Take the time to tell (and teach) your family stories to your children.

How did you celebrate Advent in your family growing up? What made you laugh or cry? What do you miss? Make sure everyone gets a turn to tell a favorite story.

Look for ways to institute new traditions. The first time you do something, it is a novelty, and there might be push back. The second time you do something, it has become a family tradition.

Decide as a family on a new way to celebrate the holidays, then write down what you did so you will remember the next year.

Ladle some soup. Spend a few hours as a family caring for those who are in great financial need.

Work at a soup kitchen, collect food for the parish food bank, give away warm clothing and jackets.

Before and after the activity talk about what you are doing and why, and pray that God will be with you and with those in need. Make sure that everyone in the family is actively involved.

Laugh together. In everything you do, make sure you have plenty of fun, with lots of smiles and laughter so that everyone remembers this Advent season.

MULHALL is a lifelong catechist. He lives in Laurel, Md.

ARTS & LIFE 19

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

Bitter lessons from the union movement REVIEWED BY MAUREEN DALY CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

“FROM THE JAWS OF VICTORY: THE TRIUMPH AND TRAGEDY OF CESAR CHAVEZ AND THE FARM WORKER MOVEMENT” by Matt Garcia.

University of California Press (Los Angeles, 2012).

338 pp., $34.95.

“From the Jaws of Victory: The Triumph and Tragedy of Cesar Chavez and the Farm Worker Movement” takes a critical look at Chavez and the rapid rise and fall of the United Farm Workers agricultural union he guided.

Labor historian Matt Garcia defends his assessment as a search for “usable knowledge” for future organizing, and a way to “hold the UFW leadership accountable to the thousands of farmworkers who were let down by the union’s retreat from the fields.”

In 1960, there was no union for California grape pickers. By 1970, fully 12,000 were members of the UFW, Garcia reports. “From the Jaws of Victory” concludes with this sobering fact: “Today not one field worker laboring on grape farms in California is covered by a labor contract.”

What happened? Garcia uses written accounts and oral interviews with organizers to answer this question. The responses include open criticism of Chavez, a man many Mexican-Americans and Catholics claim as their own American hero.

Chavez died in 1993 at the age of 66. His birthday, March 31, has been declared a state holiday in eight states. A champion of nonviolence, his organizing techniques used church practices such as fasting and pilgrimage. His vision attracted educated, white volunteers, many from church backgrounds.

Garcia writes that “obstinacy” and “willingness to risk everything” were “hallmarks of Chavez’s leadership.” They helped him build a movement and they played a part in its collapse.

Those curious about criticism of Chavez will turn directly to the chapters that focus on these disintegrating years of the mid-1970s when the charismatic leader veered to autocratic, cultlike behavior.

In those years Chavez founded La Paz, a communal living experiment, and centered union offices there. The UFW turned from direct union organiz-

ing to passing legislation and a funding referendum. After huge investments of time and money, the referendum failed in 1976. Chavez “took the defeat personally” and “became erratic,” Garcia writes.

Chavez fell under the influence of Synanon, a residential community for drug rehabilitation that used a direct confrontation technique it called the “Game” as a way of correcting member behavior.

Chavez brought the Game to La Paz and the UFW. Former members and allies “tried to point out the violence inherent in the words and threats that flowed from the Game,” Garcia writes. “Chavez dismissed the concerns as further evidence of agents conspiring to bring down the union.”

Garcia says that the Game changed the UFW from a multiethnic, multigenerational, multiclass movement to one where only young, Mexican laborers were welcome as leaders. The union developed two cultures: “obedience to Chavez at the La Paz headquarters, and resistance and nonconformity away from it.” Shared communal purpose devolved into harassment, character assassination and ideological purges.

The movement was also weakened by ethnic divisions, intra-union fights, and diversion of efforts from organizing workers to supporting ballot initiatives.

Garcia says that the story of the UFW is particularly relevant now, “at a time when the new food justice movement is on the rise.” The UFW used the internationally successful grape boycott of 1966-70 to make agricultural conditions a social justice issue. The boycott mustered support of urban consumers who were far removed from farm life. The new food justice movement can learn from the successes and failures recounted in “From the Jaws of Victory.”

DALY, writing from Baltimore, has worked with faith-based community organizing on employment issues since 2008.

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NEW YORK – As numerous church leaders have warned in recent years, the rights of believers are increasingly under threat – not only around the world but within the United States as well.

So the documentary “First Freedom: The Fight for Religious Liberty” – a look at the origins of the religious guarantees enshrined in the First Amendment – makes for timely as well as educational television.

Filmmaker Lee Groberg’s documentary – produced in association with PBS affiliate WETA in Washington – premieres on PBS stations Tuesday, Dec. 18, 8-9:30 p.m. EST (check local listings).

Narrated by Brian Stokes Mitchell, Groberg’s film uses interviews with scholars, archival images and reenactments to chart the shifting fortunes of religious liberty in the New World from the 1630 founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony to the death of James Madison in 1836. It also explores the varied views of the divine held by such seminal figures as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Patrick Henry and second cousins Samuel and John Adams.

Most of these founders seem to have been believers of one stripe or another. John Adams, we learn, never missed Sunday service unless he was ill. But their outlook on faith was affected both by Enlightenmentera suspicions of the supernatural and by emerging challenges to the doctrine of the Trinity.

As the program makes clear, anti-Catholicism, a near-universal prejudice among their English forbears, was hardly unknown among the founders themselves. Thus, the Quebec Act of 1774, in which the British Parliament guaranteed recently conquered French Canadians the free exercise of their religion, drew fulminating oratory from Sam Adams and a caricature of Catholic bishops from engraver Paul Revere.

Washington, by contrast, seems to have been proof against such sentiments. As one dramatization shows, when he sent troops to invade Canada during the Revolution, Washington ordered their commander to respect both the property of the Catholic Church there and the sensibilities of its members. His equally laudable freedom from anti-Semitism is the subject of another re-enactment.

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

ST. VERONICA STUDENTS HELP SANDY VICTIMS

It took very little effort for Theresa Sinclair, religion coordinator at St. Veronica School, South San Francisco, to get students and school families behind helping those struck by Hurricane Sandy: All she had to do was ask. Almost $1,800 was the reply.

In a letter Sinclair, a St. Hilary School and Convent of the Sacred Heart alumna, wrote to thank donors for their help, she said the tragedy of Sandy was “a perfect opportunity for our students to put their faith into action.”

Aware of the wreckage being done by Sandy, Sinclair, who comes from a career in the textbook publishing industry, contacted a former colleague now an associate superintendent of schools for the Archdiocese of New York and was connected with St. Brigid School in Manhattan.

“The basement there had been flooded and many of their families were without electricity,” Sinclair said in the letter. “We responded immediately with emergency blankets, hats, gloves and socks.” Sandy not bad enough, Sinclair said the provisions got there just ahead of a snowstorm.

Another former colleague told Sinclair about St. Rose of Lima School just outside of New York City in a beach community known as the Rockaways and but a block from the Atlantic Ocean. The remainder of the collection proceeds – more than $1,000 – were sent there to help provide Thanksgiving dinners for the school families. “Their families lost homes, cars, and personal effects,” Sinclair’s letter said.

The fundraising campaign took only three days. “We collected funds from the students in the school and I purchased the supplies and shipped them overnight,” Sinclair told Catholic San Francisco via email. She said fifth grade students brought in almost $500 on their own.

“We spent a lot of time helping the students understand the importance of helping,” Sinclair said. “We were able to provide warmth in the midst of the storm.”

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OBITUARIES

Sister Kristin Wombacher, OP, 75 Sister Kristin Wombacher, a Dominican Sister of San Rafael, died Nov. 10 at the sisters’ Our Lady of Lourdes Convent, San Rafael, after a lengthy illness.

She was 75 and a religious for 51 years. Born and raised in Southern California, Sister Kristin entered religious life following graduation from Mount St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles. A sister, Sister Bernadette Wombacher, also a Dominican Sister of San Rafael Sister Kristin is among her survivors.

Wombacher, OP “Sister Kristin was an extraordinary leader in very challenging times,” said Sister Maureen McInerney, prioress general of the Dominican Sisters of San Rafael. “We are all grateful for the vision she held for us as individuals and as a congregation.”

Sister Kristin taught high school in San Francisco before earning a doctorate in psychology from St. Louis University. She was a clinical psychologist at Napa State Hospital for 12 years while also consulting in her field with religious congregations and maintaining a counseling practice. She lectured and offered workshops around the world

and served as president of the Western region for the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.

Sister Kristin was a former prioress general of the San Rafael Dominican Sisters. Her tenure was marked by the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989 that significantly damaged St. Rose Academy in San Francisco, a school in which the sisters had ministered since 1862 and which was subsequently closed; a fire in San Rafael in 1990 that significantly damaged the sisters’ motherhouse built in 1889; and the building of a new administrative center and two convents in San Rafael.

More recently, Sister Kristin was director of a home and program in San Francisco for women leaving prostitution.

Survivors in addition to Sister Bernadette include brothers Les and his wife Jean, and Bill Wombacher.

Former San Francisco Archbishop John R. Quinn presided at a funeral Mass at the Dominican Sisters Center in San Rafael Nov. 28. Sister Kristin served for three years, 1993-96, on the archdiocesan Pastoral Planning Commission at the request of Archbishop Quinn. Interment was at St. Dominic Cemetery, Benicia.

Memorial contributions may be made to the Dominican Sisters of San Rafael, Development Office, 1520 Grand Ave., San Rafael 94901.

SISTER MARINA MAPA, RSCJ – LONGTIME TEACHER

College for Women, which became Lone Mountain College. For many years, she was also chair of the Spanish department. During this time, she earned her doctorate in Spanish and French at Stanford.

She remained at Lone Mountain until 1969 when she moved to teach Spanish at the sisters’ San Diego College for Women, now the University of San Diego and taught there for 30 years.

She retired to Oakwood in 2004. Survivors include sisters Josefa Mapa de Noroña, Virgilia Mapa and Dolores Mapa, and brothers Felix Mapa Jr. and A. Raymond Mapa.

Memorial contributions may be made to the Society of the Sacred Heart, 4120 Forest Park Ave., St. Louis, MO 63108.

Sacred Heart Sister Marina Mapa died Nov. 18, at Oakwood, the Society of the Sacred Heart’s elder care center in Atherton. She was 87 and a religious for 65 years. A funeral Mass will be celebrated Dec. 8 at 10 a.m. at Oakwood, 140 Valparaiso Ave., Atherton, followed by burial in the Oakwood Cemetery.

Born in the Philippines, Sister Mapa’s first assignment as a Sister Marina religious was to Convent of the Mapa, RSCJ Sacred Heart in San Francisco in 1950. She later taught Spanish at San Francisco

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COMMUNITY 21

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

OLM dedicates preschool in honor of Sister Claire Maher, OP, 105 Our Lady of Mercy School in Daly City dedicated its long-awaited preschool facility on Sunday, Nov. 4, and the following day 17 pupils arrived to officially take over the new space.

Sister Claire’s Preschool at Our Lady of Mercy School was blessed and named in honor of the founding principal of Our Lady of Mercy School: Dominican Sister Claire Maher, who celebrated her 105th birthday Nov. 15.

Sister Claire was on hand to cut the red ribbon herself. Father Domingo Orimaco, pastor, and Deacon Mike Ghiorso led the prayers and blessing, accompanied by members of the school choir.

Sister Claire greeted all the attendees, especially Philip Fraher from the parish school’s first

Dominican Sister Claire Maher, at right with a bouquet of flowers, is pictured at the dedication of Sister Claire’s Preschool at Our Lady of Mercy School, Daly City, on Nov. 4. graduating class, the class of 1959.

She had a chance to catch up on old

times with Al and Liz Bucci, who are considered founding members

of the both the parish and the school. Former principal Arlene Fife and her husband Bob enjoyed their reunion with Sister Claire.

After cutting the ribbon, Sister Claire was serenaded with “Happy Birthday.” She blew out the candles as the crowd of nearly 100 people cheered. In her best “principal’s voice,” Sister Claire addressed the gathering, praising the continued presence of the school in Daly City’s Westlake District and reminiscing about the original opening of the school and the school’s growth. She wished the preschool children and their families much happiness as they began their educational journey, and encouraged Kelly Walsh and Rhiann Chavez as they undertook the task of teaching the little ones.

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22 CALENDAR FRIDAY, DEC. 7 FIRST FRIDAY: The Contemplatives of St. Joseph offer Mass at Mater Dolorosa Church, 307 Willow Ave., South San Francisco, 7 p.m., followed by healing service and personal blessing with St. Joseph oil from Oratory of St. Joseph, Montreal.

FIRST FRIDAY: Adoration 8:30 a.m.5 p.m., Blessed Sacrament Shrine, St. Mary’s Cathedral, Gough Street at Geary Boulevard, San Francisco.

Contact the cathedral office at (415) 567-2020.

CHRISTMAS STORY: St. Catherine of Siena School, Dec. 7, 8, 14, 15, 7:30 p.m., school auditorium, 1300 Bayswater Ave., Burlingame. $10, $8 students/children, $25 VIP seating in first two rows. Cast and crew feature students from junior high classes. To purchase tickets in advance, www. stcos.com. Tickets also sold at the door on performance days. (650) 344-7176.

FILM NIGHT: “Maldonado Miracle� and Year of Faith, 6:30 p.m., Pauline Books & Media Center, 935 Brewster Ave., Redwood City, 7-8:30 p.m. (650) 369-4230. redwood@ paulinemedia.com.

BREAKFAST TALK: Catholic Marin Breakfast Club, Mass, 7 a.m. talk following at St. Sebastian Church, Sir Francis Drake Boulevard and Bon Air Road, Greenbrae. (415) 461-0704.

Sugaremy@aol.com. Presentation is

by Rev. James McDonald, president, San Francisco Theological Seminary.

Member breakfast $8/non-members $10.

DAILY TV MASSES: EWTN airs Mass daily at 5 a.m., 9 a.m., 9 p.m. and at 4 p.m. Monday through Friday.

EWTN is carried on Comcast 229, AT&T 562, Astound 80, San Bruno Cable 143, DISH Satellite 261 and Direct TV 370. In Half Moon Bay EWTN airs on Comcast 70 and on Comcast 74 in southern San Mateo County.

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

SUNDAY, DEC. 16 CANDLELIGHT CONCERT: Mission Dolores Basilica Choir, directed by Jerome Lenk, 5 p.m., Mission Dolores Basilica, 16th Street at Jerome Lenk Dolores, San Francisco.

Selections include Vivaldi’s “Gloria,� and songs of the season. $25 reserved, $20 general admission. (415) 621-8203. www.missiondolores.org. Free parking.

SUNDAY, DEC. 9

FRIDAY, DEC. 14

LESSONS AND CAROLS: St. Ignatius Church, 650 Parker St. at Fulton, San Francisco, 3:30 p.m. Afternoon of Advent readings, prayer and music includes choirs from St. Ignatius Parish, St. Agnes Parish, St. Ignatius College Preparatory, Jesuit School of Theology and University of San Francisco. (415) 422-2188. www.stignatiussf.org.

CHRISTMAS CONCERT: St. Charles Parish, 880 Tamarack Ave., San Carlos, 7 p.m. Adult and children’s choirs sing stories of Christmas and present an encore performance of “Bright Light,� an original children’s musical with music by Patti Beale Kelii and words by God. Bring your sunglasses! Admission is free. An offering will be taken for the support of the music ministries at St. Charles.

PRO-LIFE PROCESSION: Our Lady of Guadalupe pro-life procession, 2 p.m. rain or shine, leaving from St. Matthew Church, El Camino Real and Ninth Avenue, San Mateo to Planned Parenthood, 35 Baywood Ave., San Mateo, about a 1.5-mile round trip. smprolife@ yahoo.com. (650) 572-1468.

CLASSIC CAROLS: Holiday concerts, Dec. 7 and 8, Mater Dolorosa Church, 307 Willow Ave., South San Francisco, 7:30 p.m., featuring Mater Dolorosa Hallelujah Choir and children’s choir. Tickets $20 at door and $15 in advance. (650) 878-1715. mdssf50@ yahoo.com.

WEEKLY CATHOLIC TV MASS: A TV Mass is broadcast Sundays at 6 a.m. on the Bay Area’s KTSF Channel 26 and KOFY Channel 20, and in the Sacramento area at 5:30 a.m. on KXTL Channel 40. It is produced for viewing by the homebound and others unable to go to Mass by God Squad Productions with Msgr. Harry Schlitt, celebrant. Catholic TV Mass, One Peter Yorke Way, San Francisco 94109. (415) 614-5643. janschachern@aol.com.

SATURDAY, DEC. 8

TUESDAY, DEC. 11

CRAFT FAIR: All Souls Parish, 315 Walnut Ave., South San Francisco Dec. 8, 9, 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. in school cafeteria. (650) 871-8944.

OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE MASS: St. Thomas the Apostle Parish, Balboa at 40th Avenue, San Francisco, will honor Our Lady of Guadalupe with Mass and a reception at 4 p.m. Liturgy includes music by mariachi band and homemade favorite foods afterward.

SEPARATED DIVORCED: Meeting takes place second and fourth Tuesdays, St. Bartholomew Parish Spirituality Center, Alameda de las Pulgas at Crystal Springs Road, San Mateo, 7 p.m. Groups are part of the Separated and Divorced Catholic Ministry in the archdiocese and begin with prayer, introductions and sharing. It is a drop-in support group. Jesuit Father Al Grosskopf, (415) 422-6698 or grosskopf@ usfca.edu.

REMEMBRANCE SERVICE: Holiday Prayer Service, Holy Cross Cemetery, 1500 Old Mission Road, Colma, 11 a.m. All Saints Mausoleum Chapel, Msgr. John Talesfore, presides. (650) 756-2060.

FICTION BOOK CLUB: Discussion based on C.S Lewis’ “The Great Divorce,� Pauline Books & Media Center, 935 Brewster Ave., Redwood City, 7-8:30 p.m. (650) 369-4230. redwood@ paulinemedia.com.

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(650) 580-6334 / (925) 330-4760

Burlingame, California 650.523.4553 gsilversteinmft@gmail.com

“The most compassionate care in town�

1655 Old Mission Road #3 Colma, SSF, CA 94080

415-573-5141 or 650-993-8036 *Irish owned & operated

*Serving from San Francisco to North San Mateo

When Life Hurts It Helps To Talk • Family • Work • Relationships • Depression • Anxiety • Addictions

Dr. Daniel J. Kugler Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist Over 25 years experience

Confidential • Compassionate • Practical

(415) 921-1619 • Insurance Accepted 1537 Franklin Street • San Francisco, CA 94109

NOTARY

Irish Help at Home

Breen’s Mobile Notary Services Timothy P. Breen

Certified Signing Agent

Notary Public

High Quality Home Care Since 1996 Home Care Attendants • Companions • CNA’s Hospice • Respite Care • Insured and Bonded San Mateo 650.347.6903

San Francisco 415.759.0520

Marin 415.721.7380

www.irishhelpathome.com

MISSION SAN RAFAEL: 195th anniversary of Mission San Rafael Arcangel 1-4 p.m. Fascinating presentations on the history of Mission San Rafael and those who helped shape Marin, followed by a performance of Mission era music by the Chanticleer LAB Choir. Teri Brunner, (415) 454-8141 ext. 12 or visit www.saintraphael.com. Free.

SIMBANG GABI: Novena of Advent Masses with Filipino-American communities of Immaculate Heart of Mary, Our Lady of Angels, St. Bartholomew, St. Catherine, St. Gregory, St. Luke and St. Mark in observance of Simbang Gabi, a spiritual preparation for Christmas.

Masses are daily at 7 p.m. beginning Dec. 15 through Dec. 23 at St. Mark Church, 325 Marine View Ave., Belmont. Daily confessions 6-6:45 p.m. (650) 591-5937.

PUBLICIZE YOUR EVENT: Submit event listings by noon Friday. Email calendar.csf@ sfarchdiocese.org, write Calendar, One Peter Yorke Way, SF 94109, or call Tom Burke at (415) 614-5634.

COUNSELING

HOME HEALTH CARE

SUPPLE SENIOR CARE

SATURDAY, DEC. 15

TO ADVERTISE IN CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO VISIT www.catholic-sf.org | CALL (415) 614-5642 EMAIL advertising.csf@sfarchdiocese.org

THE PROFESSIONALS

HEALTH CARE AGENCY

ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY: Conversation group on ancient philosophical texts, St. Mary’s Cathedral, Gough Street at Geary Boulevard, San Francisco, Msgr.

Bowe Room, 7:30-10 p.m. reynaldo. miranda@gmail.com. (415) 584 8794.

PHONE: 415-846-1922 FAX: 415-702-9272 * Member National Notary Association *

Do you want to be more fulfilled in love and work – but find things keep getting in the way?

Unhealed wounds can hold you back - even if they are not the “logical� cause of your problems today. You can be the person God intended.

Inner Child Healing Offers a deep spiritual and psychological approach to counseling: â?– 30 years experience with individuals, . couples and groups â?– Directed, effective and results-oriented â?– Compassionate and Intuitive â?– Supports 12-step â?– Enneagram Personality Transformation â?– Free Counseling for Iraqi/Afghanistani Vets

Lila Caffery, MA, CCHT San Francisco: 415.337.9474 Complimentary phone consultation

www.InnerChildHealing.com

Visit catholic-sf.org for the latest Vatican headlines.

CALENDAR 23

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

SUNDAY, DEC. 16

TUESDAY, DEC. 18

HOLIDAY BOUTIQUE: St. Ignatius Church, Parker Avenue at Fulton, San Francisco, Fromm Hall behind the church 8:30 a.m.-6:30 p.m. Christmas gifts, hostess gifts, gifts for the home, puppets, clothing for girls, holiday treats, ornaments, cards, and more. Proceeds benefit parish social ministries and stewardship

CHRISTMAS LUNCH: Good Shepherd Guild at the Olympic Club, Lakeside Clubhouse, 11:30 a.m. Tickets at $70 include 3-course luncheon and valet parking. Contact Judy Terracina (415) 753-2081. Proceeds benefit Good Shepherd Gracenter.

SIMBANG GABI: Novena of Masses at St. Stephen Church, 23rd Avenue at Eucalyptus, San Francisco, Dec. 16-24, 6 a.m. in preparation for Christmas with parishioners from St. Cecilia, St. Finn Barr, St. Gabriel, Hispanic and Burmese communities, Knights of Columbus, the Legion of Mary. Nellie Hizon, (415) 699-7927.

ENGLISH CHRISTMAS: Golden Gate Boys Choir and Bellringers with “the drama, pageantry and elegance of a 16th century” Christmas celebration at St. Mary’s Cathedral Event Center, Gough Street at Geary Boulevard, San Francisco, 4-8 p.m. The dinner theater evening features the GGBC, raffle and silent auction. Adults $150/ children $85. www.ggbc.org. (510) 887-4311. (415) 431-1137. Free parking.

WEDNESDAY, DEC. 19 SEPARATED DIVORCED: Meeting takes place first and third Wednesdays, 7:30 p.m., St. Stephen Parish O’Reilly Center, 23rd Avenue at Eucalyptus, San Francisco. Groups are part of the Separated and Divorced Catholic Ministry in the archdiocese and begin with prayer, introductions and sharing. It is a drop-in support group. Jesuit Father Al Grosskopf, (415) 422-6698 or grosskopf@usfca. edu.

THURSDAY, DEC. 20 CONCERT: Our Lady of Loretto School’s Christmas Concert, 7 p.m., Our Lady of Loretto Church, Novato.

CARDINAL LEVADA ON VATICAN II: “Vatican II at 50: Looking back, moving forward,” an evening with Cardinal William J. Levada, archbishop emeri- Cardinal William tus, ArchdioJ. Levada cese of San Francisco and retired prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 7 p.m., St. Rita Church, Sir Francis Drake Boulevard and Miranda Drive, Fairfax.

Ordained to the priesthood in Rome’s St. Peter’s Basilica in 1961 and ordained bishop in 1983, Cardinal Levada has held leadership positions at all levels of church life and on major works including the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

All are invited. (415) 456-4815.

Lic. #742961

John Spillane

• Retaining Walls • Stairs • Gates • Dry Rot • Senior & Parishioner Discounts

HK Discount

S.O.S. PAINTING CO. Interior-Exterior • wallpaper • hanging & removal

ALL ELECTRIC SERVICE

Garage Door Repair

(415) 931-1540 24 hrs.

Broken Spring/Cable?

Operator Problems?

415.279.1266

Lifetime Warranty on All Doors + Motors

mikecahalan@gmail.com

HOUSECLEANING

Lic. #582766 415.566.8646

➤ ➤ ➤ ➤ ➤ ➤

Hauling Job Site Clean-Up Demolition Yard Service Garbage Runs Saturday & Sunday

FREE ESTIMATES! • Fast & Affordable

TERRY (415)282-2023

LAST-MINUTE SERVICE AVAILABLE

YOELSHAULING@YAHOO.COM

Lic.# 593788

DALY CONSTRUCTION

415.383.6122 http://tadalyremodeling.com

Kitchen/Bath Remodel Dry Rot Repair • Decks /Stairs Plumbing Repair/Replacement

Call: 650.580.2769 Lic. # 505353B-C36

M.K. Painting Interior-Exterior Residential – Commercial Insured/Bonded – Free Estimates License# 974682

Tel: (650) 630-1835 Bill Hefferon Painting Bonded & Insured CA License 819191

Residential

Free Estimates

Cell 415-710-0584 Office 415-731-8065

10% Discount Seniors & Parishioners

Licensed, Bonded & Insured

Christopher’s House Cleaning

Serving the Bay Area for over 30 Years

Bill Hefferon

415.370.4341 www.christophershousecleaning.com

ROOFING

650.322.9288 Service Changes Solar Installation Lighting/Power Fire Alarm/Data Green Energy

Fully licensed • State Certified • Locally Trained • Experienced • On Call 24/7

DEWITT ELECTRIC

YOUR # 1 CHOICE FOR Recessed Lights – Outdoor Lighting Outlets – Dimmers – Service Upgrades • Trouble Shooting!

Ph. 415.515.2043 Ph. 650.508.1348 Lic. 631209

HANDYMAN

IRISH Eoin PAINTING Lehane Discount to CSF Readers

415.368.8589 Lic.#942181

eoin_lehane@yahoo.com

PAINTING & REMODELING

Expert interior and exterior painting, carpentry, demolition, fence (repair, build), decks, remodeling, roof repair, gutter (clean/repair), landscaping, gardening, hauling, moving, welding.

All Purpose Cell (415) 517-5977 (650) 757-1946 NOT A LICENSED CONTRACTOR

c o n s t r u c t i o n

O’DONOGHUE CONSTRUCTION

415-269-0446 • 650-738-9295 www.sospainting.net F REE E STIMATES

Commercial

McGuire & Sons State License # 346397, Est. 1978 415-454-2719 FINE WORK AT REASONABLE PRICES mcguireandsonsconstruction.com

Lic # 526818 • Senior Discount

Reasonable rates

Affordable

Decks • Carports • Stairs • Concrete • Kitchen • Bathrooms

YOUTH RALLY: “Shine!” with Jesse Manibusan for junior high school and high school students at Mission Dolores, 16th Street at Dolores, San Francisco. “Come and learn more about our faith celebrate Mass and connect with friends,” the Office of Religious Education and Youth Ministry said. Cost is $20 per person. High school students welcome to volunteer.

Contact Vivian Clausing at clausingv@ sfarchdiocese.org with questions or to register.

ELECTRICAL

Lic. # 376353

Remodels, Additions, Paint, Windows, Dryrot, Stucco

SATURDAY, JAN. 5

PAINTING

Same price 7 days

Cahalan Construction

ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY: Conversation group on ancient philosophical texts, St. Mary’s Cathedral, Gough Street at Geary Boulevard, San Francisco, Msgr. Bowe Room, 7:30-10 p.m. reynaldo.miranda@gmail.com. (415) 584 8794.

GARAGE DOOR

650.291.4303

CONSTRUCTION

FRIDAY, DEC. 28

TO ADVERTISE IN CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO VISIT www.catholic-sf.org | CALL (415) 614-5642 EMAIL advertising.csf@sfarchdiocese.org

HOME SERVICES

FENCES & DECKS

Students perform a variety of traditional holiday music selections and a “Live Nativity” that will include all the students. Admission is free.

WEDNESDAY, DEC. 19

(415) 786-0121 • (650) 871-9227

John Holtz Ca. Lic 391053 General Contractor Since 1980

(650) 355-4926

Painting & Remodeling • Interiors • Exteriors • Kitchens • Baths Contractor inspection reports and pre-purchase consulting

PLUMBING

HOLLAND Plumbing Works San Francisco ALL PLUMBING WORK PAT HOLLAND

Follow us at twitter.com/catholic_sf.

CA LIC #817607

BONDED & INSURED

415-205-1235

24

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | DECEMBER 7, 2012

Faith-Based Outreach Coordinator: Mission Hospice and Home Care is Looking for a bi-lingual individual to reach out to Catholic and Protestant churches In San Mateo County with Spanish-speaking congregations, communicating the value of comfort care.

This individual should be comfortable discussing death and dying with church pastors and congregations. This is a 20-hour a week position, including some evenings and weekends.

CLASSIFIEDS TO ADVERTISE IN CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

Call Rev. Linda Siddall at 650.554.1000, Extension 253, or email your resume to lsiddall@missionhospice.org.

VISIT

www.catholic-sf. org

PUBLISH A NOVENA

Pre-payment required Mastercard or Visa accepted

EMAIL

advertising.csf @sfarchdiocese. org

Cost $26

CALL

If you wish to publish a Novena in the Catholic San Francisco You may use the form below or call 415-614-5640

(415) 614-5642

FAX

Your prayer will be published in our newspaper

(415) 614-5641

Name Address Phone MC/VISA # Exp.

SERVICES

Select One Prayer: ❑ St. Jude Novena to SH

❑ Prayer to the Blessed Virgin

❑ Prayer to St. Jude

❑ Prayer to the Holy Spirit

Please return form with check or money order for $26 Payable to: Catholic San Francisco Advertising Dept., Catholic San Francisco 1 Peter Yorke Way, San Francisco, CA 94109

St. Jude Novena May the Sacred Heart of Jesus be adored, glorified, loved & preserved throughout the world now & forever. Sacred Heart of Jesus pray for us.

St. Jude helper of the hopeless pray for us.

Say prayer 9 times a day for 9 days.

Thank You St. Jude.

Never known to fail.

You may publish.

Prayer to the Blessed Virgin never known to fail.

P.J.

Most beautiful flower of Mt. Carmel Blessed Mother of the Son of God, assist me in my need. Help me and show me you are my mother.

Oh Holy Mary, Mother of God, Queen of Heaven and earth. I humbly beseech you from the bottom of my heart to help me in this need.

Oh Mary, conceived without sin. Pray for us (3X).

Holy Mary, I place this cause in your hands (3X).

Say prayers 3 days.

M.T.

Prayer to the Blessed Virgin never known to fail.

Prayer to the Blessed Virgin never known to fail.

Most beautiful flower of Mt. Carmel Blessed Mother of the Son of God, assist me in my need. Help me and show me you are my mother.

Oh Holy Mary, Mother of God, Queen of Heaven and earth. I humbly beseech you from the bottom of my heart to help me in this need.

Oh Mary, conceived without sin. Pray for us (3X).

Holy Mary, I place this cause in your hands (3X).

Say prayers 3 days.

M.L.

Most beautiful flower of Mt. Carmel Blessed Mother of the Son of God, assist me in my need. Help me and show me you are my mother.

Oh Holy Mary, Mother of God, Queen of Heaven and earth. I humbly beseech you from the bottom of my heart to help me in this need.

Oh Mary, conceived without sin. Pray for us (3X).

Holy Mary, I place this cause in your hands (3X).

Say prayers 3 days.

B.A.

Joy Kensic 415-823-8724 JKensic17@yahoo.com

DOG CARE

Walking, Exercising Dog sitting (vacations)

PARTY PLANNING Parties for Adults & Kids

PERSONAL TRAINING References available upon request

Responsible & Reliable

HELP WANTED CATHOLIC CEMETERIES OF THE ARCHDIOCESE OF SAN FRANCISCO – CONTROLLER – The Cemetery Department of the Archdiocese of San Francisco seeks a full-time Controller. This is a professional “exempt” level position that reports to the Director of Cemeteries and offices at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma.

Job Description: The Controller assists the Director of Cemeteries with the stewardship of the physical, financial and personnel resources of the Cemetery Department, in accordance with the Archdiocesan policies and guidelines. The Controller is a person of faith committed to Gospel values. He or she values the organization and responsible management of resources and helps the Cemetery Department fulfill its mission and purposes.

Job Requirements: • Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Finance, Public or Non-profit Administration or equivalent, relevant work experience. Master’s degree a plus.

• Certified Public Accountant; experience in working with non-profits a plus • Extensive knowledge of generally accepted accounting principles and best practices • Strong knowledge of accounting software applications, including spreadsheets, word processing and database programs (Access, Excel, Word), Unix, Quickbooks, and the ability to learn new software.

• Ability and experience in hiring, supervising and coaching employees • Ability to plan, organize, set schedules, prioritize tasks, and work with other members of the staff in a collegial and collaborative manner • Must be highly detail oriented, well organized, resourceful, sensitive to confidentiality issues, self-motivated and professional • Active practicing Roman Catholic who understands and supports the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, preferred

Please send cover letter and resume to Monica Williams, Director: email mjwilliams@holycrosscemeteries.com or fax 650.757.0752

BOOKS

LIVE-IN CARE SF lady seeks living arrgmt.

In SF as housekeeper/assist.

Property caretaker in exchange for private unfurn.living area.

Non-smoker. Refs.

Also needs storage space 415-561-9275

CSF CONTENT IN YOUR INBOX:

Visit catholic-sf.org to sign up for our e-newsletter.

CHIMNEY CLEANING

“125 Years of History, Ministry & Service” A book celebrating the story of Holy Cross Cemetery

Books now available $20.00 Books may be purchased at the cemetery office or by mail.

If you wish to purchase by mail, please add $3.00 and send request to: Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery P.O. Box 1577, Colma, CA 940l4