March 29, 2013

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MARCH 29, 2013

SF supervisor proposes buffer at abortion clinics

Court may hold off Prop. 8 ruling, justices suggest

VALERIE SCHMALZ PATRICIA ZAPOR

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

A San Francisco supervisor is proposing a fixed 25-foot buffer zone around free-standing reproductive health clinics, a law that would hamper outreach by a local prayer campaign affiliated with the international Christian pro-life movement 40 Days for Life.

Supervisor David Campos introduced the ordinance on March 19, and seven of the 11 supervisors co-sponsored it. It was sent to a committee and Campos expects the legislation will be approved by May. “The national war on women is reaching a boiling point,” Campos said.

The ordinance would create a 25-foot fixed buffer zone around all entrances, exits and driveways of free-standing reproductive health clinics and would mean 40 Days for Life would be required to move its prayer vigil from the sidewalk near Planned Parenthood’s 1650 Valencia St. clinic, which performs abortions. It would apply “only to reproductive health care facilities” that are free-standing and would not apply to hospitals where abortions are performed, according to the ordinance text.

For a first offense, violators would be incarcerated in the county jail for three months or fined $500, or both.

The penalty for a second offense would be six months in jail and a $1,000 fine, or both.

“It will hinder our ability to be a presence,” said 40 Days for Life coordinator Cathleen Gillies.

She said women talk to the volunteers, who stand quietly, pray and offer SEE CLINICS, PAGE 20

(CNS/ERICH LESSING, ART RESOURCE, NEW YORK)

WASHINGTON – The legal question of the constitutionality of California’s law banning same-sex marriage may take a back seat to consideration of whether the time is “ripe” for a national-level ruling, suggested the Supreme Court justices’ questioning in the first of two major marriage cases being heard the last week of March.

In oral arguments March 26 in Hollingsworth v. Perry, the justices first asked each of the three attorneys making presentations to weigh in about whether the group of people appealing a federal judge’s decision overturning Prop.osition 8 has the legal standing to do so.

Prop. 8 is being defended in court not by the California governor or attorney general, who declined to appeal, but by those who put the amendment on the ballot.

Much of the questioning revolved around whether the country has had sufficient time to consider same-sex marriage and study how such marriages affect society and particularly how they affect children.

Same-sex marriage hasn’t even been a part of society as long as cellphones and the Internet, noted Justice Samuel Alito. It’s too soon to know whether the effect of same-sex marriage is good or not, he told Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr., who argued on behalf of the federal government that the voter-approved California law should be overturned. The U.S. govern-

The risen Christ is depicted in this detail from a 14th-century painting from Austria. Easter, the feast of the Resurrection, is March 31 in the Latin church this year.

SEE PROP. 8, PAGE 20

Crowd in support of traditional marriage marches to Supreme Court CAROL ZIMMERMANN CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

WASHINGTON – Thousands of people who gathered at one end of the National Mall March 26 in support of traditional marriage took their message to the U.S. Supreme Court as they walked and held aloft placards with signs saying: “Kids do best with a mom and dad.”

The court began hearing oral arguments that morning on the constitutionality of California’s Proposition 8, the law banning same-sex marriage, the day before hearing oral arguments in a challenge to the federal Defense of Marriage Act. Hours before and up to the minute the

hearings began, the street in front of the court was filled with protesters on both sides of the same-sex marriage issue.

Those in support of traditional marriage came to Washington with church or parish groups from nearby or had traveled alone or with one or two others from states across the country, including Massachusetts, New York, Minnesota and Florida.

When the groups dispersed, those supporting traditional marriage continued their march back to the rally point on the mall where numerous speakers echoed the message that marriage should not be redefined.

Under sunny blue skies but chilly temperatures, those taking part in

the March for Marriage cheered and applauded speakers who addressed the crowd from a platform under the banner: “Every Child Deserves a Mom and Dad.” The crowd, primarily adults, stood on muddy grass on the mall between the U.S. Capitol and the Washington Monument. Tour groups, including some on Segways, passed the group, and asked those on the periphery what the rally was about. A member of one family visiting Washington found out what was going on by looking it up on her smartphone.

Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone of San Francisco, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage and the

event’s first speaker, noted that all eyes were upon the country at this time.

“I want begin with a word to those who disagree with us on this issue and may be watching us right now: We love you, we are your neighbors, and we want to be your friends, and we want you to be happy.”

He continued: “Please understand that we don’t hate you, and that we are not motivated by animus or bigotry; it is not our intention to offend anyone, and if we have, I apologize; please try to listen to us fairly, and calmly, and try to understand us and our position, as we will try to do the same for you.”

w ww. ww w.. joel jo oe ell carr c a rr ca rric i c o. o.co co com om ca a pt p t u re th the h e lo o ve e • ww

SEE MARRIAGE, PAGE 20

INDEX On the Street . . . . . . . . .4 National . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Opinion. . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Faith. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Calendar. . . . . . . . . . . .26

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

NEED TO KNOW POPE’S SIMPLE, PASTORAL MASS OF THE LORD’S SUPPER: Pope Francis insisted on a very simple Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday, March 28. Around 10 girls and 40 boys were to take part in the Mass at Casal del Marmo Penitential Institute for Minors in Rome. The pope planned to wash the feet of 12 of them, who were to be chosen from different nationalities and diverse religious confessions, Vatican news services said.

After the Mass, the pope planned to meet with the youths and the institute’s staff. The youths were to give the pope a wooden crucifix and kneeler, which they made themselves in the institute’s workshop. The pope was to bring Easter eggs and “colomba,” the traditional Italian Easter cake in the shape of a dove, for all. Because of the intimate nature of the pastoral visit, journalists were to be restricted to the area outside the building.

(PHOTOS BY RICK DELVECCHIO/CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO)

Above, a woman featured in a Jesuit Refugee Service video made in Amman, Jordan, says she had to flee her home in Homs, Syria, because she feared for her daughters’ safety. Right, Colin Gilbert, director of the Jesuit program in Jordan, says 1,000 to 3,000 Syrians forcibly displaced by civil war enter the neighboring Middle Eastern nation every night.

3 million Syrians uprooted RICK DELVECCHIO

‘WALK WITH THE LIVING STONES’: In their Easter message, the leaders of the Christian churches of Jerusalem invited the faithful around the world to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, extending an ecumenical appeal to visit those churches and to “walk with the living stones of this land, following in the footsteps of the risen Christ.” The Christian leaders continued in their March 26 message, “We invite all people of faith and good will in the world, particularly those in positions of authority, to strive for justice and peace among nations. We especially pray for Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and Israel, Egypt, Iraq and all those places suffering political upheaval.

We pray for all victims of violence and oppression, for prisoners, for those who live without security, fugitives, and refugees, especially those here in our land.” The Christian leaders ended by asking all those who cannot make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land “to sustain the people of this land in their prayers,” emphasizing that the Christian presence in the region continues to decline.

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

More than a million Syrians have fled the Middle Eastern nation’s two-year-old civil war and 2 million have been displaced within the country as a widening conflict threatens to destabilize the region, the director of the Jesuit Refugee Service in neighboring Jordan said.

“There’s no safe place in Syria now,” the director, Colin Gilbert, said in a talk March 20 at the Joan and Ralph Lane Center for Catholic Studies and Social Thought at the University of San Francisco.

Asked how the refugee crisis compares to what followed the U.S. invasion of Iraq 10 years ago, he said “a lot of people are saying this is looking like it’s going to be worse.

There’s no sign of peace.”

The spread of hostilities in the capital of Damascus, with a population of 7 million, could send a new wave of refugees into Beirut, Gilbert said.

Rebels are fighting a war of attrition against the government of President Bashar Assad but lack the force to prevail. Civilians have been swept into the violence throughout the country, as the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights

noted in a March 4 website post titled “More than 260 people killed in Syria so far today.” The post describes the dead as 44 civilians (including 4 children), 76 rebels, 32 unidentified rebels, 108 regular forces and one defected officer.

A terrorist attack in a Damascus mosque March 21 killed 40 people, including a senior Muslim cleric, and was strongly condemned by members of the U.N. Security Council.

Also on March 21, U.N. SecretaryGeneral Ban Ki-moon announced his decision to launch an investigation into a possible use of chemical weapons in Syria.

Schools have closed throughout Syria and villages and cities have been destroyed. Gilbert quoted one refugee from Homs as saying that Syria’s third-largest city, shelled and contested in heavy urban fighting, “is no longer a place; it is just an idea.”

“The entire fabric of society is falling apart,” Gilbert said.

With fighting nearing the border of Lebanon and threatening to spill over into Iraq, Antonio Guterres, a U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees representative, warned a U.S. Senate hearing on the Syria crisis March 19 that an “alarming escala-

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tion” in the number or refugees threatens to exceed the ability of the international community to respond on the political, security and humanitarian fronts.

Every night 1,000 to 3,000 more Syrians flee into Jordan, where the Jesuit agency provides humanitarian aid and helps youths continue their schooling through its Higher Education on the Margins project, Gilbert said.

He said a critical part of the faith-based organization’s effort is to help the refugees, many of whom are women, maintain the hope and the strength to return home one day to resume meaningful lives.

Amid the destruction and dislocation, “there’s a deeply rooted hope that there’s something beyond that,” he said, adding that the Jesuit project is “not to give handouts but to empower people to transform their reality, to rebuild the country someday.”

Gilbert described the Jesuits’ work as “accompanying refugees” as individuals and serving those who have been forcibly displaced through a “mission of listening.”

The organization’s website says lay and religious in the service also advocate for refugees’ justice and rights to protection.

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

schmalzv@sfarchdiocese.org burket@sfarchdiocese.org

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Parade for peace, justice for coast families CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

The Catholic Worker house in Half Moon Bay will lead a Parade for Peace and Justice April 13, an event designed to raise awareness about immigration reform and raise funds for a Catholic Worker-staffed community breakfast program that serves struggling families and individuals on the San Mateo County coast.

“Immigration reform is an important issue for a lot of Catholic families in our country and we wanted to build an event that engaged current social justice issues but also a fundraiser for our community breakfast – and 90 percent of the people who come to our breakfast are farm worker families, 10 percent are homeless,” Eric DeBode, associate director of Kelly Avenue Catholic Worker in Half Moon Bay, told Catholic San Francisco.

The parade is a collaboration of the Catholic Worker, Notre Dame de Namur University, Our Lady of the Pillar Parish and Coastside Lutheran Church.

“We wanted to do something that drew people to have an educated, informed conversation” about immigration reform, DeBode said. “We need to have a sane, compassionate national immigration policy that addresses the needs of the undocumented and the community in general.”

Pablo Parades, an immigration reform advocate, peace activist and

youth organizer with 67 Suenos, will be the keynote speaker at the event. Also speaking will be Dennis Apel from the Guadalupe Catholic Worker, a longtime activist with the Vandenberg Witness movement that seeks an end to nuclear weapons and testing and Vandenberg Air Force Base in Lompoc.

The free community breakfast staffed

by Catholic Worker volunteers is served Wednesdays and Thursdays at Coastside Lutheran Church. The service offers two breakfasts weekly, along with weekly distribution of household items.

Volunteers also distribute produce, working with Potrero Nuevo Farm to harvest and distribute 15,000 pounds of fresh, organic produce annually.

Catholic Worker and Our Lady of the Pillar, which has an active St. Vincent de Paul Society group, are part of a Catholic effort to extend charity and hospitality to families who are not only in need but also isolated from services.

DeBode said farm worker families often live in substandard housing around a farm.

“I deliver to houses where people are renting and I’ve seen a family of five in one bedroom in a three-bedroom house, and the other two bedrooms are two other families,” he said. “It’s crowded.

It’s not good for children.”

The St. Vincent de Paul Society now has three conferences on the coast, at Our Lady of the Pillar and in Pescadero and La Honda. The Our Lady of the

Pillar group distributes 700 bags of groceries a month, and the two other conferences help especially in going out to rural areas to serve families who do not have transportation, said Nancy Clarkin, secretary of the parish Vincentian group, which is led by her husband Tom. Quality of life is “pretty meager for a lot of people,” Nancy said. “We’re trying to reach out to as many as we can.”

PARADE FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE WHEN: April 13, 10 a.m.

WHERE: Starting at Our Lady of the Pillar Church, 400 Church St., Half Moon Bay REGISTRATION: $40. Visit www.kacw. org. Registration by March 31 includes T-shirt and tamale lunch.

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Grand slam event marks 100th birthday

than we give,” Archbishop Cordileone said during brief remarks. He also spoke of his appreciation for the work of CCCYO and those who make it possible and how it puts faith into action.

SAY CHEESE: Charlie Chaplin won hearts with the song “Smile” and through the years it has been recorded by singers from Nat King Cole to Michael Jackson. Students from Mercy High School, Burlingame’s Interact Club have more recently taken the “upside-down frown” to newer heights as they raised $250 to benefit “Operation Smile,” a worldwide organization that funds surgeries for poor children with cleft lips and palates.

Happy to help with the Valentine’s Day fundraiser was club moderator, Cynthia Yabes.

TOM BURKE CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

Presentation Sister Paschal Elvin entered religious life 84 years ago come December but entered life on earth exactly 100 years ago Feb. 22, 2013. “Hello Paschal” sung to the melody of “Hello Dolly” greeted the new centenarian at a birthday party Sister Paschal Feb. 24 at the PresenElvin, PBVM tation Sisters’ motherhouse in San Francisco complete with Mass, high tea and See’s candy.

Sister Paschal was presented an Oscar for “Best Sister in a Starring Role.”

The 100-year-old continues to lead an active life with former students asking one after the other to take her to lunch.

Sister Paschal has taught at schools – some now closed – including Sts. Peter and Paul, St. Agnes, St. Teresa and St. Elizabeth. She also receives many calls from old friends. Part of each day now is set aside for prayer and reading and several days a month she can be found making sandwiches for day workers.

Sister Paschal is a huge baseball fan and last fall “had a dream come true” when she met and talked with the Giants’ Buster Posey. Sister Paschal is a graduate of Presentation High School, Berkeley.

COME ON TO MY HOUSE: Thanks for the hospitality to Bernard P. Hagan who hosted a Feb. 20 Catholic Charities CYO welcome reception for Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone.

Bernard is a former Catholic Charities CYO board member and still stays close Bernard P. to CCCYO’s good Hagan work. He is a San Francisco native and contractor who has built low-income housing for seniors. More than 50 CCCYO board members and supporters attended.

“In giving of ourselves, our time and our treasure, we often receive more

ANNIVERSARY: Happy 60 years married to Anstell and Ron Ricossa, pictured here with daughter Melinda and son Stephen and their families on a milestone-marking Caribbean cruise. The couple met at a Salesian dance in North Beach and married at Sts. Peter and Paul Church on Ron’s return from service in Korea Feb. 7, 1953. They are longtime and active members of St. Vincent de Paul Parish in Cow Hollow where Melinda and Stephen both attended school, she later to Presentation and he to St. Ignatius College Prep.

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HALLMARK CARDS: Twin sisters Carly and Sammy Ramacher are alike too in their mission to help the poor. The White Oaks School fourth graders are too young to volunteer at the St. Vincent de Paul Homeless Help Centers but still touched hearts with Easter signs and cards they made to brighten people’s days. The help centers serve more than 100,000 meals a year to those in need in San Mateo County.

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KINDNESS: Notre Dame High School’s Students in Action Club supported women helped by St. Anthony Foundation as part of International Women’s Day. Club members delivered more than 50 boxes of women’s products to the San Francisco agency March 8. The campaign will help “women in the Tenderloin who have no money to purchase these essential items,” St. Anthony’s said. Among those on the delivery team were senior, Ana Mercado and juniors, Kaela Chavez and Andrea Lim. “Driving down to St. Anthony Foundation through the Tenderloin and seeing how excited the staff was to see us and our donations really reminded us that the entire point of the drive was not to meet a specific goal but instead to help women in our community,” Kaela said. Kaela and Ana served at St. Anthony’s Dining Room in January and were excited to return and continue to respond to the needs of those helped, Notre Dame said.

HOLY GPS: Thanks to Salt Lake City Bishop John Wester – always a missed priest of the Archdiocese of San Francisco – for this homily exhortation: “The Beatitudes are a blueprint for salvation. They tell us who Jesus is and give us a road map to heaven.”

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

From crisis to cross: One man’s journey to the Catholic faith Editor’s note: A parishioner at St. Veronica Parish, South San Francisco, wrote the following article on his journey of conversion to the Catholic faith. Rich – he asked that his last name not be published – has been a catechumen in the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults at St. Veronica, and will be received into the Catholic faith at the Easter Vigil at the parish, with baptism, first Communion and confirmation. His wife is Catholic and all three of his children were baptized Catholic as infants.

(PHOTO BY DENNIS CALLAHAN/CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO)

Celebrating Christ’s splendor and Passion T Michael Lewis, left, Tina Lewis and Kimora Lewis show the palm leaves they received at Palm Sunday Mass March 24 at St. Mary’s Cathedral. Holy Week begins with Palm Sunday, or Passion Sunday, which commemorates Christ’s messianic entry into Jerusalem and combines the royal splendor of Christ with the proclamation of his Passion.

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I guess the event that really made me aware that my eternal life was not going to be one of joy and shared with God and my loved ones was when I went in for surgery, nothing life threatening.

In the hour or so before they put me under I made my peace with God and all that goes with wanting to wake up from this. I was 43 at the time and had never been a religious person. I always believed in God and prayed sometimes, but found the organized version of religion not for me.

Just as they were putting me under, I started to panic as the mask was being placed over my mouth. I have had surgeries in the past so I had anesthesia before, but this was much different. I wanted to tear the mask away from my face but something inside me said “let this happen.” I was sure I wasn’t going to wake up.

As I was going under there was a defined period of blackness, not a color, but a sense, all around me, even inside me, this wasn’t the usual fade out, I was being given a message. I woke up in the recovery room, with my wife by my side and the next couple of weeks with all the medicine I wasn’t quite myself.

Over the next month I started to develop this debilitating fear: That blackness kept haunting me, always anxious, could not keep my hands steady, fear of failing my family. This was completely opposite of my normal personality. But the seed that

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had been planted was starting to develop. I sought the help of professionals, to no avail.

One evening when I was talking with my wife’s aunt, she suggested I might want to talk to a priest.

I had been thinking about it anyway. I was pretty sure God had given me a message: I need to change my life, I need to be baptized.

As soon as I started thinking about my life in this way, everything started to make sense.

I wanted to have a relationship with God; I wanted to be with my loved ones in the afterlife. So I made an appointment with Father Charles Puthota at St. Veronica Church, our family’s parish.

I explained to Father Charles my situation.

He saw how much this event affected me because I used to not be able to tell the story without breaking into tears – my soul was damaged and I needed guidance. He said he thought I had been blessed with a calling and suggested I start the RCIA classes and learn about the Catholic faith.

I have learned so much from my experience in the RCIA program. I have gotten to know and learn a lot about people in the program; we have shared some of our most vulnerable thoughts and moments with each other. I would recommend this program to anyone interested in learning the Catholic faith. There is a lot more to this story I left out. A lot of it has to do with my childhood and growing up without a father, and understanding how God can love and forgive you no matter what, and also the constant battle with sin and the enemy who’s always waiting for your vulnerable moments to do what he does to us all.

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ARCHDIOCESE 7

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

St. Rita parents raise funds in effort to save school

(PHOTO COURTESY BEN DAVIDSON)

The St. Rita School student body of about 130 students gathered for a photo on the Fairfax campus March 19. Parents are hoping a fundraising effort will put the school, which is threatened with closure, on solid financial ground.

ARCHDIOCESE TO WELCOME 150 NEW CATHOLICS AT THE EASTER VIGIL

More than 150 people will enter the Roman Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil in the Archdiocese of San Francisco, part of a worldwide ritual that includes baptism, first Communion and confirmation.

In addition to the 159 catechumens, 255 others will enter full communion with the Catholic Church, either as returning Catholics who were baptized but have not received any other sacraments or as Christians of other faiths

who are entering the Catholic Church.

Those who are already baptized but have not yet received confirmation are traditionally confirmed at St. Mary’s Cathedral on Pentecost.

For a person who has not received Christian baptism, the process of entering the church is formalized in the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults. RCIA is structured over a series of ceremonial steps and periods of learning, and the timing of these may vary for each individual. In some parishes, the process takes two years, in others it is one year.

A fundraising campaign is under way at St. Rita School, Fairfax, aimed at paying off the school’s debt as a first step toward averting the previously announced closure of the school at the end of this academic year. “We’ve been given a reprieve,� parent Brenna Gubbins told Catholic San Francisco March 26. “We have benchmarks to meet. We need to raise funds to cover this year’s deficit. We need to present a balanced budget for the following years. We also need to work on enrollment.�

She said the current debt is $250,000 to $300,000. A donor has pledged $200,000 if the gift is matched, and the campaign is $70,000 away from that goal, she said. “It’s really about having a balanced budget and doing something that works for this parish,� she said.

School board member Michael Pon said part of the financial challenge is to collect more tuition. “A lot of people are excited for the resurrection or rebirth of St. Rita,� he said. “It gives us a fresh start at handling a lot of policies.�

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8 NATIONAL

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Pope Francis models ‘what it means to be fully human,’ says Jesuit RICK DELVECCHIO

MAKING ‘A CHURCH OF THE POOR’ A REALITY

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

Pope Francis is offering the contemporary world the example of Christ as a model of “what it means to be fully human,” in a way that is consistent with the previous two popes but breaks new ground in putting the Gospel into action, Jesuit Father James Hanvey said in an interview with Catholic San Francisco.

“Most of the issues we’re fighting are not religious but what it means to be human,” said Father Hanvey, the current Lo Schiavo Chair in Jesuit Father Catholic Social Thought at the James Hanvey Joan and Ralph Lane Center at the University of San Francisco. “What does it mean to have a destiny, more than materialism? There’s a deep hunger in the human spirit that contemporary life does not answer.”

Pope John Paul II understood his mission as going to the entire world as the evangelizer, Father Hanvey said. Pope Benedict XVI also engaged the world on the question of what it means to be human, he said.

In Pope Francis, who in his first days in office called for a church of apostolic courage in service to the poor, Catholics have a shepherd who appears to be modeling nothing less than the teaching ministry of Jesus.

“It’s fundamentally a change in style, and that should change the culture,” said Father Hanvey, who is a member of the British Province of the Society of Jesus and specializes in systematic theology, Catholic social thought and Ignatian spirituality.

He described the style this way: “I think it’s sudden-

George Wesolek, communications director for the archdiocese, invites readers to share their ideas on how put the Gospel into action in response to Pope Francis’ call for “a church of the poor.” See Page 16. ly to encounter someone who is open to them, someone who listens to them and someone who loves them basically – whatever their state, whatever condition they are in. If he can sustain that, I think he will be modeling a different way of being a priest, a different way of being in mission.”

The style of the former Argentine Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio is “to go out to the people, go out simply as their servant, without compromising the faith in any way,” Father Hanvey said. “It’s certainly normal for him. It’s about reaching the heart as well as the mind.”

Father Hanvey said that the combination of integrity and engagement offers a powerful inspiration in the church and beyond.

“I think contemporary culture is looking much more for a sign of witness which has integrity and a witness which is fundamentally open with the world – that’s not to say it’s an assimilation with the world but one that is immediately open to the world in all its forms without immediately condemning or closing it down,” he said.

Father Hanvey, said the new pope’s stance is reminiscent of the passage in John’s Gospel “not to condemn the world but that the world might be saved through him.”

M A R T I N FA M I LY

m

The Jesuit also sees in the first pope from outside the European heart of the historic church a renewed focus on justice and equality as they pertain to the developing world.

“We’ve sort of gotten locked in these issues around the liberal democratic consensus, the secular consensus,” he said. “I think they are very important because they are fundamentally about the kind of society we want to create, but the danger is they can distract us from the conditions and circumstances that people need to lead fully human lives, both the economic and the social conditions.

“It’s not much a question of secularism and faith,” he said. “It’s really more of a question of justice – economic and social justice and freedom and equalities for the people.”

Asked about the new pope’s influence on the church in the U.S., Father Hanvey spoke of healing a wounded church.

“I think it’s partly due to the wound of abuse and partly due to how the hierarchical church has conducted the debate about controversial issues,” he said.

“I think maybe the debate has been too polemical.

For instance, whenever you’re making these public statements you need to also recognize what is positive.

People need to feel their experience is being described and recognized.”

But Father Hanvey said Catholics remain loyal to the church and continue to want to be a part of it. He noted the “extraordinary confidence Catholics still have in their parish priests.”

“The great untold story is the extra-compassionate and practical heart of the church” at the parish and diocesan levels, Father Hanvey said. “The hungry are fed, the naked are clothed, prisoners are visited.”

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PAPERLESS CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO In the coming months we will begin publishing a digital replica edition of Catholic San Francisco, a project that is being coordinated with the launch of a new CSF website. This page-by-page facsimile of the print paper will be viewable on any computer or portable device and will integrate the paper’s edited content to the Web. Free to our regular print subscribers, the e-edition will offer every article, image and advertisement, as it appears in the print edition. If you are a regular print subscriber as a benefit of your membership in a parish in the archdiocese and want to be notified when the free e-edition is available, simply email circulation.csf@sfarchdiocese.org. Subject line: “Paperless.” You will receive an email alert each time a new issue is ready for viewing. If you have any questions, please call (415) 614-5639. Thank you for helping us evaluate reader interest in this new product from the archdiocesan newspaper.

NATIONAL 9

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

USCCB: Proposed mandate changes still violate religious freedom CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

WASHINGTON – New proposed regulations governing the contraceptive mandate under the Affordable Care Act continue to violate basic principles of religious freedom, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said.

In comments filed March 20 with the Department of Health and Human Services, the USCCB raised a series of concerns, among them that the new proposals keep in place “an unjust and unlawful mandate” regarding the provision of contraceptive and other pregnancy services and that the rules provide no exemption, or accommodation, for “most stakeholders in the health insurance process, such as individual employees and for-profit employers,” who are morally opposed to such coverage.

Other objections include an “unreasonable and unlawfully narrow” exemption for some nonprofit religious organizations, primarily houses of worship, and limited accommodation for religious employers that continues to require those employers falling outside of the government’s definition to “fund or facilitate objectionable coverage.”

The rules are expected to be finalized this summer. Institutions are required to provide coverage by August.

The bishops’ document said that the contraceptive mandate remains unchanged and presented the USCCB position again that it should be rescinded.

“Contraceptives and sterilization procedures, unlike other mandated ‘preventive services,’ do not ‘prevent’ disease,” the document said. “Instead they disrupt the healthy functioning of the human reproductive system.”

The USCCB argued that the contraceptive mandate requires the coverage of abortifacients drugs and devices in violation of various aspects of the Affordable Care Act dealing with abortion coverage and the non-pre-emption of state law as well as well as other laws. Such concerns are separate from religious freedom issues, the comments said.

The document also contended the new proposed

rules offer no exemption, or accommodation, for “the overwhelming majority” of individuals and institutions who object to contraceptive coverage on religious or moral grounds.

The document acknowledged that the religious employer exemption in the new proposed rules was “improved slightly” in one area, but was “worsened” in another.

The first version of proposed rules exempted only religious organizations whose main purpose is the inculcation of faith and who employ and serve mem-

bers of the faith. A later accommodation said the contraceptive mandate could be met by nonexempt organizations through third-party insurers.

Under the new proposed rules for exempt religious organizations HHS eliminated inculcation of the faith and who the organization serves.

The USCCB raised concerns, however, that the new proposed rules exclude from the definition of religious employer various organizations that “undeniably are ‘religious’ and undeniably ‘employ’ people, such as Catholic hospitals, charities and schools.

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10 NATIONAL

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

US risks ‘losing soul’ by failing immigrants CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

LOS ANGELES – The archbishop of Los Angeles called upon the United States to remember the humanity of men, women and children in the country illegally or risk losing its soul.

Addressing the city’s Jewish community March 19, Archbishop Jose H. Gomez said the time has come for the U.S. to adopt comprehensive immigration reform to provide undocumented immigrants with a path to citizenship.

He also urged U.S. officials to end the practice of breaking up families through deportation.

The chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Migration called immigration reform “the most urgent civil rights question of our time.�

Archbishop Gomez, a native of Monterey, Mexico, recalled being an immigrant himself and how he became a naturalized citizen as a young adult in explaining the church’s support for comprehensive immigration reform.

He suggested to the audience at Sephardic Temple Tifereth Israel that immigration reform would be better addressed by Christian and Jewish leaders by invoking religious and moral terms

and by recalling the religious principles upon which the U.S. was founded. “One of the problems we have today is that we’ve lost our ability to talk about issues in religious and moral terms,� he said. “We are becoming a more and more secular society. And that makes it hard to talk about the values and commitments we find in America’s founding documents.�

Archbishop Gomez said the social justice movements that ended slavery in the 19th century, led to major civil rights gains in the 1960s and gave rise to today’s culture of life campaign are grounded in the nation’s Judeo-Christian heritage.

It’s time, the archbishop said, to return God to the debate on immigration and other concerns facing the country. “We have lost the sense of the humanity of the men and women and children who are living in this country illegally,�

Archbishop Gomez said. “That worries me as a pastor. I’m worried we are losing something of our national soul.�

Describing the U.S. as a great nation that readily turns to aiding people in need around the world, he questioned its treatment of undocumented immigrants.

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“Yet this great nation finds itself today reduced to addressing this major issue in our public life through namecalling and discrimination, criminal profiling based on race, random identity checks, violent raids of workplaces and homes, arbitrary detentions and deportations,� he said.

Citing the deportation of 1.5 million people in recent years, Archbishop Gomez called for compassion. “I am a pastor, not a politician. And to talk as a pastor, these are not statistics.

These are souls. Human beings. We’re talking about fathers and husbands who, with no warning, won’t be coming home for dinner tonight and who may not see their families again for a decade at least. We are talking about a government policy that punishes children for the crimes of their parents.

In thinking about immigration reform, the archbishop said his mind turns to the words of Moses during the Exodus not to oppress a stranger because they too were strangers in a foreign land. “Our society needs the heart of a stranger,� Archbishop Gomez said. “This is our task. To be that beating heart. The heart of a stranger.�

COLORADO GOVERNOR SIGNS BILL TO LEGALIZE SAME-SEX CIVIL UNIONS

DENVER – Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper March 21 signed into law a civil unions bill for same-sex couples that Denver Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila said “harms families, civil liberties and the natural rights of all Colorado’s children.�

The new law, which takes effect May 1 and gives same-sex couples many of the rights and responsibilities of marriage, “is the beginning of an effort to redefine the family in Colorado and to undermine the right of all children to have a mother and a father.

Civil unions are not about equality, tolerance or fairness,� the archbishop said. “Civil unions are the first step to redefining marriage and to radically redefining the concept of civil rights,� he said in a statement released when the House passed the bill March 12.

Catholic Charities of the Denver archdiocese criticized the measure because it contains no religious liberty protections for agencies morally opposed to placing children for adoption with same-sex couples.

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NATIONAL 11

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

North Dakota lawmakers approve ‘right to life’ ballot measure CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

BISMARCK, N.D. – The North Dakota Legislature voted March 22 to put a referendum on the 2014 ballot that would amend the state constitution to say that “the inalienable right to life of every human being at any stage of development must be recognized and protected.� “It doesn’t ban abortion. It doesn’t ban anything,� said Christopher Dodson, executive director of the North Dakota Catholic Conference, the public policy arm of the state’s bishops. “It does provide an expression of legislative intent that would make it clear, hopefully, that there is not a right to an abortion in the state constitution and give courts guidance for interpreting state laws regarding life,� he told Catholic News Service in a telephone interview March 25.

BISHOPS: POOR MUST BE FIRST IN BUDGET PRIORITIES

WASHINGTON – The needs of poor and vulnerable Americans must remain at the top of the country’s spending priorities, the chairmen of two U.S. bishops’ committees said. “While we lack the competence to offer a detailed critique of entire budget proposals, we do ask you to consider the human and moral dimensions of these choices,� Bishop Stephen E. Blaire of Stockton and

He compared the referendum to a Missouri statute ruled constitutional by the Supreme Court in its 1989 decision in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services. The court upheld portions of the law that limits abortions in Missouri and says in part that “unborn children have protectable interests in life, health and wellbeing.�

Dodson told CNS it was incorrect to call the North Dakota referendum a “personhood amendment,� which he said would grant all the legal rights of a person to every human life at any stage. “This doesn’t do that,� he explained.

Lawmakers voted 57-35 to approve the ballot resolution, a move that followed the passage of several other abortion-related bills that now go to the desk of Republican Gov. Jack Dalrymple for his signature.

Bishop Richard E. Pates of Des Moines, Iowa, told members of Congress in a March 18 letter.

The 2014 House budget, written by Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., calls for reducing domestic spending and lowering tax rates for most income earners while growing military spending. The Senate budget, offered by Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., calls for slower growth in discretionary spending and new revenues from wealthy Americans and the biggest corporations.

Those bills would require doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a local hospital; would ban abortion for the purpose of sex selection or genetic abnormality; and would ban abortion after the detection of a fetal heartbeat, which could be as early as six weeks.

Opponents of the abortion measures are urging Dalrymple not to sign them into law and have vowed a legal challenge to fight them if he does.

A measure to protect human embryos was defeated and one to ban

abortion after 20 weeks was amended and has to go back to lawmakers for a final vote.

The bill to prohibit abortions when the heartbeat of the unborn child is detected “does raise some new legal questions,� but the questions are without merit, Dodson said in March 12 testimony. “Currently, the U.S. Supreme Court only allows states to protect unborn life after the point of viability, which is when an unborn child can survive outside the womb,� he told the Senate Judiciary Committee.

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12 WORLD

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Nobel laureate: Pope preferred silent diplomacy during ‘dirty war’ CAROL GLATZ CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

VATICAN CITY – Pope Francis preferred carrying out “a silent diplomacy” in helping victims versus leading a more public outcry during Argentina’s “dirty war,” said an Argentine Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

“The pope had nothing to do with the dictatorship ... he was not an accomplice,” Adolfo Perez Esquivel told journalists after his private meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican March 21.

While the Vatican released no details about the meeting, Perez, 81, told journalists that he and the pope spoke about the so-called “dirty war” period “in general terms” during their 30-minute encounter.

Perez, who won the 1980 Nobel Peace Prize for his work on human rights during the 1976-1983 dictatorship, said the future pope, thenJesuit Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio, “was not among the bishops who were in the front line of the defense of human rights because he preferred a silent diplomacy to ask about the missing, about the oppressed.”

He said leaders and members of the Catholic Church reacted and behaved differently during the period

(CNS PHOTO/REMO CASILLI, REUTERS)

Argentine Nobel Peace Prize laureate Adolfo Perez Esquivel speaks with media after a private meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican March 21. Pope Francis preferred carrying out “a silent diplomacy” in helping victims versus leading a more public outcry during Argentina’s “dirty war,” said Perez. as regards to either collaborating or resisting the regime.

“There were bishops who were accomplices with the dictatorship, but not Bergoglio,” he said.

Then-Father Bergoglio was head of the Jesuit province in the country from 1973 to 1979, the height of the clandestine war that saw as many as 30,000 Argentines kidnapped,

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tortured, murdered or disappeared, never to be seen again. He then served as rector of Colegio Maximo and a parish priest in the Diocese of San Miguel until leaving for Germany to complete his doctoral thesis in 1986.

Some claims had been made that Pope Francis played either a direct role in the kidnappings of two Jesuit

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priests during the country’s murderous military dictatorship or that he allegedly failed to protect the two young priests – Fathers Orlando Yorio and Francisco Jalics – from kidnapping by Argentina’s military junta in 1976. Both priests were later freed.

The Vatican spokesman, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, said March 15, “This was never a concrete or credible accusation,” adding that the future pope had been “questioned by an Argentine court as someone aware of the situation but never as a defendant. He has, in documented form, denied any accusations.”

“Instead, there have been many declarations demonstrating how much (the future Pope Francis) did to protect many persons at the time of the military dictatorship,” the spokesman said.

Father Jalics has recently emphasized that he and the late Father Yorio had never been denounced by the future pope to the military junta.

Perez made a public statement on his website March 14, saying the pope “was not directly complicit” with the regime.

He said the pope “did not have ties with the dictatorship,” even though he may have “lacked the courage to stand with us in our struggle for human rights.”

After his March 21 meeting with the pope, Perez told reporters “there is no proof ” of the pope’s complicity with the regime “because he was never an accomplice, of this I am sure.”

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WORLD 13

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Pope Francis to live in Vatican guesthouse, not papal apartments CINDY WOODEN CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

VATICAN CITY – Pope Francis has decided not to move into the papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace, but to live in a suite in the Vatican guesthouse where he has been since the beginning of the conclave that elected him, said Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman.

“He is experimenting with this type of living arrangement, which is simple,” but allows him “to live in community with others,” both the permanent residents – priests and bishops who work at the Vatican – as well as guests coming to the Vatican for meetings and conferences, Father Lombardi said March 26.

The spokesman said Pope Francis has moved out of the room he drew by lot before the conclave and into Suite 201, a room that has slightly more elegant furnishings and a larger living room where he can receive guests.

The Domus Sanctae Marthae, the official name of the guesthouse, was built in 1996 specifically to house cardinals during a conclave.

Celebrating Mass March 26 with the residents and guests, Pope Francis told them he intended to stay, Father Lombardi said. The permanent residents, who had to move out during the conclave, had just returned to their old rooms.

Pope Francis has been there since his election March 13, taking his

meals in the common dining room downstairs and celebrating a 7 a.m.

Mass with Vatican employees in the main chapel of the residence.

He will be the first pope in 110 years not to live in the papal apartments on the third floor of the Apostolic Palace.

In 1903, St. Pius X became the first pope to live in the apartments overlooking St. Peter’s Square. The apartments were completely remodeled by Pope Paul VI in 1964 and have undergone smaller modifications by each pope since, according to “Mondo

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The large living room or salon of the apartment is located directly above the papal library where official audiences with visiting bishops and heads of state are held.

Pope Francis will continue to use the library for official audiences and to recite the Angelus prayer on Sundays and holy days from the apartment window overlooking St. Peter’s Square, Father Lombardi said.

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14 WORLD

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Catechist: ‘We prayed the rosary as we ran’ PAUL JEFFREY CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

ABYEI, Sudan – When Bruna Maloal was a child, Abyei was a peaceful place, and every year her tribe, the Dinka Ngok, welcomed the Misseriya nomads who came to the region with their vast herds of cattle.

“They came with their cows for the water and grass, and we would eat together. They harvested the gum from the trees, and we would buy some of their goods. And when the rains came, they would go home,” the 63-year old Catholic catechist told Catholic News Service.

But then things changed. With a separatist movement pushing the South of the country toward eventual independence, Abyei was caught literally in the middle. The nomads who once came to Abyei in peace were transformed into an armed militia by the northern government in Khartoum.

“Omar changed things. Maybe he discovered something here he wanted.

But the whole problem began with Omar,” said Maloal, referring to Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who has been charged by the International Criminal Court with genocide and crimes against humanity for his government’s actions in Sudan’s western region of Darfur.

Backed by the Sudanese army, Misseriya militias attacked Abyei in 2008.

Maloal hid in the bush for four days, then came back to the smoldering ruins of her house. The nearby church compound had been sacked and everything of value carried away.

Border area paid heavy price

Yet the violence in 2008 was but a prelude to 2011, when the Sudanese government tried to provoke the soon-to-become-independent government in Juba, South Sudan, to respond militarily to an attack on Abyei. Such a response would have given the North an excuse to launch a full-scale war that would have derailed the South’s independence. Juba didn’t take the bait.

The people of Abyei, now one of the regions in dispute along the Sudan-South Sudan border – paid a heavy price.

“The Misseriya came on motorcycles, one driving with two on the back with guns, shooting people. I saw them with my own eyes. They chased us away, yelling in Arabic. I left everything behind except the clothes on my back. I didn’t even have time to get my shoes,” Maloal said.

CARDINAL LEVADA TRAVELS TO ASSISI TO PRAY FOR NEW POPE

ASSISI, Italy – When U.S. Cardinal William J. Levada walked through the Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi March 23, he took a moment to gaze at the fresco of the 11th-century saint who inspired the new pope’s name.

The retired prefect Cardinal William of the Congregation J. Levada for the Doctrine of the Faith told Catholic News Service that he made the journey to pray for the papal ministry of Pope Francis.

“When I was in the Sistine Chapel and the Holy Father announced that he had chosen the name Francis, I thought, ‘Now I must go to Assisi as soon as I can ... so I can ask the intercession of his patron saint – Italy’s patron saint – for his new

(CNS PHOTO/PAUL JEFFREY)

Bruna Maloal, a 63-year old Catholic catechist, stands at the gate to her home in Abyei, a town at the center of the contested Abyei region along the border between Sudan and South Sudan.

Her home was looted and burned in 2011 when soldiers and militias from Sudan swept through the area, chasing out Maloal and tens of thousands of others.

“We hid in the bush near the edge of town to see if the situation got calm.

It didn’t. They told us to leave. So we ran. For eight days we ran, with the shooting and bombing behind us. It was raining, and at night we huddled under the trees with nothing to cover ourselves. Some stopped in Agok, but they were bombing there so I kept moving farther south. When we arrived at Turalei, the United Nations people gave us food and blankets,” she said.

More than 100,000 residents of Abyei were displaced by the assault. Most of them sought shelter in Agok. Heavy rains caused the tanks and heavy artillery of the northern forces to get bogged down in mud before they could advance on Agok, preventing what could have been an even greater humanitarian crisis.

Maloal spent the next year living under a plastic tarp. When the Misseriya pulled back from Abyei in mid-2012, she was one of the first to return. Maloal set to work cleaning up the church compound, which was once again in ruins, and she picked through the rubble of what had been her own mud-walled hut. She regularly gathered other Catholics to pray.

“We prayed the rosary as we ran from here. We prayed for the bullets to miss. God ran with us, and were it not for the power of God, we couldn’t have come back,” Maloal said. “The church is always with the people. The people here have survived because the church supports them. As a catechist, I gather them, pray with them, and preach the word of God to them.”

Petrine ministry,’” Cardinal Levada said.

The cardinal, who was a member of the conclave that elected Pope Francis March 13, has visited the tomb of St. Francis of Assisi many times throughout the years. He has led pilgrimages that usually involved the Archdiocese of San Francisco – named after the Assisi saint – where the cardinal had served as archbishop from 1995 to 2005. But this time, Cardinal Levada had a much different reason for making the journey.

When Pope Francis was introduced to the world from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, he asked for prayers from the tens of thousands of people packed in the square below him. The new pope “is a man who says always at the end, ‘Pray for me, pray for me,’” Cardinal Levada said. “So I want him to know that I’m taking his admonition seriously, especially at the tomb of his patron, Francis.”

POPE FRANCIS MEETS RETIRED POPE BENEDICT, SAYS ‘WE’RE BROTHERS’

Little help from the outside

Maloal said her five children and their families remain living south of Abyei, where they have access to food from the U.N. World Food Program. In Abyei town, there is little help from the outside. Maloal harvests wild greens that she uses to supplement what’s left of two bags of sorghum she received last August from U.N. peacekeepers.

The U.N. troops, who are from Ethiopia, have also provided water to returned residents. The Misseriya sabotaged the town’s wells before leaving, so U.N. tank trucks regularly make the rounds to fill roadside barrels with water.

In several outlying villages, the Abyei Catholic parish, with support

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy – With a warm embrace, a helping hand, shared prayer, a long discussion and lunch together, Pope Francis spent several hours with retired Pope Benedict XVI March 23 at the papal summer villa.

Pope Francis gave Pope Benedict an icon of Mary and Jesus that the Russian Orthodox delegation to his inauguration had given him just a few days earlier.

“They told me this was Our Lady of Humility. If I may say, I thought of you,” Pope Francis said. Pope Benedict, obviously moved, grasped his successor’s hands. Pope Francis told Pope Benedict, “You gave us so many examples of humility and tenderness.”

The meeting took place in Castel Gandolfo, where Pope Benedict is staying while a Vatican monastery is being remodeled as a residence for him. The retired pope moved with much greater difficulty than he did a month ago.

from Caritas South Sudan and several international partners, has played a lead role in drilling new wells for the returnees, at the same time rehabilitating community clinics.

The church is an exception here, as few international nongovernmental organizations are willing to get involved in the contested territory’s rehabilitation. In part, they’re not sure the militias will not attack again and wipe out their investment. Yet many also operate in Darfur and other regions of Sudan, and they don’t want to anger the Khartoum government, which has kicked several aid groups out of the country. Some NGOs have had their Khartoum offices visited by government officials, who warned that they were watching closely any involvement in Abyei.

Because of the lack of international support for a return, only about 20,000 of those displaced in 2011 have returned to their communities, according to the United Nations, yet those numbers are inexact. Church leaders say many families have returned for a brief period, then gone back to the relative safety of Agok. Before making a decisive commitment to return home, they’re waiting to see what the political future holds.

Referendum on Abyei’s future

The African Union has proposed a referendum for next October on Abyei’s future. A similar referendum planned for 2011 did not take place, as the two governments could not agree on who was eligible to vote. This year’s proposal may well precipitate new violence from those who fear they would lose at the polls.

On the ground, while the Ethiopian peacekeepers have all but eliminated open clashes, incidents of livestock theft by the Misseriya are reportedly increasing. Many worry that’s a sign of increased violence in the months ahead.

Father Karlo Kaw, one of two priests serving the Abyei parish, said the problem is that the U.N. troops are afraid.

“The Ethiopian troops won’t go out at night. But that’s when the men with guns arrive to steal the goats and cattle, and in the morning, when the U.N. troops wake up, the animals are long gone,” Father Kaw said. “You cannot follow someone with a gun unless you are willing to die yourself. And these Arabs, they will shoot even the U.N. troops. They don’t care, they are very crazy.”

Walking with a cane, he took smaller and slower steps.

POPE URGES VATICAN EMPLOYEES TO MEDITATE ON GOD’S PATIENCE

VATICAN CITY – Continuing to invite Vatican employees to morning Mass, Pope Francis told the head of the Vatican health service and members of the photography staff of the Vatican newspaper to keep in mind throughout Holy Week just how patient God is.

“The patience of God is a mystery,” Pope Francis said in his homily March 25 at the Domus Sanctae Marthae where he is staying. “We do so many things, but he is patient.” The pope said the liturgies marking Jesus’ Last Supper, his passion and death and his resurrection are a perfect time for each person to consider “how patient has Jesus been with me in my life?

Just this. And then the words will rise from our hearts: ‘Thank you, Lord!

Thank you for your patience.’”

ARCHBISHOP 15

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

(PHOTOS BY DENNIS CALLAHAN/CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO)

Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone adds balsam to chrism at the annual Chrism Mass at St. Mary’s Cathedral March 21. Msgr. John Talesfore, cathedral rector, is at the archbishop’s left. The oil of the sick, the oil of catechumens, and the holy chrism are all blessed at the liturgy and then distributed to parishes for use throughout the year.

Every Christian must embrace humility to grow in holiness the cross … we aren’t disciples of the Lord. We are worldly, … but not disciples of the Lord.”

The cross. Think about this oil to be blessed and consecrated: How did it get here? The olives must first be crushed, and pressed, and so transformed into oil, giving off its wonderful fragrance and effecting its healing power, which takes on a special spiritual significance after it is set apart for sacred use in our Mass today.

And so it is in our spiritual life: We must be crushed, in some way, we must become a sacrifice pleasing to God, if we wish to grow in holiness and know the healing power of his love. This means the cross: What we suffer for Christ and with him, what we suffer precisely for being set aside with him to share his sacred mission.

Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone gave this homily, titled “Anointed with and in Christ for the Sanctification of the World,” at the annual Chrism Mass March 21 at St. Mary’s Cathedral. The text has been slightly condensed to fit the space on this page.

I

n these historic days, we find a double example of humility: Both Pope Benedict and Pope Francis demonstrate for us this foundational Christian virtue, each in his own unique way. That in itself is a valuable lesson: Every Christian must appropriate this virtue if he or she wishes to grow in holiness, but each according to their vocation and state in life and particular personal attributes and circumstances.

The Chrism Mass is always celebrated at this time of the year when the holy days of the Easter triduum are upon us, those special ceremonies which recall for us the ultimate act of humility which is the model for all: the death of our Lord Jesus Christ on the SALVATORE J. cross. He, though innocent, CORDILEONE freely offered his life for us, to reconcile us to his father in heaven; the judge of the universe submits himself to the authority of a human judge whom he himself created; he, the giver of the law, places his mortal destiny in the hands of those who are the teachers of the law that he gave; he, our perfect high priest, allows himself to be betrayed by the priests whose priesthood is now passing away, replaced by his one, perfect priestly offering of himself, to take away the sins of the world once for all.

This is what he was anointed to do, as we hear him proclaim in the Gospel, fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah of old. Anointed, that is, consecrated, set aside for a sacred mission. The purpose of this Chrism Mass is to bless and consecrate the oil with which God’s people will be anointed, identified with Christ, the anointed one, to be set apart to share with him his sacred mission.

In his first homily as Pope, celebrated with the cardinal electors the day after his election, Pope Francis spoke about the anointing which incorporates us into the body of Christ which is the Church.

He said: “To build, to construct the Church. This means stones. Stones are solid but these are living

FROM THE ARCHBISHOP

Oils to be blessed are presented at the annual Chrism Mass at St. Mary’s Cathedral March 21. stones, stones that are anointed by the Holy Spirit.

[Anointed to] build the Church, the bride of Christ, on the cornerstone that is the Lord himself.”

The cross

As we hear in our second reading for Mass today, St. John recounts for us what he learned in his revelation from God, further specifying what Christ built this Church to be. He tells us that Jesus Christ “has made us into a kingdom, priests for his God and father.”

The identity of a priest is to sanctify. The mission of the Church, then, the sacred mission for which we together in Christ are set apart, is to sanctify the world. We are set apart: not set apart above, nor against, but for: for the world, for the sanctification of the world. There must, then, be something identifiably different about us, something that distinguishes us from the rest of the world. If our behavior, our attitudes, our values, our speech, our manners – all of this – if it is all just like everyone else, then we will have betrayed our very identity as Christians.

No doubt, to be faithful to this identity will require paying a price. Pope Francis also spoke about this in that same homily: “In the Gospel, even Peter who confessed Jesus as Christ, says to him: ‘You are the Messiah, the son of the living God. I will follow you but let’s not talk about the cross. That doesn’t have anything to do with it. … I’ll follow you, without the cross.’ But, when we walk without the cross, when we build without the cross, when we profess a Christ without

The ministerial priesthood

The oil of chrism, in particular, is used to anoint God’s people in the sacraments of baptism and confirmation, by which they are initiated into the mysteries of Christ and incorporated into his body, the Church.

But it is also used to anoint the hands of the priest in ordination. Within this priestly people set apart for the sanctification of the world are those set apart for the sanctification of God’s people. That is, for this people to be faithful in their sacred mission for the world, they must first be sanctified. And so those ordained to the ministerial priesthood are set apart to be identified with Christ the head, bridegroom and shepherd of the church. They are set apart to offer sacrifice, with their very hands to make present Christ’s perfect priestly sacrifice here and now, so that God’s people may be nourished by the bread of life come down from heaven, the word of God made flesh, and so be more perfectly identified with God’s anointed one in his priestly mission of sanctifying the world.

Since the Chrism Mass is associated with Holy Thursday, in anticipation of those who will be anointed in the Easter sacraments and received into the communion of the church at the Easter Vigil, it also obtains a particular focus on the ministerial priesthood, given that this is when our Lord instituted the Eucharist at the Last Supper. As Blessed John Paul II reminded us, the Eucharist is the very reason for the very existence of the priesthood. The priest exists to offer the eucharistic sacrifice: not just with words and rituals, but with his whole life. Priests must be the first to lead God’s people in this way, the way of the cross, pouring out their lives as did Christ himself, loving his Church with the love of a bridegroom for his bride, laying down their lives as the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.

16 OPINION

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

A church of the poor

Immigration reform can no I longer wait JEFF BIALIK

I

n 1900, my maternal grandmother arrived in the United States from Finland. My dad’s father came here from Poland in 1906. They came through Ellis Island, poor and uneducated. They spoke no English and brought with them only the clothes on their backs and the strength of purpose to build a better life for themselves and their families.

Since before the U.S. was a country, immigrants have arrived; overcoming incredible obstacles to get here and facing many challenges to stay. This is not just an immigrant story; this is an American story. This is the story of our families, our church and our community. This is also a story of social justice. The right to work, to self-determination and to provide for one’s family.

In the aftermath of the 2012 presidential election, Republicans are now working with Democrats to create the best opportunity in years to pass comprehensive immigration reform, which the President has pledged to sign. The U.S. Senate’s “gang of eight” is nearing completion on a deal to reform immigration laws, with a bill likely ready for debate in early April.

And yet, there remains significant opposition in Congress to immigration reform. How strange it is that the grandchildren and great grandchildren of immigrants stand so fervently in opposition to immigration.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishop’s Justice for Immigrants Campaign is correct to call for a fair and humane approach to immigration reform: a path to citizenship, preserving family unity, legal work for immigrant workers, due process protections and addressing the root causes of migration.

Whether our argument is based on economics, social justice, or our Catholic faith, we stand on solid ground when we push for equal rights and benefits of citizenship for those who have contributed to their communities for many years. We must fervently resist proposals that offer legal status but no chance to become citizens, which would only sanction a permanent underclass in our society.

Who am I to accept my right as citizen by virtue of the fortunate location of my birth, while denying it to someone who has toiled harder and worked longer than I to earn it?

Current immigration policy is so broken that it creates the very conditions which encourage illegal immigration. Once these individuals are fortunate enough to survive crossing the border, more than 80 percent find work with companies in the U.S. Thus, our national immigration policies send mixed signals, with a “keep out” sign hung at the border and a “help wanted” sign at the workplace. We need to fix this. First, we need to create a path to citizenship for immigrants in the U.S., and then establish a process to allow those who wish to come and work a legal, safe and humane manner to do so. We must halt deportations that separate parents from their children and spouses from their families. We must also fight to end the backlog of family-based visas so loved ones are not waiting decades to be reunited.

The goal is not just legal status and economic self-sufficiency, but for immigrants to become fully active participants in the social and civic life of our communities. Certainly we can agree that breaking families apart runs counter to building healthy, economically sustainable communities. It is important that we continue to create the same pathways of opportunity that my grandparents had to pursue the American dream.

Our entire community must work together to monitor the public debate and position on this issue vital to our nation. We can no longer wait.

Comprehensive immigration reform is a must to ensure that our values as Catholics and as Americans are reflected, supported and advanced.

BIALIK is executive director of Catholic Charities-CYO of the Archdiocese of San Francisco.

n the opening comments of his papacy, Pope Francis has been clear about his vision for the church.

“How I would love a church that is poor and for the poor,” he said. More important, he has modeled for us through his actions, a humble, human touch that recognizes the poor and the marginalized. He again shook up Vatican protocol by changing the Holy Thursday schedule.

Instead of a ceremony at St. Peter’s he will visit a juvenile prison in Rome and wash the feet of the inmates.

Our shepherd and leader is putting the 1.2 billion-strong GEORGE Catholic Church on the path WESOLEK of service and justice. He is saying that the trappings of power and the glitter of vestments are not the essential ingredients in our journey of faith.

How can the Catholic Church become a “church for the poor?” The answer is not to sell off the magnificent treasures in the Vatican museums. These works of art are meant to be our trust that we preserve for the world and the world’s poor. The poor need and desire the beauty of the Pieta as much as, or even more, than the wealthiest connoisseurs. These treasures are priceless anyway. Vatican accounting values the Pieta, as well as other works of art in the Vatican’s possession, at one euro.

There must be other paths that we create that bring us to this desired goal. First of all, we must discuss what a “church for the poor” would look like.

I think very few of us have a clear vision of this. We are content, most of us, to quietly attend Mass and profess our faith in a very pragmatic and middleclass manner. There are very few dramatic gestures in an average parish of the community washing the feet of the homeless or visiting prisons, or working with our legislators to end poverty by good public policy. “Service” of the poor and marginalized is not our primary thought or our motivation when we come to church. What Pope Francis is pointing out, however, is that “service” is essential to the living out of our faith. It is a direct extension of our eucharistic prayer. To make the gift of Christ real in our lives, we must “love one another.”

Hopefully, Pope Francis, with his inspired words and mandate to all of us, has started a worldwide discussion among Catholics as to how we may truly become a “church for the poor.” Many parishioners already serve the poor and the marginalized in sometimes heroic ways in our archdiocese. They are too few, however.

Many of you reading this have ideas about how to change our church so that it reflects the vision of our pope. Let us begin a wide-ranging discussion in our archdiocese of how we can become a local “church of the poor.” Send your thoughts, ideas and suggestions to wesolekg@sfarchdiocese.org and Catholic San Francisco will print the best of them.

We cannot allow Pope Francis’ bold vision to end up as merely words. We must take up his invitation to turn these Spirit-filled words into action.

WESOLEK is the communications director for the archdiocese and director of the Office of Public Policy and Social Concerns.

LETTERS ‘Only Jesus and Mary’ Yes to the letter writers for “What Obama inherited” and “Can’t serve 2 masters” (Feb. 15), and to Father Rolheiser for “Honoring an abundant and prodigal God” (March 15).

We cannot serve God unless we give up “the power of money over everything.” We are living in a too materialistic society with so much freedom that we lose sight of the way to our Creator.

Even the church speaks through our Holy Father, with Pope Benedict XVI who in his humble state resigned for the good of God’s people and now with our humble Pope Francis. Do we hear and listen to the cry of the good shepherd through the voice of our holy fathers on earth?

It is true what Father Ron Rolheiser wrote: “Only Jesus and Mary were fully practicing Catholics.”

If we forever keep throwing stones at each other, where is the love of God, where is the love of neighbor?

Rosenda M. Jardin San Bruno

The Lord’s grace for unity is always obtainable Through researching some of the speakers for the St. Rita Lenten lecture series you advertised in the Catholic San Francisco, I found that several of them openly disagree with the teachings of the church on issues ranging from the ordination of women, to same-sex marriage, sexual ethics and the doctrine on life issues. As someone who finds profound wisdom and beauty in the teachings of our faith, I would caution your readers to check out the reputations of any speakers advertised as Catholic. Are they in line with Catholic teaching?

Is their message political or spiritual? Often while social and political agendas for the “common good” are being promoted, the most important social and moral issues of our times are being ignored, making a justly ordered society impossible. The first Christians were called to be countercultural and so are we.

In this Year of Faith many are working hard to encourage Catholics to rediscover authentic Catholicism to bring about a greater unity. Our Lord made

his desire for unity so clear and his grace for unity is always obtainable. After raising six children our experience has taught us that for there to be any kind of fairness, peace, justice or unity within a family there has to be a very clear understanding and following of rules. The same is true for the classroom, the workplace, society and the church.

Daphne Massucco Woodacre

Excellent bread and food for thought Catholicism is well and being nurtured at St. Rita Church, Fairfax. Father Ken Weare, pastor, outdid himself with a Lenten lineup of gifted speakers on topics from Pope John XXIII’s “Pacem in Terris” exhorting universal peace. The talks were especially relevant in these times of wars and leaders’ failure to work out issues on national and local levels.

The talks each Tuesday followed soup suppers and were a perfect opportunity to review how we take our faith with us daily incorporating it into our regular lives and living the Gospel.

The program reinforced the meaning and importance of my Catholic religion, making it relevant on a daily basis, and I am grateful. The evenings had more than 100 people attending, some from other parishes as far away as San Francisco. I am sure it was not just the soup.

Father Ken and his parishioners who helped present the soup, excellent bread and food for thought deserve to be recognized and applauded.

Will Silverthorne Fairfax

School costs difficult for pastors In reference to Kathleen Kelly’s letter (March 22), I do not think Father Kenneth Weare is being critical of lay teachers themselves. It is the cost of maintaining a lay faculty that modern-day pastors find difficult. In earlier years parishes provided the sisters with a convent to live in and the religious orders covered their medical costs. Obviously lay teachers do not live under these circumstances.

Bev Rowden San Rafael

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 17

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

The reforms that are coming SANDRO MAGISTER

Pope John XXIII appointed his new secretary of state on the very evening of his election as pope. And he was the great diplomat Domenico Tardini, at the time an ordinary priest, not yet bishop or cardinal.

But that is prehistory, compared to the earthquake of today.

Pope Francis has arrived in Rome “from the ends of the earth,” and he is innovating the manner of governing the church from on high, starting with himself. The reform of the Curia will come. And many other things will come as well. But after “a certain time,” he has cautioned.

Meanwhile, he has told all of the heads of the Curia whose mandates ended with the resignation of his predecessor to get back to work – “temporarily,” until he, the new pope, decides. Since March 13 the Vatican Curia has been a tremulous army of functionaries without a certain future.

At his first appearance on the loggia of the basilica of St. Peter, the newly elected Jorge Mario Bergoglio wanted two cardinals at his side. At his right his vicar for the diocese of Rome, Agostino Vallini, and at his left his Brazilian friend Claudio Hummes, a Franciscan. They are a pair that personifies his program.

The new pope wants to be the bishop of Rome for all intents and purposes, as he implied immediately on the first Sunday of his pontificate, with the Mass celebrated in the parish of St. Anne on the border of

T

the Vatican and the Borgo, amid a rejoicing crowd.

He will go from church to church, he will visit center and periphery, “for the evangelization of this city that is so beautiful,” in direct contact with the people of the diocese which now is his “bride.”

Above all, Pope Francis loves to call himself “bishop of Rome.” But he also holds firm, and said so immediately, that “the church of Rome is that which presides in charity over all the churches.”

They are the words of Ignatius of Antioch, a bishop and martyr of the second century, which since then have served as a guide for the difficult balance of power between the successor of Peter, the bishop of Rome, and the successors of the college of the twelve apostles, the bishops of the whole world, between the exercise of papal primacy and the exercise of episcopal collegiality. At the beginning of the second millennium this balance was toppled and schism divided the church of Rome from the churches of the East.

But within the Catholic Church as well papal primacy, pushed to the limit, is waiting to be balanced by the college of bishops. This was called for by Vatican II, so far with scarce practical application, and again forcefully by Benedict XVI in one of his last discourses as pope, a few days before his resignation.

His successor Francis has already made it known that this is precisely what he means to do.

To do this he has available to him a rough and ready implement, the synod. It consists of the approximately two hundred bishops, the elite of the almost five thousand bishops of the whole world, who

every two years meet in Rome to discuss an issue of particular urgency for the life of the church.

Its powers are purely advisory, and its twenty-eight editions so far, since the first in 1967, have risen only rarely above tedium. Pope Francis could make it deliberative, naturally “together with and under” his power of primacy.

But above all he could transform into a proper and permanent “council of the crown” that restricted group of bishops, three for each continent, which every synod elects at the end of its work, to act as a bridge to the following synod.

For a pope like Francis, who wants to feel from Rome the pulse of the worldwide church, this group is the ideal instrument. Suffice it to say that among the twelve elected by the last synod are almost all of the outstanding names of the recent conclave: the cardinals Timothy Dolan of New York; Odilo Scherer of São Paulo, Brazil; Christoph Schonborn of Vienna; Peter Erdo of Budapest; George Pell of Sydney; Luis Antonio Tagle of Manila.

By gathering around himself a summit of the worldwide episcopate of such a high level, once a month or even more frequently, physically present in Rome or by videoconference, Pope Francis could govern the church just as Vatican Council II wished: with stable collegial support for his ultimate decisions as successor of Peter.

Magister is a Rome-based journalist. This article first appeared on his website www.chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it.

Author’s bizarre misreading of priestly tradition

he hermeneutical key to Garry Wills’ preposterous book “Why Priests? A Failed Tradition” can be found in the second chapter, which is a memoir of the author’s Catholic boyhood in the 1940s and 1950s. He recalls a time when lay people were denied access to the chalice, when Catholic grade school children worried about what happened to the consecrated host once it entered their intestines, when pampered priests wore “fiddle-back” vestments, maniples and birettas, when women pinned paper tissue to their hair in order to FATHER ROBERT satisfy the requirement that their heads be covered during BARRON Mass, and when priest golfers were ceded to on the first tee. I am 53 years old and I’ve been a priest for 27 years, and I can testify that the only contact I have had with the world Wills describes is in Bing Crosby movies and John Powers books. Though the hyper-clerical church of Wills’ youth has almost entirely evanesced, he is still railing against it.

“Why Priests?” it seems to me, is a sustained, deeply polemical, and finally irrational working out of that anger.

On Wills’ reading, priests have been bad news from the beginning. Jesus was a layman and a prophet, who was opposed by the Jewish establishment of scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees. But when those relatively ineffectual enemies of Jesus wanted to eliminate the troublesome prophet, they turned – like Don Corleone turning to Luca Brasi – to the priests: “The priests killed Jesus. That is what they do. They kill the prophets” (Wills, p. 80). I suppose Pontius Pilate, the Roman cohort, Judas, the Sanhedrin, etc., etc., had nothing to do with it. It was just those “killer priests,” whose distant descendants were undermining the true spirit of Jesus in mid-20th-century America.

This bizarre association leads Wills down all sorts of strange paths. At the center of his argument is an analysis of the Letter to the Hebrews, a text that is not only part of the canonical Scriptures but that has worked its way deeply into the spiritual and liturgical life of the church. The unknown author of this ancient sermon/exhortation/treatise famously used the language of temple, cult, and sacrifice and in order to explain the significance of Jesus’ death and resurrection. He urged that Jesus best be understood as the recapitulation and perfection of the ancient Jewish priesthood and that his bloody death on the cross best be construed as temple sacrifice lifted

into a new and higher context. What priesthood and sacrifice only imperfectly accomplished in the old dispensation, he wrote, was now fulfilled and brought to completion through the act of this new and unexpected high priest.

In the spirit of Luther

Very much in the spirit of Martin Luther, who recommended that the Letter of James, which stood athwart Luther’s theorizing about justification, should simply be eliminated from the canon, Wills wants us to think of the Letter to the Hebrews as an egregious anomaly, the black sheep in the family of the New Testament texts. The priesthood and Mass as we know them today, he claims, flow exclusively from this unique and exceptional letter. No other New Testament author, he says, ever characterized Jesus as a priest or even hinted that his crucifixion should be given a sacrificial interpretation.

All of this is patently absurd. The Gospel of Luke begins and ends in the temple, and its entire trajectory is toward the cross, which is given an unambiguously sacrificial reading by Jesus himself at the Last Supper: “This is my body, which is given for you …This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22:19-20).

More to it, the disciples who take this cup of blood are implicitly identified with temple priests whose task it was to catch the blood of sacrifice in bowls.

Further, all the Gospels reference John the Baptist, son of a temple priest, who was doing temple work in the desert: washing the faithful in a kind of mikvah bath and offering the forgiveness of sins.

And the Gospel of John places in the Baptist’s mouth the words that clearly designate Jesus as a sacrifice: “Here is the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

Jesus, the definitive high priest

Moreover, on John’s reading, Jesus offers his body and blood to his disciples at the moment when the Passover lambs were being slaughtered in the temple (John 13:1). Matthew tells us that, at Jesus’ death, “The curtain in the temple was torn in two from top to bottom” (Matthew 27:51). On the Day of Atonement, the high priest, having performed a sacrifice in the holy of holies, would come past the veil and sprinkle the people with blood, symbolizing Yahweh’s forgiveness of his people Israel. No first century Jew would have missed Matthew’s implication that Jesus is the definitive high priest who has performed, through his death, the final sacrifice and hence affected the final reconciliation of God and humanity.

I could cite many more examples, but let these suffice to demonstrate that the interpretation of Jesus

offered by the Letter to the Hebrews is anything but egregious. In point of fact, it is the summation and explication of priestly themes present throughout the New Testament. The priesthood and the Mass, with its strong sacrificial overtones, were hardly accretions distorting the New Testament, but rather developments of themes seminally present from the beginning of Christianity.

Another peculiar claim of Wills is that the early fathers of the church, including St. Augustine, did not believe in the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist and that this doctrine, so tied to the distinctiveness and indispensability of the priesthood, was but a Medieval distortion. But St. Irenaeus, writing in the second century said, “The bread which comes from the earth, having received the invocation of God, is no longer ordinary bread, but the Eucharist, consisting of two realities, heavenly and earthly.” Origen of Alexandria, writing in the third century, said that Christians rightly reverence every crumb of the consecrated bread. And Wills’ hero, St. Augustine of Hippo, writing in the fourth century, said, “That bread which you see on the altar, having been sanctified by the word of God, is the body of Christ.”

Augustine claim ‘beyond absurd’

It also might be worth noting that all three of these worthy gentlemen were ordained priests and two were bishops. To be sure, Thomas Aquinas’ teaching on transubstantiation represented a development and precision of these earlier views, but it was by no means a betrayal of them. To claim that Augustine and his patristic colleagues would subscribe to Wills’ repudiation of the real presence and the priesthood is beyond absurd.

According to Catholic theology, the ministerial priesthood is a unique participation in the high priesthood of Jesus, which in turn is grounded in the coming together of two natures, divine and human, in the person of Christ. Affirming the distinctiveness and necessity of the priesthood, therefore, is tightly linked to affirming the divinity of Jesus.

Therefore, we shouldn’t be surprised that the author of this attack on the priesthood should conclude his text as follows: “Let me say simply this: There is one God, and Jesus is one of his prophets, and I am one of his millions of followers” (Wills, 259). Quite right: If Jesus is nothing more than one more prophet of God, then the Catholic priesthood is indeed an absurdity. But if Jesus is who the great creeds of the church say he is, then priesthood, real presence, sacrifice and Eucharist remain as indispensable as ever.

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

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

SUNDAY READINGS

The Resurrection of the Lord – Easter Then the other disciples also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed.

JOHN 20:1-9 ACTS 10:34A, 37-43 Peter proceeded to speak and said: “You know what has happened all over Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power. He went about doing good and healing all those oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.

We are witnesses of all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree. This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible, not to all the people, but to us, the witnesses chosen by God in advance, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commissioned us to preach to the people and testify that he is the one appointed by God as judge of the living and the dead. To him all the prophets bear witness, that everyone who believes in him will receive forgiveness of sins through his name.”

PSALM118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23 This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures forever.

Let the house of Israel say, “His mercy endures forever.”

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.

“The right hand of the Lord has struck with power; the right hand of the Lord is exalted. I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord.”

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.

The stone which the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. By the Lord has this been done; it is wonderful in our eyes.

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.

COLOSSIANS 3:1-4 Brothers and sisters: If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life

is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory.

JOHN 20:1-9 On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and saw the stone removed from the tomb.

So she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them, “They have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don’t know where they put him.” So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb. They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first; he bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in. When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there, and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place. Then the other disciples also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed. For they did not yet understand the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead.

Where is he? – the great cliffhanger

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proaching the tomb, experience an earthquake, then see the angel descending, pushing back the stone and resting upon it. When they rush forward to look inside, however, he is gone (Matthew 28:1-6). The other three Gospels tell simply of the tomb being found empty and an angelic being reminding them of Jesus’ promise.

Even the Gospel stories of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances are products of testimony from only a handful of disciples. For the majority of those who personally knew Jesus, the last image they had was of their “messiah” being led away under arrest, or dead on the cross. Regarding the resurrection, however, all that is left to us is the empty tomb, a reminder by angelic beings, and the testimony of a chosen few that they had seen him in his risen glory.

In the end, this is all we have, the empty tomb, and an angelic reminder of Christ’s promise. It is as if the sacred authors are looking at us and asking, “what do you think happened to him?” On Easter Sunday, our highest holy day of the year, we celebrate a great cliffhanger, when Jesus was nowhere to be found.

Our response to this disappearance is outlined in the writing of the letter to the Colossians, when Paul speaks of our own resurrection with Christ. Paul speaks of this resurrection with Christ in the present tense, rather than the future. He teaches us that in believing that Jesus has risen from the dead, we

believe that we too have been raised. Therefore, we believe that we will one day appear with Christ in glory. In the letter to the Romans, Paul links this death and resurrection with Christ to the sacrament of baptism, celebrated each year during the Easter Vigil, in which we do not enter into our Easter festivities before we have first received in baptism the new members of our faith community.

Therefore, how do we respond to this great cliffhanger? How do we live as children of the resurrection? How does the manner in which we live our lives manifest the level of faith we have in the resurrection of Jesus? Where do we focus our priorities, our values and our lives as people of the resurrection? What kind of people ought we to be if we have been raised with Christ and await the kingdom where we will be glorified with him?

As church, we celebrate the great event of Christ’s resurrection, not as a mystery to be solved, but as the central event of our salvation. We profess our faith in the testimony of those who have told us they have seen him, and we believe in the testimony that has been handed down to us by the church. We celebrate every Easter, indeed every Sunday, that great event which, for us, is not a cliffhanger, but a fulfillment.

MONDAY, APRIL 1: Monday in the Octave of Easter.

Acts 2:14, 22-33. PS 16:1-2a and 5, 7-8, 9-10, 11. Mt 28:8-15.

PETER OF VERONA 1205-1252 April 6

SUNDAY, APRIL 7: Second Sunday of Easter (or Sunday of Divine Mercy). Acts 5:12-16. PS 118:2-4, 13-15, 22-24. Rev 1:9-11a, 12-13, 17-19. Jn 20:19-31.

TUESDAY, APRIL 2: Tuesday in the Octave of Easter.

Acts 2:36-41. PS 33:4-5, 18-19, 20 and 22. Jn 20:11-18.

This Dominican saint was born in Verona, Italy to Cathars, members of a heretical sect. However, Peter got a Catholic education and while at university in Bologna decided to join the new Dominican order. He received the order’s habit from St. Dominic himself. He served as prior of several houses, preached and worked miracles throughout Lombardy and brought many back to the faith. He also served the pope as inquisitor of Milan, then of all northern Italy. Peter was a steadfast enemy of the Cathars, and in 1252 they put a price on his head.

He said, “Let them do their worst, I shall be more powerful dead than alive.” He was murdered soon after, becoming the first Dominican martyr.

MONDAY, APRIL 8: Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord. Is 7:10-14; 8:10. PS 40:7-8a, 8b-9, 10, 11.

Heb 10:4-10. Lk 1:26-38.

fter spending what is traditionally regarded as a three-year ministry in which he preached a daring message, performed stunning miracles in which he cured the sick, transformed water into wine, multiplied loaves and fishes, expelled demons, liberated the sinful and raised the dead; after being transfigured before three of his closest associates, challenging and antagonizing the self-righteous to no end while lifting up the downtrodden with his message of hope; after surrendering himself to betrayal by a friend, condemnation by his people, and ultimately to death at the hands of foreign oppressors, Jesus of Nazareth performed the most daring, most unexpected act of his FATHER WILLIAM entire ministry … he disapNICHOLAS peared!

Of the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, not one gives a firsthand account of Jesus rising from the dead and emerging from the tomb. The closest we get (while still missing it completely) is the account in Matthew where the women, upon ap-

SCRIPTURE REFLECTION

FATHER NICHOLAS is parochial vicar of Mission Dolores Basilica, San Francisco. www.frwcnicholas.com.

LITURGICAL CALENDAR, DAILY MASS READINGS

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 3: Wednesday in the Octave of Easter. Acts 3:1-1. PS 105:1-2, 3-4, 6-7, 8-9. Lk 24:13-35.

THURSDAY, APRIL 4: Thursday in the Octave of Easter. Acts 3:11-26. PS 8:2ab and 5, 6-7, 8-9. Lk 24:35-48.

FRIDAY, APRIL 5: Friday in the Octave of Easter. Acts 4:1-12. PS 118:1-2 and 4, 22-24, 25-27a. Jn 21:1-14.

SATURDAY, APRIL 6: Saturday in the Octave of Easter. Acts 4:13-21. PS 118:1 and 14-15ab, 16-18, 19-21. Mk 16:9-15.

TUESDAY, APRIL 9: Tuesday of the Second Week of Easter. Acts 4:32-37. PS 93:1ab, 1cd-2, 5. Jn 3:7b-15.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 10: Wednesday of the Second Week of Easter. Acts 5:17-26. PS 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9. Jn 3:16-21.

THURSDAY, APRIL 11: Memorial of Saint Stanislaus, Bishop and Martyr. Acts 5:27-33. PS 34:2 and 9, 1718, 19-20. Jn 3:31-36.

FRIDAY, APRIL 12: Friday of the Second Week of Easter. Acts 5:34-42. PS 27:1, 4, 13-14. Jn 6:1-15.

FAITH 19

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Guidance for prayer in our darkest moments

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ow do we lift our darkest, most depressed, most lonely moments up to God? How can we pray when we are most deeply alone, helpless, and our whole world seems to be collapsing?

We can learn from Jesus and how he prayed the night before his death in the Garden of Gethsemane, in his darkest hour: It was late at night; he had just had his last meal with his closest friends, and he had one hour to prepare to face his death. His humanity breaks through and Jesus finds himself prostrate on the ground, begging for escape. Here’s how FATHER RON the Gospels describe it: ROLHEISER Jesus withdrew from his disciples, about a stone’s throw away, and threw himself to the ground and prayed. “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you, if you are willing, take this cup away from me. Nevertheless, let your will be done, not mine.”

And he came back and found his disciples sleeping. So he withdrew again and in anguish prayed even more earnestly, and his sweat fell to the ground like great drops of blood. When he rose from prayer he went to the disciples and found them sleeping for sheer grief.

And he said to them, “Why are you asleep? Get up and pray not to be put to the test.” And he prayed a third time, and an angel came and strengthened him, and he rose to face with strength what lay before him.

This prayer by Jesus in Gethsemane can serve as a model for how we can pray when we’re in crisis. Looking at the prayer, we can highlight seven elements, each of which has something to teach us in terms of how to pray in our darkest times: 1. The prayer issues forth from his loneliness: The Gospels highlight this, both in terms of telling us that the prayer takes place in a garden (the archetypal place for love) and in that Jesus is “a stone’s throw away” from his loved ones who cannot be present to what he is undergoing. In our deepest crises, we are always painfully alone, a stone’s throw away from others. Deep prayer should issue from that place.

2. The prayer is one of great familiarity: He begins the prayer by calling his father “Abba,” the most familiar term possible, the phrase that a young child would use sitting on his or her father’s lap. In our darkest hours, we must be most familiar with God. 3. The prayer is one of complete honesty: Classically, prayer is defined as “lifting mind and heart to God.” Jesus does this here, radically, in searing honesty. He asks God to take the suffering away, to give him escape.

His humanity cringes before duty and he asks for escape. That’s honest prayer, true prayer.

4. The prayer is one of utter helplessness: He falls to the ground, prostrate, with no illusions about his own strength. His prayer contains the petition that if God is to do this through him, God needs to provide the strength for it.

5. The prayer is one of openness, despite personal resistance: Even as he cringes before what he is being asked to undergo and asks for escape, he still gives

God the radical permission to enter his freedom. His prayer opens him to God’s will, if that is what’s ultimately being asked of him.

6. The prayer is one of repetition: He repeats the prayer several times, each time more earnestly, sweating blood, not just once, but several times over.

7. The prayer is one of transformation: Eventually an angel (divine strength) comes and fortifies him and he gives himself over to what he is being asked to undergo on the basis of a new strength that comes from beyond him. But that strength can only flow into him after he has, through helplessness, let go of his own strength. It is only after the desert has done its work on us that we are open to let God’s strength flow into us.

In his book “Stride Toward Freedom,” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. recounts how one night, after receiving a death threat, he panicked, gave into fear, and, not unlike Jesus in Gethsemane, literally collapsed to the floor in fear, loneliness, helplessness – and prayer.

“The people are looking to me for leadership, and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter,” he prayed. “I am at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I’ve come to the point where I can’t face it alone.” Then he adds: “At that moment I experienced the presence of the Divine as I had never experienced him before.”

When we pray honestly, whatever our pain, an angel of God will always find us.

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

Did Jesus baptize anyone? Lectors and inclusive language

Q.

I remember being taught, somewhere in my Catholic training, that the Bible never mentions Jesus baptizing anyone, because our sacrament of baptism commemorates the death and resurrection of Christ and he had not yet died and risen. But I recently came across this passage in John’s Gospel (3:22-23): “After this Jesus and his disciples went into the region of Judea, where he spent some time with them baptizing. John was also baptizing in Aenon near Salim.” In Matthew 3:11 though, John says that he is baptizing with water and Jesus will baptize with fire and the Holy Spirit. So my question is this: In John 3:22, isn’t Jesus baptizing with water, or what else would that quote FATHER mean? (Milwaukee, Wis.) KENNETH DOYLE You raise a good question, and the plain truth is that we don’t really know whether Jesus baptized anyone with water during the two and a half years of his public ministry. The scriptural passage to which you refer (John 3:22) would seem to

QUESTION CORNER

A.

indicate that Jesus did baptize, along with some of his disciples.

However, if you continue on just a few more verses, you will read (John 4:1-3): “Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John (although Jesus himself was not baptizing, just his disciples), he left Judea and returned to Galilee.”

The synoptic writers – Matthew, Mark and Luke – offer no clarity on this, because they are silent on the question of Jesus baptizing.

What we know is this – if Christ did in fact baptize during the early days with his apostles, it was not the sacrament of baptism as we know it today. That sacrament, as you correctly point out, inserts us into the mystery of Jesus’ death and resurrection and applies the merits of Christ’s action to ourselves.

We, the baptized, are initiated into the sacramental life of the church and placed on a path to holiness and to heaven.

My parish regularly changes or omits words from the first and second scriptural readings at Sunday Mass. They claim that, under Vatican II, it is permissible to do so under the inclusive language guidelines. Shouldn’t the Scripture readings be read as they are printed in the Lectionary? (Louisville, Ky.) First, and parenthetically, isn’t it funny how the Second Vatican Council gets blamed for (and sometimes credited with) things that were far

Q. A.

from its agenda? During the years of Vatican II (196265), I don’t think that the issue of inclusive language was on the radar screen of the council fathers or of the world.

The answer to your question is stated in a balanced and succinct way by the Office for Worship of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in guidelines offered to lectors: “In recent years sensitivity for inclusive language in the liturgy has been encouraged. It is important to note, however, that the lector is not at liberty to change the approved scriptural and prayer texts for the liturgy. In the preparation of other texts, such as the general intercessions or commentary of any type, language which is inclusive is always used.”

The approved text for the Mass readings is a modified version of the New American Bible with revised psalms and revised New Testament; this is the text found in all current Lectionaries in the United States.

In publishing that text, the Holy See accepted some suggestions on inclusive language by a committee of U.S. bishops and rejected others: where, for example, the speaker/author intended a mixed audience, “brothers and sisters” is now allowed in place of the earlier “brethren.” What were not changed, though, were references to God or to Christ.

Send questions to Father Kenneth Doyle at askfatherdoyle@gmail.com and 40 Hopewell St., Albany, NY, 12208.

Divisions that are making us feel uneasy

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s fruitful as our country is and as wonderful as our church is, there is far too much discontent in both these days. This discontent indicates to us that something essential is missing. What might it be?

I believe we are experiencing growing divisions.

We often hear, “In unity there is strength.” At daily Mass we pray for unity. Yet when Pope Benedict XVI resigned, he pointed to harmful divisions within the church as one of our biggest challenges.

In his book “Earth-Honoring FATHER EUGENE Faith,” Larry Rasmussen HEMRICK writes, “We are by nature relational beings who know that the only life we have, and can have, is life together. Our natural condition is not,

per Hobbes, the war of each against the other and all against all. Our natural condition is a shared instinct to create coteries and communities held together in no small part by moral rules, some of them laws backed by force.”

Paraphrasing Rasmussen, we can say that is what is missing is our sense of unity, our sense of togetherness. There is too much warring against others. Our instincts are telling us that we aren’t playing by the rules of healthy community spirit.

Eliminating some of these divisions does not mean doing away with differences. Within our church, we have diversity. It includes diversity in our rites, languages and also in the interpretation of theology.

The same holds true for our country: Diversity is everywhere.

I remember when we studied growing multiculturalism in our country. One of my colleagues said to me, “Multiculturalism is like a mixed salad that is a blend of delightful flavors. It is to be enjoyed and savored.”

How do we regain this sense of unity, even while living with our differences?

Years ago, Pope Paul VI wrote the encyclical “Ecclesiam Suam,” in which he said dialogue is imperative for the church’s renewal. He then listed the qualities of true dialogue: clarity, meekness, trust and the prudence of a teacher.

This means that to enter into dialogue, we must talk with each other. Unfortunately, more often than not, we are talking at each other.

We are encouraged to see the situation the way another person sees it, to put ourselves in the other person’s “shoes.” And yet, the only shoes we wear are our own. We also need to stop allowing our selfish interests from outweighing the need for the common good.

These fundamental principles for carrying on a decent conversation are missing. Whenever our instincts make us feel uneasy, it is time to revisit the fundamentals.

20 FROM THE FRONT

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

PROP. 8: Supreme Court may delay ruling until issue evolves nationally FROM PAGE 1

ment’s position is that because California extends domestic partnership benefits to same-sex couples, it is unconstitutional to prevent them from going the additional step and marrying.

Charles Cooper, the attorney for those who want Prop. 8 reinstated, argued that the court should uphold the law because it represents the will of the majority of California voters. The national debate over samesex marriage should be allowed to continue without the government stepping in to overrule a state’s voters.

But Justice Anthony Kennedy noted that according to briefs filed with the court, an estimated 40,000 California children have same-sex partners as parents and he told Cooper his argument doesn’t take into account their interests in having parents who are treated the same as heterosexual couples.

“The voices of these children are important, don’t you think?” Kennedy said.

The case was brought by two California couples who were denied marriage licenses after the state’s voters in 2008 approved a constitutional amendment limiting marriage to heterosexual couples. The law was passed after the state Supreme Court ruled earlier that year that statutes banning same-sex marriage were unconstitutional.

After a federal District Court judge found that Prop.

8 served no legitimate purpose and violates due process and equal protection rights of same-sex couples to marry, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2-1 ruling upheld that conclusion, although on a narrower legal finding.

The Supreme Court is weighing two separate issues: whether the supporters who appealed have the legal standing to challenge it in court, and secondari-

(CNS PHOTO/NANCY PHELAN WIECHEC)

People demonstrate outside the Supreme Court building in Washington March 26 as justices hear arguments in a case challenging California’s Proposition 8. ly, whether the amendment violates the Constitution.

Scores of organizations representing millions of people according to their religious, legal, civil rights, medical and educational interests weighed in on both sides of the case with “amicus” or friend-of-the-court briefs.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops was among those who filed briefs. It urged the court to uphold Prop. 8, arguing that although the Supreme Court “has held that laws forbidding private, consensual, homo-

sexual conduct between adults lack a rational basis, it does not follow that the government has a constitutional duty to encourage or endorse such conduct.

Thus, governments may legitimately decide to further the interests of opposite-sex unions only.”

The USCCB brief argues that because the union between a man and a woman is “the only union capable of creating new life,” therefore “given both the unique capacity for reproduction and unique value of homes with a mother and father, it is reasonable for a state to treat the union of one man and one woman as having a public value that is absent from other intimate interpersonal relationships.”

Justice Elena Kagan asked Cooper why, if the right to marriage is predicated on a heterosexual couple’s role in reproduction, is it legal for infertile heterosexual couples to be married. She posed the hypothetical case of two 55-year-olds who would not be able to have children. Cooper’s response didn’t address her hypothetical, but he noted that some men are able to father children well into their later years.

The Prop. 8 case could be tossed out simply on the basis of who is defending it. Or the court could say the law is constitutional, effectively leaving the question of who can be married to be decided by the states.

Other possibilities raised by the American Bar Association’s publication “Preview of United States Supreme Court Cases,” include that the court could find that California denied equal protection by extending and then withdrawing the right for same-sex couples to marry; or decide that because California affords domestic partnership rights it is constitutionally required to allow them to marry or by deciding that laws denying marriage equality to same-sex couples violates the constitutional right to equal protection under the law.

MARRIAGE: Thousands march in Washington to defend traditional marriage FROM PAGE 1

He said the message of the day boils down to the concept that traditional marriage “matters to kids.”

“Only men can be fathers and only women can be mothers,” he added, noting: “I find it hard to believe I have to stand here and say that.”

He urged the Supreme Court justices for the “sake of the children” to “preserve the meaning of marriage in the law, a meaning common to every human society since the beginning of the human race.”

Other speakers similarly stressed the importance of preserving marriage as a union of one man and one woman.

Gia Coluccio, a recent graduate from George Washington University in Washington, stressed that contrary to what is often portrayed in the media, not all young people are in favor of same-sex marriage.

She stressed that young people need to realize that they can either “defend marriage or watch it be redefined.”

‘I want begin with a word to those who disagree with us on this issue and may be watching us right now: We love you, we are your neighbors, and we want to be your friends, and we want you to be happy.’

ARCHBISHOP SALVATORE J. CORDILEONE “It’s OK to be countercultural,” she added.

Other speakers noted that this was an issue they intended to keep defending, no matter how the Supreme Court ruled.

As one speaker put it: “We are here to be the conscience of America.”

Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Council for the Family, sent a message praising Catholics’ support for and participation in the march as a “witness to the beauty and value of Catholic belief and practice, which sees in marriage and the family a unique resource for the good of all humanity.”

He said the ecumenical character of the march was important because it showed the importance many Americans see in marriage, particularly on the day when the U.S. Supreme Court will begin hearings in two cases involving the definition of marriage.

“I think it is important as well that the march is being held during Holy Week, because that time in the life of the church not only makes us more aware of the great sacrifice that Jesus made in giving his life for us, it also reveals how he did so in the context of relationship that are mirrored in the life of every family,” the archbishop wrote.

CLINICS: 40 Days says buffer zone would hinder prayer campaign FROM PAGE 1

information about resources including housing, help with finances and help with recovery from alcoholism and substance abuse. The 40 Days campaign runs for 40 days during Lent, and ended March 24.

“I have met too many women who have said they didn’t feel there was any other choice but abortion,” Gillies said, noting that the area around the clinic is under constant video surveillance by Planned Parenthood.

Current law requires pro-lifers to remain eight feet away, unless approached, from clients entering and leaving the clinic. The law prohibits harassing within 100 feet of the clinic.

Campos said that because of the congested urban location, these restrictions are not working. “The right to free speech is not absolute,” he said.

“Patients of the Planned Parenthood clinic have been intimidated, they have been harassed, they have been screamed at; they have been videotaped as they tried to access the services of this clinic,” Campos said, saying his office has worked closely with Planned Parenthood, the Police Department and

other city agencies to craft legislation. “The neighborhood has been shocked by the level of harassment we have seen.”

Planned Parenthood spokeswoman Adrienne Verrilli said the clinic has issued five citizens arrests to specific protesters during the past five weeks but there has not been enough proof for police to make arrests. She described a number of groups and people who protest at the clinic. “This has been going on basically since we opened” in January 2011, she said.

George Wesolek, Archdiocese of San Francisco director of communications and public policy and social concerns, said 40 Days for Life volunteers “are praying and being very peaceful.”

“I think it is important for us to remember that the reason for the protest is that unborn innocent children are being killed in these facilities. And that is a good enough reason to offer witness,” Wesolek said.

The proposed ordinance is an infringement on free speech of pro-life advocates even though such “bubble” ordinances are couched as ways to protect freedom of choice for prospective abortion clinic patients, he said. “The bubble ordinances become

harassment and intimidation of free speech rights,” Wesolek said.

A similar law in Massachusetts was upheld by the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston, but the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco is historically more sympathetic to free speech concerns and therefore might strike it down, said Life Legal Defense Fund attorney Katie Short.

40 Days for Life was founded in Bryan/College Station, Texas, in 2004 by a local group of Christians who prayed for a way to help end abortion. It quickly expanded to a national and then international movement. Since 2007, 2,210 individual campaigns have taken place in 481 cities in all 50 states and numerous countries, according to 40 Days for Life.

In 2010, former abortion clinic manager Abby Johnson spoke at the Walk for Life West Coast in San Francisco about how the Bryan/College Station prayer vigil led to her pro-life conversion.

According to its 2011-12 annual report, Planned Parenthood performed 333,964 abortions nationwide.

The pro-life Susan B. Anthony List estimates the organization performed 1 million abortions over a three-year period.

ARCHDIOCESE 21

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

(PHOTOS BY JOSE AGUIRRE/CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO)

Practicing for the Good Friday Passion play at St. Robert Church are, from left, Colin Clifford, Jack Thomson, Marionne Cevilla, Katelien Blumenthal, Victoria Lopez, Kayla McLoughlin.

18th year for youth Passion play at St. Robert Parish VALERIE SCHMALZ CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

For the 18th year, young Catholics at St. Robert Parish will stage a Passion play on Good Friday at 7:30 p.m. in the San Bruno Catholic church.

This year, the cast numbers 17, with ages ranging from fourth grade all the way up to narrator, St. Ignatius College Ben Baldonado Preparatory senior Alexandra Cotroneo who has been part of the production since seventh grade.

“It brings me back to the parish,” said Alexandra. “It’s good to connect with all the people I grew up with.”

“I can’t imagine not doing it,” said Lauren Clifford, 17, a junior at St. Ignatius College Preparatory, who plays Peter as he denies Christ. She has been in the play since third grade. “It’s part of the Easter spirit.”

The hour-long play begins with the Last Supper, includes Jesus’ agony in the garden and ends with the crucifixion. The play includes eight songs, which the young people sing. The songs include two written by local musician and composer Pat Vallez-Kelly when he was involved with youth ministry.

“It’s very fun to do,” said Jack Thomson, a seventh grader at St. Robert

Left, Julia Cordero plays the flute. Right, Katelien Blumenthal portrays one of those who call for Jesus’ crucifixion.

School, who is a soldier, along with another seventh grade boy and a fifth grade boy.

The project began as a youth ministry project using a script donated by a writer who sent it with a copyright waiver from Oregon, said Ben Baldonado, who has been involved from the beginning, first as a youth minister and then as a parish volunteer. Music

director is ninth grader Giovanni Cosmos, a ninth grader at Capuchino High School, who is in Baldonado’s confirmation preparation class.

The director this year is a former actor in the St. Robert Passion play, 25-year-old Collin Tullius, a computer techie who works in information security at Electronic Arts. As a seventh grader at St. Robert School, Tullius

played John, and later ‘random apostles’, and once Pilate in high school, Tullius said. He began as director four years ago.

The costumes are simple, and feature a lot of bathrobes and scarves. “It keeps it simple. We don’t have big theatrical effects. We don’t use a lot of microphones,” Tullius said.

The play takes commitment. The youth come for rehearsals beginning about a week before Lent begins and include two nights a week with more rehearsals in the week before the performance. In addition to the Good Friday performance, the youth play is staged for the school during the day on Holy Thursday.

“The spirit moves it. The kids know what they’re doing,” said Baldonado, who feeds the actors with a pasta salad and fruit and prays with the group before the performance, always scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Good Friday. A few weeks after the play the group meets for pizza and a few weeks after that Baldonado takes the troupe to Malibu Grand Prix in Redwood City.

A guest speaker gives a reflection on the meaning of the play and of the Passion of Christ, said Baldonado who owns and operates a staircase construction company, Atlas Stair Building Co. With mostly girls in this year’s production, Baldonado says casting is “not gender bound.” This year girls were cast as Jesus, Peter, Pilate, Judas and Caiphas.

22 FAITH

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

Medjugorje message mesmerizes parishioners MEDJUGORJE SHRINE CONTROVERSIAL

LIDIA WASOWICZ CATHOLIC SAN FRANICSCO

It’s Super Bowl Sunday, and the crowd sits riveted to the big screen at St. Sebastian Church in Greenbrae.

It is not live coverage of the 2013 NFL championship game in New Orleans that has the viewers transfixed but a documentary completed last August on Medjugorje, a town of about 4,300 inhabitants in the former Yugoslavia where the Virgin Mary reportedly has appeared regularly to six townsfolk for nearly 32 years.

During that time, those who profess to see her say, the Blessed Mother has urged a worldwide return to God and specified five weapons against evil – holy Communion, monthly confession, daily prayer and Scripture reading and fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays. According to believers’ accounts, which have not been authenticated by the church but have attracted some 40 million visitors from around the world to the remote mountain village in what is now Bosnia-Herzegovina, she also began revealing 10 “secrets” about future events – some pertaining to the world, some to the people experiencing the visions or their villages.

Christina Georgotas, a young filmmaker who set aside her faith in high school but retrieved it at the apex of her career with television personality Kelly Ripa’s production company, decided to investigate the claims.

The result of her study is the film “Queen of Peace” – a title said to have been used by the Madonna to introduce herself to the Medjugorje children in 1981. The film continues to make the rounds at parishes and other venues since its showing at St. Sebastian Feb. 3.

“I’m hoping for a global sharing of the message of Medjugorje, especially among those outside the church,” said Georgotas, 27, who recently received an offer from a nonprofit in Lebanon to translate and release her documentary in Arabic, Greek, French, Spanish and Lebanese.

“If Medjugorje – and Our Lady – could change my heart, it can change others,” she said.

Experienced conversion at age 22

Born into a Greek Orthodox family, Georgotas as a teen rebelled against religion and even questioned God’s existence before experiencing, at age 22, the kind of conversion she portrays in “Queen of Peace.”

She describes Oct. 12, 2008, as “the day my life changed.”

Taking the weekend off from a Manhattan lifestyle befitting a rising star on Ripa’s creative team to attend a family christening, she returned to her childhood home in the suburban bedroom community of Ridgewood, N.J. On her mother’s laptop, she viewed a video of a woman and surrounding multitudes lost in prayer.

“Her breathing quickened, and she clasped her heart,” Georgotas recalled. “When she looked up toward the vision, I instantaneously knew this was really true and that God really exists.”

This introduction to Medjugorje had immediate

Lacking the formal recognition of such shrines as Fatima and Lourdes where the Catholic Church has deemed accounts of divine visits “worthy of belief,” Medjugorje remains under review by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Pope John Paul II had said, “Let them go there, let them pray there, let them convert there.” However, the final decision on its status, which rests with the Holy See, is not expected while the reported apparitions continue, said Father Mark Taheny, the pastor of St. Sebastian Parish, Greenbrae, who has visited the site five times.

In the meantime, the local parish of St. James strictly adheres to church guidelines on such matters as where to celebrate Mass or how to credential visiting priests so “it’s all done properly,” Father Taheny said.

Filmmaker Christina Georgotas is pictured on Cross Mountain in Medjugorje in the former Yugoslavia. The pastor and people of Medjugorje erected the cross in 1934 in commemoration of the 1,900th anniversary of the Passion of Jesus. After the reported Medjugorje apparitions of Mary began in 1981, a great number of people claim that they saw various luminous and other “signs” on the cross, according to the Medjugorje website. impact. That evening, the former skeptic resolved to make a pilgrimage to the village.

The next day, she entered church “for the first time really believing and wanting to be there.” As the ceremony commenced, her cousin asked her to step in as her daughter’s godmother.

“It felt like I was renewing my own baptism,” Georgotas said.

Back in New York, fear of ridicule kept her from sharing her experience with friends and colleagues, but, she said, “I saw everything differently.”

Former attractions, including her dream job, now repelled her as detractions and distractions from God.

Prayed, read Bible for first time

She coped with the difficult transition by praying, reading the Bible for the first time and gathering information on Medjugorje.

On June 24, 2009 – the 28th anniversary of the first reported Medjugorje apparition – Georgotas’s 68-year-old father suffered a fatal heart attack while swimming in the Mediterranean Sea during a visit to his sister in Greece.

“When and where he passed so suddenly was not a coincidence for it enabled my family to make a side trip to Medjugorje one year later” when they returned to the area for a memorial service they traditionally hold on the first anniversary of a relative’s death.

Three trans-Atlantic visits and more than a year of interviewing, researching, collecting archival footage, filming, selecting music and editing later, Georgotas completed “Queen of Peace,” the first of what she hopes will be many documentaries produced by her Bambiina Productions.

To make ends meet, she has moved in with her mom, rent-free.

“I might no longer be able to afford New York,” she said, “but my life dedicated to spreading Our Lady’s message is so much fuller now, I would never change it for the one I would have had had I continued on the television path.”

Equally inspired, St. Sebastian parishioners Chris and Vickie Lyford set aside most of their possessions, including a home, to create a healing center for families.

“The underlying foundation of our New Life Family Mission is Mary’s message of God’s mercy,” said Chris, a lay minister for 30 years.

The family’s nine-day stay in “heaven” in 2007 healed her longstanding hurts from childhood and adolescence, Vickie Lyford said.

“Despite the struggles I had gone through, Our Lady was with me at Medjugorje, assuring me, ‘God still loves you,’” she said.

St. Sebastian pastor Father Mark Taheny, who is planning his sixth pilgrimage this summer with a group organized by the Lyfords, felt an “overwhelming reassurance that our prayers are heard” during his first and “most emotional” tour – as a seminarian four years from ordination – which coincided with the 10th anniversary of the first apparition and the annual youth festival said to have inspired Pope John Paul II to initiate World Youth Day in 1985.

“As the sun went down on Apparition Hill, I looked around at the thousands of people praying the rosary in many languages,” Father Taheny said. “The sight was as amazing as any miracle.”

Vatican rules help pastors in ‘difficult task’ of discerning apparitions’ veracity CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

VATICAN CITY – More than 1,500 visions of Mary have been reported around the world, but in the past century only nine cases have received church approval as worthy of belief.

Determining the veracity of an apparition falls to the local bishop, and the Vatican’s doctrinal congregation established the norms to guide the process.

Granting approval is never brief, with some cases taking hundreds of years. Visionaries and witnesses must be questioned and the fruits of the apparitions, such as conversions, miracles and healings, must be examined.

According to the norms, the local bishop should set up a commission of experts, including theologians, canonists, psychologists and doctors, to help him determine the facts, the mental, moral and spiritual wholesomeness and seriousness of the visionary, and whether the message and testimony are free from theological and doctrinal error.

A bishop can come to one of three conclusions: He can determine the apparition to be true and worthy of belief; he can say it is not true, which leaves open the possibility for an appeal; or he can say that at the moment he doesn’t know and needs more help.

In the last scenario, the investigation is brought to the country’s bishops’ conference. If that body cannot come to a conclusion, the matter is turned over to the pope, who delegates the doctrinal congregation to step in and give advice or appoint others to investigate.

The alleged apparitions at Medjugorje in Bosnia-Herzegovina are an example of a situation in which the country’s bishops requested the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to intervene. In that case, the congregation established an international commission in 2010 to investigate the claims of six young people who said Mary had appeared to them daily beginning in 1981. The apparitions purportedly continue and thousands

travel to the small town each month to meet the alleged seers and to pray.

Pope Benedict XVI has reaffirmed that the church never requires the faithful to believe in apparitions, not even those recognized by the church.

In a Dec. 14, 2011, note, Cardinal William J. Levada, then prefect of the doctrinal congregation, quoted the pope saying “The criterion for judging the truth of a private revelation is its orientation to Christ himself,” in that it doesn’t lead people away from Jesus, but urges them toward closer communion with Christ and the Gospel.

Church approval of a private revelation, in essence, is just the church’s way of saying the message is not contrary to the faith or morality, it is licit to make the message public “and the faithful are authorized to give to it their prudent adhesion,” the pope said in his 2010 Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation, “Verbum Domini” (“The Word of the Lord”).

COMMUNITY 23

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

OBITUARIES

ARCHBISHOP APPOINTS 2 TO CCCYO BOARD

FATHER ANDREW MAGINNIS, SJ – JESUIT FOR 73 YEARS

the Archdiocese of San Francisco. Msgr. O’Connor was appointed pastor of Mission Dolores Basilica in 1983. On March 27, 1989, he was named a Prelate of Honor by Pope John Paul II with the title of monsignor. Msgr. O’Connor continued serving at Mission Dolores until 1997 when he was named pastor of St. Mary’s Cathedral. After his retirement he remained in close contact with his family, and with his support group and many friends.

Msgr. O’Connor He is survived by his sister, Peggy Vollert, and nieces and nephews.

A funeral Mass was celebrated March 22 at St. Mary’s Cathedral. Remembrances may be made to the Priests’ Retirement Fund, One Peter Yorke Way, San Francisco 94109.

Jesuit Father Andrew Francis Maginnis, 89, died March 17 in the Jesuits’ Regis Infirmary, Sacred Heart Jesuit Center, Los Gatos. He had been a Jesuit for 73 years, an ordained priest for 50.

Born in San Francisco, Father Maginnis attended St. Patrick School and St. Ignatius College Preparatory. He graduated in 1939 and entered the Jesuit Novitiate at Los Gatos. He was ordained a priest Father Maginnis in St. Mary’s Cathedral, San Francisco, by Archbishop John J. Mitty June 12, 1952.

In 1974 Archbishop Joseph McGucken named Father Maginnis vicar for religious for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, a role in which he served until 2004.

A funeral Mass was celebrated March 22 at Sacred Heart Jesuit Center with inurnment at Santa Clara Mission Cemetery.

Donations in memory of Father Maginnis may be made to the California Province of the Society of Jesus, P.O. Box 68, Los Gatos 95031.

SISTER MERCEDES REYGADAS, SH, 88

Society of Helpers Sister Mercedes Reygadas died March 5, in Chicago at the age of 88. Born in Mexico City. she entered the novitiate of the Society of Helpers in Chappaqua, N.Y., March 12, 1943.

Sister Mercedes served in religious education at Mater Dolorosa Parish in South San Francisco.

Also, in the Archdiocese of San Francisco, she is remembered Sister Mercedes for her many years with the Reygadas, SH Movimiento Familiar Cristiano, Marriage Encounter and Latin America Mission programs. She completed her years in ministry in service to the sick at Kaiser Permanente and people living with AIDS. A memorial Mass was celebrated March 16 in Illinois.

Remembrances may be made to the Society of Helpers, 4721 J South Woodlawn, Chicago, IL 60615.

MSGR. JOHN O’CONNOR – RETIRED CATHEDRAL PASTOR

Msgr. John O’Connor, retired pastor of Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption, died March 15. He was 78 years old. Born in San Francisco and baptized at Holy Name of Jesus Church where he also attended grade school, he was a 1952 graduate of Archbishop Riordan High School. He then entered St. Joseph College, Mountain View to begin study for the priesthood. He was ordained from St. Patrick’s Seminary & University, Menlo Park by Archbishop John J. Mitty June 11, 1960.

Msgr. O’Connor initially served at St. Stephen Church before entering Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., to complete a master’s degree in social work. Beginning in 1963, he served in leadership posts with Catholic Social Services of

Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone has appointed Jane Crowley Pardini and Michael L. Pautler to the board of directors of Catholic Charities CYO, the social services arm of the Catholic Church in the Archdiocese of San Francisco, Jane Crowley Michael L. CCCYO anPardini Pautler nounced.

The board governs the organization, whose services help the most vulnerable families in San Francisco, Marin and San Mateo Counties.

Pardini is a litigation contract attorney and author of “The Babysitting Book: Everything You and Your Babysitter Need to Know Before You Leave the House “(The McGraw-Hill Companies).

She has practiced in San Francisco since 2008 and earlier worked at Nixon Peabody LLP (Lillick & Charles). A graduate of University of California Hastings College of Law, most of her volunteer activities have been at her children’s schools, Convent of the Sacred Heart and Stuart Hall.

Pautler recently retired as the executive vice president and chief financial officer at NORCAL Mutual Insurance Co., where he served since 2001.

Prior to that, he was executive vice president and CFO at USI Insurance Services. A certified public accountant, Pautler served on the St. Hilary parish and school finance committee, and was on the Marin District Council of St. Vincent de Paul. He coached CYO basketball, serves as an extraordinary minister of holy Communion and a committee member for the Vincentian Villa for the San Francisco Archdiocesan Council of St. Vincent de Paul.

The CCCYO board of directors works under the guidance of Archbishop Cordileone, chairman.

Deborah Dasovich is president; Mark Okashima, treasurer; and Carlos Alvarez, secretary.

Archdiocese of San Francisco Restorative Justice Office of Public Policy and Social Concerns

MINISTRY FOR VICTIMS AND FAMILIES OF VIOLENT CRIME Dear Brothers and Sisters: We appeal to your kindness and compassion for Josefa Osorio-Acevedo 50 years old killed March 9, her two sons Amado Osorio-Acevedo 23 years old and Josué OsorioAcevedo 15 years also killed March 9, 2013 from a suspected drunken driver.

DONATIONS ARE BEING RECEIVED AT: BANK OF THE WEST ACCOUNT: OSORIO MEMORIAL May God Bless you for you generosity, Julio Escobar If you would like to receive more information please call (415) 861-9579 or e-mail escobarj@sfarchdiocese.org

24

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

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Cardinal accepts White House offer for conference

Cardinal: Secularism ‘weighing heavily’ in conclave

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CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO

A top candidate for of faith and prayer the next pope will be a man with skill in major and a record of languages leadership in a major archdioce se or Vatican office – ideally both, Cardinal William J. Levada said Feb. 25 as he prepared to leave for Rome to join as many cardinals in a conclaveas 116 other to elect a successor to Pope Benedict XVI. Cardinal Levada, during a press conference at St. Patrick’s Seminary & Universit y in Cardinal Levada said that in a church Menlo Park, (PHOTO BY DENNIS CALLAHAN/CATHO that has beLIC SAN FRANCISCO) come thoroughl y globalized in the past 50 to 60 years the influence of Cecilia Carrier, left, a around the world cardinals from candidate for full communion “will have great archdiocese’s annual impact.”

“In regard to the Rite of Election celebrated in the Catholic Church, is pictured with needs to the church, and McLaughlin are her sponsor Karen McLaughlin

by Archbishop Salvatore ent cultural situations from St. Hilary Parish, the Tiburon. Typically performed J. Cordileone Feb. 17 at St. Mary’s Cathedral. at the gathering with their sponsors – Africa, America, differthe Middle East, on the first Sunday of and families, the ancient those historic churches Asia, Lent are the final period Lent with those called Carrier ceremony of the rite up from the time of purification and enlightenmen coming to the church is a step of Christ’s own parishes participated t leading up to the Easter in the process of Christian initiation. The generation – each has its own in the Mass, with 159 days of Vigil and full initiation series of problems, catechumens and into of these things 255 the ” he said. “All candidates. More photos church. Forty-nine will on Page 2. son we’re consideri play a part in this. Is the perng knowledgeable needs? Is he sensitive about those to them?”

Cardinal Levada did not speculate ground of any cardinal on the he thinks may makebackpick but played a top down the possibilit can pope. y of an AmeriCINDY WOODEN “I don’t know what red shoes, Father CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE the Las Vegas odds Lombardi said. Instead, are saying today wear brown shoes, makers but I don’t think VATICAN CITY beginning with loafers he will it’s likely that we will see an American – given as a gift last he was tinue to be known Pope Benedict XVI will conMarch during a visit pope,” said Cardinal Levada, who served as Pope Benedict Mexico. The Jesuit and addressed as “His Holiness,” said the pope has to Leon, co from 1995-2005. as archbishop of San Francisbut zapatos to be very found the “And add the title “emeritusafter his resignation, he will comfortable. would be an additiona I say that for this reason: It The safety of the ” in one of two acceptable forms, either “pope l complexity for pope emeritus will can pope to have an Ameriby the Vatican police, emeritus” or “Roman be ensured to deal with the emeritus.” pontiff perception that some of his decisions Three hours before Father Lombardi said.

Jesuit Father Federico his pontificate ends, dictated by American might be perceived to be Benedict intends Pope Lombardi , Vatican spokesman, said decisions to fly by helicopter governmental policy.”

He said that perceptio summer villa at to the papal Castel Gandolfo. addressed and what about how the pope would be n could be a problem the church in the he At would 8 for p.m.

Feb. wear rest of the world.

28 were made in consultation with – “On the other hand, Pope Benedict and dict has said he will the exact moment Pope BeneTarcisio Bertone, if an American with Cardinal cease being pope elected – provided pope is the chamberlain Guards stationed it’s of the church, along with others. at the main doors – the Swiss obedience and supportnot me – I will give him my of the papal villa at Castel Gandolfo any way I can,” After Feb. 28, Pope Levada said.

Cardinal doors, Father Lombardi will withdraw and close the Benedict will continue a white cassock, said. The Vatican to wear Cardinal Levada, but it will be a simplifi darmes will take genwho said the prospect of the papal vestment, over. ed version Pope Benedict also of the mainly without the white cape piece little on nals his “fisherman’swill give the College of CardiSEE CARDINAL, PAGE 21 told reporters Feb. the shoulders, Father Lombardi ring” and seal to as is usually done 26. be broken, upon the death of Pope Benedict will spokesman said. a pope, the leave behind his The pope will go emblematic back an episcopal ring he wore as a cardinal.to wearing

‘God is always faithful to

those he calls’

INDEX

ca a pt p t u re th the h e lo o ve e • ww w ww. ww w.. joel jo oe ell carr c a rr ca rric i c o. o.co

com co om

On the Street . . . . . . . . .4 National . . . . . . . . . . . . .7 World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 Opinion. . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Faith. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Calendar. . . . . . . . . . . .26

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26 CALENDAR

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

SUNDAY, MARCH 31 CONCERT: St. Mary’s Cathedral, Gough Street at Geary Boulevard, San Francisco, 3:30 p.m., Alexei Kodash, violin. Recitals open to the public.

Unless otherwise indicated, a free-will offering will be requested at the door.

Free parking. (415) 567-2020, ext 213.

MONDAY, APRIL 1

reservations call Katie O’Leary at (415) 282-6588 or email nuttydames@aol.com.

REUNION: St Matthew Alumni Association is looking for lost alums. Reunion is planned to celebrate parish’s 150th Anniversary at 5 p.m. All classes invited. Ann Connelly, aconnelly@ stmatthewcath.org or (650) 344 7622, ext. 104.

MASS: First Saturday at Holy Cross Cemetery, Colma, All Saints Mausoleum Chapel, 11 a.m. Father Paul Rossi, pastor, St. Pius Parish, celebrant and homilist. (650) 756-2060.

DIVINE MERCY: Divine Mercy Week with Father Seraphim Michalenko, postulator for Faustina Kowalska’s cause for sainthood with “Reflections on the Healing Power of Divine Mercy,�

St. Sebastian Church, Greenbrae, 6:30 p.m. Email stevenpatrickkasch@yahoo. com or call (415) 413-6300.

FATIMA MASS: Most Holy Redeemer Church, 100 Diamond St., San Francisco, 9 a.m. Father Brian Costello, pastor, principal celebrant and homilist. zonia@zoniafasquelle.com.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 3

SUNDAY, APRIL 7

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 include prayer, introductions, sharing. It is a drop-in support group. Jesuit Father Al Grosskopf (415) 422-6698, grosskopf@usfca.edu.

CHAPLET: St. Catherine of Siena Church, 1310 Bayswater Ave. at El Camino Real, Burlingame, 2:30 p.m. with Mass followed by Benediction, veneration and rosary. Judy Miller (650) 342-1988.

FRIDAY, APRIL 5 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.

SATURDAY, APRIL 6 REUNION: Notre Dame de Namur alumnae of San Francisco Mass and luncheon, 10:30 a.m. at Mission Dolores Basilica followed by lunch at the Spanish Cultural Center, 2850 Alemany Blvd.

Honorees are classes of ‘63, ‘38, ‘43, ‘53, and ‘73. For more information and

CONCERT: St. Mary’s Cathedral, Gough Street at Geary Boulevard, San Francisco, 3:30 p.m., Robert Gurney, organist. Recitals open to the public.

Unless otherwise indicated, a free-will offering will be requested at the door.

Free parking. (415) 567-2020, ext 213.

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.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 10 WELLNESS LUNCH: Dr. Dean Ornish is guest speaker at St. Vincent de Paul Society lunch benefiting the SVdP Wellness Center in San Francisco, Four Seasons Hotel, 757 Market St., Dr. Ornish San Francisco with tickets at $85 or tables of eight at $680. Reception starts at 11:30 a.m. with program and lunch at noon. Ornish is a clinical professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. The SVDP Wellness Center helps individuals struggling with addiction and mental health challenges make difficult and lasting changes. Call (415) 977-1270, ext. 3079 or visit www.svdp-sf.org.

and Divorced Catholic Ministry in the archdiocese and include prayer, introductions, sharing. It is a drop-in support group. Jesuit Father Al Grosskopf (415) 422-6698, grosskopf@usfca.edu.

FRIDAY, APRIL 12

TUESDAY, APRIL 9

FASHION: “Discarded to Divine� preview, 5:30-8:30 p.m., de Young Museum, Golden Gate Park. Meet established and emerging designers, enjoy music and no-host refreshments, and view fashions, accessories and home decor that will be auctioned April 16.

Proceeds benefit St. Vincent de Paul Wellness Center, San Francisco. http:// www.discardedtodivine.org. srosen@ svdp-sf.org. (415) 552-5561, ext. 301.

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

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.

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TAXES Jon the tax man

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SATURDAY, APRIL 13 CCCYO GALA: Catholic Charities CYO Loaves & Fishes Awards Dinner & Gala, St. Regis Hotel, San Francisco honoring the women religious of the Archdiocese of San Francisco for “Faith in Action.� www.cccyo.org/loavesandfishes.

SUNDAY, APRIL 14 ICF SPRING DINNER: Italian Catholic Federation Branch 173 annual meatballs and pasta dinner at Our Lady of Angels Parish gym, 1721 Hillside Drive, Burlingame. No-host bar at 4 p.m., dinner at 5 p.m., wine for purchase with dinner. Raffle and silent auction features sports memorabilia. Adults $18, children $5 (14 and under). Sandra, (650) 697-4279. Reserve a spot by April 10.

CONCERT: St. Mary’s Cathedral, Gough Street at Geary Boulevard, San Francisco, 3:30 p.m. Simon Berry, director of music St. Dominic Church, San Francisco, organist; Scott Macomber, trumpet. Recitals open to the public.

Unless otherwise indicated, a free-will offering will be requested at the door.

Free parking. (415) 567-2020, ext 213.

TUESDAY, APRIL 16 FASHION SALON: “Discarded to Divine� and silent auction, 6-9 p.m., Gensler, San Francisco, 2 Harrison St., $75 tickets include appetizer and wine reception and auction of more than 75 items by established and emerging designers. Proceeds benefit St. Vincent de Paul Wellness Center, San Francisco, serving people with mental health and addiction issues. http:// www.discardedtodivine.org. srosen@ svdp-sf.org. (415) 552-5561, ext. 301.

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CONCERT: The Singing Girls of Texas perform at Sts. Peter and Paul Church, 666 Filbert St. on Washington Square, San Francisco, 7:30 p.m. The teenage choir has an eclectic repertoire.

The concert is open and free to all, but free-will offerings are appreciated.

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CALENDAR 27

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29, 2013

SATURDAY, APRIL 27 TUESDAY, APRIL 23

MAGIC SHOW: Garry Carson, one of Las Vegas’ most popular illusionist acts, performs at Donworth Event Center at St. Stephen Parish, 7 p.m. $15.

Proceeds support the Joanne Pang Foundation’s public cord blood collection program. Contact the JPF, sally@joannepang. org or (415) 845-5795.

SATURDAY, APRIL 20 TASTING PARTY: Dads of St. Brigid School present “A Taste of San Francisco II,” 6 to 10 p.m. at the school, 2250 Franklin St., San Francisco. Event features cuisine from eight San Francisco restaurants, live jazz music, live and silent auctions and CBS 5 sports reporter Dennis O’Donnell as host. Tickets are $50 per person. Visit saintbrigidsf.eventbrite.com.

Email sbdads@gmail.com.

ADVANCE DIRECTIVES: Panel with Connie Borden, Carol Bayley, vice president, ethics and justice education; Father Pablo Iwaszewicz, and Dr. John H. Fullerton, Carol Bayley 2-3:30 p.m., Morrissey Hall 2250 Hayes St., C level, St. Mary’s Medical Center, San Francisco. (415) 750-5790 or stmarysafoundation@dignityhealth.org.

SUNDAY, APRIL 21 FAITH SHELTER WALK: Sponsored by the San Francisco Interfaith Council benefiting program hosting up to 100 men who are homeless at an inner-city religious community for dinner, a comfortable place to sleep and breakfast, during the four wettest and coldest months of the year. All monies collected will go to support this program. Visit www.winterfaithwalk.dojiggycom to donate or get more information. Walk is around Lake Merced.

TUESDAY, APRIL 23 GOOD SHEPHERD GALA: The Good Shepherd Guild presents a fashion

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SABBATH: “Sacred Time,” a workshop with Paulist Father Terry Ryan, 9 a.m.noon, Old St. Mary’s Paulist Center, 614 Grant Ave. at California, San Francisco. Free-will donations welcome.

(415) 288-3845.

show and luncheon at Lake Merced Golf Club, Daly City, 11:30 a.m. Tickets at $65 include a three-course lunch with entree choices. Contact Diana Bacigalupi for reservations (415) 7312537. Proceeds benefit Good Shepherd Gracenter.

THURSDAY, APRIL 25 VATICAN II TALKS: “Scripture” with Ruth Ohm at St. Pius Parish, Homer Crouse Hall, Woodside Road at Valota, Redwood City, 7 p.m. (650) 361-1411, ext. 121. laura@pius.org.

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ST. DUNSTAN ANNIVERSARY: 60th anniversary Mass and reception, 10 a.m., St. Dunstan parish and School, Millbrae. San Francisco Auxiliary Bishop William Justice presides. Open to the community with a special welcome to all alumni, parishioners, alumni parents, school parents, teachers, and staff past and present. Visit http://stdunstan.org or call (650) 697-8119.

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FOOD FAIR: St. Ignatius College Preparatory International Food Faire “Rock the Block,” 4-8 p.m., SI Commons, 2001 37th Ave., San Francisco, with 10 different food booths, three food trucks, multicultural entertainment and a dance party from 6-8 p.m.

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POMEROY CENTER: “Banner of Love Gala” honoring San Francisco Fire Department and Chief Joanne HayesWhite with 2013 Humanitarian Award.

Evening inChief Hayescludes dinner, White live, and silent auctions, Pomeroy Recreation & Rehabilitation Center, 207 Skyline Blvd., San Francisco, across from Lake Merced, 6-11p.m., $150 per person.

Maria Crespin, (415) 665-4100, mcrespin@prrcsf.org, or visit www.prrcsf.org.

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HOME SERVICES

GARAGE DOOR

DOMINICAN DAY: Dominican Father Michael Fones speaks on “The New Evangelization” at St. Albert Priory, 5890 Birch Court, Oakland, a block from Rockridge BART, 8:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Donation of $25 includes lunch, snacks, and chance at prizes. Anne Regan, (510) 655-4046. Susanna Krch, susannakrcharkin@att.net.

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THURSDAY, APRIL 18

FRIDAY, MAY 17

28

CATHOLIC SAN FRANCISCO | MARCH 29 29, 2013