CARING FOR MIND, BODY, SPIRIT
ST. ANTHONY JANUARY 2014 • $3.95
What Does God Look Like? New York Radio’s ‘Mad Dog’ Russo Living Fully to the End
Messenger
Sister Helen Prejean 20 Years after Dead Man Walking
CONTENTS
ST. ANTHONY Messenger
❘ JANUARY 2014 ❘ VOLUME 121/NUMBER 8
ON THE COVER
COVER STORY
Helen Prejean, CSJ, has been inspiring a movement to abolish the death penalty. She feels compelled by the Gospel to do so.
26 Sister Helen Prejean: 20 Years after Dead Man Walking State by state, capital punishment is being repealed. This longtime death-penalty opponent gives us a progress report. By John Feister
F E AT U R E S
Photo by Mike Posey Photography & Video
20 D E PA R T M E N T S
16 What Does God Look Like?
2 Dear Reader
We can find glimpses of the Divine all around us. By Joe McHugh
3 From Our Readers 6 Followers of St. Francis Suzanne Kush, CSSF
20 The Skinny on Wellness
8 Reel Time
Wellness isn’t just about waistlines. Our minds and spirits need attention, too. By Jim Brennan and Colleen Montgomery
32 Walking the Talk with ‘Mad Dog’ Russo
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
10 Channel Surfing
32
Alaska: The Last Frontier
12 Church in the News
This New York sports commentator is known for his vocal opinions. When he’s not on the air, what grounds him are his faith and family. By James Breig
15 Editorial Is Anybody Listening?
25 Short Take Rosary Rapper
38 The Symphony of Life Illness and age served only to strengthen this mother and daughter’s relationship. By Barbara Tylla
42 Fiction: Playing the Faith Card The house doesn’t always win. By Joan Sauro, CSJ
41 At Home on Earth Satisfying Fire
38
46 Ask a Franciscan Refusing to Be Confirmed
48 Book Corner Catching Fire, Becoming Flame
50 A Catholic Mom Speaks A Little Help Here
52 Backstory Farewell, Friar Jack
ST. ANTHONY M
DEAR READER
essenger
‘The Fifth Gospel’
Publisher/CEO Daniel Kroger, OFM
Although the New Testament includes only the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the land where Jesus lived, died, and rose from the dead has sometimes been called “the fifth Gospel.” God uniquely entered human history in a definite place and at a specific time. Within 40 years after Jesus’ ascension into heaven, the Romans ruled Palestine even more tightly. The land’s first Christian shrines were very modest. These became more elaborate in the fourth century, thanks to the interest and zeal of St. Helena, mother of Emperor Constantine. After Christianity became a legal religion, she visited Bethlehem and Jerusalem and built basilicas there. Late in the same century, the pilgrim Egeria left an account about churches and liturgies in the Holy Land. Muslim control after the seventh century made Christian pilgrimages more difficult. These increased in popularity in the 19th century, thanks in small part to the ministry of the Franciscans, welcoming Christians at several shrines and developing new ones linked to the life of Jesus and of the early Christian community. Whoever has visited the Holy Land can never read the Bible as she or he once did. In 2014, this column will feature Holy Land shrines cared for by the Order of Friars Minor.
Chief Operating Officer Thomas A. Shumate, CPA
Director of Content Creation and Services Jennifer Scroggins
Editor in Chief John Feister
Art Director Jeanne Kortekamp
Franciscan Editor Pat McCloskey, OFM
Managing Editor Susan Hines-Brigger
Associate Editor Christopher Heffron
Editorial Assistant Sharon Lape
Director of Marketing, Sales, and Internet Barbara K. Baker
Advertising Fred Limke
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ST. ANTHONY MESSENGER (ISSN #0036276X) (U.S.P.S. PUBLICATION #007956 CANADA PUBLICATION #PM40036350) Volume 121, Number 8, is published monthly for $39.00 a year by the Franciscan Friars of St. John the Baptist Province, 28 W. Liberty Street, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202-6498. Phone (513) 241-5615. Periodicals postage paid at Cincinnati, Ohio, and additional entry offices. U.S. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to: St. Anthony Messenger, P.O. Box 189, Congers, NY 10920-0189. CANADA RETURN ADDRESS: c/o AIM, 7289 Torbram Rd., Mississauga, ON, Canada L4T 1G8. To subscribe, write to the above address or call (866) 543-6870. Yearly subscription price: $39.00 in the United States; $69.00 in Canada and other foreign countries. Single copy price: $3.95. For change of address, four weeks’ notice is necessary. Writer’s guidelines can be found at Franciscan Media.org. The publishers are not responsible for manuscripts or photos lost or damaged in transit. Names in fiction do not refer to living or dead persons. Member of the Catholic Press Association Published with ecclesiastical approval Copyright ©2013. All rights reserved.
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FROM OUR READERS
A Soldier’s Story As a Vietnam veteran now active in the organization Veterans for Peace, I took a keen interest in Richard B. Patterson, PhD’s insightful, thoughtful, and well-written November article, “Welcome Home, Soldier.” Dr. Patterson, a psychologist, told of his conversations with former soldiers suffering from emotional wounds caused by war. It is understandable that some combat veterans are offended by well-meaning Americans who thank them for their service, since their service involved killing or wounding fellow human beings and/or witnessing the death of fellow soldiers. These are such painful, lifelong memories. I, however, was fortunate enough to never have been put in combat situations during my year in Vietnam. I never saw any dead or wounded
What’s on Your Mind? Letters that are published do not necessarily represent the views of the Franciscan friars or the editors. We do not publish slander or libel. Please include your name and postal address. Letters may be edited for clarity and space. Mail Letters, St. Anthony Messenger 28 W. Liberty St. Cincinnati, OH 45202-6498 Fax 513-241-0399
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people, and the only blood I saw was my own if I nicked myself shaving. Today, when some people see me in my 45-year-old Army uniform carrying a peace flag and say, “Thank you for serving our country,” I respond with, “You're welcome. I wish I could say it was my pleasure, but it really wasn’t.” I always recall Lieutenant Billy Joe Blacksten’s grisly death from mortar shrapnel on February 4, 1968, three days after his 23rd birthday. Thank God I was not there when it happened, which was a few days into the Tet Offensive. But privately, I say to myself, “I didn’t serve my country. I served fear-mongering politicians and war profiteers.” Those truly serving our country and who are the real “war heroes” are health-care professionals—such as Dr. Patterson—who strive mightily to mend as much as possible the broken bodies and psyches of those ravaged by war. Louis H. Pumphrey Shaker Heights, Ohio
Gender Roles: Separate but Equal? Thank you for your many thoughtprovoking articles, such as “Big Faith in the Big Easy,” “Homeless like Me,” and “Welcome Home, Soldier,” from the November issue. I’m responding to the “Pope Addresses Tough Issues in Interview” item in November’s “Church in the News,” especially the last sentence about our all-male priesthood. We ought to remember that Jesus instituted a Church with an all-male priesthood. Pope John Paul II dealt with this, saying that it cannot be changed because Jesus did it that way. Even though times were different then, Jesus could have instituted women priests, but he did not. I believe women’s roles are just as important as men’s roles, but they’re not the same. Jesus’ mother, Mary,
led the way here. She chose not to have a visible role, but to be his handmaiden, his supporter. She did not seek personal visibility, yet God exalted her higher than any woman who ever lived or will live. I believe this is where women’s greatness lies. We have the example. Cosette Schaaf Yuma, Arizona
Editorial Disturbs Reader Christopher Heffron’s editorial in the November issue, “Catholics and Politics,” disturbed me very much. It was disturbing because I think it represents many Catholics who are trying to justify voting for candidates whose basic party platform affirms the taking of innocent human lives as a basic right. The right to life is foundational not only for this country, but also for Catholics. Pope John Paul II told us that in his beautiful encyclical Evangelium Vitae. Archbishop Charles Chaput and others are reminding us today. It appears that electing leaders who consider eliminating innocent human life in the womb a foundational right leads to the making of rules that force employers to pay for such procedures in violation of employees’ consciences. It seems that Catholics voting for such leaders are doing so in spite of the warnings of Blessed John Paul II and others who warned that this country is in danger of being immersed in a culture of death. Patrick J. Serey, MD Prospect, Kentucky
A Sore Subject I saw the review of the film Aftermath in Sister Rose Pacatte, FSP’s November “Reel Time.” This is an old and sore subject for Jews and Poles. I get the feeling from the review that the Poles (Catholics) have a lot January 2014 ❘ 3
to be sorry for, but in Yad Vashem, the Polish saviors of Jews outnumber any other group. The Poles are very open in saying that there were traitors in their midst—ones who betrayed Jew and gentile alike. But they strongly assert that those people were the exception, not the rule. Not every Pole was a saint, but many Poles were executed for hiding Jews. Others survived with their Jewish refugees, facing a quick death if they were discovered. When will they make a film about those heroes? Guy Sudano Sunnyvale, California
Charity Is Blind to Party Lines
God Makes the Rules It seems as if Mary Courteau and Larry N. Lorenzoni, who wrote letters in November’s “From Our Readers,” don’t understand that the Church is not a man-made, secular institution that is run by popular opinion. God set the rules. If they want a Church which sways with the popular cul4 ❘ January 2014
Some Soldiers Treated Poorly Not to take away from what I’m sure is a tough return for the current veterans returning home, but as a veteran of the Vietnam War, I can’t help but think of the poor receptions we received upon returning home from duty. It was a time of unrest because of the unpopular war. Back then, soldiers were humiliated, degraded, called names, and even spat upon for serving their country. I actually changed my uniform into “civvies” in California before returning home so that I wouldn’t be looked down upon.
I still don’t understand why today soldiers are received with open arms, parades, and celebrations. Yet in our day, it was the opposite—just awful. Bob LaPre Westfield, Massachusetts
A Good Read I had heard of St. Anthony Messenger before, but always figured it would be boring. But I was ordering a book on saints and decided I would give the magazine a try. Boy, was I wrong! I get two very popular magazines and I get through them in about half an hour. But I wish that St. Anthony Messenger came out twice a month. I can’t wait for it to come and, when it does, I read it cover to cover. I think the wonderful St. Anthony made me subscribe. Thank you very much for a very interesting magazine. I am now a subscriber for life. Marguerite Jeffords Oregon House, California
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I was puzzled by the “Party Lines” letter in November’s “From Our Readers” expressing “social-justice Catholics” having a narrow view, and saying that nowhere in the Bible does it say that Caesar is to take care of his neighbor. Most social-justice Catholics I know are actively engaged in personal charitable work in addition to promoting compassionate government policies. Unlike Caesar’s rule, we are a democracy of the people. Christ-like moral principles should permeate government policies. In responding to the needs of the poor, government action should mirror our faith and values rather than ignoring or oppressing the needy. Individual charity alone cannot respond adequately; legislating living wages must be a priority. The late Archbishop Hélder Câmara said it well: “When I feed the poor, they call me a saint, but when I ask why the poor are hungry, they call me a communist.” Mark Dorais Nashville, Tennessee
ture of the day, become Protestant and find a church that suits their fancies among the myriad of choices. If they want the one, holy, Catholic Church, pray to be humble and accept what God wants. Doreen King New Bloomfield, Pennsylvania
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F O L L O W E R S O F S T. F R A N C I S
Working to Make a Difference
S
ister Suzanne Kush, CSSF, is working to make a difference in the lives of others. She’s also working to encourage others to do the same. Sister Suzanne is a Felician sister and the director of the Franciscan Center for Social Concern (FCSC) at St. Bonaventure University. In her role at St. Bonaventure, she provides students with direct service experience, arranges to bring speakers to campus to address issues related to the FCSC mission, and works to involve students and faculty in advocacy. This includes experiences and issues on a local, regional, national, and international level. According to the center’s website, the work of FCSC “begins with serving others, but also includes reflecting on that experience in the light of faith, integrating it with our studies, and becoming agents for positive change in the Catholic-Franciscan tradition.” In addition to her work with FCSC, Sister Suzanne is an adjunct faculty member at the university, where she teaches courses that focus on Catholic and Franciscan heritage.
Sister Suzanne Kush, CSSF
“My ministry at St. Bonaventure University,” says Sister Suzanne, “is intertwined with my Felician vocation. By providing various opportunities both academically and experientially, individuals are able to not only reflect upon the dignity of the person but also to do so for the common good.” Having been influenced by the good example of some of the Felician sisters who taught her, Sister Suzanne entered the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Felix of Cantalice in 1964. “My desire to make a difference in the lives of others was the example that many of us experienced,” she recalls. After entering the community, she soon discovered that there were many similarities in the charism of her order’s foundress, Blessed Mary Angela Truszkowska, and Francis of Assisi, especially “that abundant love of God that calls us to extend compassion and mercy to others.” In addition to her work at St. Bonaventure, Sister Suzanne helps lead pilgrimages to Assisi and Rome as part of the Franciscan Pilgrimage Program. She says that the experience “allows me to walk in the footprints
STORIES FROM OUR READERS Photo from Italy
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Learn more about St. Anthony and share your story of how he helped you at AmericanCatholic.org/ Features/Anthony.
6 ❘ January 2014
My daughter and son-in-law vacationed in Italy in August 2012. They took numerous pictures of all the many beautiful attractions and statuesque monuments. When they returned home, no photo card was to be found in any of their suitcases. St. Anthony was immediately called upon in many of our prayers. Our dear saint came to the rescue. After having used their suitcases many times since then and scouring them in searches, the photo card appeared right where it was placed a year before. They both exclaimed, “We scoured our luggage over and over and found nothing! But St. Anthony once again showered his graces upon us.” —Margaret Ann Underwood, Louisville, Kentucky
St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
Click here for more on St. Bonaventure University’s Franciscan Center for Social Concern.
ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI
Embracing Lepers In Francis’ day, people who suffered from leprosy were cut off from the rest of society. “Abandon hope, all you who enter here” reads the sign over hell’s gate in Dante’s Divine Comedy. In fact, some medieval leper colonies had those words inscribed over their main entrance. People afflicted with leprosy rang a bell to warn of their approach. Francis’ conversion took place gradually. When he first embraced a leper for the love of God, Francis saw the world differently and began to recognize them as people made in God’s image. –P.M.
WALTERS ART MUSEUM (BALTIMORE/MARYLAND)
of Francis and Clare, but also provides the opportunity to journey with others. Whether I am on pilgrimage with college students or individuals from various walks of life, God’s grace is evident time and time again.” “The Franciscan spirit,” she notes, “is based upon the humanity of Christ and on the human condition. It is responding to the circumstances of daily life that calls each of us to reach out to others in compassion and mercy. Thereby not only doing charitable deeds but to do justice, that is, work for the changing of structures that oppress others.” Her favorite story of Francis and Clare is one that can be found in the tavola (table) of Francis and Clare. The scene depicts Francis and the hungry brother, and Clare with her sisters around the table. “These two accounts focus on the meaning of Eucharist,” says Sister Suzanne. “It is a love that is relational. Love is at the center of the Gospel for Francis and Clare, a life grounded in Christ that is extended to others.” —Susan Hines-Brigger
tal Digi as Extr
To learn more about Franciscan saints, visit AmericanCatholic.org/Features/Saintofday.
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PHOTO BY FRANK JASPER, OFM
The National Shrine of St. Anthony is located in Cincinnati, Ohio. Consecrated in 1889, it includes a first-class relic of St. Anthony and serves as a center for daily prayer and contemplation. The Franciscan friars minister from the shrine. To help them in their work among the poor, you may send a monetary offering called St. Anthony Bread. Make checks or money orders payable to “Franciscans” and mail to the address below. Every Tuesday, a Mass is offered for benefactors and petitioners at the shrine. To seek St. Anthony’s intercession, mail your petition to the address below. Petitions are taken to the shrine each week. To post your petition online, please visit stanthony.org, where you can also request to have a candle lit or a Mass offered; or you may make a donation to the Franciscans or sign up to receive a novena booklet.
REEL TIME
W I T H S I S T E R R O S E PA C AT T E , F S P
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
SISTER ROSE’S CNS PHOTO/LIONSGATE
Favorite Films with
Young Heroines Whale Rider (2002) The Wizard of Oz (1939) True Grit (2010) Akeelah and the Bee (2006) Matilda (1996)
8 ❘ January 2014
Josh Hutcherson and Jennifer Lawrence compete in another round of the deadly Hunger Games. In the much-anticipated sequel to the 2012 blockbuster The Hunger Games, Catching Fire picks up a couple of months after the first story ended. Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta (Josh Hutcherson), who won the 74th Hunger Games, have been living in District 12’s Victors’ Village. Their mentor, Haymitch (Woody Harrelson), also lives there and is drunk as usual. Katniss and Peeta have been told to show they are in love as a way to justify their triumph at the Games. This is hard because she still harbors feelings for her friend Gale. President Snow (Donald Sutherland) shocks Katniss by showing up just before the tour is about to begin and threatening her. Katniss discovers that rebellions are breaking out because people have started to hope since she and Peeta won, and the Capitol publicity machine created a love story. But the one thing Snow cannot allow is hope to flourish. Snow then calls the Quarter Quell Games, marking the 75th anniversary of the suppression of the first rebellion. The contestants are two surviving tributes from past Games in
each district. Katniss and Haymitch are chosen, but Peeta volunteers to take his place. Fire is the theme for Katniss and Peeta, and they wear their costumes well. The fire means passion, perhaps between Peeta and Katniss, and certainly the passion of the oppressed people for freedom. One of the new characters—the Game maker, Plutarch (Philip Seymour Hoffman)—devises torturous methods to thwart Katniss and Peeta in the arena, and time on the Games’ clock is running out. Catching Fire is dark and disturbing because it focuses on the extremes to which a dictator of a totalitarian state will go to maintain power. The film is, as a colleague describes it, a cultural parable that seems aimed at an adult audience more than adolescents. The film stayed with me for days. A-3, PG-13 ■ Peril, violence.
The Book Thief The Book Thief, based on the 2005 historical novel of the same name by Markus Zusak, is one of my favorite books in recent years. In St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
© 2013 TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX
Based on the novel by Markus Zusak, The Book Thief stars Sophie Nélisse as a young girl during the early days of World War II.
CNS PHOTO/DISNEY
1938, the mother of Liesel (Sophie Nélisse) takes her and her little brother by train to Munich, Germany, as threats of war grow and the Nazi regime starts to round up those suspected of dissenting. Her little brother dies along the way. At the funeral, Liesel, who cannot read though she is almost 12, picks up a burial manual the gravedigger drops. Later, her mother drops her off at the home of Rosa (Emily Watson) and Hans (Geoffrey Rush), a childless couple. They want to take her in so she can help with the laundry. Rosa is impatient, while Hans is kind and plays a colorful accordion. He also teaches her to read. Liesel begins school and makes friends with Rudy (Nico Liersch). They both have to deal with another kid who bullies them. As the war begins, food and work become scarce. Then, suddenly, a stranger, Max (Ben Schnetzer), arrives. Rosa becomes softer, and the three of them struggle to keep Max, who is hiding in the basement, a secret. The film is beautifully shot, and the acting—especially that of Nélisse—is simply luminous. This is a movie that celebrates reading and the love of words as it tells the truth about love, respect, death, and keeping promises. Not yet rated, PG-13 ■ Peril, bullying.
when she unintentionally hurts Anna. She is healed, but the parents decide that Elsa should be hidden away so she will not hurt anyone else—rather than teach her how to control her feelings and her powers. When the parents die on a voyage, Elsa comes out of hiding to be crowned queen. She wears long gloves so she will not harm anyone, but it happens when Anna pulls one off. In her anger, Elsa turns summer into winter and runs away to live by herself, believing that if she is alone she can be free. Frozen shows Disney’s return to musical animation featuring beautiful—and impossibly thin—female characters. The music is good, but the story excels because it shows that love can truly thaw a frozen heart. The theme of freedom is strong as well. I liked the two young princesses in Frozen much better than Merida, a brat, in 2012’s Brave. And the kiss that saves Elsa is unique among Disney’s animated features, and it is very moving. A-1, PG ■ Peril.
Disney’s Frozen is a musical fantasy that boasts the vocal talents of Idina Menzel, Kristen Bell, and Jonathan Groff.
Catholic Cl assifications A-1 A-2 A-3 L O
Frozen Princesses Elsa (voiced by Idina Menzel) and Anna (voiced by Kristen Bell) live in a palace in Arendelle with their parents. Elsa is born with special powers: when she becomes emotional in any way, she can turn people and objects into ice and create winter when it is summer. Her parents consult the trolls Fr anciscanMedia.org
General patronage Adults and adolescents Adults Limited adult audience Morally offensive
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The Catholic News Service Media Review Office gives these ratings. See usccb.org/movies.
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Find reviews by Sister Rose and others at CatholicMovieReviews.org.
January 2014 ❘ 9
CHANNEL SURFING
WITH CHRISTOPHER HEFFRON
UP CLOSE
Sundays, 9 p.m., Discovery Channel Alaska is an enigma to many suburbanites and city dwellers, and for good reason: seemingly untouched by the industrialized world, it boasts 6,640 miles of coastline and is home to 17 of the 20 highest peaks in the United States. It’s so vast that Iowa could fit inside of it 12 times, yet it’s occupied by just over 731,000 people. Discovery Channel’s Alaska: The Last Frontier introduces us to 10 of them. The series follows the lives of the Kilcher clan, a group of seasoned outdoorsmen and women who not only survive in conditions most of us would deem unlivable, but thrive in them. What hooked me was Atz Kilcher, the wise patriarch, whose Zen approach to life belies a deep understanding of the land and how to live off it. Moving and often funny, past episodes of The Last Frontier have centered on the construction of a deluxe outhouse and caring for a cow with infected udders. You can’t help but smile when you watch it. Sensitive channel surfers might find aspects of frontier life disturbing, but take a closer look: the Kilchers—not one of them a cynic—have little use for the past or the future. They live in the now. That “seize the day” mentality is not only inspiring, but also great fun to watch.
The Crazy Ones Thursdays, 9 p.m., CBS Robin Williams can be an acquired taste. When he’s restrained, he’s manageable (see his Oscarwinning turn in Good Will Hunting). But without boundaries, the comedian can be exhausting, and he teeters between the two in the CBS sitcom The Crazy Ones. Williams stars as Simon Roberts, an ad executive for a Chicago firm who works alongside his tough and taciturn daughter, played by the formidable Sarah Michelle Gellar. Williams often resorts to his typical lightning-fast banter and bizarre personalities, but the relationship between father and daughter resonates. Hopefully this freshman series will find its footing and its star will calm down a bit.
Iyanla: Fix My Life
© DISCOVERY COMMUNICATIONS
Saturdays, 9 p.m., OWN The title of this series suggests that relationship expert Iyanla Vanzant can solve any problem, which is preposterous. Her efforts, however, are anything but. What makes this series so absorbing is that Vanzant, no stranger to tragedy herself, knows that forgiveness is the surest road to healing. Past episodes have dealt with families facing drug addiction, betrayals, and long-buried secrets, but what makes Fix My Life unique is that Vanzant is prone to asking those in her care to offer it up. What we destroy, God can rebuild. And though she can sometimes border on the theatrical, Vanzant’s motives are pure and the show captures real moments of discovery that should move even the hardest viewer.
Alaska: The Last Frontier profiles family members who thrive despite difficult conditions. 10 ❘ January 2014
St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
PHOTO BY RICHARD CARTWRIGHT/CBS
Alaska: The Last Frontier
New From Servant Books! The Miraculous Medal Stories, Prayers, and Devotions Donna-Marie Cooper O'Boyle What is the significance of this medal? Why is it considered miraculous? Where did it come from and is it still relevant for us today? The Miraculous Medal tells the origin and history of this beloved sacramental. You'll learn how it got its name and the story of St. Catherine, who introduced it to the world. You'll discover personal stories of those who have experienced the medal's miraculous power, and you'll learn the prayers and practices that can help you share in its graces.
Lily of the Mohawks The Story of St. Kateri Emily Cavins; foreword by Mitch Pacwa, S.J. Many have been inspired by the story of this young Native American mystic who lived in the Mohawk Valley during the seventeenth century. Readers will discover what lead to Kateri’s desire to become Christian, her impact on the Catholic Mohawk community, her path to sainthood, and more. Item #T36555 | ISBN 978-1-61636-555-4 | $14.99
Item # T36625 | ISBN 978-1-61636-625-4 | $14.99
Thirsting for God Daily Meditations Mother Teresa; Edited by Angelo D. Scolozzi, M.C.III.O. This collection of short stories, prayers, and meditations come from the heart of Mother Teresa—a heart filled with a humble surrender to Jesus, a love for souls, and a simple joy in service to others. As you feast on these daily reflections, you will discover the secrets of a life fully surrendered to God. Item # T36689 | ISBN 978-1-61636-689-6 | $12.99
Love Never Fails 120 Reflections Debra Herbeck Perfect for gift-giving or personal reflection, this treasury contains the writings of favorite saints and others, including: Mother Teresa, C.S. Lewis, St. John of the Cross, Henri Nouwen, St. Julian of Norwich, Fulton Sheen, and St. Catherine of Siena. Enrich your soul with these meditations on love: God’s love for us, our love for him, and our love for each other. Item # T36530 | ISBN 978-1-61636-530-1 | $12.99
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CHURCH IN THE NEWS
❘ BY SUSAN HINES-BRIGGER
Pope Lays Out a Vision for the Church
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eral,” nor “understood as domination.” The pope also encouraged better preaching and offered several pages of suggestions for better homilies. He said both the clergy and laity suffer from poor preaching: “the laity from having to listen to them and the clergy from having to preach them!” Returning to a theme of which he has repeatedly spoken, the pope warned against “spiritual worldliness, which hides behind the appearance of piety and even love for the Church, (but) consists in seeking not the Lord’s glory but human glory and personal well-being,” either through embrace of a “purely subjective faith” or a “narcissistic and authoritarian elitism” that overemphasizes certain rules or a “particular Catholic style from the past.”
In his first extensive piece of writing as pope, Pope Francis lays out a vision of the Catholic Church dedicated to evangelization, with a focus on society’s poorest and most vulnerable members, including the aged and unborn.
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In addressing the subject of abortion, Pope Francis pointed out that the Church’s concern for the vulnerable extends to “unborn children, the most defenseless and innocent among us,” whose defense is “closely linked to the defense of each and every other human right. “A human being is always sacred and inviolable, in any situation and at every stage of development,” the pope wrote. “Once this conviction disappears, so do solid and lasting foundations for the defense of human rights, which would always be subject to the passing whims of the powers that be.” In the letter, the pope reaffirmed that only men can be priests, but pointed out that while it is a “sacramental power,” it should not be “too closely identified with power in gen-
The US bishops elected a new president for their conference at their annual meeting November 11-14 in
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In the first apostolic exhortation of his papacy, Pope Francis addressed a wide range of issues such as evangelization, charity, and preaching, among others, reported Catholic News Service (CNS). Evangelii Gaudium (“The Joy of the Gospel”) was released on November 26. It was written in response to the October 2012 Synod of Bishops on the new evangelization. The pope, however, declined to work from a draft provided by synod officials. He wrote that the Church’s message “has to concentrate on the essentials, on what is most beautiful, most grand, most appealing and at the same time most necessary. In this basic core, what shines forth is the beauty of the saving love of God made manifest in Jesus Christ who died and rose from the dead.”
US Bishops Elect New Leaders at Fall Meeting
Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, was elected president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
N E W S B R I E F S N AT I O N A L A N D I N T E R N AT I O N A L
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founded in 1923, and its mission is to apply the teachings of Jesus Christ for the social, economic, and spiritual development of rural America with responsibility for the care of God’s creation. Jim Ennis, Catholic Rural Life’s executive director, said the name change, which has been in the works for some time, doesn’t mean the organization’s focus has changed. “We’re still who we are,” said Ennis. “Our focus is still the same—on rural life and rural communities.”
In a 5-4 vote, the US Supreme Court ruled on November 19 to leave in place a provision in the state of Texas requiring doctors who perform abortions in clinics to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital. The case is on appeal to the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, and the court will hear arguments in a challenge brought by Planned Parenthood in January. The law will remain in effect until then. The National Catholic Rural Life Conference announced on November 11 that it has changed its name to Catholic Rural Life. The organization was
Baltimore. The bishops also discussed issues such as defense of religious liberty, the situation in the Philippines after the typhoon, and a Mexican translation of the Roman Missal for use in the United States, reported CNS. On the second day of the meeting, Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Louisville was elected to succeed Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York as conference president. Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of GalvestonFr ancisca n Media .org
CNS PHOTO/L’OSSERVATORE ROMANO VIA REUTERS
People can now visit Rome’s Catacombs of Priscilla via the Internet. Using Google’s Street View feature, people can click the “see-inside” option for the catacombs, which allows them to move virtually through the narrow corridors, and see high-resolution and well-lit images of the interiors from almost every angle. Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, president of both the Pontifical Council for Culture and the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology, said, “This is perhaps the sign of the joining of two extremes, remote antiquity and modernity.” Russian President Vladimir Putin visited with Pope Francis for 35 minutes on November 25. A statement from the Vatican said that during the meeting “special attention was given to the pursuit of peace in the Middle East and to the serious situations in Syria.” The two also discussed “the life of the Catholic community in Russia.” The day before the meeting, Pope Francis marked the 80th anniversary of the Holodomor (“Terror-Famine of Ukraine”). The pope joined Ukrainian pilgrims in remembering “the great famine provoked by the Soviet regime that caused millions of victims.” For more news, visit AmericanCatholic.org.
Houston was elected vice president. Shortly after his election, Archbishop Kurtz told CNS that he saw Pope Francis as a model for outreach, listening, and collegiality. “He’s asking us to go beyond what we’ve been doing,” said the archbishop, whose term is for three years. In his address to the body of bishops, Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, apostolic nuncio to the United States, told the bishops, “The Holy Father wants bishops in tune with
their people.” The nuncio said that when he met with the pope this summer, the pontiff made “a special point of saying that he wants pastoral bishops, not bishops who profess or follow a particular ideology.” The bishops approved the development of a pastoral statement on the dangers pornography poses to family life that would serve as a teaching tool for Church leaders. They also nearly unanimously approved several steps toward adaptJanuary 2014 ❘ 13
ing the Mexican Misal Romano for use in the United States. The Mexican translation of the Missal will have Mass propers for the US calendar included, with publication possible as soon as fall 2015.
Collection Taken Up for Typhoon Recovery
Pope Closes Year of Faith At a Mass marking the end of the Year of Faith, Pope Francis called on people to keep Christ at the center of their lives, especially during times of trouble, reported CNS. The pope began his homily by thanking Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI for establishing the Year of Faith, calling it a “providential initiative” that gave Christians “the opportunity to rediscover the beauty of the journey of faith begun on the day of our Baptism.” Pope Francis went on to reflect on the Gospel reading of the good thief, saying that “whenever anyone finds the courage to ask for this forgiveness, the Lord does not let such a petition go unheard.” He added that people need to say, “‘Jesus, remember me because I want to be good, I have the desire to become good, but I don’t have the strength. I can’t, I’m a sinner.’ The Lord always grants more than what he has been asked.” The November 24 Mass also
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During the US bishops’ annual fall meeting in Baltimore, Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas of Tucson, Arizona, chairman of the board of Catholic Relief Services (CRS), provided a report on what the agency is doing for survivors of Super Typhoon Haiyan. By now, most bishops have responded to a plea by CRS officials to take up a special collection in their dioceses for the Philippines. The organization committed $20 million in emergency aid for survivors of the storm, expecting that the funds will come from the collection. Carolyn Woo, president of CRS, told the bishops, “Our goal is to serve 100,000 families, about a halfmillion people.” Bishop Kicanas said some of the funds will be set aside for the reconstruction of Catholic churches,
schools, and agencies, but the immediate need was for relief efforts.
Typhoon victims wait in line for free rice at a businessman’s warehouse in Tacloban, Philippines, which was devastated by Super Typhoon Haiyan. Aid agencies faced challenges getting food and water to the hundreds of thousands of Filipinos affected by the storm. 14 ❘ January 2014
marked the exposition for public veneration of bones believed to be those of St. Peter. The eight bone fragments—each 2 to 3 centimeters long—were held in an open bronze reliquary displayed to the side of the altar. The bones were discovered during excavations of the necropolis under St. Peter’s Basilica in the 1940s. They are kept in the pope’s private chapel but had never been displayed in public.
Supreme Court to Hear Cases on HHS Mandate The US Supreme Court announced on November 26 that it will hear two cases that are challenging provisions of the Affordable Care Act requiring employers to provide contraceptive coverage on behalf of for-profit companies whose owners object to the mandate for religious reasons, according to CNS. The two cases being heard are those of Hobby Lobby, an Oklahomabased, family-run, arts-and-crafts chain, and Conestoga Wood Specialties, a Pennsylvania family-run company that makes cabinets. The two cases will be combined for the arguments. Both companies will argue that a federal requirement that the owners of the companies must provide insurance coverage they morally oppose violates their Free Exercise rights, as well as their rights under the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore, chairman of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty, responded to the decision, saying, “We pray that the Supreme Court will find that the Constitution and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act protect everyone’s right to religious freedom. We are encouraged by the advances in the lower federal courts so far in cases involving family-owned companies as well as nonprofit religious organizations.” A ruling is likely to be made by late June. A St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
EDITORIAL
Is Anybody Listening? It’s about time that our hierarchy listens more intently to the world. It’s about time the hierarchy spends some time listening more carefully to, as lofty Church documents say, the “joys and hopes, the struggles and anxieties” of the people of God before charting a program for the Church. Thank God, this listening seems to be under way. Later this year, in October, our Church will hold a Synod of Bishops on “Pastoral Challenges to the Family in the Context of Evangelization.” It might sound as if we’ve heard this all before. Yet this synod promises something dramatically new. Pope Francis is preparing our leaders to meet by starting with a Church-wide poll of sorts, a sounding that is now happening.
Challenges to the Church
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When he announced this pastoral synod this past October, Pope Francis acknowledged that families everywhere face challenges that our Church simply isn’t addressing. What are these challenges? Let’s find out, says the pope. Let’s ask people who are facing these challenges day-to-day. It’s a welcome approach. Past synods have more typically involved a large group of bishClick here for family ops, hopefully in prayers, a video, and touch with their more on synods. people, gathering for a period of time, speaking to that synod’s topic. A few months later, the pope would issue a document interpreting the learnings of the synod. No empty gesture, these synods: the results have almost always touched the entire Church in one way or another. But sometimes their findings could have been broader, or more on target toward the lived experience of the faithful. There were times since Vatican II, that a local bishop might seek advice from his people before heading off to discern and debate with his fellow bishops. But this time every-
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one is consulting, at the explicit request of the Holy Father. Pope Francis has given our bishops a set of questions to drive the process. It’s the first time in history the Roman Catholic Church has done anything like this.
Some Starter Questions The questions are a big clue that this Holy Father understands there is a problem. For example: How should a Catholic approach the non-Church wedding of the niece or nephew, brother or sister, who has been living with a partner for years? What about divorce, a huge family question? How many do each of us know who simply have shaken their heads and walked away from the Church, perhaps at a time when they The questions are a big needed it most? Lots of clue that this Holy them never came back. What about interreligious Father understands marriages? Single-parent there is a problem. households? How can the Church be warm and inviting to those living with same-sex partners, some of whom are raising children? How do we address the growing trend of less-than-lifetime marriage commitment? Surrogate parenthood? Those questions are coming from Western culture. Yet it’s a worldwide Church. What about polygamy? Dowries that translate into the purchase of wives? Caste systems? There’s something else, even more basic to the Church: What does it mean for marriage to be a sacrament? This is such a spiritual crisis, says the pope, that it will take two synods: one this year, where urgent questions will be named via consultation with the faithful; and a second, in 2015, where some practical approaches and responses are discerned. Hey, Church! Let’s all do our homework. Let’s broaden the nets and listen to all manner of experiences. Let us listen and better understand the challenges of families—all sorts of them—in the modern world. —John Feister January 2014 ❘ 15
What Does God Look Like? We can find glimpses of the Divine all around us.
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HERE’S A WONDERFUL story about compelling story that gives real light to our the late American Jesuit theologian path. Without image and story, our lives turn Cardinal Avery Dulles that is no doubt into little more than a collection of disconas apocryphal as it is charming. He nected episodes in search of a plot. supposedly once slipped into a church and Our growth as Christians follows a similar spied a banner hanging from the pulpit that path. Until we find an image of God that read, “God Is Other People.” After making enlivens our imaginations and quickens our sure the coast was clear, he took a marker from hearts, our spiritual lives are a cluttered collechis pocket and inserted a comma in the word- tion of experiences in search of substance and ing that made it read, “God Is Other, People.” sustenance. Tucked away in the story’s humor is a permanent tension in how Christians understand The Watchful Eyes and experience God, who utterly transcends of Emerson Burkhart anything we can think, know, or imagine. Let me give you an example. In 1958, my parGod is also intimately present in our experi- ents bought a self-portrait of Ohio painter Emerson Burkhart. It hung in ence, particularly in human our living room for the next relationships—God Is Other 30 years. During that time, People. Emerson probably plugged his We live on a spiritual conears when I practiced piano, tinuum between the two. We but he also shared Christmas long for bread and are given celebrations, refereed bridge living bread; for life and are games, and silently held us in given eternal life; for a shephis gaze as we planned my herd and are given the Good father’s funeral. Shepherd. But without ordiI inherited the portrait in nary bread, ordinary life, and 1989, and it’s hung in my livan ordinary shepherd, the ing room ever since. Emerson eternal depth of God’s grace is has seen me grow up and is nowhere to be found. now watching me grow old We grow as human persons in his protective, calming when we have an image of This Emerson Burkhart painting, sight. who we are and who we hope a family treasure, tells this author You and I share a deep deto become, coupled with a much about God.
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FRAMES © RYANKING999/VEER; JESUS PAINTING BY HANS MEMLING/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS; PAINTING BY EMERSON BURKHART COURTESY OF JOE McHUGH
BY JOE MCHUGH
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sire to be seen as special and lovable by someone significant. When this happens, we can finally take our place with the rest of creation as “very good” in God’s sight. Our world becomes a place of grace and hope rather than one of danger Click here to learn more and threat. about the author of this I start my prayer every mornarticle, Joe McHugh. ing in Emerson’s sight. He’s become a powerful image of God for me, an icon of God’s benevolent oversight, without which I can be tempted to let selfish isolation hijack my soul. Like people in the Gospels, we are made whole only in the healing sight of the God we recognize in Jesus. Emerson is a face I
can put on Jesus that shows me what God is like. Allowing Emerson’s image to remind me of God’s love also helps me see what goes on around me with new depth. For example, I often see a mother bring her visually and mentally challenged adult son to Starbucks for a treat on Sunday afternoons. While there, they reach for one another’s hands, wordless reassurance that they are both still there for each other. Who doesn’t need to be reassured that we’ve not been abandoned or left to die? We probably surround ourselves with pictures of friends and family for the same reason.
Human and Divine Each year we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord, and our attention is drawn to what the words and actions in that story say about God, Jesus, and us (Mk 1:9–11). When John baptizes Jesus, the heavens open, the Spirit descends, and a voice describes Jesus as God’s beloved— someone in whom God takes delight. Our image of God needs to be rooted in this story, because we find our real life when we hear God speak the same words into our hearts: you are also my beloved in whom I delight. My praying and living under the loving gaze of Emerson Burkhart comes with a depth that finds final expression and completion in a Gospel story like this. In the end, both images merge and yet both remain distinct. This is the great mystery of all love—human and divine.
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Blurred Vision
Like people in the Gospels, we are made whole only in the healing sight of the God we recognize in Jesus. 18 ❘ January 2014
Being human, though, means imperfection. My birthright is second-class vision. I can’t remember a time without glasses, and McHugh family lore holds that I even asked my mom if I had glasses on when I was born. I can’t remember what she said, but I do know that my eyesight has always been just good enough to get and keep a driver’s license. A week or so before I started college, I had my eyes examined by an ophthalmologist I had never gone to before. He was smart and professional, and had a soft-spoken manner about him. But if you listened carefully to what he said, it was fairly clear that this guy flunked Bedside Manner 101. “You’ve got terrible binocularity,” he said, “and that’s why you have a bad case of imperfect stereopsis.” Since he used two interesting words I’d never heard before, I interrupted his spiel to find out what they meant. “You don’t use both eyes; that’s why you’ve St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
got borderline depth perception.” He sounded downright irked with my question, but he went on. “‘Imperfect stereopsis’ means that since your eyes don’t work together, they don’t come together in a single point on the horizon right in front of you. That’s why you have trouble calculating how far things are away from you.” I sort of understood, but I bit my tongue, not daring to ask another question. “If you get a job that requires lots of reading,” he snapped, “it would be like somebody with a clubfoot going out for track.” Just the encouragement I needed right before I packed up for college. It galls me to say it, but he was right. I use only my right eye to see. If I squint, I can use my left eye by itself, but I never use them both together. You might say I have either/or rather than both/and vision. Whenever blindness comes up in Scripture, it’s usually a metaphor for spiritual blindness, or what we might call imperfect spiritual depth perception. When Jesus gives sight to the blind, their physical eyes are opened, but so are the eyes of their heart. If we take these stories as metaphors for our own spiritual blindness, we’ll soon discover our own need to make our way to Jesus to have our spiritual sight restored, or at least deepened.
We need to make regular appointments with God to have the eyes of our heart examined.
Was Blind, but Now I See
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Keep in mind that how we see is often just as important as what we see. How we see something determines how we understand it, and seeing something clearly for what it is—on its own terms, not ours—helps us discern its personal meaning for us. How we see God and self, prayer and discipleship, love and service, is crucial for living a Gospel life. We can suffer from imperfect spiritual binocularity. Some of us can only see our grace or our guilt, but we rarely see them together. Others see only death or resurrection, loss or gain, sacred or secular, real life or spiritual life. As a result, we see with little spiritual depth because these seemingly irreconcilable experiences never meet in the merciful heart of our God. We need Jesus to smear our eyes with mud and spittle to heal our damaged spiritual vision—the one-sided way we might see God and ourselves. Our gift, however, is in seeing ourselves with both eyes. That’s when we see ourselves as God sees us: a loved sinner. We have to keep telling ourselves that we have a both/and rather than an either/or God. As our spiritual binocularity starts to heal, we see guilt and grace, death and resurrection,
loss and gain, giving and receiving, and sacred and secular in a single vision that is not only healthy, but also saving. We need to make regular appointments with God to have the eyes of our heart examined, and, when necessary, change the prescription for our glasses. Allowing our injured eyes to be healed in the loving gaze of Jesus keeps God and grace as part of our lived experience, not just polite ideas. All we can do is bring our either/or vision in prayer to Jesus for continual healing over time. A Spiritual director Joe McHugh writes about finding God in everyday experiences of life. This article was excerpted from Startled by God: Wisdom from Unexpected Places (Franciscan Media). This retreat leader, teacher, and writer is based in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota. January 2014 ❘ 19
The
Skinny Wellness on
Wellness isn’t just about waistlines. Our minds and spirits need attention, too. BY JIM BRENNAN
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AND COLLEEN MONTGOMERY
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HE TERM holistic living conjures up different images in each of us. Some may see holistic living as a self-sustaining lifestyle that includes raising free-range livestock and growing an organic garden. Others imagine herbal remedies and natural cures for ailments. Many associate holistic living with Eastern spiritualities, such as Buddhism or Taoism. Whenever we hear the term, we can’t help thinking about the Seinfeld episode when a holistic healer tells George Costanza that he should have been born in August, and suggests to Jerry that he should stop eating dairy prodSt A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
ucts. In other words, holistic living has a broad interpretation. In the simplest terms, holistic living refers to a lifestyle that tends to the whole self. The concept is derived from the word holism. Holism is a theory that the whole is more than the sum of its parts, and that those parts are intimately interconnected and cannot exist independently. In terms of medicine, advocates of holism treat the whole person, taking into account mental and social factors rather than just symptoms of a disease. Ideally, adopting a holistic lifestyle will enhance the well-being of the whole self— mind, body, and spirit. Because the three parts Fr anciscanMedia.org
of our being are interconnected, actions taken to improve one part of our self have positive implications on the other parts. For instance, improved physical condition has a positive effect on our mental outlook. And a refreshed spirit can lead to an unburdened mind. References in Scripture are clear that the spirit is integral to our humanity. St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians says, “Your body is a temple of the holy Spirit” (6:19). And as those temples, it is incumbent upon us to respect our spiritual temples and tend to their needs, not only spiritually, but also physically and mentally. Consequently, a holistic lifestyle that enriches the whole being is aligned with our faith.
“Your body is a temple of the holy Spirit.” —1 Cor 6:19
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Mind, Body, Spirit
it requires no particular religious or cultural belief system. In our Catholic tradition, contemplation has been the word for meditative prayer.
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The topic of mind, body, and spirit is more easily understood by looking at each part individually. Examining each part of our being exposes all of its connections to the other two. When holistic living is put into practice, this interconnectedness becomes even more apparent.
Mind. The accelerated pace of today’s
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Meditation is widely recommended by both the medical and spiritual communities.
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society produces clutter that fills our minds. Our jobs, paying bills, raising families, social commitments, education, and planning for retirement compete for our attention. The pace is compounded by the continuous onslaught of information on the Internet, smartphones, apps, and cable television. Stress from all of these weakens our immune system and we become susceptible to ailments. Life can become so overwhelming at times that our minds scream for a break. Dharma Singh Khalsa, MD, known as the original voice in integrative and holistic medicine, recommends mind/body exercises to reduce stress. Three such forms of exercise are deep breathing, muscle relaxation, and meditation. Each of these techniques relieves stress by slowing down the body and calming the mind, which reduces anxiety and restores clarity of thought. Meditation is widely recommended by both the medical and spiritual communities. Historically a Buddhist practice, meditation is considered a universal human capacity to foster clear thinking and open-heartedness. As such,
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Body.
A regular exercise routine improves muscle tone, flexibility, strength, and endurance, and also helps maintain healthy weight. Byproducts of a healthy body are increased energy and alertness, improved mood, and reduced stress. Dr. Khalsa says that exercise is a key aspect of a holistic plan. Such exercises might include walking, jogging, swimming, or cycling. Other forms of physical activity, such as gardening and woodworking, are also good ways to exert the body, and they provide intrinsic benefits for the mind and spirit. Yoga, tai chi, and Pilates are examples of interconnecting physical and mental exercises. Practitioners may begin a program in one of these disciplines to improve their physical condition, strength, and endurance, and then become advocates when they experience a sense of serenity, peace of mind, and reduced stress. St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
Healthy eating habits are an essential ingredient to a healthy body. Thomas Rau, MD, a leading practitioner of holistic medicine in Switzerland who has gained international recognition for his work, is an advocate of eating whole, unprocessed foods. He warns that stabilizers and preservatives in prepared foods contain toxins that suppress metabolic functions and prevent bacteria that the body needs. Organic foods that come from the ground— the way God prepares them—are whole and unprocessed, and contain no added chemi-
cals. There is a sense of wholesomeness when we enjoy food for its nutritional value. Eating healthfully has a self-perpetuating effect that can transform Click here for more into a consciousness and perresources on health and sonal preference for fruit, vegwellness, and to check out etables, fiber, and herbal tea. Jim’s running blog. Spiritual conditioning is prominent in the lives of Catholics, and therefore the head of the mind/body/spirit trinity. Prayer, reading Scripture, attending Mass, receiving
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Spirit.
ANSWERS TO PETE AND REPEAT
Byproducts of a healthy body are increased energy and alertness, improved mood, and reduced stress.
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.
Pete is now frowning. Scruffy has joined Pete. There is an extra step up to the house. Pete is wearing a hat. The curtains have been replaced by blinds. Another window is to the right of the door. The door panel has changed. A wreath now appears on the door.
So that his work might continue...
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© CNS PHOTO/GREGORY A. SHEMITZ
the sacraments, and going on retreats are some ways Catholics strengthen their spirituality. Fundamental to a spiritual lifestyle is belonging to a faith-based community, such as a parish. The hectic pace of our lives sometimes presents a challenge to fulfill our spiritual obligations; however, receiving the sacraments
There are also intangible benefits of living a holistic lifestyle, such as increased self-esteem, improved or reestablished personal relationships, and prevention of ailments and illnesses. Moderate-intensity exercise can reduce arthritis pain and prevent the onset or progression of heart disease and obesity. Physical and mental exercise, healthy eating, and spiritual restoration can help reduce stress—a primary source of chronic pain and sickness. When taking steps to adopt a holistic lifestyle, it is important to acknowledge that there are factors we cannot control. We don’t have control over our DNA or aging. Instead, concentrate on those factors within your control, which is where the opportunity to improve overall health exists. It is also important to note that most professionals who advocate holistic practices emphasize that holistic remedies are not a magic bullet; they suggest using them in concert with traditional medical practices. They may prescribe exercise, eating more organic foods, meditation, mind/body exercises, and using supplements.
The Journey Begins
Fundamental to a spiritual lifestyle is belonging to a faith-based community, such as a parish.
and being active in a faith-based community have a tendency to calm the waters and provide reciprocal benefits. There are many levels of involvement depending on your lifestyle. Opportunities abound, such as serving as a eucharistic minister or lector, volunteering at a food bank, helping with a clothing drive, or delivering food to those who cannot leave their homes. The great thing about such activities is that volunteers usually find the experience more rewarding than those receiving the services. Volunteerism is the epitome of Christ’s teaching, “Give and gifts will be given to you” (Lk 6:38). In fact, it is not unusual for a volunteer to experience a conversion that leads to new opportunities to help others, or to develop interest in a particular field—such as homelessness or hunger—and pursue more involvement.
Celebrate the Connection Starting in February, Jim Brennan and Colleen Montgomery will begin a monthly health column in our pages called “Live Well.”
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Understanding the mind/body/spirit relationship makes it easier to appreciate how an action in one area seamlessly fits into another. For instance, a regular exercise routine can lead to better eating habits, which can improve alertness, increase energy, and shape a more optimistic outlook on life. A positive attitude can revive spirituality and be motivation to help others.
The key to implementing holistic practices is to adjust the way you think about lifestyle changes. It is more effective to look at new behaviors from a positive perspective, rather than as a means to avoid negative results. For example, if you decide to begin walking daily, rather than doing it to avoid gaining weight or keeping stress at bay, walk to be outdoors and commune with nature, breathe the fresh air, and watch the wonders of creation. And rather than considering a change in eating habits as going on a diet, approach your new diet as eating healthy, colorful, organic food from the ground—the way God intended it. Practicing a holistic lifestyle is a journey that should not be mysterious or intimidating. The keys to success when adopting any new behavior are to choose those activities that interest you and fit your lifestyle, implement the changes incrementally, and set goals that are realistic. Once you begin to feel the results, the rest will take care of itself. A Jim Brennan writes about health and fitness from Bucks County, Pennsylvania. His daughter, Colleen Montgomery, is a registered clinical exercise physiologist and certified wellness coach. Jim’s memoir about the Boston Marathon, Twenty-Four Years to Boston, was published by Saint Johann Press in 2013. St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
SHORT TAKE
❘ AUTHOR
Rosary Rapper Through his music, Joe Melendrez connects to young Catholics. Joe Melendrez is rapping to a large group of onlookers at the 2013 Los Angeles Religious Education Congress in Anaheim, California. The crowd around him seems electrified by his lyrics and beats, but, most of all, by his message. The scene replays often throughout the Congress. Following one of his performances, Melendrez sits down with St. Anthony Messenger to discuss his ministries and his inspiration.
PHOTO BY SOPHIE RYBALOV
Q: Tell us a little about your work with young Catholics. A: The goal of our ministry is to build a generation of believers. We do that through three major aspects. We do that through inspirational music: Catholic rap and hip-hop. And we also do spiritual retreat work and faith-based apparel, which is called God Swag Apparel. St. Paul said, “Put on Christ,” so we want people to represent what they believe every day. Q: How did you get started in this? A: I was about 15 years old and I went on a retreat that transformed my life. During this retreat, it was as if I was experiencing the love I had been given my whole life in one moment. From that moment, I thought I needed everyone I know to get closer to God. So I started trying different methods to evangelize. I started a charity at school, taking homeless people out to eat; finding new ways to be relevant. Then I started doing retreat work. Then I started rapping. I love music and I love poetry, so I made a rosary rap. Four years later, the Rosary Rap CD was released. Fr ancisca n Media .org
Q: What do you hope people get out of your ministry? A: I hope they get God. And I hope they get God exactly how they need God. My goal is not to make everyone a rapper or get everyone praying through rap. It’s to think about praying in new ways, finding what works for you. This helped to facilitate my spiritual life and help grow me, and I think we all have to get in a routine of prayer. Hopefully, through prayer and being inspired by the rosary rap and the whole ministry we have here, people can say: “You know, I have this talent. I can use that. I can bring God in this way. Let me develop that. Let me cultivate that and give it back.” Q: What does your ministry give to your faith? A: I love performing. I love rapping. I love ministering. I become alive when I’m with others and I’m able to see God working in them. Q: Do you have a favorite prayer? A: My mom taught me this prayer as a kid: “Thank you, Jesus, for this day. Please be with me, Lord, in everything I do and say.” So when I wake up in the morning, I automatically say that, and I’m already dedicating my entire day to Christ. Q: Finish this phrase for me: I love my Catholic faith because . . . A: I love my Catholic faith because it’s rich in not only tradition, but in truth, spirit, and family. It is a true community. It is a world that’s united under God in Jesus Christ. Susan Hines-Brigger is the managing editor of this magazine.
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Click here for a sample of Joe’s rap, and for more information on his ministries. January 2014 ❘ 25
Sister Helen Prejean
20 Years after Dead Man Walking
© GRAMERCY PICTURES/PHOTOFEST
State by state, capital punishment is being repealed. This longtime death-penalty opponent gives us a progress report.
BY JOHN FEISTER
A
BOUT 25 YEARS AGO, St. Anthony Messenger received a short manuscript from a new writer. Sister Helen Prejean, a sister of St. Joseph, was writing a book about the death penalty and had written a chapter that was too churchy, too pious, she thought, for the mass market. Hers was a completely new perspective on the death penalty— a look at the pain of the victims’ families given by the same person, a Catholic sister, who advocated for death-row convicts.
26 ❘ January 2014
In her 1991 article: “Victims and Murderers: A Rosary Reflection,” Sister Helen, a New Orleanian, wrote of how she drove out to the Louisiana countryside to pray the rosary with Lloyd LeBlanc, whose son, David, had been murdered. Patrick Sonnier, whom Sister Helen had accompanied to Louisiana’s electric chair, was convicted of the murder, although his brother may have committed the crime. The rosary story ended up, after all, as the closing scene in her now-famous book, Dead Man Walking. The book, in turn, became the basis of a film by the same name, which propelled actress Susan Sarandon to the Academy Awards in 1996, where she won the Oscar for Best Actress. Over the following years, Sarandon and director/producer Tim Robbins moved on to other filmmaking projects. Sister Helen, though, single-mindedly focused on the antideath-penalty campaign, all the while continuing to visit and pray with victims’ families. The whole experience launched a new career for Sister Helen, who was a teacher and novicemistress in the past. It started “my Gospel career,” she quips to St. Anthony Messenger today, with her trademark sharp sense of humor, coupled with an even sharper sense of compassion. She became a globetrotter, moving constantly from one rally, one speaking appearance to the next, all devoted toward ending capital punishment. St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
CNS/OWEN SWEENEY III, CATHOLIC REVIEW
She was influential even in getting Pope John Paul II—through a personal conversation—specifically to address capital punishment more effectively in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Over those years, more than a half-million copies of her book have made it into at least as many hands, and the film has had an even larger impact. “We are seeing a diminishment of the death penalty in the United States,” she observes matter-of-factly. It’s a diminishment that her work has helped to fuel.
Extent of the Death Penalty “I know the statistics,” she says. And the spunky sister, about 5 feet 2 inches tall, starts reciting them, rapid-fire, from memory during a St. Anthony Messenger interview. “1999 was the apex of execution,” she says. “And you look now, and they’re at an all-time low.” She notes that in 2001 prosecutors’ requests for the death Fr anciscanMedia.org
penalty began to drop, as did jury rulings calling for execution. She stops mid-sentence and interjects: “The biggest change in attitude, the most dramatic, has happened in the Catholic population in the United States.” She continues, reporting public opinions, year by year. Reliable statistics bear out her assertions. The Pew Center, which surveys the public about all manner of things, issued a report in 2012 that listed the trends she reports (albeit with her own emphases). The report, “Continued Majority Support for the Death Penalty,” is summed up in its opening paragraph: “Public opinion about the death penalty has changed only modestly in recent years, but there continues to be far less support for the death penalty than there was in the mid-1990s.” Then it lists the change, based on national surveys over the years: “In 1996, 78 percent favored capital punishment for people convicted of murder. Support for the death penalty
(Above) The cross Sister Helen wears was a gift from the first man she accompanied to execution. Here she talks to a reporter at St. Pius X Church in Baltimore. (Opposite) Susan Sarandon plays Sister Helen opposite Sean Penn as Matthew Poncelet in the 1995 award-winning film Dead Man Walking.
January 2014 ❘ 27
Most Americans Continue to Favor Death Penalty Percent Who Favor/Oppose Death Penalty for Persons Convicted of Murder
Favor
Gallup 1936-1996
A Catholic Change
Pew Research 1996-2011
Oppose
SOURCE: PEW CENTER RESEARCH, NOVEMBER 9-14, 2011
“. . . the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity ‘are very rare, if not practically nonexistent.’” —Catechism of the Catholic Church 2267
Boston Residents Favor Life without Parole for Suspects in Marathon Bombing
Don’t Know 10%
Death Penalty 33%
Life without Parole 57%
SOURCE: BOSTON GLOBE/UNIVERSITY OF NH SURVEY CENTER, SEPTEMBER 18, 2013
28 ❘ January 2014
subsequently declined, falling to 66 percent in 2001, and 62 percent late in 2005.” Support has remained in about that low-60s range, though it dipped to 58 percent in 2011. A Gallup poll, released at the end of this past October, echoes the findings.
Take the example of Boston. The predominantly Catholic city is deeply scarred from the bombing-and-shooting rampage of the Tsarnaev brothers around last April’s Boston Marathon. Yet most Bostonians do not favor the death penalty for Dzhokhar, the brother who was captured alive; they want to see him imprisoned without parole for life. “In 1996, 80 percent of Catholics [nationally] supported the death penalty,” reports Prejean. By 2011, it had dropped to a steady 59 percent, a statistically significant three percentage points lower than the national average. “And [statistically] the more people went to Church, the less they believed in the death penalty,” she notes. Statistics among young Catholics, those under 30, are even more promising, she says, lowering her voice, bringing you in close to hear what she has to say. (She is a campaigner for her cause.) Once again, an independent source bears her out. Lake Research Partners, in 2010, found that, when offered alternatives to capital punishment such as life imprisonment without parole, only 24 percent of the Catholic population supports the death penalty over such imprisonment, compared to a national average of 33 percent. Why the difference? “We’ve been doing our work,” says Helen. “Catholic journalists, people giving talks, people leading RCIA, Catholic teachers in schools teaching social justice; all of the pro-life groups are really now beginning to pick up that the death penalty is a prolife issue.” She credits that to a turning point, Pope John Paul II’s visit to St. Louis in 1999. In a dramatic moment, the pope, onstage at the thenTWA Dome center, turned to Missouri governor Mel Carnahan and pleaded for the life of convicted killer Darrell Mease. “Have mercy on Mr. Mease," the pope said. (Governor Carnahan, to honor the pope, changed Mease’s sentence to life imprisonment.) In his historic homily that day—on the feast of the Sacred Heart, a celebration of God’s mercy—the pope clearly put the death penalty into the context of all of the life issues which the Gospel compels Christians to defend. St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
“He said no to abortion, no to euthanasia, no to physician-assisted suicide, and no to the death penalty, which is cruel and unnecessary,” recalls Sister Helen. He had issued the teaching clearly in his 1995 encyclical “The Gospel of Life.” “It was a turn,” says Prejean, “a bend in the river.” The US bishops soon came on board with their own statements, which surely empowered parishes and dioceses in their education programs. “But it’s grassroots,” says Prejean, “a grassroots group of laity mainly urged on by our sisters and the Catholic Mobilizing Network to End the Use of the Death Penalty (catholicsmobilizing.org). Sister Helen’s passion for all of this comes, she says, from “the heart of the Gospel.” For Christians, she says, the death penalty is no peripheral issue of what to do with a few criminals. “What are you for?” she challenges: “Compassion or vengeance?” That’s no easy question, and not one of being some kind of doormat, she says, something she learned from Lloyd LeBlanc, whose son was murdered. Initially, he told Helen that he wanted to see the murderers be executed. “Then he came to, ‘Oh, no, they killed my son, but I’m not going to let them kill me. I’m going to choose to do what Jesus said.’” He refused to be overcome by hatred, she says, the spirit that would have us kill our enemies. “What happens to you when you get in that position of hatred of the enemy is that you lose your life, too. He taught me what Jesus meant when he said, ‘Love your enemy.’”
death penalty in 1992, but haven’t executed anyone since. The states with the most executions since the Supreme Court re-legalized the death penalty in 1976 are Texas (493), Virginia (110), Oklahoma (102), Florida (74), and Missouri (68). All told, 32 of the 50 states allow the death penalty. In the coming year, legislative campaigns to repeal the death penalty are active in New Hampshire, Delaware, and Kansas. Nebraska and Colorado are also on the horizon, according to Cathy Click here for more on Sister Jarboe at the aforementioned Helen and the death-penalty Catholic Mobilizing Network. issue. The Pew Center notes that 43 people were executed and 77 death sentences were handed down in 2012. That’s just one more sentence than was issued in 2011, which saw the fewest number of people sentenced to death than in any year since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. The legality of executing mentally disabled people made it to the US Supreme Court again
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Where Things Stand
Fr anciscanMedia.org
CNS PHOTO/NANCY WIECHEC
The fruit of these efforts, tied to the advocacy work of many other religious groups from many faiths, and from other organizations across society, has been a raft of legislative activity, repealing the death penalty state by state. Six states have repealed the death penalty during the past six years: Maryland, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, New Mexico, and Illinois. That brings the total number to 18 states and the District of Columbia that have abolished capital punishment in the past 16 years. (Perhaps the most dramatic recent activity was in California, but it ended in defeat for abolitionists. In November 2012, the electoral vote was 47 percent in favor of repeal; 53 percent against.) But that tells only part of the story—many of the states that allow executions have not executed anyone recently. New Hampshire and Kansas reinstituted the
“I renew the appeal I made . . . for a consensus to end the death penalty, which is both cruel and unnecessary.” —Pope John Paul II, Papal Mass, St. Louis, Missouri, January 27, 1999 January 2014 ❘ 29
Doberge Cake Once, during a radio interview with Franciscan Media producer Judy Zarick, Sister Helen, in inimitable style, compared her awareness of the complexity of capital punishment to doberge cake, a New Orleans specialty. “In a doberge cake you have all these thin layers, like lemon, and then you’ve got the batter, then, you know, the bread, the cake. Then you got chocolate and thin, thin layers stacked. This is all a doberge cake, with grace upon grace. It’s not a cream puff; it leads us in.” Led she was, and, now a celebrity, she draws crowds wherever she is asked to speak, frequently on college campuses. But the crowds aren’t following her, she insists. “I mean, they’re coming to hear, because they say, ‘Oooh! Let’s go hear the death-penalty nun!’ Some of them say, ‘Let’s go hear the nun who was played by Susan Sarandon in the movie,’ or whatever. College kids? I don’t care what gets them in the gate!” She wants to open their hearts to grace, to lead them into her doberge life, too. “And then I just say, fasten your seat belts, because we’re going to go on a ride.” 30 ❘ January 2014
Reversing Wrongful Convictions
The Innocence Project, a nonprofit started in New York City in 1992, has a mission: to use DNA testing to discover cases of wrongful conviction. Since it was founded, the project has been imitated in 48 projects coast-to-coast, generally sponsored by law schools. Law students pore through court cases and legal records as a practical legal training, with the intent of locating miscarriages of justice. About 300 wrongful convictions have been proven by Innocence projects since all of this started, including freeing 18 wrongfully sentenced to die. There have been exonerations in 35 states and the District of Columbia. Various organizations in the Innocence Network are reviewing a whopping 3,000 to 6,000 cases at any given time. “The Innocence projects help illustrate how broken the system is,” says Cathy Jarboe, of the Catholic Mobilizing Network to End the Death Penalty. “Each time an innocent person is released, it’s a glaring reminder that the system is run by human beings who make terrible mistakes.”
(Above, left to right) Ohio Innocence Project director Mark Godsey stands before the Ohio Statehouse with Robert McClendon and Clarence Elkins, who served a combined 25 years in prison before DNA evidence proved their innocence.
What caught the interest of this magazine 24 years ago, before the book, before the film, was how challenging all of this is to our faith. “You know, that’s what the cross is,” says Helen. “You’ve got two arms. Even though our culture says that if you’re for the victim then you’re against the victim’s family, and vice versa, the Gospel challenges us to see both the dignity of the victim and that of the perpetrator. Now that’s a huge journey.” A John Feister is the editor in chief of this magazine. His latest book is Thank You, Sisters (Franciscan Media). St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
DOTTIE STOVER/UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI
late in 2012, over the case of Floridian Freddie Lee Hall. Ten years earlier, the court had ruled that executing people with mental disabilities is a “cruel and unusual punishment,” but it left it to the states to decide who has mental disabilities. Hall has an IQ that borders on mental retardation as defined in a manual used nationally by the medical community (though the American Psychiatric Association calls for a definition that includes more factors than the standardized testing). States including Florida, Georgia, and Texas use their own definitions—the Supreme Court will rule on the use of Florida’s. Yet none of that is enough for Sister Helen: “California is so over the top, they spent $4 billion to kill 13 people!” she exclaims. “And they’re not alone: Everybody that has that machinery of death is putting millions of dollars into maintaining this culture of death.” Then there’s the work of the Innocence Project, a national program to exonerate wrongfully convicted individuals via DNA testing and other reforms. It has reversed the convictions of wrongfully convicted people who were awaiting execution. These people weren’t spared because the court system is working, says Sister Helen. “It was college students getting into it. They get the papers from the warehouse and find all sorts of evidence that never made it into court.”
POETRY
Winter Penance
Spirit in Action
On a parchment of snow the sun proclaims in shadowy hieroglyphs a long renunciation of color and arias of wrens and woozy scent of lilac. Instead— abstinence and contemplation in winter silhouette chastening with arctic blasts your typical yearnings till like the Buddha you renounce desire —almost— and in your chilly chapel pray and wait.
Light of all lights shining in silent darkness; melting sinners into saints without proclamation.
—Patricia Schnapp, RSM
A Wintry Repose The cemetery’s silent under moonlit snows No scampering squirrels nor cawing crows No sun-bright warblers nor nibbling does No solemn funerals nor footprints marring snows Only moonlight and shadows on a wintry repose
—Jean Gier
Creativity Inhale sights and sounds . . . Heart-stopping, resonating: Exhale poetry!
Some souls so turned around, turn away; awakening in fear; fearing Love without responsibility.
—George E. Shultz
Love A morning of gold heralding fluffy snow scented crispness in the winter air the day we met. Air stood still and bright the earth whispered its approval of us to the radiant sun. Life was magic.
—Susan L. Taylor
Winter Song Quiet and unrelenting an unmoving sky litters the world around me in a blanket of snow. All I can do is play a waiting game— my heavy heart cries out for a redeeming spring.
—Ryan Cory
—Jeanette Martino Land
Fr ancisca n Media .org
January 2014 ❘ 31
Walking Talk the w ith
‘Mad Dog’ Russo This New York sports commentator is known for his vocal opinions. When he’s not on the air, what grounds him are his faith and family. BY JAMES BREIG
PHOTO BY JEAN MARIE GUYEAUX
32 ❘ January 2014
C
hristopher and Jeanne Russo of New Canaan, Connecticut, might seem mismatched. For one thing, Chris, nicknamed “Mad Dog,” hosts a daily, five-hour sports-talk program and oversees several other shows on SiriusXM Radio. On air, he pontificates—often shrilly—about athletics. His wife, Jeanne, provides a calming influence in his life, although she is not shy about offering her own opinions, some of which have changed Chris’ mind. There’s another difference between the Russos. Rather than mismatching them, however, it solidifies their marriage: Chris is Episcopalian, while Jeanne is Roman Catholic. Their four children—14, 12, 10, and 7—are being raised in their mother’s faith, a decision made when the two discussed, well before their wedding, how they would successfully navigate the sometimes stormy seas of an ecumenical marriage. The duo—he is from Syosset, Long Island, and she from Rye, New York, just 14 miles apart as the crow flies—first crossed paths in a way a romantic movie might begin. “We met on a plane, flying from Chicago to New York, on Memorial Day weekend of ’93,” Jeanne recounts. “We were in the waiting area, and he was with a couple of other sports guys and kept talking and talking. All I could think was, ‘This guy’s going to be sitting behind me on the plane, and he’s going to talk the whole way home. I’m praying he’s going to be far away from me. Then he gets on the plane and sits next to me!’” When she noticed that the previously voluble Chris was engrossed in reading Jurassic Park, she decided to engage him in conversation. “I had just finished it,” she says, “so I asked him what he thought of it. We started talking, and that was it. We had our first date a week later and were married two years later.” Part of their courtship was spent negotiating their divergent styles of Christianity. “My mother is English; my father, Italian,” Chris explains. “I was baptized a Catholic, but confirmed an Episcopalian.” That happened, Jeanne explains, because his mother, who was born in England and came to the United States as an Anglican, “took instruction to become a Catholic, but it was not for her. She said to Chris’ father, ‘You’ll have to raise him Catholic.’” Instead, Chris’ dad opted to become an Episcopalian. Jeanne was raised in an Irish Catholic family. “My parents were daily communicants,” she says. “Faith was a very large part of our lives growing up. I’m completely satisfied and comfortable with where I am. When people start to question their faith, they start to look around for a good fit for them. That never crossed my mind.”
Finding Common Ground Although close in many ways, Episcopalianism and Roman Catholicism presented enough differences that Chris and Jeanne knew they had to resolve some issues before saying, “I do.” Says Jeanne, “A large part of my upbringing was always how wonderful marriage can be, but also how hard it can be and the hard work it takes to make it last. “My parents were married for 48 years, until my father passed away. They were soul mates and best friends. Chris’ parents have been married over 50 January 2014 ❘ 33
34 ❘ January 2014
FROM THE RUSSO FAMILY
years, so we both came from very strong family backgrounds and had very wonderful examples in our parents of what it takes to make a marriage work.” [Chris’ father died this past August.] As she and Chris weighed how they were going to handle their differing religions, Jeanne thought of her parents. She noted that “they always stressed, ‘Ask the tough questions and figure out the tough issues before you get married. Don’t get married and say you’ll figure it out down the road, because you won’t.’ So we did.” She calls the effort “a long, hard look at what was important to us: children, what our lives would be like. There was a lot of respect for each other. All of the conversations we had were really important.” As a result of their efforts, Chris says, “when I talked to her father to say I wanted to marry his daughter, he asked if I was going to raise the kids Catholic. I said I certainly was. I knew going in what was going to happen; it was no surprise; no one pulled any punches. I went into it with an open mind and knew exactly what I was getting into.” Their pre-wedding decision-making didn’t eradicate all difficulties. Sunday scheduling is one of them. “Jeanne goes to a Catholic church; I go to an Episcopalian church,” Chris notes. “For Christmas and Easter, when the kids are serving Mass, for Baptism or Confirmation, we all go to the Catholic church. It’s important to my wife that we do that. It’s important to me [to have] God in my children’s lives. “When I go to a Catholic service, I don’t take Communion. My wife occasionally goes to my church, but she does not take Communion. Jeanne and I have learned to adjust to it [because] God’s important to me, my kids, and my wife.” Jeanne concedes that “the holidays are always hard. Once in awhile, I feel, ‘Wouldn’t it be lovely if we shared this together?’ But I respect his faith and how comfortable he feels with it. We have a tremendous amount of respect for each other and for our beliefs. “I’ve never said to him, ‘I need you to [convert] for me, because I don’t
Chris and Jeanne Russo stand among their four children. Chris, an active Episcopalian, respect his wife’s desire to raise the kids in her Roman Catholic tradition. need him to do it for me.’ He’s got a lot of integrity; he’s a good person deep down inside and a wonderful man. I teach my kids, ‘We respect Daddy, and he respects us.’ We don’t allow it to become an issue.” “I will not convert,” Chris affirms. “My wife has never asked. I would never ask her. Having God in my life is important. I don’t want to say I had an enlightenment or a conversion, but I felt in my late teens or early 20s that God was in my life. As a result, I try to live my life the proper way. You need that foundation of religion. You need the solace of God in your life. “I had a car accident in 1998,” he adds. “The car was totaled; I didn’t have a scratch on me. I went to church and thanked God for keeping me alive. Hopefully, somewhere along the line with my four children, when they’re in a bad situation, they’ll feel God helping them.” To that end, the sportscaster says, “I try to get them to understand right and wrong,” and he inculcates such lessons as “treat people equally; do the right thing; make sure you help others not as fortunate as yourself. Overall, I try to teach them the right thing. Lead your life the proper way, and things will work out the right way.” He credits his wife with doing a great job in bringing up their children in their faith. “They all go to CCD,” he says. “We make sure they have as much religion in their lives as possible.” He was pleased recently when he encountered his 14-year-old son’s CCD teacher.
“She told me, ‘Your son is a complete delight in class. I can’t tell you how much of a joy he is,’” Chris says. He then adds, with a laugh, “But when I take him, he’s moaning and groaning about going.”
Sounding Off On-Air Chris might have honed his partnership skills when he was co-host, for nearly two decades, of “Mike and the Mad Dog,” a sports-talk radio program heard in New York City and carried on the Yankees’ cable-TV YES Network. Since Chris left in 2008, Mike Francesa has continued to do the show solo. Though the two had rough patches, Chris remembers many favorite times with Mike. “In ’96, when the Yankees won their first World Series in 18 years,” he says, recalling one of his special memories, “we did shows right after the games concluded. There was a good kinship between us—eating dinners in the studio and watching the games.” The intangible, he says, is “the camaraderie of working with a guy five hours a day, five days a week for 19 years. There are a lot of ups and downs, just like in a marriage, and we sure had plenty of downs. The ups were when you’re both in the mood and sense this is going to be a good sports day. You can’t put a price tag on that. You feel you are clicking with your partner. If there’s good give-and-take, the show can be a lot of fun. I miss that. We still have a good relationship; we still know what we had. We made our mark.” St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
Chris got his “Mad Dog” nickname for his signature howls and growls when he’s riled up about some issue in sports. An example is athletes who point to the sky or otherwise acknowledge God when they have hit a homer, scored a touchdown, or won a big game. David Akers, the kicker for the San Francisco 49ers, is one player who gets under the radio host’s skin. “He drives me crazy!” Chris says. “He always points to the sky when he makes a long field goal. It’s funny: he didn’t point to the sky last season, because he was awful. It always bothers me. God has more important things to worry about. I think it’s a crutch for too many people. “Barry Bonds did the same thing all the time, and I’m a [San Francisco] Giants fan. He was a cheat and using steroids, which made it even more of a joke.” Last January, Bonds, who holds records both for most lifetime home runs and for homers in a single season, was not elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame because of strong suspicions that
he used performance-enhancing drugs. “You wonder how seriously religious these athletes are who point to the sky after they do something well,” Chris continues. “Then they’re out at four o’clock in the morning, drinking in
when you make an error, point to the sky. When you get thrown out s tealing, point to the sky [in gratitude] for the o pportunity to play this great game. If you hit a rocket to rig ht that’s caug ht, point to the sky. . .
bars. They’re very hypocritical. I’d rather have them go to the bars at night and not be phonies about it. Or live their lives properly.” Asked how he would respond to
evangelical Christians who assert that being public about their faith is part of their belief system, Chris replies, “OK, fine, but when you make an error, point to the sky. When you get thrown out stealing, point to the sky [in gratitude] for the opportunity to play this great game. If you hit a rocket to right that’s caught, point to the sky, thanking God for allowing you to hit the ball hard. Religion should be more of a private enterprise: it’s you and your God. Do you have to share it with 75,000 people?”
Keys to a Successful Marriage “Mad Dog”’s strong opinions about sports often spark listeners to phone in to challenge his positions. Sometimes, Jeanne admits, she has considered being one of those callers. “I want to tell him he’s wrong,” she says. “The interesting times are when we’ve talked about a topic [at home]. He gives his two cents, and I put in my opinion, and he says, ‘You’re wrong.’ Then, a day or two later, I’ll be listening to him on the radio, and he gives my
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point of view! I think, ‘Wait a minute. You need to give a little credit here!’” However, her schedule and their kids don’t allow her to hear Chris very often. “I listen when I’m in the car,” she says. “But when you have kids in the car, they’re not listening to ‘Mad Dog.’ They’re listening to Daddy and say, ‘Can you please turn it off?’ Daddy is not cool, so I don’t listen as much as I want to.” After many years of marriage, Jeanne and Chris are happy they worked out the issues of their different denominations before getting married. Jeanne says, “We’re like every other married couple. We’ve had tough times. [Marriage is] work. It’s compromise. It’s sacrifice.” The key to the success of their marriage, she continues, is “having strength in your own life, in your faith and in your partner before you
embark on the whole thing.” She would advise couples to “have that conversation and go through potential scenarios. Respect each other. We knew we were going to raise our kids Catholic. “I know too many people who don’t discuss it or say, ‘We’ll figure it out when the time comes,’ and it becomes an issue. Or they choose not to have any religion for their children at all, which is the worst thing in the world. It’s a big part of our lives.” However, Jeanne admits that another big part of her husband’s life is not so huge to her. “Believe it or not,” she confesses, “I am not a die-hard sports fan.” A
‘Mad Dog’ Picks
Religious Athletes Chris Russo’s strong opinion about public expressions of religion by athletes didn’t prevent him from naming sports figures who he believes are genuinely religious. “You run into some, no question about it,” he says. His four choices—three of them Catholics—all come from professional football. First up is Tim Tebow, a quarterback who has played with the Denver Broncos and, most recently, the New York Jets. He may be known more for his evangelical faith than for his performance on the field. “He’s the one guy I don’t have as much of a problem with because he puts his money where his mouth is,” Russo explains. “His parents are missionaries. He’s a complete, legit, noquestion-about-it religious performer that I have a tremendous amount of respect for.” The sportscaster reaches back to the 1970s to select Roger Staubach, a Catholic who played for the Dallas Cowboys during that decade. As quarterback, he led the team to two Super Bowl victories. “You know he has led his life properly,” Russo says. He then travels even further back in time to select Vince Lombardi, the Catholic coach of the Green Bay Packers who was so legendary that the Super Bowl trophy is named for him. “He was a tough guy,” the radio host notes, “but he went to church every day. He was a guy I admired.” Returning to the present day, Russo nominates Tom Coughlin, the current head coach of the New York Giants (see January 2012 St. Anthony Messenger). Russo terms Coughlin, who is a Catholic, “very religious. He tries to do the right thing all the time, but he doesn’t wear his religion on his sleeve.”
James Breig is a freelance author from East Greenbush, New York. He has written hundreds, if not thousands, of articles, columns, editorials, and features, including articles for this magazine.
Coach Tom Coughlin (left) and quarterback Tim Tebow (below) are two sports figures whom Russo admires for true expressions of faith.
CNS PHOTO/MIKE BLAKE, REUTERS
tal Digi as Extr CNS PHOTO/MARC PISCOTTY, REUTERS
36 ❘ January 2014
Click here for more on “Mad Dog” Russo.
LIGHTEN UP
“Next time you’re praying as you drive, I think it’ll be all right to skip bowing your head and closing your eyes.”
“The star was before they had GPS.”
Fr ancisca n Media .org
“Any ideas other than hoping for divine intervention?”
January 2014 ❘ 37
The
Symphonyof
Illness and age served only to strengthen this mother and daughter’s relationship.
Life
BY BARBARA TYLLA
T
HROUGH the years, life has been given a lot of metaphors. It’s been called a “passage” by some, a “journey” by others. It’s been compared to circles, cycles, symphonies, and songs. I kind of like the symphony thing. To be able to write or play music seems like a nice way to spend your time on earth. Let’s face it, though, some are better composers than others. Some write songs that are melodic; some write songs that are discordant— and some never get to finish their songs at all.
One Prayer at a Time
© TATIANA MOROZOVA/PHOTOXPRESS
When my father was diagnosed with lymphoma, our family was shocked and shaken. We saw the disease as a sentence, not a salvation. Dad was just the opposite. He saw those years as a gift, and was determined to make the most of them. When the disease went into remission, he and Mom didn’t waste a minute of it. They took trips, they visited friends, they talked and prayed and made memories together. When the lymphoma resurfaced, however, complicated by a bout with shingles, Dad sank pretty fast. I helped as much as I could, but Mom bore the brunt of the daily caregiving. I marFr anciscanMedia.org
veled at her courage. What kept her going? How did she get through it? “I took it a minute and a prayer at a time,” she told me after Dad’s death. “To look any further ahead was frightening.” Would she have done anything differently? I asked. Given a choice of my father going fast, would she have chosen an easier end? She looked at me in disbelief. “Never. In many ways those years were some of the best of our lives. If he had gone earlier, we would have missed them.” Mom lived 12 years after my father’s death, so I had time to ponder what she said. Would I have been able to do what she had done? Could I take care of someone selflessly and consider it a gift? The spirit might have been willing, but would the flesh obey? And then I learned how strong the flesh can be.
The Journey Begins It began with an early-morning phone call in September 1999. “Something’s wrong with my back,” my mother whispered. “I can hardly move it’s so painful. And I’m having trouble breathing.” A trip to the emergency room showed us that indeed something was wrong. Somehow during the night she had broken a vertebra in her back. An Xray showed she also had the start of bron-
chitis. Then the doctor showed me her spine, which looked like someone had run down it wearing high heels. “This is not the first break she’s suffered,” he said. “The bronchitis just compounded her discomfort.” Because she wasn’t in any immediate danger, he didn’t admit her to the hospital. He ordered a back brace to relieve pressure on the spine, painkillers to take care of her discomfort, and an antibiotic for the bronchitis. “I know it’s easier said than done,” he said with a sympathetic smile, “but go home and try to rest.”
Now What? Rest. The advice sounded good, but it was plain that Mom wasn’t going to be able to do it in bed. Lying down was too painful. “We could turn my recliner into a bed,” she suggested and grinned when she saw my uncertainty. “I spend half of the night in this chair anyway. Now I won’t have to get up to get to it.” There didn’t seem to be any other choice. So I made the chair up with sheets and a blanket and then turned my attention to another pressing matter. The doctor had told us that her back would take at least five weeks to heal. Mom could dress herself and get to the bathroom on her own, but any January 2014 ❘ 39
sudden movement was painful and threw her off balance. It was clear she wasn’t going to be able to stay in her house alone. Luckily, help was close at hand. A female neighbor who was a homenursing aide volunteered to stay with my mother while I was at work. And since I only worked mornings, I would be free to take care of her in the afternoon. Nights were the biggest problem. But that was solved when my motherin-law agreed to alternate evenings with me staying at the house. My mother was grateful, but worried about inconveniencing us. “Five weeks isn’t that long,” we reassured her. “You just rest and get better.”
A Setback In October, however, things worsened. When her bronchitis turned into pneumonia, she had to be hospitalized. It was during her hospital stay that a blood clot was found in her lungs. “Forget the five-week healing time,” the doctor told us grimly. “This blood clot is going to take at least six months to dissolve. She’s lucky she’s still alive. If the clot had reached her heart, it would have killed her.” Lucky? I looked down at my mother in the hospital bed. This latest setback had taken its toll. She had lost so much weight that she was little more than skin and bones. But her eyes were bright as she clasped my hand. “I’m
the term “nursing home” put Mom into a panic. “Can’t we just do what we’ve been doing? Can’t I just stay at home?” she asked. “Of course you can,” I said. But my voice conveyed a lot more confidence than I felt. I made a silent prayer asking for help. So far her expenses had been manageable. Now this setback had changed all that. She needed blood thinners and oxygen, inhalation therapy, and physical therapy. Medicare would have paid for a nursing-home stay, but it would cover only two weeks of home care. After that we would be on our own. Mom clutched my hand. “I have a rider on my insurance policy to help pay for home care; the rest we’ll take out of savings. Please, I want to go back to my house.”
A Wish Granted And so we took my mother home. We brought her home in an ambulance because she couldn’t walk up the stairs. The medics hooked up her oxygen tank and settled her back in her chair. She hadn’t been able to sleep in the hospital, but when Davy, her little cat, crawled into her lap, Mom smiled and fell right to sleep. Those last weeks of her life were hard, but bringing her home was a decision I’ll never regret. We sat in her living room and prayed. We listened to music and talked. We made plans for
© KUNDRA/FOTOLIA
My mother gave me the greatest gift a parent can give to a child. She let me help her play out her song to the end.
still here. I’m not going anywhere except home,” she said. My heart sank as I looked into her face. I knew the doctor didn’t want to send her home. He thought she’d be better off in a nursing home where she could get physical therapy and have her progress monitored. But just 40 ❘ January 2014
the spring, even though we both knew she probably wouldn’t make it through the winter. At the end, she was blind and her world had been reduced to a little brown recliner in her living room. But she never lost her zest for life. Friends and family visited and talked
to her on the phone. My husband baked her bread to tease her appetite, and neighbors brought in soup and conversation. I found a bag full of letters in her cedar chest that had been written to her by her family when she was a young schoolteacher. We read them all. I learned about my mother through my grandmother’s letters. I saw the Depression and the Second World War through my great-grandmother’s eyes. That afternoon was one of our happiest times together. The letters brought
Click here for more resources on caregiving.
tal Digi as t Ex r
Mom back to herself and to me. We laughed at the good times and cried at the sad. When we were finished, we put the letters back into the cedar chest and said good-bye. Mom was able to stay at home until the last two weeks of her life. When she broke her hip during a routine trip to the bathroom, that was the beginning of the end. She had to be hospitalized, and died four days after surgery.
Looking Back No one has asked me this question, but after 12 years I am still waiting for it. No one has asked me if I would have chosen a different end for my mother. My first impulse would be to say yes. But then I would have to rethink that answer. Because while those months were some of the hardest I have ever known, they were also many of the most beautiful. With life stripped to the bone, Mother and I could see it clearly and cherished each waking moment we had. My mother gave me the greatest gift a parent can give to a child. She let me help her play out her song to the end. I only hope I can play mine as well. A Barbara Tylla is a freelance writer from Racine, Wisconsin. Her work has previously been published in this magazine. St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g
AT HOME ON EARTH
❘ BY KYLE KRAMER
Satisfying Fire
M
ence, though, wood heat also has brought me very close to the natural world. I’ve come to know the trees and creatures of our woodlot, and I’ve learned to pay careful attention to the weather when loading our stove, so we don’t wake up at midnight to a 90-degree house or in the morning with Warming up blue lips (believe me, we’ve to Nature done both). Handling all that firewood is hard work and Help your kids or grandkids takes time. But there’s a soulavoid “nature-deficit deep satisfaction and pleasure disorder” at childrenand in feeling so connected to nature.org. nature—something that feels right in my bones. Find out where some of Technology has made your food comes from. modern life much easier, but Can you buy, sometime this it has given most of us less year, from local farmers? contact with nature. Based on my experience on our farm, I Regulations permitting, rig suspect that the planet, the up a rain barrel to your poor, future generations, and downspouts: get water for our own souls would be betyour plants. ter off if we could begin to strip away some of the layers of separation between us and God’s creation. It’s easy to start, and you don’t necessarily have to give up on creature comforts or live on a farm. Simply commit each day to pay a little less attention to a screen and a little more to one small, close-at-hand part of the natural world. If you stick with it, these experiences will start to transform your awareness, your heart, and eventually your choices about what you buy, the energy you use, and so on. Like the mustard seed, a small act of faith like this may move mountains—or even save them. A
1
2
3
Kyle Kramer, an organic farmer, is author of A Time to Plant: Life Lessons in Work, Prayer and Dirt (Sorin Books).
A woodstove brings soul-deep satisfaction and pleasure. Fire reminds us of the warmth of family. Fr ancisca n Media .org
tal Digi as Extr
Click here for or more ways to connect with nature. January 2014 ❘ 41
© MAROŠ MARKOVIČ/FOTOLIA
© SUKRAUß/FOTOLIA
y family and I live on a small farm in rural southern Indiana. We’re trying to care for God’s creation, sink roots in our local community, and give our young kids the experience of growing up close to the natural world. We’re also trying to figure out how all of this fits within our Catholic spiritual journey. During the coming year, I’ll be reflecting in these pages about how this experience ties to all our lives. So, let’s start. What is it about fire? We heat our farmhouse with wood, so in January, firewood is much on my mind and my muscles. Outside, while the sap is down, I’m busy in our woodlot with a chain saw and splitting maul. Inside, our woodstove has become a family altar, drawing us to its gentle, soapstone warmth for bedtime stories, cuddles, squabbles, and prayers. Like most technology, fire insulates all of us from nature: it helps us stay warm and toasty inside while wild creatures endure the winter out in the elements. In my experi-
Playing the Faith Card The house doesn’t always win. FICTION BY JOAN SAURO, CSJ
In the early days of the Church, the most frequent representation of God was that of the Good Shepherd giving his life for his sheep. In all of early Christian art, whether on chalices, on catacomb walls or in household shrines, the Good Shepherd has been the most loved image of God.
T
he day of his mother’s wake, Tom entered Shephardson’s Funeral Home like someone gone blind. He stumbled over the polished parquet and onto the dark pile of Oriental rugs, coming to rest in a square of light in the back of a long, narrow parlor. Looking over the heads of the seated mourners, Tom saw the
42 ❘ January 2014
velvet-covered gurney up front, with the box laid horizontally on top with his mother in it, her breast an upheaval of flowers. Tom stayed in the small square of light, unable to join his father and siblings next to the casket. Though he was desperate for an escape, it never occurred to him to back out the way he had come in. All he found was a mammoth picture of the Good Shepherd dominating the wall to his right, an appropriate piece given the name of the funeral director. Given the absurdity of his mother’s death, Tom’s next move was equally absurd. He mentally crawled over the St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
ILLUSTRATION BY JON KRAUSE
large oak frame and into the field of the Good Shepherd, who stood in grass up to his knees with a lamb draped like a fur piece around his neck. There the distraught son stayed, safe with the Good Shepherd in the alcove of his mother’s death.
M
onths later, Tom was still adrift. His children were grown and moved away, his wife of 26 years was dead of cancer, and now his mother was gone. He saw her everywhere. The pearls he had given her, still in their velvet box in her top drawer back at the old homestead. He saw her hands all over the coffeepot Fr ancisca n Media .org
that was always on, her fingerprints deep in the pink skin of the begonias on the windowsill near the coffeepot. Looking out the window at the lush backyard, the weeping willow draped over the picnic table, he remembered the whole family gathered there. How his parents loved to watch their grandchildren climb the tree and swing from its branches. Tom’s mind swung from the window to the dining room where his father sat waiting. They had made Friday nights fish nights. It was Tom’s idea because he was not about to make things worse by forgetting his father. The two settled themselves under a January 2014 ❘ 43
low-hanging lamp in the dining room. The light made a triangle of father and son, while the rest of the room receded into unclear shapes. The two of them could just as well be having a card game at the dining room table, which, as it happened, was not a bad analogy for their lifetime relationship. Tom’s father held his cards close to the vest. Tom tended to dart in and out, chancing big losses for big gains. His father called him careless. The fish was always from Doug’s Fish Fry, always haddock, with stray bones here and there in the white flesh, bones to catch in his father’s throat, except he never talked when he ate. He attended wholeheartedly to his meal, as he knew one with failing eyes and unpredictable teeth should. Tom’s father was never careless. He knew his bones. It was Tom who dropped his guard, complimenting his father on the Swiss chard he had cooked to go along with the fish, the Spanish rice bubbling on the kitchen stove next to the coffee. “You think it’s Spanish, Dad, just
because you put peppers and onions in it, don’t you?� Reluctantly, the father lifted his eyes from the plate and gave his son a look that was difficult to read, unless you caught the sly move about the older man’s mouth. All of his life Tom had trouble reading his father, as anyone who darted in and out will necessarily have in the face of careful reason. Now Tom not only missed his father’s sly smile, he missed the fish bone as well. He felt his face heat up. He tried to cough up the trouble quietly, without frightening his father. Then he tried to drown the obstacle. Finally, his father pushed a plate of bread over and said, “Chew it good, then swallow big.� He went back to his meal and mumbled, “You probably ate a lot of bones before this, only chewed them up.� Once Tom recovered, he was back on guard. “I don’t think so, Dad. You can usually feel the bones in your mouth.� No sooner had he said it when he realized he had missed his father’s way
“I wish to fit you for that world in which you are destined to live.â€? - St. Elizabeth Ann Seton The Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati celebrate the Jan. 4 Feast Day of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton our founder CPF ĹżTUV #OGTKECP DQTP 5CKPV Painting by Rebecca Pearl
www.srcharitycinti.org YYY HCEGDQQM EQO UKUVGTUQHEJCTKV[QHEKPEKPPCVK
44 â?˜ January 2014
of comfort, a parent’s way of minimizing the danger. You’ve eaten a lot of bones before, son, a peck of dirt, poison ivy, crashed cars, water way over your head. You’ve met danger before. And loss. You’ll be OK.
T
om slid his chair back and hurried to the kitchen. He took a deep breath and stirred the last of the Spanish rice. While his son was out in the kitchen, the father decided to tell him. “Got to go for one of those eye operations,� he said into the air. “Monday.� Tom came back in with the pan of rice. “Cataracts again?� “Left eye, this time.� One by one his father pushed a few bones to the edge of his plate. White bones on a white plate were baffling, so Tom waited, the pan of rice in his hand. “What time do you have to get there, Dad? What time do you have to come home?� Tom was figuring out his night shift at the power plant, how he could shorten his work time, pick up his father, sleep a few hours, and return to bring his father home. His father lowered his eyes and said he thought maybe he’d call his brother-in-law. A more distant relative would be better. “It’s all set, Dad. I’ll pick you up and bring you home. And then I’ll cook us some Spanish rice.� His father smiled. “You didn’t even like onions until I introduced them to you.� He tapped the fork in a cleared-out space on his plate and Tom spooned the last of the meal onto his father’s plate, a thing his mother used to do for them, spooning the dinner onto their plates, always equal, spendthrift, as far as her husband’s factory job would allow. Now Tom wondered if his mother ever ate herself. He couldn’t remember her sitting down to a meal. Bewildered, Tom stood over his father, unsure what to do with the empty pan. He imagined his father slipping down through the floorboards, the cellar, the bottom St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
of the house, and what was under the house. Terrified, Tom put a firm hand on his father’s shoulder and held him safe in the dining room chair, close to the table with the Spanish rice steaming off the plate. He was unwilling to let go because now he saw that if you did, if you took your eyes off a person for the smallest time, they were gone. Just like that; gone, while you were thinking of something else. After he found his breath a second time, Tom seated himself down across the table. Steam rose between them, making his father’s eyes even more bleary. He had felt his son’s hand on his shoulder and was waiting. Tom knew it was his call, so he laid his last card down, a hard, bitter one. “The house always wins. You know that, don’t you, Dad? In the end the house always wins.” His father looked stunned, as if he’d just heard the worst kind of blasphemy, and now there was a breach of faith hanging over the table. He was slow to speak, which made Tom think that was the end of it, that there was no more to say, that his father didn’t even understand what he meant.
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ust when Tom was about to rise and do something about the empty pan, his father took his wallet out of his back pocket. Carefully, he slipped his wife’s memorial card out, the one with the Good Shepherd on one side and Psalm 23 printed under his wife’s name and dates on the other. “The Lord is my Shepherd. There is nothing I shall want. In verdant pastures he gives me repose.” Tom’s father laid the card on the table, clean and crisp—his ace in the hole, his faith card. Then eye-to-eye with Tom, so that there was no room left for discussion, he said, “Just between you and me, Tom, I intend to beat the house, just like your mother.” A Joan Sauro, CSJ, a Sister of St. Joseph of Carondelet, lives in Syracuse, New York. She has spent 40 years writing and teaching creative writing to adults and children. Her story “The Eyeglass Drawer” appeared in this magazine’s November 2012 issue. Fr ancisca n Media .org
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ASK A FRANCISCAN
❘ BY FATHER PAT McCLOSKEY, OFM
Refusing to Be Confirmed What can I say to my 18-year-old grandson to convince him to receive the Sacrament of Confirmation? He went through Catholic grade school but, due to a pastor who turned him off to the Catholic Church, he chose not to be confirmed. His parents were also turned off by this same priest. That pastor has since been transferred and replaced by a good priest. I want to talk to my grandson, but don’t have the words. I
have been praying to the Holy Spirit to guide me. What would you say to him? Our current pastor agrees that my grandson would not have to go through the sacramental preparation again. From what you have written, it sounds as though the issue is more than a problem with that one priest. You didn’t mention if your grandson now joins in the celebration of Sunday Mass or what his other
What about the Infant of Prague?
© JORGE ROYAN/WWW.ROYAN.COM.AR/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
I have always wondered about the Infant of Prague. What can you tell me about this statue and this devotion? My mother was born in Slovakia, close to Prague. The original wooden statue is 18 inches high and since 1629 has been kept in Our Lady of Victory Church in Prague. That church adjoins a house of Carmelite friars. The statue came to what is now the Czech Republic in 1556 when Maria Manriquez de Lara married a local nobleman. In his left hand, Jesus holds a globe with a cross on the top, symbolizing Christ’s kingship of the world. (The feast of Christ the King was established for the universal Church only in 1925.) This statue’s right hand is raised in blessing. As devotion to the Infant of Prague spread, copies of the statue began appearing in parish churches and homes. Since 1949 the National Shrine of the Infant Jesus of Prague has been housed in St. Wenceslaus Church in Prague, Oklahoma (Archdiocese of Oklahoma City). St. Wenceslaus (d. 929) is the patron of the Czech people. More information about the original statue and the Oklahoma shrine can be found at shrineofinfantjesus.com.
46 ❘ January 2014
religious involvements may be. Perhaps he feels that he has outgrown his need for religion. Maybe he feels that its answers to his earlier and very serious questions no longer work. Have you spoken with him recently about why your Catholic faith is important to you? Does he realize that your faith has grown over the years? Unfortunately, people sometimes speak of faith as though it were a light switch: either on or off. They might never have heard of the expressions “child’s faith,” “teen’s faith,” or “adult faith.” I recently asked an 80-year-old priest when he first heard the expression “adult faith.” He thought that the first time was after he was ordained. I think I was in my early 20s before that expression really sank in for me. If faith doesn’t grow as our life experiences do, then faith can easily be seen as something no longer appropriate for someone’s age and experience. Leaving it behind can become for some people as much a rite of passage as obtaining a driver’s license or becoming old enough to vote. If your grandson’s negative feelings about his previous pastor are still strong, he might be open to hearing about how you have dealt with disappointments over the actions of people whose religion did not have enough influence on their daily choices. Not all the Catholics you have known seemed like saints, but you are still a Catholic. There’s a story behind that fact! Speaking with your grandson along these lines is not guaranteed to change his mind about the Sacrament of Confirmation or about St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
larger religious issues. But such a conversation could be a positive influence in the longer term. Researchers are starting to find that grandparents’ faith can be admired at a distance by grandchildren and eventually become very influential on the young person’s faith development. Faith is both content (teachings in catechisms or other books) and a journey. As someone further along on your journey, you may be able to help your grandson on his. You were once his age; he has never been your age! In all of this, pray that you will continue to be the loving grandmother whom he has known for many years.
Catholic Being a Sponsor in Another Church Does the Catholic Church prohibit a Catholic from being a sponsor for someone baptized in a Protestant or Orthodox Church? The Catholic Church does not object to this, but the Church in question might. It is best to follow the practice of that Church on this matter. The Catholic Church recognizes Baptisms in Orthodox Churches as certainly valid and Baptisms in mainline Protestant denominations as valid if they use water and baptize in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Can a Catholic Do a Reading There? My niece and goddaughter will be married in a nondenominational ceremony. She has asked me to do a reading during that service. Does the Catholic Church allow that? The Catholic Church allows that. If some individual Catholics object, calmly hold your ground. If your niece is a baptized Catholic, the Church certainly would prefer that this wedding be celebrated before a priest or deacon and two witnesses—or receive a dispensation Fr ancisca n Media .org
from that requirement, which is called canonical form.
What Is a Consecrated Virgin? A Catholic friend of mine recently heard about a group called consecrated virgins. She had never heard the term before, and neither had I. Who are they and what exactly do they do? The Code of Canon Law speaks of institutes of consecrated life and hermits recognized by the Church. Then it says: “The order of virgins approximates to these forms of consecrated life. Through their pledge to follow Christ more closely, virgins are consecrated to God, mystically espoused to Christ and dedicated to the service of the Church, when the diocesan bishop consecrates them according to the approved liturgical rite. Virgins can be associated together to fulfill their pledge more faithfully, and to assist each other to serve the
Church in a way that befits their state” (604). The Catechism of the Catholic Church speaks of them in numbers 922 to 924. They may pray the Liturgy of the Hours and engage in charitable works—in addition to their other employment. The United States Association of Consecrated Virgins (USACV) has chosen as its patron St. Kateri Tekakwitha, a Native American whose life in many ways resembled theirs. More information about the USACV is available at consecratedvirgins.org or from its national office (300 West Ottawa St., Lansing, MI 48933-1577). A
Father Pat welcomes your questions! Send them to: Ask a Franciscan, 28 W. Liberty Street, Cincinnati, OH 45202-6498, or Ask@FranciscanMedia.org. All questions sent by mail need to include a selfaddressed stamped envelope. This column’s answers can be searched back to April 1996 at StAnthonyMessenger.org.
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January 2014 ❘ 47
BOOK CORNER
❘ BY CAROL ANN MORROW
Catching Fire, Becoming Flame A Guide for Spiritual Transformation By Albert Haase, OFM Paraclete Press 222 pages • $16.99 Paperback Reviewed by EDGAR A. GAMBOA, MD, author of Virtuous Healers: Models of Faith in Medicine, published by Franciscan Media.
WHAT I’M READING ■ Deeper
Than Darwin: The Prospect for Religion in the Age of Evolution, by Catholic theologian John Haught
■ Bad
Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics, by New York Times op-ed columnist Ross Douthat
■ The
Elegance of the Hedgehog, a second novel by Muriel Barbery, author of The Gourmet Rhapsody
■ The
Art of Happiness in a Troubled World, by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler, MD
■ The
PHOTO BY FR. JEFFREY ESTACIO
Blue Sapphire of the Mind: Notes for a Contemplative Ecology, by Douglas E. Christie, professor of theological studies at Loyola Marymount University
Kyle Kramer writes the new column in this magazine, “At Home on Earth“ (p. 41). He is director of lay degree programs at St. Meinrad School of Theology in Indiana. He is author of A Time to Plant (Sorin Books).
48 ❘ January 2014
Albert Haase is a Franciscan friar, formerly a missionary in China. He preaches parish missions, leads spirituality workshops, and cohosts a radio program, “Spirit and Life.” His latest book, Catching Fire, Becoming Flame, gives a brief overview of conversion and the process of spiritual transformation, metanoia. That’s, of course, both simple and complicated. God often writes straight with crooked lines. Furthermore, each of our spiritual journeys—our love affair with God—is similar in many ways but also unique. Still, there are the classic pathways, such as St. Augustine’s purgation, illumination, and union; St. John of the Cross’ dark night and ascent to Mt. Carmel; St. Teresa of Avila’s interior castle; de Caussade’s and de Foucauld’s abandonment to Divine Providence. Father Haase draws from all these spiritual masters, surveying the many disciplines of spiritual transformation—daily prayer, lectio divina, examen of consciousness, fasting, Stations of the Cross, spiritual direction, retreats, and pilgrimages. As Father Haase points out, God constantly invites us into relationship and gives us the graces to accept the invitation. Divine intimacy, however, is a two-way street. The value in Catching Fire is that Fr. Haase lines up the varied time-tested spiritual practices available to us. At the end of each chapter, he offers reflection points and suggests practical ways for readers to try such practices. To the reader who is just starting to “catch the fire” of God’s love, the book is a helpful survey, an encouraging bird’s-eye view of the journey ahead. For pilgrims who have already experienced spiritual transformation, whose flames are ablaze, the book is a friendly reminder to enlarge one’s heart through avenues the author suggests: a private retreat, an online 19th annotation, or a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. The author’s list was far from exhaustive. This reader would have added practices such as visits to the Blessed Sacrament, devotions to Our Blessed Mother, and mission trips. Catching Fire is a readable book containing many valuable spiritual practices. It is obviously written by a priest afire with God’s love. St . A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r
BOOK BRIEFS
2014: Engage Your Creative Side Eyes of the Heart Photography as a Christian Contemplative Practice By Christine Valters Paintner Sorin Books 143 pages • $15.95
Atchison Blue A Search for Silence, a Spiritual Home, and a Living Faith By Judith Valente Sorin Books/Ave Maria Press 181 pages • $15.95 Softcover, e-book
This book introduces readers to a form of lectio divina (sacred reading) that she calls visio divina (sacred seeing) by adapting its four steps— read, reflect, respond, and rest—to visual prayer. The text is an invitation to discover the truth hidden below the surface, to be reminded of the holiness in every moment (or vision).
Learning to Dream Again Reviewed by ALICE CAMILLE, MDiv, retreat leader and author of This Transforming Word and Isaiah and the Kingdom of Peace. Ours is an era of wonderful opportunity and terrible power. This is why we have great need of an ancient authority to help us find our way: what Judith Valente calls ”meaning makers.” Valente is a prime example of the dilemma. A noted journalist and Pulitzer Prize nominee, NPR and PBS commentator, poet and retreat leader, she sensed the need to knit her life experience together more coherently. This led her to a Benedictine monastery in Atchison, Kansas, and to an encounter with an unforgettable group of women who choose to be “signs of contradiction“ to the frantic press of modern living. Valente takes us into the heart of the cloister. We meet sisters at prayer and work; others in fragile retirement, at the hour of death, or in the hopeful moment of professing vows. We’re invited as well into the cloister of the heart: an interior place where silence is a friend, and wisdom gradually flowers. As the author takes fateful steps toward a life of deeper conversation with her better nature and with family members, readers share her frank questions and thoughtful companionship in seeking our own answers. We may never get to Mount St. Scholastica for ourselves. But those Atchison blue chapel windows will continue to admit light into our heart cloisters all the same. Fr ancisca n Media .org
Rediscovering the Heart of God By Samuel Wells Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. 221 pages • $18 Despite its title, this is not a book about what happens in our psyches at night. Still, it engages our creativity through the author’s musings on loving, living, thinking, reading, and feeling. His final chapter engages head, gut, heart, and hand within the context of Scripture to identify, restore, and live the dream.
Conversation: The Sacred Art Practicing Presence in an Age of Distraction By Diane M. Millis, PhD Skylight Paths Publishing 154 pages • $16.99 In an age of tweets and posts, this book encourages all who engage in conversation (and who doesn’t?) to practice it as a sacred art, rather than as a careless throwaway. Through seeing our daily exchanges as sacred, we can balance our awareness, our receptivity, and our capacity to listen. Great conversations put us in touch with our deepest selves—and the depths of the other. Books featured in this column can be ordered from
St. Mary’s Bookstore & Church Supply 1909 West End Avenue • Nashville, TN 37203 800-233-3604 www.stmarysbookstore.com • stmarysbookstore@gmail.com January 2014 ❘ 49
A CATHOLIC MOM SPEAKS
❘ BY SUSAN HINES-BRIGGER
A Little Help Here
E
very January my parish, as well as many others, places thousands of small, white crosses on the parish grounds to signify the number of babies lost each day to the tragedy of abortion. And each year I struggle to explain to my younger children what the crosses represent. It is a struggle to explain it to my thirdgrader in a way that she can comprehend, but it is especially difficult to address it with my 3-year-old. She definitely recognizes the crosses, but is too young to understand. She is also at that horrible stage where everything said needs to be challenged, and every answer is met 50 ❘ January 2014
with a call for further explanation. Every time we drop the kids off at school, go to Mass, or just drive past our parish or others with the crosses our conversations go something like this: “What are those crosses for?” “Babies who have died.” “How did they die?” This is where it gets tricky. Dare I say that their mommies decided they couldn’t take care of them? I know the next question after that is going to be “why?” regardless of what I say. So I decided to take a different tack. I decided to be vague and tell her that the crosses represent all the
babies that we need to help out. “How?” “Well, we can help the mommies and daddies be able to take care of them.” “How?” “We can give them clothes and food and all the things your daddy and I needed to take care of you.” “But I don’t want to give them my clothes. What will I wear?” See how this goes?
What to Do? So, what are parents to do in such situations? Sure, there are a lot of documents and papers written for the older crowd concerning tough St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
Help, Please Perhaps that’s why so many people— including my kids—seem drawn to Pope Francis and the style of his papacy. He speaks dramatically through real-life demonstrations of charity. That’s what we parents need more of. We need help handling the everyday struggles of faith, often
WRAPPED IN LOVE
My kids wanted to know what they could do to help mothers who felt abortion was their only option. My oldest daughter, who is in the pro-life club at her high school, suggested that we collect items for the local pregnancy center. We put out a call to friends and family for donations of gently used baby clothes that could be distributed. Our family filled bags full of clothes our youngest had outgrown. The kids clipped coupons for things like diapers and formula to give to the center. And in an attempt to provide a personal touch, they decided to make small fleece blankets the center could give to parents. Check in your area to locate centers that provide assistance to young mothers who need help. Call and ask what they need. Or simply provide what you have.
brought on by things like thousands of white crosses on the parish grounds. So this mom is asking, could our Church please help us parents by remembering that a significant part of our Church family is children? These are children who can’t understand many of the issues our faith and world face; children who are asking questions and seeking answers— on their level. As parents we want to provide them with those answers. I’m not
ILLUSTRATIONS BY MARY KURNICK MAASS
issues, such as abortion. But where are the resources for parents of the next generation of Catholics? I’m pretty sure—let’s say, really sure—my kids would not understand papal and bishops’ documents. Sure, I could always search the Internet, as I do for most other things for which I have no answer. But searching “explaining abortion to a 3-year-old” surprisingly does not yield any resources. I found suggestions for how to talk to her about death, divorce, and a lot of other things. But not this. I thought perhaps our parish would provide resources in conjunction with the cross display. Nope, none that I could find. How many issues are we parents faced with that are difficult to talk with our children about, and have very little help doing so? Kids these days—even at the age of 3—are much more aware and observant of things around them, thanks to the Internet and social media. Abortion, war, suffering, homelessness, and a ton of other societal problems are laid out in front of them. But those issues come with very little to no explanation.
exactly sure what the answer is—a letter, a story, something else—but we parents could use some help because our kids aren’t going to stop asking questions anytime soon. A
Do you have comments or suggestions for topics you’d like to see addressed in this column? Send them to me at “A Catholic Mom Speaks,” 28 W. Liberty St., Cincinnati, OH 45202-6498, or e-mail them to CatholicMom@FranciscanMedia.org.
PETE AND REPEAT These scenes may seem alike to you, But there are changes in the two. So look and see if you can name ILLUSTRATION BY TOM GREENE
Eight ways in which they’re not the same. (Answers on page 23)
Fr ancisca n Media .org
January 2014 ❘ 51
BACKSTORY
Farewell, Friar Jack
J
anuary marks a milestone for this magazine: the retirement of Jack Wintz, OFM, a multitalented journalist, onetime editor in chief of this publication, founding editor of Catholic Update, and beloved as Friar
Jack by some 40,000 fans of our monthly e-newsletter, Friar Jack’s E-Spirations. He has been a key leader among the editors here for over 40 years. How many of us do the things we do better because of the gifts of the people around us? Jack helped to shape me as a journalist and editor over PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER HEFFRON
nearly 25 years working side by side—and even a few years before then, as he helped steer my early work toward this magazine. I’m not alone among our staff. Jack’s joyful, intense-while-relaxed disposition, along with his keen instincts for what kind of content resonates with our readers, all coupled with a fascination and determination to interview Catholic celebrities, inspires us all. It was Jack who brought such celebrities as Gene Kelly, Carroll O’Connor, Bob Newhart, Ann Jillian, Raul Julia, Brooke Shields, and Martin Sheen to our readers. Not too long ago, he even revisited Sheen, meeting with him at a Franciscan retreat center to talk with him and his son Emilio Estevez about their 2010 film, The Way. Jack’s work often was supported by his own skillfully taken photographs—mostly in the predigital days when you got only a few shots to get things right! His curiosity took him around the world where, like a missionary, he brought back stories from continents afar. Jack clearly has a deep love for St. Francis,
Father Jack Wintz, OFM
and brought that time and time again to our readers in his various stories about the saint himself (along with St. Anthony). His final article, in fact, published just this past October, was on the seven key moments in the life of St. Francis. It’s a relatively small group of us who, each month, marshal the resources of writers and illustrators in many parts of the country to create this magazine for you. Each of us editors and writers builds up and supports the other. Friar Jack has been a big part of that. On behalf of our editors and staff, and indeed on the part of your many readers, we say, “Thank you, Friar Jack.”
Editor in Chief
52 ❘ January 2014
St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg
REFLECTION
We can never obtain peace in the outer world
until we make peace with ourselves.
© BOBOLING/DREAMSTIME.COM
— the Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso
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