January 2016

5 LESSONS FROM MEGACHURCHES

ST. ANTHONY JANUARY JANUARY 2016 2016 •• $3.95 $3.95 ••FRANCISCANMEDIA.ORG FRANCISCANMEDIA.ORG

Mary’s Loneliness St. Francis the Peacemaker The Legend of Pope Joan Paul Elie’s Passion for Stories My Franciscan Parents

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CONTENTS

ST. ANTHONY Messenger

❘ JANUARY 2016 ❘ VOLUME 123/NUMBER 8

ON THE COVE R

28 Mary’s Loneliness

In his painting “Mary of the Annunciation,” Antonello da Messina captures the visage of a woman who has endured her share of life’s challenges.

She suffered great isolation, from confusion about her unique call to the deaths of those closest to her. Yet her trust in God was rewarded.

By Jim Van Vurst, OFM

Photo from the Yorck Project

F E AT U R E S

D E PA R T M E N T S

14 Artisans of Peace

2 Dear Reader

Peace is not found; with God’s help, it is built.

St. Francis of Assisi can show us the way.

By Pat McCloskey, OFM

3 From Our Readers 4 Followers of St. Francis Katie Sullivan

20 5 Lessons from Megachurches They still are experiencing phenomenal growth.

What can Catholic parishes learn?

By Dr. Brennan R. Hill

6 Reel Time The Good Dinosaur

14

26 My Parents, Third Order Franciscans

The Grinder

10 Church in the News

Their witness of faith provided gifts for a lifetime.

By Brian Doyle

25 Editorial Dr. King’s ‘Dream’ for America

42 At Home on Earth

34 The Legend of Pope Joan

Does the Earth Have Cancer?

Though she never existed, the myth persists for a reason.

By Christopher M. Bellitto

36 Paul Elie’s Passion for Stories

8 Channel Surfing

20

Hear the story of the man behind the American Pilgrimage Project.

By James Breig

50 Ask a Franciscan How Can God Be Both Just and Merciful?

52 Book Corner The Vatican Prophecies

54 A Catholic Mom Speaks

44 Fiction: My Father’s Memorial Mass

Lord, Help Me, I Have Teenagers

Hope can be found in the midst of a blizzard.

By Joseph Carlton Porter

56 Year of Mercy Burial for an Unknown Child

36

57 Backstory

DEAR READER

ST. ANTHONY M essenger

Francis’ Birthplace This year I will focus this column on Italian places linked to the life of St. Francis. What better place to start than the Chiesa Nuova (the “new church”), built over the presumed site of the home of Francis’ family?

This small church in the form of a Greek cross (nave and transept are of equal length) was completed in 1619, financed by King Philip III of Spain. Standing very close to the Piazza Comune, the center of the medieval city, is the church where Pietro Bernardone’s cloth shop once stood. The family lived on the upper floors.

For a short time in 1206, Pietro imprisoned Francis there, but Lady Pica freed him while Pietro was away on business. The small piazza in front of the church includes a beautiful statue of Francis’ parents.

A painting in the sanctuary recalls Francis’ dream of glory as a knight, a yearning that developed into a very different way of serving God. More information on Franciscan places in Assisi, Rome, and the Rieti Valley can be found in Pilgrim’s Companion of Franciscan Places (Minerva Press).

Click the button on the left to hear Father Pat’s further reflections on this topic.

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Member of the Catholic Press Association Published with ecclesiastical approval Copyright ©2015. All rights reserved.

2 ❘ January 2016

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

FROM OUR READERS

Bias Clouds Bishop’s Message I enjoyed the St. Anthony Messenger cover story from the November issue, “It’s Not Over Yet,” by Alicia von Stamwitz. It was an informative glimpse into the historical developments of Vatican II and one man’s attempt to keep the torch burning for the spirit of the council. Unfortunately, the bishop’s bias outshined the beauty of the message when he labeled those who don’t agree with him and his assessment of Pope Francis as ignorant and “narrowminded.”

Such has been the condescension and contradiction of those who promote the spirit of a council and clamor for

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.

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structural reforms before they seek to reform their own hearts.

Anne Costa Cicero, New York

Let’s Look to Scripture I’m writing in regard to the special report from the November issue, “Vatican II Today.” Vatican II was the only council that was not dogmatic; so it cannot be compared with the other councils in importance.

Harm to the Church resulted from wording taken out of context and wording of a novel character that was thought by the people to be a command from a dogmatic council.

Ecumenism and religious liberty were also encouraged by Vatican II and mentioned as an achievement.

Church history, however, says otherwise. Scripture forbids any intercourse with those who profess a corrupt version of its teaching: “If anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, do not receive him in your house or even greet him” (2 Jn 10).

Kathleen Jaynes Warren, Pennsylvania

Disturbing Disparity I find some of the results of your survey, featured in Daniel Imwalle’s article “Readers Speak Up on Catholic Family Issues” from the October issue, to be quite disturbing. The disparity between 85 percent of the responders feeling they understand the Church’s teaching on marriage and family issues and 51 percent not finding same-sex marriage to be a threat is especially worrisome to me.

Either the responders really do not understand the Church’s teaching, or they are choosing to deny the truth of it.

There are many resources available online and in book form for Catholics who really wish to know and understand why the Church can never sanction same-sex marriage.

I respectfully suggest that they pray for enlightenment and closely study this topic from the Church’s perspective.

There is a definite need to reach out more effectively to those who in some way feel alienated from the Church. However, it is just as necessary to lovingly guide them to a deeper understanding of why the Church teaches as it does, rather than supporting their lifestyle choices from a purely emotional standpoint.

Nancy Gruber Harrison, Ohio

Battle Flag a Symbol for Secession After reading John Feister’s October editorial, “Stars, Bars, and Scars,” a quote jumped out at me. He writes, “Glorified symbols of the Confederacy promote the suppression of blacks. Period.” I submit the issue is not that simple and losing the battle flag as a symbol for the right of secession will hurt the cause of freedom in the world.

America’s militarist leaders refuse to recognize the right of Abkhazia and South Ossetia to secede from Georgia and the right of Crimea to secede from Ukraine. Instead of demanding UN-supervised plebiscites to settle these issues, they rattle their sabers.

I submit the battle flag is not overly glorified. It was justly glorified by the death of 300,000 Confederates in their fight for the right of secession. Condemn their defense of slavery, but don’t throw out the truth with a lie.

John F. Scanlon San Diego, California January 2016 ❘ 3

F O L L O W E R S O F S T. F R A N C I S

‘Love . . . Lived in Service’

Y

ou could say service is in Katie Sullivan’s DNA. “Our family is one of educators, nurses, lawyers, and vowed religious (two great-aunts who were Dominicans and two aunts who are Daughters of Charity),” says Sullivan, the executive director of the Franciscan Volunteer Ministry (FVM), a ministry founded by the Holy Name OFM Province in 1989.

For the past 18 years, Sullivan has been at the helm of FVM, which is headquartered in Philadelphia and includes locations in Camden, New Jersey; Silver Spring, Maryland; and Wilmington, Delaware. The organization’s motto, “Love . . . lived in service,” is put into action by its volunteer participants in soup kitchens, prison ministry, English as a Second Language (ESL) programs, and more. The current of St. Francis’ care for and need to be one with the poor pulses strongly at FVM, as it has throughout Sullivan’s life.

Originally from Washington, DC, she grew up in an environment where volunteering was a part of normal family life. “My childhood was infused with doing things for and with others: camp for kids in DC’s shelters and low-income housing, food drives,

Katie Sullivan

visits to nursing homes, readathons, and walkathons,” she recalls. A product of Catholic schooling, Sullivan attended the College of Holy Cross—in Worcester, Massachusetts—where she decided that she would take a year to focus on service work following her graduation in 1995.

After poring over a list of 120 service programs, Sullivan noticed FVM. “I was looking for a program in which the sponsoring religious community was involved not just in name, but also directly and daily in the life of the ministry,” she says. Instead of volunteering for one year with FVM, Sullivan was so taken by the work of the ministry that she spent two years working closely with Philadelphia’s St. Francis Inn soup kitchen and living in community with other FVM participants.

In 1997, Sullivan was hired as the second lay director of FVM, and has since seen well over 200 volunteer ministers pass through the program. The majority of the volunteers are recent college graduates, though some participants are high school graduates or people in their 30s and 40s. Sullivan notes that many have gone on to work as educa-

STORIES FROM OUR READERS Learn more about St. Anthony and share your story of how he helped you at AmericanCatholic.org/ Features/Anthony.

Miracle in the Magazine Pages

PHOTO FROM INGIMAGE

The other day I was preparing to pay our monthly bills when I realized I couldn’t find our water bill. After checking with my husband (who couldn’t find it either) as to its whereabouts, he asked, “Who is that person we pray to for lost things?” I told him it was St. Anthony. We prayed to him right away. I think St. Anthony moved pretty fast on this miracle for us.

My husband went into the garage, looked through our paper pile, and found the water bill in our copy of St. Anthony Messenger. What a surprise!

—Elizabeth Glaza, Pleasant Ridge, Michigan

4 ❘ January 2016

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

Click here for more on the Franciscan Volunteer Ministry.

ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI

Forgetting a Sermon According to St. Bonaventure, Francis was once called upon to preach before Pope Innocent III and his cardinals.

Francis prepared very carefully but, once he began, he forgot everything he had intended to say.

Calling on the Holy Spirit’s help, Francis went on to preach so eloquently that his listeners realized “it was not he, but the Spirit of the Lord was speaking” (LM 12).

There were other times when Francis forgot what he had prepared and asked a blessing for his listeners. –P.M.

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tors and physicians, while some have entered religious communities.

Each FVM site has its own particular flavor. In Philadelphia, volunteer ministers have opportunities to help out at the St. Francis Inn soup kitchen or work in a women’s day center, an urban center, and a thrift shop. The Camden location offers outreach at Francis House, a place that provides vital resources for HIV-infected individuals and their families. Both the Silver Spring and Wilmington sites have ESL classes and youth ministry programs. Common to all the FVM locations is the spirit of life in community for the participants, direct service to those in need alongside vowed Franciscans, and a strong emphasis on praying together.

Sullivan is constantly impressed with and inspired by both the volunteer ministers she oversees and the communities they serve.

“With FVM, I interact with people daily who desire to fully live their faith and integrate their faith into all they do. They are beacons of joy and hope in a world that is in need of healing. They remind me of my family.”

—Daniel Imwalle

tal Digi as Extr

To learn more about Franciscan saints, visit SaintoftheDay.org.

S T. A N T H O N Y B R E A D

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Send all postal communication to: St. Anthony Bread 1615 Vine St. Cincinnati, OH 45202-6498

January 2016 ❘ 5

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.

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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 Good Dinosaur

Favorite Films for the Year of

Mercy Cinderella (2015) FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1992) The Joy Luck Club (1993) Mi Familia/My Family (1995) The Color Purple (1985)

6 ❘

January 2016

© 2014 DISNEY PIXAR

SISTER ROSE’S

Raymond Ochoa and Jack Bright voice the two main characters in Disney-Pixar’s latest, The Good Dinosaur.

Disney-Pixar flips the boy-and-his-dog story with a dinosaur-with-his-boy tale. In the late Jurassic period, just as humans are beginning to walk upright and move out of caves, Poppa (Jeffrey Wright), an apatosaurus, and Momma (Frances McDormand) welcome three baby dinosaurs: Buck (Ryan Teeple), Libby (Maleah Nipay-Padilla), and Arlo (Raymond Ochoa).

Arlo is afraid of everything. To teach him courage and how to make his mark in the world, Poppa takes his son on a journey. But when Poppa is swept away by a raging river, Arlo has to find his way home.

He sees a small boy (Jack Bright) in the bushes who answers to the name Spot. They travel together through the Pacific Northwest and soon realize that nature, at once so beautiful, is also very dangerous. They get help along the way from a variety of creatures, including Butch (Sam Elliott), a tyrannosaurus rex, and his “kids,” who herd prehistoric longhorn cattle. Butch tells Arlo, “If you ain’t scared, you ain’t alive.”

There are many themes to appreciate in The Good Dinosaur: family, death, grieving, courage, friendship, and adoption. A case can easily be made to care for the earth’s resources, too. I have never seen such stunning animation in a film—it’s gorgeous and very realistic.

I was, however, uncomfortable with the boy behaving as a dog. There is also much peril for little kids to endure, but that probably won’t stop parents from buying the film’s merchandise.

A-1, PG ■ Intense peril.

The Letters The world was surprised a few years ago when the book Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light was released, because it contained her letters about her decades-long dark night of the soul. In a new film written and directed

by William Riead, the letters of this brave woman, played by Juliet Stevenson, come to life.

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

COURTESY OF CINEMA WEST FILMS

Juliet Stevenson shines in the formidable role of Blessed Mother Teresa in writer-director William Riead’s film The Letters.

PHOTO BY JONATHAN PRIME/ WARNER BROS. ENTERTAINMENT

The film is a biography dotted with her writing these letters, but most of the time it is spent in Calcutta, where Mother Teresa is a teacher during India’s struggle for independence.

The film also documents how she hears the call of God to serve the poor on her way to a retreat—and how she begins to found her order. For much of the time, she deals with her Mother General (Mahabanoo Mody-Kotwal), her spiritual director, Father van Exem (Max von Sydow), and Archbishop Perrier (Kaizaad Kotwal) along the way.

The cinematography is lovely, though you can tell it’s a set because India’s vast slums are not shown. When Mother Teresa finally receives permission from the Vatican to begin the Missionaries of Charity, I was moved because Stevenson communicates the depth of this woman’s “call within a call” so well.

The Letters shows that Mother Teresa had to surmount many obstacles, including the Hindu community and Church authorities.

She is not a ghostly figure passing through life. She is active, dynamic, prayerful, and smart—a woman who never seems to stop. I loved Stevenson’s portrayal.

A-2, PG ■ Images of human suffering.

the Pacific Ocean. Nickerson has never told anyone the truth—indeed, what happened to the ship has been covered up. Melville, hoping to write a novel based on the story, gets Nickerson to talk to him. And what a story it is!

The ship set sail in 1820 with Owen Chase (Chris Hemsworth) as first mate, and George Pollard (Benjamin Walker) as captain. They don’t get along. They harpoon one whale, but they need many more to process the blubber for oil. After weeks of no sightings, Chase spears a sperm whale that turns on the ship. What follows is beyond imagination.

Ron Howard directs this enthralling epic.

The special effects thrill and terrify at the same time. What men do to survive, the exploitation of resources, and the conflict between man and nature are key themes.

How the shipping industry covers up certain dark truths about life at sea to those on dry land is what we now call “spin.”

Not yet rated, PG-13 ■ Peril, brief violence, mature themes.

Chris Hemsworth must rely on his brawn and his brains to battle a very large whale in Ron Howard’s In the Heart of the Sea.

Catholic Cl assifications A-1 A-2 A-3 L O

In the Heart of the Sea It is 1850. A young Herman Melville (Ben Whishaw) makes his way to a boarding house on Nantucket Island off the coast of Massachusetts. He’s there to talk to Thomas Nickerson (Brendan Gleeson) who, as an adolescent in 1820, survived the shipwreck of the whaling vessel Essex somewhere in Fr anciscanMedia.org

General patronage Adults and adolescents Adults Limited adult audience Morally offensive

■

The Catholic News Service Media Review Office gives these ratings. See usccb.org/movies.

■

Find reviews by Sister Rose and others at CatholicMovieReviews.org.

January 2016 ❘

7

CHANNEL SURFING

WITH CHRISTOPHER HEFFRON

UP CLOSE

Tuesdays, 8:30 p.m., FOX With all due respect to Rob Lowe, it’s hard not to buy into the argument that he’s coasted through his successful 30-year career, in part, on the wave of his boyish looks (he doesn’t seem to age). The veteran actor lends some much-needed star wattage to his latest project, The Grinder, but is it enough to carry the series?

Lowe plays Dean Sanderson, an actor famous for his role as an attorney on a popular television series, who takes a hiatus from show business to spend time with his brother, Stewart (Fred Savage), a competent but painfully self-conscious lawyer. The two brothers play an Odd Couple for 21st-century channel surfers: Stewart is buttoned-up and serious; Dean is breezy and fun.

The comedic pulse of the series hinges on two actors with virtually no chemistry, making The Grinder an anemic experience. But it still manages to address themes that resonate, such as the bonds between siblings, loyalty, and the importance of family.

Lowe can be a dynamic actor, but he does little more than work his million-dollar smile. Savage, on the other hand, is the real comedic force here. Much like he did with the classic The Wonder Years, the actor has an innate ability to juggle humor and heart with equal ease. He deserves a better project than this.

Truth Be Told

PHOTO BY RAY MICKSHAW/FOX

Fridays, 8:30 p.m., NBC What could have been a smart, fresh, contemporary glimpse into the richness and diversity of interracial friendships, Truth Be Told, on the contrary, is a poorly written—if not amiably acted— series.

Billed as a comedy, with too few a clever line or insightful moment to its scant 23 minutes, it stars Mark-Paul Gosselaar and Tone Bell as best friends and neighbors who navigate the waters of family life and careers with each other as trusted sounding boards.

While the cast, which also stars the lovely Vanessa Lachey and the scene-stealing Bresha Webb, are affable and camera-ready, they aren’t given substantive material to work with. Too often jokes fall with a thud, and no new ground is broken regarding adult friendship, married life, and child-rearing—themes that could find a home with viewers.

But the series has its moments. The two leads have an undeniable chemistry together. Gosselaar and Bell’s rapid-fire repartee does give the series an occasional lift, but even that grows tiresome after a while. What audiences are left with is a carbon copy of other buddy shows that have come before it—and did it better.

Too often, the series falls on crude humor as a fallback ingredient to an already tepid recipe. Truth be told, this show is a dud.

Rob Lowe and Fred Savage play brothers who must weather each other’s eccentricities in FOX’s sitcom The Grinder.

8 ❘

January 2016

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

PHOTO BY COLLEEN HAYES/NBC

The Grinder

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CHURCH IN THE NEWS

❘ BY SUSAN HINES-BRIGGER

CNS PHOTO/IAN LANGSDON, EPA

Pope ‘Shaken and Pained’ by Attacks

Armed police officers go on foot patrol around Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris November 14.

Dozens of people were killed in a series of attacks in Paris November 13.

The day after terrorist attacks killed 129 people in Paris, France, Pope Francis said he was “shaken and pained” by the attacks, calling them an “unspeakable affront to the dignity of the human person,” reported Catholic News Service (CNS).

“I don’t understand, but these things are difficult to understand, how human beings can do this,” the pope said.

The day after the attacks, some 1,500 people gathered inside Paris’ Notre Dame Cathedral and hundreds more outside to take part in a special Mass in memory of the victims.

Cardinal Vingt-Trois of Paris celebrated the Mass and told participants, “The savage killings this black Friday plunged entire families into despair, and this despair is all the more profound because there can be no rational explanation that would justify the indiscriminate execution of dozens of anonymous people.”

The only Christian response, he said, is to be “messengers of hope in 10 ❘ January 2016

the heart of human suffering.”

The attacks also drew a response from the US bishops. The day after the attacks, the bishops’ administrative committee issued a statement saying, “To the people of France, we mourn with you and honor the lives lost from several nations, including our own.

“To our brothers and sisters in the Church in France, your family in the United States holds you close to our hearts. May the tender and merciful love of Jesus Christ give you comfort during this great trial and lead you on a path toward healing and peace.”

Bishops Address Pornography, Political Responsibility At their annual fall meeting in Baltimore, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) addressed a wide range of issues, including an update to the statement on political respon-

sibility they publish every four years and a statement on pornography, according to CNS. In his presidential address at the start of the November 16–19 meeting, Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, called on his fellow bishops to imitate the “pastor’s presence” exhibited by Pope Francis during his September visit to the United States, “touching the hearts of the most influential, the forgotten, and all of us in between.”

The 2015 version of the political responsibility document, “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship,” was updated to reflect longheld concerns related to abortion and the needs of poor people. It also references emerging issues related to court decisions on same-sex marriage, public policies that affect religious freedom, and a rising concern for the environment as climate change affects more people around the world.

Some bishops, however, expressed concern that the document does not adequately address poverty, as Pope Francis has asked the Church to do.

The bishops also approved “Create in Me a Clean Heart: A Pastoral Response to Pornography” by a vote of 230–4, with one abstention. The document states that “producing or using pornography is gravely wrong” and is a “mortal sin” if committed with deliberate consent, and urges Catholics to turn away from it.

Bishop Richard J. Malone, of Buffalo, New York, chair of the bishops’ Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth, described pornography as a “dark shadow in our world today.”

In response to the November 13 attacks in Paris, Auxiliary Bishop Eusebio Elizondo of Seattle, chairSt 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

CNS PHOTO/CINDY WOODEN

During his homily on November 1, Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera of Mexico City revealed that Pope Francis will be coming to Mexico on February 12, 2016. He offered no further information, however, on itineraries or the length of the stay. The Vatican has not confirmed the dates, but said this past October that Pope Francis would visit Mexico in 2016.

A 1,066-page report—known as a “positio”—on Army chaplain Father Emil J. Kapaun’s life, virtues, and fame of holiness was presented to the Congregation for Saints’ Causes on November 9 by Bishop Carl A. Kemme of Wichita, Kansas. During the Korean War, Father Kapaun, a priest of the Wichita Diocese, and other members of the 3rd Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, were captured by Chinese troops in North Korea on November 2, 1950. The priest died in a North Korean prison camp May 23, 1951. In 2013, President Barack Obama presented the Medal of Honor posthumously to Father Kapaun.

The bankruptcy plan for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee was approved on November 9, nearly five years after the archdiocese filed for bankruptcy. The plan calls for $21 million to be paid to 355 survivors of clergy sexual abuse. It also includes a $500,000 therapy fund that will allow all survivors to receive counseling for as long as they need it.

Following the ruling, Milwaukee Archbishop Jerome E. Listecki said, “I apologize to the victims and their families for what they endured under these clergy who exercised

man of the USCCB Committee on Migration, addressed the issue of resettlement of Syrian refugees.

“I am disturbed,” he said, “by calls from both federal and state officials for an end to the resettlement of Syrian refugees in the United States” in the wake of the attacks. “These refugees are fleeing terror themselves—violence like we have witnessed in Paris.”

He added: “Moreover, refugees to this country must pass security checks and multiple interviews Fr ancisca n Media .org

criminal and immoral behavior. There is no resolution that will ever bring back what the victims have lost and their families have suffered.”

He said their courage to come forward and tell their stories made a difference.

In a continuation of “the goodwill evident during the visit of Pope Francis” to the United States this past September, Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) Cardinal Donald W. Wuerl of Washington, and Msgr. Ronny Jenkins, USCCB general secretary, met with President Barack Obama and Vice President Joseph Biden at the White House on November 6.

According to a statement issued by the USCCB, the group “addressed a range of issues important to Catholics in the United States as well as the common good, including Syrian and Middle East refugees, religious persecution, religious freedom, immigration reform, and prison reform.”

Progress in Catholic-Lutheran relations over the past 50 years is addressed in a new 120-page document that also maps the remaining steps needed to achieve full unity, reported CNS. The “Declaration on the Way” was prepared by a joint task force of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs and the Chicago-based Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, which has more than 3.7 million members in 9,300 congregations across the United States. The text was intended to mark the 50th anniversary of CatholicLutheran dialogue in 2015 and the upcoming 500th anniversary of the start of the Protestant Reformation in 2017.

For more Catholic news, visit AmericanCatholic.org.

before entering the United States— more than any arrival to the United States. It can take up to two years for a refugee to pass through the whole vetting process. We can look at strengthening the already stringent screening program, but we should continue to welcome those in desperate need.”

Other items addressed at the bishop’s meeting were: ■ Bishop Frank J. Caggiano of Bridgeport, Connecticut, said 13,000 people are already registered for

World Youth Day, which will be held July 25–31 in Krakow, Poland. He said that US registration is expected to top 30,000.

■ The bishops discussed how the US Catholic Church can move forward in response to the Supreme Court’s ruling on same-sex marriage last June. The bishops are planning to develop a pastoral plan for marriage and family life.

■ Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio, head of the US Archdiocese for the Military Services, outlined a dire picJanuary 2016 ❘ 11

ture of “a pastoral problem that affects all of us” about the “desperate” shortage of Catholic priests serving as military chaplains.

■ Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory of Atlanta asked if there would be an opportunity “to examine the reception” by both Catholics in the pews and priests of the new Mass translations that came into use four years ago. He called on his fellow bishops to “look at improving, adjusting, amending the text.”

Five Stand Trial in ‘VatiLeaks’ Scandal

12 ❘ January 2016

This past November, Franciscan Sister Alicia Torres, who ministers at Chicago’s Mission of Our Lady of the Angels, won $10,000 on Food Network’s show Chopped. The competition was part of a special Thanksgiving competition where Sister Alicia competed against three other chefs who, like herself, work in soup kitchens. The money, she says, will go to feed the poor in the community, reported CNS. The mission assists about 700 families a month with food, clothing, and household goods through its food pantry. Food and staples come from both the Chicago Food Depository, parishes, and area businesses such as Whole Foods and O’Hare Airport. In addition, a monthly mobile food pantry assists about 250 to 300 families the first Saturday of each month. It is located in a Chicago neighborhood that is home to crime, violence, drug trafficking, and poverty.

Sister Alicia says she wasn’t familiar with Chopped until she heard the show was looking for women religious participants. She went to Father Bob Lombardo, OFM, one of the mission’s founders, and told him, “You know, I think I have a fairly good chance of getting on this TV show.” He gave his permission, she applied, and within 24 hours of receiving her application, the show’s producers gave her a call.

Calling the experience “incredible,” Sister Alicia says she believes God had a hand in her making it onto the show. “I mean, come on. Why did God take me to this place and on this show if he wasn’t going to do something really powerful with it?”

CNS PHOTO/KAREN CALLAWAY/CATHOLIC NEW WORLD

Five people, including two journalists and a Spanish monsignor, were on trial in a Vatican court beginning November 24 in connection with the leaking and publication of documents about Vatican finances, reported CNS. The accused are Spanish Msgr.

Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda, secretary of the Prefecture for the Economic Affairs of the Holy See; Francesca Chaouqui, a member of the former Pontifical Commission for Reference on the Organization of the Economic-Administrative Structure of the Holy See; and Nicola Maio, who served as personal assistant to Msgr.

Vallejo Balda when he worked on the commission. Journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi, author of Merchants in the Temple, and Emiliano Fittipaldi, author of Avarice, are also on trial.

Both books illustrate what the authors claim is serious financial mismanagement in the Vatican.

Much of the evidence they cite allegedly comes from documents written by or for the commission that Pope Francis established in July 2013 to reform Vatican financial practices. Msgr. Vallejo Balda and Chaouqui were members of that commission.

Msgr. Vallejo Balda, Chaouqui, and Maio are accused of “committing several illegal acts of divulging news and documents concerning fundamental interests of the Holy See and [Vatican City] State.” Balda and Nuzzi defended their right to

Franciscan Sister Wins Prize on Food Network’s Chopped

Franciscan Sister Alicia Torres, left center, joins friends and neighbors for a viewing party at Chicago’s Mission of Our Lady of the Angels November 9.

freedom of the press, while the Vatican prosecution said the way they acquired confidential information was illegal. Nuzzi and Fittipaldi are accused of “soliciting and exercising pressure, especially on [Msgr.] Vallejo Balda, in order to obtain confidential documents and news.”

In July 2013, the Vatican criminalized the release of “news and documents” following the first so-called “VatiLeaks” trial in 2012 when Pope Benedict XVI’s butler was charged with “aggravated theft” for giving Vatican documents and papal correspondence to Nuzzi. A St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

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14 ❘

January 2016

Artisans of

Peace is not found; with God’s help, it is built.

St. Francis of Assisi can show us the way.

B Y P A T M C C L O S K E Y, O F M

P

PHOTO BY BILL WITTMAN

erhaps no other virtue is more associated with St. Francis of Assisi than peace. He made peace with people, with animals, in the Church, and within civil society. This peace grew out of his honesty about his relationship to God, others, and himself. Before seeking peace with people and creation around him, Francis had to find peace within himself. That was a challenge faced with times of deep prayer.

The peace that Francis showed with birds, wolves, lambs, larks, and worms reminded his contemporaries that Adam and Eve lived in total harmony with all creatures before they were sent from the Garden of Eden. The serpent in the Garden of Eden promised Eve and Adam knowledge and power that would equal God’s, but the serpent’s promise was worthless.

Women and men suffering from leprosy were perhaps the most universally despised social group in Francis’ day. The Lord led Francis to recognize them as his brothers and sisters.

His respect for them as equals in God’s creation brought peace to these afflicted ones.

Peace is both a wonderful and a muchabused word. Because we seek peace constantly, it has many counterfeits. For example, peace at any price always yields no peace at a very steep price.

Fr anciscanMedia.org

Francis promoted peace among his friars, among the Poor Clares, among the Secular Franciscans, among all people. Thomas of Celano writes that the immensely popular Francis “seemed to be a man of another world” (First Life, 36). Francis called people back into the peace and harmony of a world into which God had created the human family and which was as fragile in Francis’ day as it is in our own.

Peace is a gift from God. Human actions that cooperate with God’s grace promote peace in the world. On October 27, 1986, St. John Paul II invited leaders of world religions to Assisi to pray and fast there for the sake of world peace. At the concluding prayer service, the pope called those present and everyone who would hear or read his words to be “artisans of peace.” Francis of Assisi was certainly an artisan of peace.

Earlier, the same pope had designated Francis as the patron of ecology. Francis learned to appreciate God’s gift of natural resources, not to dominate them selfishly. All creation pointed Francis toward God. He would have agreed with Dante Alighieri, who wrote in the Divine Comedy that over the gate of heaven is the affirmation, “In his will is our peace.”

“Peace be with you” echoed from Jesus’ life January 2016 ❘

15

CNS PHOTO/L’OSSERVATORE ROMANO

The World Day of Prayer for Peace on October 27, 1986 (above), began outside a chapel St. Francis rebuilt near Assisi and ended at the basilica built over his tomb.

through the life of St. Francis of Assisi. We are called to allow it to reverberate through our lives as well.

The following six reflections on peace are inspired by quotes from St. Francis or his first biography, by Thomas of Celano. The article concludes with several suggested peacemaking activities.

Justice Seeks Peace

Click the button above to hear an interview with John Michael Talbot, musician and follower of St. Francis.

16 ❘

January 2016

“The friars should be delighted to follow the lowliness and poverty of our Lord Jesus Christ, remembering that of the whole world we must own nothing; but having food and sufficient clothing, with these let us be content (1 Tm 6:8), as St. Paul says. They should be glad to live among social outcasts, among the poor and helpless, the sick and the lepers, and those who beg by the wayside. If they [the friars] are in want, they should not be ashamed to beg alms, remembering that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the living, all-powerful God set his face like a very hard rock (Is 50:7) and was not ashamed. He was poor and he had no home of his own and he lived on alms, he and the Blessed Virgin and his disciples” (Rule of 1221, chapter 9).

January 1 is a day of prayer for world peace.

Peace is a work of justice; it does not come about by a display of superior strength or military might. In fact, it can be argued that those who “live among social outcasts, among the poor and helpless, the sick and the lepers, and those who beg by the wayside” most truly

effect the cause of peace and justice by changing society at its very roots: its people.

Peaceful Thinking “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God (Mt 5:9). They are truly peacemakers who are able to preserve their peace of mind and heart for love of our Lord Jesus Christ, despite all that they suffer in this world” (Admonition XV).

It is very easy to engage in “if only” thinking: If only I had been born into a wealthier family, if only I had the advantage of a better education, if only I knew more influential people who could advance my career, and so on. “If only” thinking suggests that I am a spectator of my life, not an active participant in it.

Someone who constantly engages in “if only” thinking can never truly be at peace.

She or he imagines that the key to happiness lies in someone else’s hands, someone who is withholding that key. Jesus’ words will often seem an obstacle because the “if only” thinkers tend to forget that Jesus suffered and died on a cross. If Jesus had followed their example, his time on the cross would have been filled with complaints about his bad luck. The Gospels, especially the Gospel of John, show Jesus as very deliberate in his choices. He rules—even from the cross.

The Next Step “Every creature in heaven and on earth and in the depths of the sea should give God praise St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

and glory and honor and blessing (Rv 5:13); he has borne so much for us and has done and will do so much good to us; he is our power and our strength, and he alone is good (see Lk 18:19), he alone most high, he alone all-powerful, wonderful, and glorious; he alone is holy and worthy of all praise and blessing for endless ages and ages. Amen” (Letter to the Faithful).

We praise God because that is the only way that we can live truthfully.

We are not the sources of all goodness, every blessing. God is. Whatever strength we possess comes not from our efforts alone but from cooperating with God’s grace and direction in our lives. Francis wrote to his friars that once he embraced a leper, what had previously seemed bitter then seemed sweet. God’s ways always challenge conventional wisdom.

Choose Peace

Sacrifice for the Kingdom “Men ran, and women, too, ran, clerics hurried, and religious hastened that they might see and hear the holy man of God who seemed Fr anciscanMedia.org

CNS PHOTO/KAREN CALLAWAY, CATHOLIC NEW WORLD

“In all his preaching, before he proposed the word of God to those gathered about, he first prayed for peace for them, saying: ‘The Lord give you peace.’ He always most devoutly announced peace to men and women, to all he met and overtook. For this reason many who had hated peace and had hated also salvation embraced peace, through the cooperation of the Lord, with all their heart and were made children of peace and seekers after eternal salvation” (1 Celano 23).

Francis of Assisi was one of the world’s greatest peacemakers. He started by recognizing that peace is never simply a human achievement; it always depends on God as its source.

God will not impose peace on us but will always encourage us to choose the ways of peace. That’s a key part of our being made in the image and likeness of God. Adam and Eve thought that they had a better plan. After all, wouldn’t disobeying God’s command turn them into God’s equals? There is a reason why Satan has long been called “the father of lies.” Genuine peace is never to his advantage. Peace always benefits us.

to all to be a man of another world. Every age and every sex hurried to see the wonderful things that the Lord was newly working in the world through his servant. It seemed at that time, whether because of the presence of St. Francis or through his reputation, that a new light had been sent from heaven upon this earth, shattering the widespread darkness that had so filled almost the whole region that hardly anyone knew where to go. For so profound was the forgetfulness of God and the sleep of neglect of his commandments oppressing almost everyone that they could hardly be aroused even a little from their old and deeply rooted sins” (1 Celano 36).

Francis could have been reduced to a carnival attraction—interesting but hardly lifechanging. What Celano describes here is a life-changing Francis—not by the force of Francis’ personality but by God’s grace. All levels

In Chicago on November 4, 2015, students from the Academy of St. Benedict the African conduct a prayer walk for peace in their community.

A 9-year-old boy was fatally shot in a Chicago alley two days earlier.

January 2016 ❘

17

Most people felt extremely at ease in his presence. The only ones who did not were men and women who wanted him to endorse their selfdeceptions about where they stood before God and in relation to others.

CNS PHOTO/PAUL HARING

Building Peace

Pope Francis watches from a window in his study as two young people release doves, symbols of the Church’s call to build up peace in the world.

Francis of Assisi once preached to birds.

tal Digi as t Ex r

18 ❘

of society recognized him as authentic. In a way, Francis was indeed a “man of another world” because he took the kingdom of God very seriously; it was a matter of life or death for him.

Free Living

“Truly Francis had a free and noble heart.

Those who have experienced his magnanimity know how free, how liberal he was in all things; how confident and fearless he was in all things; with what great virtue, with what great fervor he trampled underfoot all worldly things.

What indeed shall I say of the other parts of the world, where, by means of his clothing, diseases depart, illnesses leave, and crowds of both sexes are delivered from their troubles by merely invoking his name?”

(1 Celano 120).

Francis was a paradox in his Click here for more own day. In many ways, he on St. Francis and might not have seemed a very his work for peace. free person. His health was never terribly strong. The friars could take up a great deal of his time, and not all of them were saints!

And yet Francis was one of the freest people who ever lived. He had no front to put up, no masks behind which to hide, no image to maintain except that of a sinner open to the grace of God. Celano and other early biographers emphasize that Francis appealed to men and women of all economic and social classes.

January 2016

In Assisi on October 27, 1986, St. John Paul II urged those gathered to pray for world peace to become “artisans of peace.”

Francis of Assisi can help us to do that. Every such artisan is regularly acting for justice to improve life for everyone. That requires courage. “If only” thinking is an obstacle to peacemaking because it makes us observers instead of artisans. Peacemakers play the hand that has been dealt to them, respecting everyone else in the process.

Often we are on the cusp of deeper conversion but are reluctant to take the next step because we fear that it will be too costly, that other people may consider us foolish. After prayerful reflection, take whatever step you think God wants you to take next.

At times, people are embarrassed to be called a “peacemaker” because the person using that term may follow up with the suggestion that we are naive or idealists unprepared to live in the real world. Peacemakers act even if they know they may be criticized for doing so.

People frequently have to sacrifice an idea, behavior, or prejudice in order to create more room for God’s kingdom to grow within them.

Sacrifice at least one idea, behavior, or prejudice for the kingdom to grow in you.

Peacemaking requires inner freedom and considerable creativity. Francis demonstrated both to a high degree. Ask yourself, “Am I enjoying the freedom that God wants me to have?” If you answer no, what needs to change for you to become an “artisan of peace”? A The text above is adapted from Peace and Good: Through the Year with Francis of Assisi,

by Pat McCloskey, OFM (Franciscan Media), a book of reflections for each day of the year.

Pat McCloskey, OFM, Franciscan editor of this publication, writes its “Dear Reader” and “Ask a Franciscan” columns and edits Weekday Homily Helps.

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Crossroads Community Church in Cincinnati is currently the fastest growing megachurch in America, according to Outreach magazine. With an attendance of almost 23,000, it is the ninth largest in the country.

5 Lessons from MEGA They still are experiencing phenomenal growth.

What can Catholic parishes learn?

BY DR. BRENNAN R. HILL

20 â?˜

January 2016

N THIS AGE of ecumenism and interfaith dialogue, churches and religions are working together on social issues and learning from one another. As a Catholic theologian and parishioner, I have been able to learn a great deal from other faiths and yet remain loyal to Catholicism. One trend I think Catholic parishes could learn a lot from is megachurches.

If you haven’t heard of them, megachurches, by their very name, are large churches, many with multiple sites and attendance on any given Sunday in the thousands. A number of these churches serve 20,000 or more members. Typically, megachurches are Protestant, often evangelical, and non-

I

denominational. About 10 percent of Christian churchgoers in this country attend megachurches, the growing churches in the United States.

So what are they doing that is driving this growth? In this article, I don’t imply criticism of Catholic parishes, but I want to point to five areas parishes can benefit from megachurches that are enjoying such phenomenal growth today. The specific areas are mission statements, welcoming, worship services, multiple services and ministries, and fund-raising.

The largest of the megachurches is the Lakewood Church, led by the wellknown Pastor Joel Osteen in Houston, Texas. Currently there are about 44,000 in attendance. In Lake Forest, CaliforSt A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

CHURCHES PHOTO BY TOM UHLMAN

nia, the popular Pastor Rick Warren leads the Saddleback Church of 20,000 members. The Chicago area is home to the Willow Creek Community Church. Here, Pastor Bill Hybels serves 22,500 members.

In my own city of Cincinnati, Ohio, there is Crossroads, a church of 20,000, now with five sites, and led by a young and dynamic Pastor Brian Tome. I know most about this church because my son, Brennan John Hill, works fulltime as the director of client services, and attends there with his wife, Allie, and their new son, Grant. I have attended there several times myself, and had the pleasure of speaking with Pastor Tome for this article. Now let’s look at some of the areas where Fr anciscanMedia.org

Catholic parishes can learn from megachurches.

1

Mission Statements: Carefully Crafted and Lived

Megachurches are conscious of their history—how they got started as a community and their specific mission. With careful discernment, the leadership monitors the evolution of their church’s mission, makes appropriate adjustments when necessary, and keeps the mission ever before the staff and church members.

Bill Hybel, the founder of Willow Creek Community Church, recalls that his vision for the church started in a New Testament class when he heard

the first church described in Acts 2: 42-47. He dreamed of starting such a church where the members devoted themselves to Gospel teaching, fellowship, breaking of the bread, and prayer.

The members would be filled with awe at the many wonders performed by the apostles. They would share all their possessions and give to all those in need. Now, 40 years later, Willow Creek’s members hold up the earliest faith communities as their ideal for following Jesus as believers who serve others.

Mission statements vary, but Jesus and Gospel living seem to be at the heart of them all. Crossroads in Cincinnati wants to be “for anyone who wants to seek God—from those explorJanuary 2016 ❘

21

ing whether or not God even exists, to committed Christ-followers. We present biblical truths and show how they apply to our everyday lives. And we have fun while doing it.”

West Angeles Church of God in Christ “seeks to be a biblical ministry of excellence designed to encourage life transformation through our threefold purpose to evangelize, edify, and equip the whole person to serve the community and reach the world for Jesus Christ.”

For megachurches, these mission statements are much more than words on paper. They are the driving force behind the community, the goals which they seek to fulfill in their personal lives and ministries.

2

PHOTO © TOBEDANIEL AT ITALIAN WIKIPEDIA

Popular author and pastor Joel Osteen, along with his wife, Victoria, lead the Lakewood Church in Houston. Osteen’s extensive use of media has helped him spread his message far beyond the 43,500 who attend weekly services.

22 ❘

January 2016

Welcoming: Meet and Greet

Recently, while shopping, I met a stock boy and, during our chat, he mentioned that he attended Crossroads. When I asked him why he attended there, he said: “I want to be happy in church and free to express my love of Jesus. It makes me happy to attend Crossroads because the people there welcome me, care about me, and encourage me to reach out to others.” He said he is proud that he was able to help in the recovery after Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

When one enters a megachurch, there is usually a feeling that you are entering into an exciting and vibrant community that is glad you are there. Most people come early for the service and gather in a large area, where they enjoy coffee and conversation. It is a time to meet people whom you know and to make new acquaintances. It is time to congratulate, console, share, inquire, and chat with others.

There might be the excitement of an anniversary, a birthday, a promotion. It is a time to share concerns about a young person

being deployed, to show off a new baby, or to congratulate a teen whose team has just won an important game. Here, church is community, where compassion is extended to one who is going through a divorce or desertion by a spouse, and where hugs of concern are offered. One comes to realizes that this is what church is all about—the people of God sharing their lives, their love, and their closeness to Jesus, the Son of God. If you have brought children, they can be taken off to the area where little ones can have fun, be taught, and be cared for by a competent and trusted staff. Then, often, ushers will greet you and take you to the seat of your choice.

If you are a new face, you will be welcomed by a member and introduced to others. If you have been there awhile, your participation in the services, small group sessions in homes, local and international missions, and courses will have already connected you with many members.

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Lively Services: Exciting Music and Powerful Preaching

The worship service in the megachurch is the central event of the community.

It is lively with full participation, including gestures and manifestations of praise. Evangelicals are not shy about expressing their feelings in church, and during the services they express their worship of God and their love of Jesus—both physically and verbally.

Music is an integral part of the service, and is robust and loud. Singing is accompanied by a group of musicians and led by someone who is full-voiced. There is nothing halfhearted about congregational participation!

The words to each song are clearly visible on a screen before the congregation. The songs vary, but are mostly songs of praise and petition that express both the thoughts and feelings of the community. (Catholics have their own style of songs, and some might not feel comfortable with gospel rock and rousing acclaim.)

Preaching is central to the service in these churches. Megachurches are led by pastors who are accomplished preachers, trained and experienced in reaching people of differing backgrounds with the Gospel message. Sermons are well prepared, contain vivid stories and striking examples, and are designed to inspire and move the congregation. Usually these sermons are recorded and made available to those unable to attend or for later review.

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PHOTO © GLENN DAVIS

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trained and well paid, as well as hundreds more of active volunteers.

Some staff provide services to the internal needs of the church. There are pastors and assistant pastors, leaders who serve specific age groups in the community: children, preteens, teens, young adults, adults, and seniors.

Special events are provided for each of these groups: celebrations, socials, trips, and fun activities. Megachurches give special attention to the young, recognizing a valuable investment in the future of their ministry. Catholic parishes can learn much from their success with young and young adult members.

Some staff members attend to communication with the members, through both personal interaction and social media. Facebook, YouTube, blogs, and Twitter are employed to communicate with members, especially the young.

Specific staff members focus on the website, the finances, or human resources. Staff or volunteers attend to the many means for spiritual growth, including healing sessions, baptisms, organizing small faith groups, marriage prepa-

Music is a key component of megachurch services, such as this one at Willow Creek Community Church in Chicago. Large screens throughout the venue showcase lyrics in order to encourage participation.

Crossroads places a strong emphasis on establishing a discipling culture. Faithsharing groups, such as this one, help people continually grow in their relationship with Jesus, and to take that relationship into their homes, marriages, and neighborhoods.

PHOTO COURTESY CROSSROADS COMMUNITY CHURCH

The sermons focus on Scriptures, and apply biblical teachings to the challenges of everyday life. Relevancy is the key word here. As one woman commented to me: “It always seems like the pastor has been sitting at our breakfast table. So often he is addressing the very real everyday issues that we face in our family or in our personal lives.”

The preachers are expected to have a deep understanding and lived experience of the Gospels, and be adept at connecting the Scriptures with the everyday challenges that people face in their lives. This speaks to the very purpose of church: to help people relate to God, deepen their faith and spiritual lives, and inspire them to serve others as Jesus did.

The congregation is encouraged to become attuned to these sermons through Bible study that is provided by the church, to attend small faith group discussions, and become active in some of the many ministries offered by the church. Spiritual transformation is the overarching goal—building a closer relationship with Jesus and with all the people of God in the local community, as well as worldwide.

Those planning megachurch services recognize that variety is indeed the spice of life.

Sometimes brief dramatizations might be included, or perhaps PowerPoint visuals or a film clip. A witness from someone who has just returned from a mission trip in a developing country might be offered, or someone who has recently experienced a conversion might share his or her story.

Multiple Services and Ministries

The organizational structures of megachurches can boggle the mind.

Many of the churches have a staff of over 100 women and men, who are professionally Fr anciscanMedia.org

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are willing to give generously to make sure these services continue and expand.

PHOTO COURTESY CROSSROADS COMMUNITTY CHURCH

What Now?

Based on the belief that something unique happens when you leave familiar surroundings, Crossroads continues to invest in their ReachOut ministries, which support efforts in South Africa, India, Nicaragua, and New Orleans.

ration, and counseling. Others visit nursing homes, hospitals, or hospice, and attend to many other areas of pastoral care (e.g., groups for divorcing adults and sessions for survivors of sexual abuse). Some staff are responsible for the planning of worship services and music.

Specific staff members attend to projects outside the church: provide food for the poor and shelter to the homeless, partner with other churches to serve the elderly, support those returning from war, assist those with disabilities. Some organize retreats, while others facilitate mission trips to serve in developing countries. These megachurches take Jesus’ command to “go forth and teach all nations” very seriously.

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Fund-Raising

Leaders of megachurches are not shy about raising money. Referring to the Hebrew Bible, they point to the custom of tithing, where 10 percent of one’s possessions are given to God. From this Click the button above to hear about a thriving perspective, one’s material things are a blessing from God and a portion should be returned Catholic parish. to God. From another perspective, leaders of megachurches believe that, if their members experience pastoral care, spiritual transformation, a deepening of their faith, moving worship services, and opportunities to use their gifts Click here for more on the tal Digi as in ministry, they will be willing growth of megachurches.

Extr to contribute the funds needed to provide these services. As further incentive to give, the leaders of these churches are transparent regarding the disbursement of donations. Members experience what their church is doing for them in their Christian lives and in the lives of their children. Most 24 ❘

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Megachurches have been around for at least the last four decades in this country. They seem to be thriving and growing in their numbers: clear evidence that they have unique insights for building up the churches of the people of God. Catholic parishes can learn much from these new models of Church.

Parishes can develop specific mission statements and constantly keep these before the eyes and actions of the parishioners. Parishes can provide time and space where their members can go beyond anonymity, feel welcome, meet and greet others with their concerns, their good news and bad. Catholic communities can learn to better prepare their liturgies, incorporate more variety, or improve the music and singing. Preachers can be reminded to prepare their homilies more carefully and see to it that their preaching more directly relates to the everyday lives of the people in the pews.

With regard to multiple ministries, it is important that Catholic parishes improve their pastoral care, especially of the poor, teenagers, young adults, singles, married couples, people who can’t make it to church, those with disabilities, and the elderly.

Catholic parishes have many people with unique gifts and talents that can be better used to reach out to those in hospitals, hospice, or nursing homes. Parishes can learn from megachurches how to better organize small faith groups, Bible study, and expert sessions for married couples, the divorced and separated, and singles. More outreach can be developed for widows and widowers, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and the transgendered. Much can be learned on how to serve the needy, the poor, and the homeless, both locally and internationally.

Finally, there are things to be learned from megachurches in the area of raising the money needed to support a professional and wellpaid staff and to pay for the development of much-needed pastoral programs.

It is enlightening to realize that we all have the same goals: to imitate the life of Jesus and the early Christian communities. Thanks to megachurches for the new energy and passion with which you infuse this mission. A Dr. Brennan R. Hill is professor emeritus at Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio. His most recent books are World Religions and Contemporary Issues and The Jesus Dialogues.

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EDITORIAL

Dr. King’s ‘Dream’ for America Is it a dream realized?

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stood on a platform few people of color were given during the civil rights movement and dared to demand a life better than what they had been handed. And like a visionary with eyes affixed on the horizon, he stood on the precipice of social change and said, in a tone laden with hope, “I have a dream.”

The dream outlived the dreamer after an assassin’s bullet took his life in April 1968.

That act of violence stopped the revolutionary, but it could not halt the revolution: the march for freedom continued in King’s formidable shadow.

It marches to this day, now with Black Lives Matter (BLM), an activist movement that campaigns against violence toward African Americans. And while the group has become a lightning rod in political circles since it was founded, following Florida resident George Zimmerman’s 2013 acquittal in the Trayvon Martin case, its existence proves how important King’s work was—and how unfinished it is.

Progress through Peace Dr. King’s influence is still felt nearly 50 years after he was murdered. Pope Francis singled him out, along with Abraham Lincoln, Dorothy Day, and Thomas Merton, as a model American.

“A nation can be considered great when it . . . fosters a culture which enables people to ‘dream’ of full rights for all their brothers and sisters, as Martin Luther King sought to do,” the pope told Congress in September 2015. He was spot-on, but he neglected to mention the methods by which the civil rights leader sought freedom. Dr. King advocated for peaceful resistance, even when mobs in the Jim Crow South used violence to keep equality from taking root.

BLM employs an even stronger confrontational method to address racial issues than its civil rights—a kind of “discourse by way Fr ancisca n Media .org

of discomfort.” Activists have also resorted to “die-ins,” where protesters clog sidewalks by pretending to be dead. Political rallies, marathons, and other large-scale events have been disrupted by the group. In a July 2015 protest, for example, they chanted, “Burn everything down!” in angry unison.

Peace was not on BLM’s agenda that day.

Respect must be given to any group that defends the lives of minorities. But would King approve of BLM’s incendiary tactics?

Dream On When King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech in 1963, 250,000 people in DC stood spellbound. It’s perhaps the most important oration of the 20th century. The true punch of the speech is its inclusionary message.

King dreamed of a day when “little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.” That is a statement infused with Gospel truth: it’s what Jesus preached.

Our pope is clearly moved by the man. “That dream continues to inspire us all. I am happy that America continues to be, for many, a land of ‘dreams,’” he told Congress.

“Dreams which awaken what is deepest and truest in the life of a people.”

Has King’s dream been realized? While we’ve made strides in the last 50 years, the deaths of Michael Brown and Freddie Gray— unarmed black men who died at the hands of police—demand a closer look.

As Americans, King’s dream should be our mission. As Christians, it should be our mandate. The march to Selma never really ended. We must continue the journey until “all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and gentiles, Protestants and Catholics” stand shoulder to shoulder, looking out at the same horizon Dr. King eyed with brazen hope.

That is still a dream worth fighting for.

—C.H.

King’s dream of freedom should be our mission.

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My Parents, Third Order

Franciscans Their witness of faith provided gifts for a lifetime.

BY BRIAN DOYLE

PHOTO BY ABRAHAM SOBKOWSKI, OFM

HEN I WAS about 10 years old, my mother and father, devout Catholics who sought a deeper and more intimate spiritual experience than just their parish life, began attending meetings of the Third Order of St. Francis—one of the many tertiary clans in the Church. The first two orders consist of men and women who have sworn vows as Franciscan friars or as Poor Clares.

As regards the actual tenets of the Third Order of St. Francis, the depth and length of my parents’ commitment to it, and exactly where and how long my younger brothers and I went with my mother and father to the meetings, I have not a clue. I can guess, though,

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that simplicity and service were the watchwords of the day, what with that most admirable man Francis’ name engraved on the enterprise. But it is not the order and its long history that fascinates me this morning; it is the fact that my mom and dad, then in their 40s, working furiously to house, feed, protect, educate, and elevate their many children, would happily add two or three hours to their duties every week or two, simply to go deeper into their faith.

We would drive to some unfamiliar church or school, two or three towns away, and make our way to the basement—always it was a basement, as if returning in spirit to the catacombs in which the Christian cult began so long ago—and there we would part, our parents St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

Click here for more on the Third Order of St. Francis.

into the meeting, and us boys into the nether chambers of the unfamiliar school. Often, we would be nominally stationed in the library or a classroom, where we would wait decorously until we were sure that the meeting was up and running, at which point we would slip away to explore.

I suppose my brothers and I ranged more freely in Catholic schools on Long Island than any other boys we knew, voyaging through teachers’ break rooms, principals’ offices, janitorial storerooms, fraught haunted chapels, and even the occasional lowceilinged gymnasium, where the floors shone alluringly, and we skated hilariously and silently in our socks.

Those dusty school basements, with their ubiquitous scents of stale coffee, linoleum wax, and unknown schoolchildren; the clank and clatter of metal folding chairs, ever so slightly rusted, and never to be oiled in this life; the fat plastic smell of day-old doughnuts and the big buttery boxes in which they rattled; the beam and heft of the occasional Franciscan friar, and the wisp and grin of the occasional Franciscan nun; the hat racks on which the men hung their fedoras and Irish caps, and the coatracks on which the women carefully draped their raincoats and lovely pastel overcoats; the motley other Third Order children we studiously avoided, as we ranged about the unfamiliar school, free and independent for exactly as long as the meeting lasted. I remember this all now faintly and clearly at once, all vague and sepia and almost forgotten except for a sudden crisp detail—skating in our socks!

For many years, the sort of writer I was Fr anciscanMedia.org

tal Digi as Extr

would revel and relish in those details, tease them out, and so defeat time, reclaiming some of the existence we are so sure is lost with age.

But now the sort of writer I am is staring not at the happy footloose boys but the weary, gentle parents.

A woman and a man in their 40s, energetic members of their parish, with one small income between them, with four children in Catholic school and one more on the way, regularly surrender three hours of their weekend, so that they may more deeply explore a faith devoted to the revolutionary idea that Christ is resident in every heart; that miracles are not only possible, but prevalent and accessible; that every living being is evidence of grace; and that every being, in a real sense, is potentially a priest, standing as awed witness and celebrant of divine love loose in this world.

They took their faith so seriously, so happily, so thoroughly, so deeply—not merely as a religion, but as a compass point and lodestar— that I find I cannot take it any less seriously, not if I love and revere them, as I do.

Whenever I grow dark about my Church, and go gray at the gills about its addiction to power and greed, its corporate smirk about the lost and helpless—the very souls it was created to succor—I remember my mother and father herding us three youngest boys into the station wagon on a Sunday afternoon, when we would have rather done anything else in the world except drive two towns over to the Third Order of St. Francis meeting. Perhaps they too drove to the meeting a bit reluctantly, half-wishing they could stay home and nap, garden, watch the game, repair the storm windows, or read Ernie Pyle in the hammock; but they went.

Probably the best lessons we teach our children are not the ones in which we use words; perhaps those are the lessons the children never forget. As you see. A

Click the button above to hear an interview about one Secular Franciscan’s call to the Third Order.

Brian Doyle is the editor of Portland Magazine at the University of Portland, Oregon. His most recent book is Grace Notes, a collection of spiritual essays, published by ACTA Publications.

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This painting—“On the Eve of the Birth of Christ”

by Michael Reiser—portrays the beginning of Mary’s lifelong journey during which she constantly relied on God for strength and comfort.

Mary’s

Loneliness

She suffered great isolation, from confusion about her unique call to the deaths of those closest to her. Yet her trust in God was rewarded.

B Y J I M V A N V U R S T, O F M

ARY OF NAZARETH, the mother of Jesus, has from the earliest Christian tradition been given a preeminence of place and status in our faith, far beyond any other person in history. She gave God’s son flesh and blood, and no one was closer to the Savior. In preparation for that unique role, God preserved her from original sin and from all personal sin.

Unfortunately, because of her special status and role, through the centuries Mary has also often been removed in the eyes of many writers and artists from our world and the experiences every person has in life. That is one reason why, in 1964, the Second Vatican Council wrote the following statement: The “Church strongly urges that theologians and preachers of the word of God be careful to refrain as much as possible from all false exaggeration as from too summary an attitude in considering the special dignity of the Mother of God.” In other words, it is totally appropriate that we understand and embrace Mary as a real human being who lived in Palestine in the early years of the first century. Granted, we may not have many detailed historical incidents described in the Gospels of Mary’s life, but there is no doubt that those moments actually took place. Her pregnancy with Jesus put her in a situation, i.e., pregnant with no reasonable explanation for her parents or Joseph, that was in fact life-threatening. And she experienced that situation and others with

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PHOTO BY DOROTHEUM/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

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the anxiety and fear any human being would.

Great faith and trust do not temper powerful and painful emotions. They did not to Jesus on the cross; nor would they with Mary. She experienced life as you and I experience it.

Actually, what is true is that her very personal sinlessness gave her a deep sense of what sin and evil are. It only caused her moments of suffering to be intense to a point we cannot fully grasp. If you want to ask what sin is, don’t ask an evil person. The one who knows sin is the one who is in a deep and loving relationship with God, and one who suffers from the evil of others.

The idea that Mary was never tempted is trumped by the simple fact that Satan tempted Jesus himself. For Satan, Mary would have been a real prize. So, understanding Mary’s own humanity, as perfect as it is, consider what would be one of the most painful experiences she or anyone could have. I suspect it was those moments of deep loneliness that she suffered during her earthly journey. There are five occasions, none of them brief, that the Gospels allude to.

An Unexpected Pregnancy The Gospels lay the foundation for the first painful experience of aloneness and isolation for Mary. She was the daughter of Anna and Joachim (as tradition relates) and engaged to Joseph, though not yet fully married to him, and so they were not living together. Mary was a young teenage girl, perhaps 14 years January 2016 ❘

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Though we don’t hear much about the relationship between Mary and Joseph, his death certainly left a profound void in Mary’s life.

THE DEATH OF ST. JOSEPH BY GIOACCHINO ASSERETO/ WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

old. It was normal in that time for a young girl, once able to bear children, to be married.

At some moment prior to the marriage, in a response to God’s grace, Mary gave herself to God and, in effect, said, “Whatever you want, Lord, and I’m your maidservant.” In that moment, Mary became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit and became not just the mother of Jesus of Nazareth. Mary’s pregnancy immediately catapulted her whole life into confusion, conflict, and indeed mortal danger (Mt 1:18ff).

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The beautiful film The Nativity Story portrays exactly what Mary faced. She had no answer that would make sense to her shocked parents or to Joseph. Her parents seek an answer: Was she ravished by a Roman soldier? This would not have been unheard-of, because of the Roman oppressors. Mary denies that and any other suggestion with the only answer she has: “I broke no law.”

But nothing anyone can come up with solves the problem. She was pregnant, and there is only one way you become pregnant.

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Joseph is overwhelmed with hurt and disappointment by what he sees. He can only conclude that now it is impossible for him to marry her. In fact, by law he would have to divorce her. And, if that happened, Mary would have been in mortal danger since obviously she could never hide the pregnancy.

As a result, Mary would have become isolated from the three people she loved more than any other in the world—her parents and her intended spouse. To describe her as feeling lonely and confused hardly would describe the emotional turmoil raging inside her. The Gospel reveals that eventually Joseph was told in a dream not to fear taking Mary as his wife.

So he did. But we don’t know how many hours or days Mary was totally alone with herself, without fully understanding she was carrying the savior of the world.

Life as a Widow There is a second time of intense loneliness that Mary experienced. Though it is not specifically noted in the Gospels, we know it happened. It was the death of her beloved husband, Joseph. Jesus began his public ministry around the age of 30 or so. It is significant we never hear of the presence of Joseph after Jesus begins his public life, since ancient tradition has Joseph dying some years before.

The relationship of Mary and Joseph must have been something very special indeed— very human in their deep love for one another.

Though our tradition has always been that they lived as brother and sister, in no way would it lessen their love or their tenderness and care for one another. Joseph was the protector of her and Jesus, as he grew up.

We know that the closer two people are, the more difficult the pain and loss when they are separated by death. Mary became a widow.

Even with Jesus still present in her life, that marital bond had ended. Any widow would know what that experience is like.

I remember when my father died suddenly of a heart attack. My mother and I were quietly sorting some of his belongings and she stopped for a moment and, in a soft voice, said, “Now what do I do?” Why would Mary not have the same kind of thought and experience the emotions that any loving widow would experience?

Letting Go As I noted, at the age of 28 or so, Jesus was called by the Spirit to begin his ministry. Nothing would or could hold him back from what Fr anciscanMedia.org

he sensed God was pulling him to. We often imagine that, because of Mary’s role, she knew something of what was going on in Jesus’ life.

Luke hints of it when Jesus, at age 12, remained in Jerusalem at the Passover feast (2:41ff). She and Jesus almost certainly talked about his future, even as Jesus’ call was still developing and becoming clearer. We don’t know how this all happened, but there came that moment when Jesus knew it was his time. It would likely have come upon his hearing of the work and words of the powerful new prophet, John the Baptist. Jesus was led by the Spirit to John Click here for more on the Baptist, who then realized Mary, the mother of God. Jesus was the promised one the prophets had foretold.

Even if Mary had some understanding that this was what Jesus was called to, that fact would in no way ease the pain of separation as she saw Jesus disappear in the distance, leaving her now alone in Nazareth. We know from our own experience that just knowing the will of God and following it in no way makes that human experience easy, especially when it calls for separation from loved ones.

There was no question of Jesus abandoning his mother. There were other relatives of some degree who would provide for her. But still, she was now separated from those closest to her because of Joseph’s death and Jesus’ departure. Ask any mother who kisses her son goodbye as he goes off to war. She will have some understanding of what Mary felt in that moment when Jesus turned and headed toward his future. There had to be tears in her eyes and a deep sense of aloneness and worry for Jesus.

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On the Sidelines Surprisingly, the Gospel recounts the events following Jesus’ baptism by John in the Jordan, his 40-day preparation in the desert, and his first battle with Satan. Luke (4:16-30) points out that soon afterward, Jesus, filled with the Spirit, “returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news of him spread throughout the whole region. He taught . . . and was praised by all” (4:14-15).

Next, Luke describes Jesus’ return to Nazareth, “where he had grown up.” We can imagine what the sight of Jesus must have done to Mary’s heart when word got to her that he was coming in the distance. Talk about a homecoming! No words could describe that moment. What did they talk about? What did January 2016 ❘

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OUR LADY OF SORROWS BY ANDREA SOLARI/ WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

With the death of Jesus, Mary endured a mother’s worst nightmare— the loss of a child.

Jesus share with her? But, almost immediately, there is a dark and foreboding cloud that comes over Jesus and Mary, too.

Jesus’ first preaching in the little synagogue of Nazareth, following his reading from the prophet Isaiah, was initially received with wonderment on the part of his friends and neighbors.

But they see that there is something different about Jesus. “Isn’t this the son of Joseph?” (Lk 4:22).

But when Jesus begins to speak that the truth of God’s love is for all people,

including even gentiles in the Old Testament such as the widow of Zarephath and Syrian General Naaman, everything changes. In an instant, the townspeople are stunned and shocked

by Jesus’ assertion. How dare a Jew speak of God’s love for the gentiles?

They rise up and attempt to kill him.

Jesus is able to escape and leave Nazareth, never to return (Lk 4:29).

But now, as a result of the town’s criticism and rejection of Jesus’ words, try to imagine what Mary’s status would have become among her own

So that his work might continue...

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neighbors. From that time on, Mary’s life in Nazareth must have been terribly uncomfortable. Was there sniping and criticism of her, implying that there was something wrong with Jesus and all the changes in him? Who did he think he was? What was it like for her to meet the women at the well each day and overhear their gossip and snide remarks? What had happened to her son?

But it would get worse. As Jesus moved through his public ministry, it became very plain that what his preaching and teaching were doing was turning the Pharisees and scribes against him. Rumors that “he’s a lawbreaker and a blasphemer” would reach Nazareth. Even more, the powerful high priests were getting critical word about Jesus. They were sending representatives to check him out and test him. What they were finding drove them in time to plot against Jesus.

Word had to get back to Nazareth where everyone knew Jesus was from.

Such accusations were giving the people of Nazareth a bad name. “Don’t you people in Nazareth know how to St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

control your own people?”

How many sleepless nights would Mary have experienced? We know that faith itself is not a sedative against suffering and hurt. Who could she turn to?

A Mother’s Despair Finally we come to the moment of Mary’s deepest suffering in her whole life—witnessing the terrifying death of her son on the cross (Jn 19:25 and Mt 27:55). John mentions that Mary was at the foot of the cross. Matthew’s account is probably more historically accurate, as Mary and other holy women disciples of Jesus “watched from a distance.”

Any crucifixion was a horrible event to witness. For Roman soldiers hardened by their brutal experiences, it was simply business to be taken care of as proficiently as possible. The last thing they would allow would be hysterical and emotionally distraught relatives and friends of the victim getting in the way of their gruesome task.

Regardless, there is no question Mary witnessed the death of her son.

Granted, the women were supporting her, especially Mary Magdalene, but no one could possibly touch the inner pain and devastation of that scene and Mary’s sense of total helplessness. Of all those moments of loneliness up till then, this would have been the most devastating and heartbreaking of Mary’s whole life.

To make matters even worse, it would have been the time when Satan himself, who was already tempting Jesus as he hung helpless on the cross, would besiege Mary with the most horrible thoughts. “So, this is the reward for your gift of yourself to God. What a failure your son turned out to be.

What kind of a mother were you, anyway? Why didn’t you stop him when you had time? Doing God’s will? Nonsense!”

Early Church tradition describes the next time she would touch her only son would be when they took Jesus’ dead body down from the cross and laid him in her arms. No words can describe that moment for her. Now, alone, she would continue her earthly Fr anciscanMedia.org

journey cared for by Jesus’ apostles and especially by the “disciple whom Jesus loved” (Jn 19:26-27).

A Greater Understanding There is one final moment to understand. Many people wonder why none of the Gospels describe a scene where the risen Jesus appears to Mary. After all, Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene first, numerous times to his apostles, and even to large groups of people.

But there is nothing about an appearance to Mary.

The reason for this omission must not be understood as a kind of neglect of Jesus’ mother or his love for her.

Remember, the Gospels were written for all those who did not realize just who Jesus was and what his death meant. For them, Jesus’ resurrection was proof of who he truly was. But Mary is not considered to be among that group of people who needed an appearance. Jesus’ mother knew he had arisen long before his appearance to others and we can assume that she, the woman of faith, would have seen him first of all.

The experience of Mary and her times of loneliness that arose from the circumstances of her life as the mother of Jesus is a reminder that Mary’s life was real and truly human. She knew what it meant to be isolated; to fear; to experience terrible anxiety, loneliness, and hurt. For all her sinlessness, Mary’s life was filled with the faithdemanding events just mentioned.

There likely were many more. It is for those moments in her life that Pope Paul VI wrote, “She is worthy of imitation because she was the first and the most perfect of Christ’s disciples.”

We begin to realize what her “Yes, Lord” really meant. She knew the human experience more than we can describe. She was the best gift Jesus could give just before his last breath when he told us all: “Behold, your mother” (Jn 19:27). A Jim Van Vurst, OFM, has been a Franciscan friar for 62 years and a priest for 54 years. He is the assistant pastor at St. Clement Parish in Cincinnati and is a contributor to Franciscan Media’s free enewsletter A Friar’s E-spirations.

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CONTACT US 1 - 800 - 461 - 3064 annuity@uscsvd.org www.annuitysvd.org Divine Word Gift Annuity (SVD Funds, Inc.) PO Box 6067 1985 Waukegan Road Techny, IL 60082-6067 January 2016 ❘

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The Legend of

Pope Joan Though she never existed, the myth persists for a reason.

BY CHRISTOPHER M. BELLITTO

AS THERE REALLY a pope named Joan? The historical evidence says no—that the story is just a myth. But the history behind this particular myth can teach us a great deal about Church history done well or poorly. At the same time, the tale of Pope Joan demonstrates why myths matter.

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The Story of la Popessa Several versions of la popessa (or “the popess”) story exist, but the most common tells of a ninth-century girl of great intellect and devotion who decided that she wanted to learn more about her faith. Since girls were largely excluded from studying, she dressed like a boy and adopted the name Johannes, which comes out as John, Joan, or Johanna in other versions. She may have been English, as we findher with last names such as Anglicus or Anglicanus. One version has her living with English parents in Germany under

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Click here for more on Pope Joan and papal history.

the names Jutta, Agnes, Anna, or Gilberta. Apparently, she later followed a lover from Mainz to Athens to Rome.

Disguised as a monk or scribe, Joan’s smarts brought her attention, and she 34 ❘

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quickly rose through the clerical ranks, all the way up to cardinal. Eventually, according to the myth, she was elected pope, but was discovered to be a woman when she gave birth while riding a horse down a particular street in Rome. In a brutal conclusion to the tale, the crowd—alarmed and enraged, shocked and surprised—pulled her from the horse and killed her and the child. Some of the tales add horrid details such as being tied to her horse’s tail and paraded around Rome before being stoned to death.

Pope Joan, Debunked Historians deal with facts, not fable.

To do so, we examine sources, but we don’t always take them at face value.

We ask: Who was writing something?

When were they writing? For what audience? Once we start to pull on the story of Joan, the tale unravels.

The first time that Joan appears is in the middle of the 13th century, when a Dominican friar named Jean de Mailly offers a German version in his Universal Chronicle of Metz. There, he places the story more than 150 years earlier, stating a legend that Pope Victor III was succeeded in 1087 by a woman disguised as a man.

Others tell a similar tale starting about a decade after de Mailly, but they place it way back in the early 900s or move it forward into the early 1100s.

In his Chronicle of Popes and Emperors, a Dominican named Martin of Troppau placed John/Joan even farther back in time. When Leo IV died in 855, la

popessa (referred to as John Anglicus) reigned for about two and a half years.

Clearly we have here far too wide a range of dates to be authentic.

If we look closely, we immediately find several issues. In the first account, the one by de Mailly, we discover that he wrote the words “confirm” and “to be verified” in the margins. That is, it looked as if he was recording a myth and reminding himself to delve deeper later, though if he did, we don’t have the result of his investigation. (Think of the times we hear “there are unconfirmed reports that . . .” on the news that turn out to be nothing more than rumor.)

Next, in other reliable accounts where historians have been able to check details, there simply is no place in the chronological record for Joan in 855 or 1087. Many of these sources, like that of de Mailly, use phrases like “it is reported” or “it is said.”

Some say Joan was erased from history by men who didn’t want her story told. Historians call this an argument ex silentio (“from silence”): that is, we can’t say something didn’t happen because we don’t have evidence that it didn’t. That’s a lot of double and triple negatives; it’s also not how historians work.

Where we don’t have full evidence, we go as far as the evidence can take us and then perhaps we judge as to what was or wasn’t likely, given the evidence. When you consider all the real evidence about Joan, she just doesn’t add up.

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

ILLUSTRATION BY SARA TYSON

A French Protestant named David Blondel was the first person to debunk the Pope Joan myth. Working in a modern scientific way when it came to analyzing manuscripts, he looked closely at the sources and discovered that the myth simply didn’t fit the facts. He had no axe to grind; he just stuck to the evidence and found that there was no reliable data.

Why the Myth Matters So why does the myth of Joan persist?

Partially it’s because people love a good Fr anciscanMedia.org

story. People might also want a myth to be true to serve their own purposes. Some stories, although they are myths, become so rooted in a popular belief or urban legend that people believe they truly happened.There is even a genre for this called “mythistory” (a portmanteau of myth and history). An American version is George Washington chopping down the cherry tree and being unable to lie to his father about it.

One of the finest scholars of Pope Joan, a Frenchman named Alain Bour-

eau, called Joan a “symbolic object.”

Many commentators say that our opinions about the papacy are a Rorschach test. We might think of Pope Joan in the same way. What we think about the myth of Pope Joan tells people as much about ourselves and our agendas as it does about la popessa. A Christopher M. Bellitto, PhD, is associate professor of history at Kean University in Union, New Jersey.

His books include 101 Questions and Answers on Popes and the Papacy and Renewing Christianity (Paulist Press).

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Paul Elie’s Passion for

Stories Hear the story of the man behind the American Pilgrimage Project.

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F A VISITOR didn’t spot a writer’s lair behind a curtain in an apartment . . . if the president of a major Catholic university didn’t listen to the radio . . . if an upstate New York boy didn’t grow up to become a book editor, maybe thousands of stories of love, faith, sorrow, and loss would never have been told. But those ifs did happen, and the result is the American Pilgrimage Project (APP), overseen by writer Paul Elie.

The phrase “once upon a time” would make a great motto for Elie. As head of the APP, based at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, he has made it his mission to preserve as many stories of ordinary people as he can.

Through the project, they have the opportunity to tell their personal stories, which are recorded and preserved for all time. The title of his effort reflects Elie’s appreciation of stories as part of each person’s unique pilgrimage. In one of his books, he laid down his understanding of a pilgrimage as “a journey undertaken in the light of a story. A great event has happened; the pilgrim hears the reports and goes in search of the evidence, aspiring to be an eyewitness. The pilgrim seeks . . . to be changed by the experience.”

Expanding on that notion, Elie tells St. Anthony Messenger that his wish is “to follow the path others have taken. We’re not trailblazers. We follow a path that’s already been trodden by others to a place where something significant has happened. You’ve heard about

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[something] happening. You go there in a group, and your wish is to see the place with your own eyes. You’re not trying to replicate somebody else’s experience; you’re after your own experiences. You hope you will be changed by the encounter.”

Elie honed his keen interest in the significance of pilgrimages while writing his 2004 book, The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American Pilgrimage. It focuses on four American Catholics who influenced the 20th century: activist Dorothy Day, authors Walker Percy and Flannery O’Connor, and Trappist monk Thomas Merton.

Ironically, given his fascination with stories, Elie did not grow up in a home filled with raconteurs. On the contrary, he says, “Ours wasn’t a storytelling family.” That’s counterintuitive because the Elie household had plenty of seeds that could have blossomed into memorable tales.

Once upon a Childhood Recalling his youth in Latham, New York, a suburb of Albany, Elie says, “My father was a Catholic seminarian. My mother met him through her brother, who traveled to and from the seminary with my father.” The Elies also had relatives in France, and his granduncle was the bishop of Burlington, Vermont, who occasionally celebrated Mass in Latham. “That was very special,” Elie recalls. “From him, we knew we were part of a larger Catholic story that includes our parents’ generation, the genSt A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

PHOTO COURTESY GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY; MICROPHONE ART FROM INGIMAGE

BY JAMES BREIG

PHOTO COURTESY GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Participating in a lecture series at Georgetown University, US National Book Award winner Alice McDermott shares with Paul Elie how her Catholic faith influences her work as a novelist.

eration prior, and relatives in other countries.”

While those topics could have triggered all sorts of tales for dinner-table chatter, Elie says that he “came to sense the power of narrative more as a writer than a teller of stories.” In high school, he desired to become a writer, but wasn’t sure what kind: a novelist? a reporter? a poet? “It took a few years to figure out that I have an attraction for narrative and know how to do it,” he says. “By the time I started writing seriously, I had read thousands of novels and stories.”

Much of that reading occurred during his college years at Fordham University; even more took place during his time as an editor at the Manhattan publishing firm of Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG). While poring over manuscripts, Elie detected how “certain decisions taken by the writer made the story more compelling. I learned certain tricks on the job and applied them to my story about the four Catholic writers.” Merton, Day, O’Connor, and Percy—the latter two FSG clients—“had their own personal stories,” Elie continues, “and I had the instinctive sense that they were part of a larger story.

“But what does that mean? How is it that people are parts of one another’s stories? I then came up with a sense of what a pilgrimage is. That word figures into the work of those four writers in significant ways.”

Meditating on that observation, Elie came up with his notion of relating the individual life stories of the quartet “as part of a single pilgrimage. They’re pilgrims on the same journey, but not taking part in the same story, a story that through their work now includes 38 ❘

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us. That gave me a very strong sense of what story is and the religious dimension of story that I hadn’t had when I set out to write the book.”

Behind the Curtain In 2012, the linkage he saw between pilgrimages and stories took a new turn with the birth of the American Pilgrimage Project. Through it, Elie seeks out “stories of how we communicate our interior lives, stories that have social dimensions when we tell others about it, stories that belong to a narrative time before our birth and extend out beyond our deaths, stories that join us to people of other cultures.”

Two people played major roles in bringing his dream to reality. First, he met with Dave Isay, a winner of a MacArthur “genius award” and creator of StoryCorps, an effort to collect oral histories, all of which are stored at the Library of Congress and some of which are regularly aired on National Public Radio. Over a decade, StoryCorps has gathered tens of thousands of stories from ordinary people. “It has been a really effective model for how to elicit people’s best stories,” Elie says. “Two people who know each other go together to wherever the stories are gathered and talk to each other in a conversation that takes about 45 minutes.”

“Paul is an extraordinary man,” Isay says.

“I really admire him. I met him through my wife,” whose book Elie had edited. On a visit to Elie’s small apartment, Isay detected something telling. “I remember seeing a little curtained-off part that he worked in,” Isay says.

“It was almost monastic. He would work all St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

PHOTO COURTESY GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Fr anciscanMedia.org

PHOTO BY BY GEORGE HERRICK

day at FSG and stay up all night writing.” Isay sensed in Elie a “dedication and spirit and gentleness that’s almost otherworldly. He’s such a moral, smart, thoughtful, hardworking person.” As a result, Isay remarks, the decision to connect Elie to his StoryCorps work was “a no-brainer.”

A second figure whose action solidified the American Pilgrimage Project is John DeGioia, president of Georgetown University, where Elie was overseeing a lecture series. When Elie, Isay, and DeGioia got together, the latter two invited Elie to merge his work with StoryCorps and establish a base at the university. That led Elie and his younger sister to take part in a StoryCorps session to learn how it works.

The result was profound, he says. “We had a conversation that we had never really had before of what we believe and what we think of each other’s beliefs.” His eyes welled up as he listened to her. That’s a response that often happens at the sessions, which “lead people to greater candor,” he says, because they “try to really touch bottom and tell stories of who they are.”

Isay defines his StoryCorps technique as “a conversation between two people where the microphone gives you the license to talk about things you might not normally talk about. It gives people a chance to have a meaningful conversation. There’s a sense of safety and comfort in the way we hold these interviews.”

When the dialogue is done, he continues, the participants “can sign a release or not for it to go to the Library of Congress. If you don’t sign, we erase the fact that you have been in the booth.”

Isay had guessed, when the project started, that the compliance rate would be “maybe 70 percent.” But his estimate was off. He says that “99.9 percent of the people sign the release. Clearly, people feel a need to leave a record to speak their truth. It’s very intimate.

It’s an act of generosity and love.”

Stories of Light and Darkness While Elie’s American Pilgrimage Project, led by a Catholic and located on a Catholic campus, is open to people of all faiths or none at all, Isay, who is Jewish, senses a religious side even in his own StoryCorps. “There’s a real strain of Catholicism running through it,” he observes. “I feel like there’s an incredible spiritual alignment. I spend a lot of time going to schools to lecture about StoryCorps. At one point, I said [to colleagues] I was going only to Catholic colleges because they were the only ones where the students were actually thinking about this seriously. There are a lot of points of connection between the work

(Top) Elie moderates a panel at the Faith, Culture, and Common Good conference held in Georgetown University, which included authors Ayana Mathis, Alan Lightman, Alice McDermott, and poet Robert Pinsky.

(Above) Participants in Elie’s StoryCorps sessions often explore serious or painful memories in their conversations with him.

Yervant Kutchukan, a chaplain from the Albany Medical Center, speaks with Elie about ministering to the parents of children with incurable diseases.

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story of a difficult moment. In the Christian tradition, people are encouraged to testify in an affirming way. That’s not what this project is about. This isn’t inspirational in a simple sense. It’s a documentary project.”

As a result of his encouragement, “people have told some pretty tough stories along the way,” he reveals. “One of the partnerships was a laicized priest who had committed sexual abuse in the ’60s and a woman who had been sexually abused about the same time. They now work together to reconcile people in a community that’s riven by controversy over sexual abuse. That’s pretty dark stuff. There’s no easy way to deal with that material.”

What Really Matters Pilgrimage, for Elie, is “a journey undertaken in the light of a story.” In an unforgettable moment from Elie’s own story, Pope Francis greets him at the Vatican in March 2015.

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we’re doing and Catholicism.” He adds that “a lot of people have compared [the process] to a confessional booth” and notes, “There’s something almost sacred [about it] to some people.”

Certainly, there’s something alluring about it. Having overseen many American Pilgrimage Project events in several locations, Elie says that “sometimes, people show up so eager and so prepared that they end up telling their stories to the people who are there just to greet them before the microphone goes on. People know what a significant occasion it is.”

After their conversations, Elie has seen people exit with a “sense of discovery. Everybody goes in knowing just what they’re going to say, but conversations go to unexpected places.

Most people come out surprised. ‘I wound up telling people a story I never told before’— that’s what I hear. Some of them also are really glad that the project has an archival aspect.

People take great satisfaction in knowing that the story they told is going to be part of the permanent public record of this country.”

While it’s tempting for stoClick here to learn rytellers to share only positive more about the American or happy events, both Isay and Pilgrimage Project.

Elie hope people will consider speaking about dark events, as well. Many times, Isay says, “people talk about incredibly difficult and sad things” during their sessions.

“Typically, we have people talking about the great themes of human existence: love, death, birth. People often talk about very serious and painful things.”

Elie notes, “I wrote a series of questions as prompts” for people coming to APP sessions.

“One of them invited people to search for a

January 2016

As he presses on with his career of fostering both conversations and the written word, Elie admits he is “disconcerted” at how much time people, including his son, spend “staring at their phone.” But he has not despaired. “When I was in college,” he points out, “the concern was that we would become preoccupied by video, and the words in the textbooks wouldn’t mean anything to people. Something very different happened. In an unexpected way, young people are very focused on the texts they read digitally.” He says that the hundreds of words his son reads each day are “a real surprise.”

Elie also tempers his worry about the decline in reading and personal conversation by refusing to go by statistics alone. “The whole wisdom of the Catholic tradition is to avoid measuring things by numbers and size,” he says, citing the parable of the mustard seed and quoting Jesus’ words, “Wherever two or three are gathered . . .” (Mt 18:20).

Elie asks, “Does it really matter if a million and a half people go to see Pope Francis in Philadelphia? It’s the same Mass as when [a priest offered it] at Fordham for half a dozen of us sitting Indian-style on the floor. To go by the numbers is to really miss the point of Christianity. I was one of two students in the Aquinas class I took at Fordham, but it reached me. It was very consequential for my life; it really mattered.”

People who take part in the American Pilgrimage Project might utter that same final sentence. A James Breig is a frequent contributor to this publication.

His most recent article was an interview with Sir Gilbert Levine in the July 2015 issue. He is also the author of Searching for Sgt. Bailey: Saluting an Ordinary Solider of World War II. St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o r g

POETRY

Cousy, the Poem

The Eternal Measure

Slim as a trout, quick as a snakebite, dribbling dead-steady, dexterously down court, pitching a pass behind his back, angling, hooking, bending space like a physicist, escaping a thicket of defenders, finding the hands of a teammate for a game-winner: a Utopian experience, the locus lying somewhere between the body and soul, or even more in their fusion.

This strong, sweet life eternal, By which we measure and praise our God Beyond pale fires of earthly delight, Passion, regret, and loss Realities distant are more convincing Than truths which hover close at hand Delivered from the courts of heaven’s praise, Love beyond all earthly answers, And joy to measure out our days

—B.G. Kelley

No Birds in Sight No birds in sight Just sounds The click of a cardinal The raucous chorus of crows A finch’s squeaky solo A blue jay’s strong bass Winged singers’ Mixed choral tones No birds in sight Just sounds Hidden birdsong Choruses.

—Paul Flodquist

All One Slowly, windows lighten, and alone, I feel less so, as if morning were an old friend long dead come round again, his arms full, standing outside my door with coffee and warm bread, tapping at my door with his shoe, all I need do is let him in.

—Jim Littwin

Divine Sparks!

First man, then woman, made in the image of God: Sparks of the Divine!

—Jeanette Martino Land

—Eileen Sullivan

Fr ancisca n Media .org

January 2016 ❘ 41

AT HOME ON EARTH

❘ BY KYLE KRAMER

Does the Earth Have Cancer?

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But I don’t like that the way we treat and talk about cancer is rooted in violence: “fighting” it, “beating” it, and winning the “war” on it. If humans have indeed become something Be Part like a planetary cancer, as opposed to the Earth’s benefiof the Healing cial caretakers whom Pope Francis asks us to be, will we Ask your electric utility get the same kind of violent provider if it provides treatment? options for purchasing It’s certainly possible. renewable energy.

Mother Nature tends to show little mercy to any species Have your car tires filled that won’t follow her basic with nitrogen, not air. ecological laws. But as a Your tires will stay properly species, we humans have a inflated without monthly great advantage that could pressure checks. help us avoid such a fate.

We can think and act conPope Francis asks us to wear sciously; we don’t need to be warmer winter clothing beaten. We can choose, collecso we can keep our houses tively, to stop destroying the cooler. Can you bump your Earth—and with it, ourselves. thermostat down a degree If we do, I think it would or two this month? help heal more than just our planet. I know that Mom’s cancer has helped draw our family closer, keep our squabbles in perspective, and savor the preciousness of the time we have with her—however long that may be. Maybe something similar could happen on a global scale, too, as the human family finds ways to reverse our destructiveness. Maybe we’ll find more joy, more authenticity, and more appreciation for Creation, the Creator, and each other. Then maybe we will be healed, too. A

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Kyle Kramer is the executive director of the Passionist Earth and Spirit Center in Louisville, Kentucky.

How many examples of our mistreatment of the Earth are necessary before we realize the need for change?

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Click here for more ways to help heal the earth. Click the button on the right to hear an interview with Kyle.

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

PHOTO © INGIMAGE

CNS PHOTO/JEFF TUTTLE, REUTERS

y 71-year-old mom has stage IV non-Hodgkins lymphoma, and she is currently undergoing an aggressive chemotherapy regimen. Cancer has been a painful, difficult journey, both for her and for all of us who love her.

In my environmental work, I’ve come across the idea that human beings, as a species, have become something like a global-scale cancer. I never agreed with this line of thought—and still don’t—but with cancer such a real and present concern in my family’s life right now, I find myself pondering it once again.

It’s a hard idea to dismiss; the personal and planetary parallels are very strong.

Mom’s cancer is her own body turning on itself with uncontrolled cell growth. In his new encyclical, “Laudato Si’,” Pope Francis observes that we humans are an integral part of the Earth (we’re of the Earth, not just on it), yet our influence seems to be growing with no limit—at the expense of other species and all of the planet’s interrelated ecosystems. That sounds a lot like cancer to me.

More than anything, I want my mom’s harsh chemo treatments to do their job well.

Celebrate the Year of Mercy with Pope Francis Pope Francis has called mercy “the Lord’s most powerful message.” Published in partnership with the Vatican, A Year of Mercy celebrates the Jubilee year of 2016 with a collection of his most moving words on the subject of mercy.

These short passages reflect the pope’s warm, accessible style and powerfully convey the message of God’s love and his infinite capacity for forgiveness. Pope Francis addresses not only God’s mercy for his people, but also our own call to be merciful to our fellow sinners.

This inspiring collection is sure to renew and reaffirm your own trust in God’s infinite mercy.

“I have decided to announce an Extraordinary Jubilee which has at its center the mercy of God. It will be a Holy Year of Mercy. We want to live in the light of the word of the Lord: ‘Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful’ (cf. Lk 6:36).”

—Pope Francis, from his announcement of 2016 as a Holy Year of Mercy Softcover | 176 pages | $15.99 ISBN 978-1-63253-082-0

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My Father’s

Memorial Mass Hope can be found in the midst of a blizzard.

F I C T I O N B Y J O S E P H C A R LT O N P O R T E R

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E WERE NOT A PROMINENT or well-to-do family.

After my father’s death, we lived frugally and feasted only on dreams and my mother’s infinite hope. We were Catholic, and every year my mother had a

memorial Mass said for my father on the anniversary of his death.

One anniversary Mass is fixed in my memory. On the night before

the Mass, the mercury dropped to 15 degrees, and an early winter storm blew in. It snowed all night, and when my mother woke us at 5:30 a.m. for the 6:45 Mass, it was still snowing.

In a flutter, she rushed into my bedroom and flicked on the light.

“Michael, wake up! We have to hurry.” She then rushed into my little brother’s room.

“Jim, wake up! Jim, darling, it’s time for Mass.”

Half asleep, my 8-year-old brother groaned, “Do I have to?”

“Oh, yes, darling, it’s Daddy’s Mass.”

My mother brought us each a glass of orange juice. As I took off my pajamas and put on my corduroy pants, shirt, and sweater, she helped ILLUSTRATION © TIM ZELTNER/i2iART.COM

Jim, who was called Painter by everyone except my mother.

“Pull your pants on over your long johns,” she said. “It’s very cold . . . Michael, are you dressed?”

“Almost. What’s the big hurry?”

“You’ll have to shovel. I’m going out to warm up the car,” she said.

Downstairs, as we were pulling on our sturdy, rubber-soled pac boots, my mother burst in and stomped her fur boots in the foyer. Her gray January 2016 ❘ 45

cashmere coat was covered with snow.

She was frantic.

“The car won’t start, Michael! What should I do? Call AAA?” My older brother, Mark, was a sophomore at Georgetown University.

I was a senior in high school, and Painter was a third grader. With Mark away, I liked it when my mother depended on me.

“No sweat, Mom. I’ll get that baby started,” I proudly said, as I wrapped my scarf, pulled on my navy wool duffle coat, and tugged on my toboggan knit hat.

“The city plows haven’t been through,” she said with some alarm.

Painter slurped down his orange juice. “I’ll shovel,” he said as he pulled on his mittens.

“Yes, darling, we’ll all have to,” my mother replied.

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utside, everything was a swirl of white. The frigid wind howled and whipped snow in our faces. Yesterday only an inch of snow covered the ground; now there was a fresh foot. I noticed that my mother had used the kitchen broom to sweep off mounds of snow piled on the hood and top of the Plymouth.

“Holy cow!” Painter shouted. “I can go sledding!”

I got in the car and turned the ignition key, but it wouldn’t start. I smelled gasoline. “It’s flooded,” I said. “We’ll let it sit a few minutes.”

The streetlight in front of the Eicholzers’ house cast an amber glow as I began shoveling the driveway in the early morning darkness. After a

ANSWERS TO PETE AND REPEAT 1. Snow has piled up in front of the tree.

2. The puppy has slid back on the sled.

3. A snowdrift has formed behind the house.

4. The collar on Pete’s jacket is showing.

5. There is a window on the house.

6. A branch is missing from the tree.

7. The cord on the sled is longer.

8. Pete’s right boot has sunk deeper into the snow.

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few minutes, I stopped to catch my breath and looked around. I couldn’t see more than 20 feet in front of me, and I suddenly realized: this is impossible. Even if the car started and we got out of the driveway, the unplowed streets were impassable. Before Thanksgiving, my mother had the snow tires put on, but they wouldn’t get us through this.

Breathless from shoveling, my mother said, “Try it again, Michael.

We don’t want to be late.”

Late? I felt awful for my mother. She placed so much importance on this Mass, but I wanted her to come to the conclusion herself: we weren’t going to make it to Mass.

“Mom, I don’t know how we’re going to get there.”

Surprised, my mother stopped shoveling. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“The snow, Mom; look at it. The roads aren’t plowed.”

Undaunted, my mother acted as if she hadn’t heard me and said, “Try it.

It’ll start.” Annoyed, I got behind the wheel and tried again.

“Give it the gas!” Painter yelled.

“Shut up!” I shot back.

The starter clicked and the engine whirred sickly.

“Mom, it won’t start. What are we going to do?”

Her answer was maddening. “Everyone say a prayer.” Painter prayed loudly as if God was hard of hearing.

“Our Father! Who art in heaven. . . .”

“Mom, shut him up. He’s going to wake the neighbors,” I said. I tried the ignition again. Not only did it not start, but the battery was getting weaker.

“Mom, I hate to say it, but it’s useless. Even if it does start, look, the snow’s up to the bumper.”

“Michael, we’re not missing your father’s Mass.”

Angry, I sat there listening to my mother and brother pray as the snow swirled and fell around us. Then, just to prove how useless it was, I tried once more. Amazingly, the engine started. Painter clapped, and my mother said, “Jim, get in.”

I backed out into the street, but when I put the car in first gear, the

wheels just spun and the car wouldn’t move forward. I rocked it back and forth, but the best I could do was pull back into the driveway. Now would she believe me?

As my mother went inside the house to call a cab, I kept the car running to recharge the battery. In the meantime, the snow kept falling, piling up. She was just wasting her time—there were no cabs running. Why couldn’t she see? It would kill her, but this year— for the first time—we would have to miss my father’s memorial Mass.

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y mother came right back out. “Oh, boys, I’m sorry.

There are no cabs running— we’ll have to walk.”

Walk? It was over a mile to the church, but I realized that would not faze my mother. She had grown up on a farm in Westmoreland, New York, so snowstorms were nothing new to her. As the oldest of five children, she had to milk a cow every morning and then, in winter, plow the snow with her horse, Maggie, before riding the horse to school.

She stepped out into the road. “We have to start, or we’ll be late.”

“Mom, face it! You can’t walk. You can’t see 10 feet. It’s a blizzard. Turn on the radio—it’ll tell you.”

“How else will we get there?” she asked.

“We won’t, Mom. We can’t! We can’t make it. Not this year.”

“Michael, eight years ago today your father died. There is a Mass being said in his honor, and the Luke family is going to be there.”

“How?” I questioned. “Just tell me how! Fly? The drifts will be two feet in the park.”

“Your father would’ve been prepared. He would have had the chains on the tires.”

“It’s my fault that God sent us a snowstorm?”

“I’m surprised at you, Michael, that you want to give up so easily.”

“Give up? It’s a blizzard. Maybe God doesn’t want us to be there,” I countered. “Did you think about that? Will you listen? You can’t make it.”

“Nonsense! I can and I will,” she St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

said resolutely. “Take my hand, Jim. I guess your brother isn’t going with us.”

Painter blurted, “You chicken!”

Your dream vacation is just a phone call away!

T

hey trudged up the street through the blinding snow, and I yelled after them, “You’ll never make it!” The wind was blowing so hard I don’t think they even heard me. Squinting, I didn’t see them turn the corner; they just vanished through a wall of snow. My mother was out of her mind trying to walk through a blizzard with my little brother. Even if they did make it there, Mass would be over. What good was it to go, anyway?

My mother could pray and go to as many Masses as she wanted. It still wouldn’t bring my father back.

Worried, I wondered how far they had gotten. Not far, I was sure. Maybe they had already turned back. On second thought, my mother would never turn back. Never. She would plod ahead, holding Painter’s hand, until they reached the church. Somehow she would make it.

My mother had good luck; things always worked out for her. She had prayers speaking for her and it was apparent that God liked her. Her children always got well after being sick; checks always arrived on time in the mail; if the refrigerator or furnace broke, a man always showed up the next day to fix it. Her credo was “give and you shall receive,” and because she always gave to people, she always received.

Still sitting in the idle car, I thought about how my mother took such care to prepare for this Mass. Last week, she sent her tweed suit to the dry cleaner. Saturday was confession, and two nights ago she had me shine her newest shoes. Yesterday, she went to the beauty parlor to have her hair done, and last night she had spent over an hour bathing, laying out her clothes, picking a hat, and trying to decide whether she would wear her fox fur or cashmere coat. Why would she go to all that trouble, make all those preparations, unless, just possibly . . . no, it couldn’t happen. But why was she always so happy after attendFr ancisca n Media .org

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ing my father’s Mass? What if he did show up and I wasn’t there?

I

wasn’t going to give up. I ran to the garage behind the house to get the chains that were hanging on the wall next to Painter’s sled. Last Christmas, I had helped my brother Mark put the chains on the back tires when he took his girlfriend skiing. I got the jack out of the trunk, and in 15 minutes, I secured the chains to the back tires.

I threw a shovel in the trunk, just in case, then I revved the engine and backed out of the driveway. This time when I put it in first gear, the chains gripped and the car lunged forward up the street. I didn’t slow down at the corner for fear of getting stuck, but turned sharply and accelerated up Parkway Drive. The windshield wipers worked furiously to keep the glass clear, while the defroster blasted out warm air. I turned onto the road beside the park. “Come on, baby!”

Wind buffeted the car as I plowed through two-foot drifts of light powder, and white curtains of snow whipped across the road, momentarily blinding me. I switched on my high beams, but there was no sign of my mother and brother. Afraid I wouldn’t see them if they were walking in the road, I slowed down and honked. If they had crossed the field, I could have driven right by them and not even known it.

They finally appeared in the headlights. They had almost made it across the park.

I braked and rolled down my window. “Hop in!”

W

e entered the chapel just as Msgr. Devine came out of the sacristy with the veiled chalice. Only one altar boy had made it to Mass. I genuflected, crossed myself, and followed my mother and Painter into the pew.

Monsignor bent to kiss the altar and the pinkish crown of his head shone in the golden candlelight. He turned to the sparse congregation and announced, “This Mass is being said for the repose of the soul of James Gregory Luke.” At those words, my mother wept quietly and Painter sympathetically reached out and patted her arm.

I, however, turned my attention to the sights, sounds, and scents of the church. I smelled the wet wool of my coat, and the fragrance of paraffin wax and incense in the warm chapel air.

The Stations of the Cross were spaced below a dark wall of stained-glass biblical scenes: the Holy Family, the sacrifice of Melchizedek, the sacrifice of Isaac, and Mary at the tomb. People came in late. I heard a cough, a tinkling boot buckle, a creaking kneeler. I turned to see who was there—as if I expected someone.

Being an altar boy, I knew the liturgical responses by heart, but my interest in Mass quickly waned. My mind wandered away amid the wonder of the event. I was overwhelmed by anticipation until I was eventually lulled by a vision of my own making. Monsignor raised the Eucharist and the jangle of bells snapped me out of my dream.

Returning from Communion, I

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48 ❘ January 2016

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glanced once more toward the back of the chapel expecting to see him, but it seemed he couldn’t stay.

As we were leaving after Mass, my mother, glowing, greeted the few parishioners. She then ducked back into the chapel and went to thank Monsignor personally.

O

utside, the daylight revealed that the snow had finally stopped.

Painter asked, “You think we’ll have school?”

“Not a chance,” I replied. “The kids would need snowshoes.”

“Then I’m going sledding when I get home.”

Smiling as she got in the car, my mother—grateful that I came—leaned over and kissed my cheek. She had enjoyed her quick chat with Monsignor Devine.

“It was Monsignor who said your father’s funeral Mass. Do you remember, Michael? He was your father’s friend.”

I nodded. Seeing my mother so happy made me happy, as I followed a city plow on Roberts Avenue along the park all the way to West Colvin Street, our tire chains clinking on the scraped road.

“I was so proud of you boys. I only wish Mark was here. I’ll write to him today.”

“Tell him I shoveled,” Painter exclaimed.

“Tell him I put on the chains,” I added.

“I will. I’ll tell him how we all pulled together and how beautiful the Mass was.”

As I drove home, I felt uplifted, although that was quickly followed by a pang of guilt. I shouldn’t have let my mother cry alone during Mass.

But to cry, I thought, was to give up hope—and that was something I just couldn’t do. No, in that cold morning light, I was sure I would see my father again. A

Joseph Carlton Porter is a freelance writer from Syracuse, New York. A former newspaper reporter, he has worked as a college English professor for the past 22 years.

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

LIGHTEN UP

“Basically, what you’re saying is I get a box of chocolate chip cookies and the sixth-grade class gets a field trip to Tuscany?”

“I prefer sitting over here during the sermon and out of your elbow range.”

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“It started with ‘wash your hands’ and mushroomed.”

January 2016 ❘ 49

ASK A FRANCISCAN

❘ BY FATHER PAT McCLOSKEY, OFM

How Can God Be Both Just and Merciful?

The Holy Year of Mercy that began on December 8 and runs through November 20 of this year has me wondering how God can be perfectly just and at the same time completely merciful. Doesn’t one of those adjectives have to “give” in order for the other one to be true?

Our language about God must always be humble, while also being firm on certain matters. Our knowledge about God cannot equal God’s self-knowledge, but that does not mean that we cannot know anything about God (for example, God is one and yet is three persons, is the creator of whatever exists, and similar summaries of God’s fundamental self-revelation through Scripture).

Our language about God needs to avoid a zero-sum approach—as if God were some type of pie so that

when we cut one piece that determines how big the other piece is.

We are attracted to binary systems (the light switch is on, or it is off).

Binary thinking serves us well in various situations. The computer that enables me to write this column absolutely depends on a binary system. But binary thinking flat out rejects any paradox.

Binary systems are designed for objects, but they come up short in dealing with persons. Is God primarily an object or a person? I once heard about two librarians at a theology school who had a spirited argument in answering that question!

In his document “The Face of Mercy,” which opened the Holy Year of Mercy, Pope Francis writes, “The mercy of God is not an abstract idea, but a concrete reality through which he reveals his love as that of a father

or a mother, moved to the very depths out of love for their child” (6).

In a sense, Pope Francis was anticipating your question when he wrote: “Mercy is not opposed to justice but rather expresses God’s way of reaching out to the sinner, offering him a new chance to look at himself, convert, and believe. . . . If God limited himself to only justice, he would cease to be God, and would instead be like human beings who ask merely that the law be respected. But mere justice is not enough. Experience shows that an appeal to justice alone will result in its destruction.

This is why God goes beyond justice with his mercy and forgiveness” (21).

When our language about God is not sufficiently humble, we make the same mistake as the Pharisee praying in the front of the Temple (Lk 18:1112) and as the people who were con-

Scriptural Basis Available?

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The assumption of Mary and the coronation of the Blessed Virgin Mary are dogmas of the Catholic faith. Is there any basis for them in holy Scripture?

After consulting the whole Church through the bishops, Pope Pius XII defined the Assumption as divinely revealed.

For what reason?

The coronation of Mary as queen of heaven and earth is a popular belief, but it is not a dogma of the Catholic Church. It has been a favorite subject for many painters, and has been a way for some Catholics living under persecution to assert that their current rulers must still answer to God. The 1950 definition of Mary’s assumption was done at the request of many Catholic bishops around

50 ❘ January 2016

the world, and after careful study. It is the only explicit example of the pope’s infallibility as solemnly defined at Vatican I in 1870.

Christians who belong to one of the Orthodox Churches believe that Mary is in heaven, but they prefer to speak of her “dormition” (falling asleep) rather than of her assumption. A tomb of Mary (containing her body for only a few days, according to one writing not in the Bible) is venerated outside the east walls of the Old City of Jerusalem. Pope Pius XII did not reject the dormition tradition.

Some Church fathers from the East and the West wrote that she who gave birth to the Incarnate Word could not have experienced bodily decay.

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

demned for refusing to see God in people who were hungry or otherwise in great need (Mt 25:41-46).

In the first act of the musical Les Misérables, Inspector Javert praises the order, constancy, and justice represented by the stars that God has created. After he has experienced mercy in the second act from Jean Valjean (his nemesis), Javert sings a second soliloquy (using the same melody), this time affirming that he would rather commit suicide than live with the knowledge that Valjean had spared his life. Javert kills himself because he would rather do that than change his zero-sum thinking about Valjean and everyone else.

“Men like you can never change,” Javert had earlier told Valjean. In fact, Javert was the one who refused to change.

In the Gospels, not all Pharisees are condemned. The ones who are, however, represent people who lack humility in speaking about God, allowing themselves to be trapped by exclusive yes/no thinking where it cannot apply.

C.S. Lewis once wrote that religious hypocrites are the worst kind of sinners. Why? I think the answer is that their extreme binary thinking and relentless self-righteousness can only lead them into deeper illusion about God, themselves, and other people. They would rather live in that world than in the one that God has created.

Everyone—but especially disciples of Jesus—must repent in order to live out the threefold truth about God, oneself, and others.

May this Holy Year of Mercy be a continuing time of grace and blessing for each of us!

About Evangelizing What do you do when people are not open to how you share your faith? Some people are very set in their ways and will not budge from their comfort zone.

We share the good news of Jesus more by example than by words.

Fr ancisca n Media .org

What counts is not my “score” (number of people I have converted) but how honestly and consistently I have lived out my Baptism. Only God knows a person’s heart well enough to judge him or her. People can obscure the good news while thinking they are advancing it.

Uncaring Priests I heard a priest say a couple years ago that younger priests have a don’t-care attitude about laypeople.

Is that true?

Click the button above to hear Father Pat’s insights on Catholic topics.

That sounds to me like a wild generalization. You can find caring priests in every age group. You can also find priests in every age group who think that ordination gives them the right to treat laypeople like children.

Everyone in the Church is called to be a servant leader on some level.

Jesus washed the feet of his apostles at the Last Supper to show all of us how to recognize that kind of leadership. 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 2016 ❘ 51

BOOK CORNER

❘ BY CAROL ANN MORROW

The Vatican Prophecies Investigating Supernatural Signs, Apparitions, and Miracles in the Modern Age

What Our

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52 ❘ January 2016

By John Thavis Viking Press 288 pages • $27.95 Hardcover/E-book Reviewed by ANGELA ANN ZUKOWSKI, MHSH, DMin, who served on the Pontifical Council for Social Communications (Vatican) and is a professor in the University of Dayton’s Department of Religious Studies.

Every now and then a book comes across my path that I simply cannot put down—The Vatican Prophecies is such a book! John Thavis has over 35 years as a news journalist, spending 30 of them in Rome. In 1983, Catholic News Service engaged him to cover the Vatican. He traveled with both St. John Paul II and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI through 60 countries and reported on religious events throughout Europe. In 2012, he published The Vatican Diaries, which became a New York Times best-seller.

The Vatican Prophecies is an added feather in Thavis’ cap for excellence in capturing and teasing one’s religious imagination regarding the supernatural. Each chapter elaborates on the Vatican’s process for vetting supernatural experiences and sifting out the excessive and bizarre. There are many skeptics (including Vatican officials) who may profess incredulity at the proliferation of apparitions, miracles, and apocalyptic signs. Yet our Catholic understanding of the world is sacramental, as Thavis reiterates, in

the sense that all things can be a medium of the divine and a means of grace. Through probing research and interviews with leading Vatican officials, experts on miracles and demonology, Catholic visionaries, and others, Thavis invites the reader into the inner sanctums of Vatican offices, files, and debates in search of the truth behind supernatural occurrences.

Hollywood has found exorcisms plentiful fodder for graphic drama. Chapter 4 is straightforward, indicating that the revised Rite of Exorcism of 1999 reflects the cautionary attitude of Vatican experts. The Church continues to prepare select priests and qualified medical and psychological professionals to discern if and when a demonic force is at play. Thavis offers a solid understanding for coming to terms with these supernatural issues in the face of Catholic traditional theology and modern skepticism.

In recent times, we have witnessed the largest increase of canonizations in Church history. This rise has accelerated the resurgence of individuals on constant lookout for miracles. Thavis emphasizes that canonization is not about exalting the ability to produce miracles, but rather offers saints as exemplars in living the Christian life. In this light, he states that “miracles are simply signposts toward holiness.” With this in mind, the reader is introduced to the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints, detailing accounts for vetting individuals through the canonization process. It includes fascinating accounts, such as St. Damien de Veuster, St. Marguerite d’Youville, St. John Paul II, and Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

If you love reading what goes on behind Vatican walls discerning supernatural claims, you will discover a richness of adventure in The Vatican Prophecies. Thavis offers the reader a sensible understanding of the balanced approach the Church strives to maintain in the face of fraudulent or unauthentic supernatural encounters and proclamations. As the Church of the 21st century continues to face new supernatural claims, it continues to ask: Can the miraculous and the reasonable peacefully coexist?

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

BOOK BRIEFS

Making for a Meaningful New Year The Year without a Purchase One Family’s Quest to Stop Shopping and Start Connecting

By Scott Dannemiller Westminster John Knox Press 272 pages • $16 Paperback/E-book

Broken Gods Hope, Healing, and the Seven Longings of the Human Heart

By Gregory K. Popcak, PhD Image Books 208 pages • $21 Hardcover/E-book Reviewed by FRAN REPKA, RSM, a spiritual director and psychologist in Cincinnati, Ohio.

The title Broken Gods reflects the author’s thesis that we are “meant to be gods, but because of our fallen humanity, we are for now broken gods” in need of healing. Popcak proceeds to instruct the reader how the seven deadly sins (pride, envy, wrath, sloth, greed, gluttony, and lust) correspond with and distort the seven longings of the human heart for abundance, dignity, justice, peace, trust, well-being, and communion. All of the longings can be fulfilled only by living the seven parallel virtues of humility, kindness, patience, diligence/fortitude, generosity/charity, temperance, and chastity.

Dr. Popcak has a master’s degree in clinical social work and a PhD in human services. He uses clinical stories of brokenness, healing, and his Catholic background to help readers discover how their destructive desires can be transformed into “engines of divine actualization.” Each chapter is sequentially dedicated to the aforementioned divine longings of the human heart.

How to put into practice the key virtue that becomes an antidote to each deadly sin closes each chapter. Dr. Popcak often quotes St. John Paul II and his theology of the body.

There are few efforts to connect the deadly sins to social injustices and lack of care for the common good. However, the book is pastoral, fairly easy to read, and helpful for adults beginning a spiritual practice.

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Tired of trying to keep up with the Joneses and hungry for more meaningful lives, Scott Dannemiller and his wife decided their family would go a year without buying anything nonessential. Their decision brought the family closer in ways that will inspire and surprise you.

A Catholic Gardener’s Spiritual Almanac Cultivating Your Faith throughout the Year

By Margaret Rose Realy Ave Maria Press 288 pages • $17.95 Paperback/E-book Master gardener, retreat leader, and Catholic blogger Margaret Rose Realy guides readers through both the liturgical year and the seasons with Scripture passages, saints’ stories, and even expert gardening tips.

The Gratitude Diaries How a Year Looking on the Bright Side Can Transform Your Life

By Janice Kaplan Dutton 320 pages • $26.95 Hardcover/E-book Many New Year’s resolutions have to do with giving up some vice, but Janice Kaplan decided to commit to being more grateful for the next 12 months. Putting into practice advice from academics, doctors, and philosophers, Kaplan relates her life-changing year with warmth and wit in equal doses. —D.I. Books featured in Book Corner and Book Briefs 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 2016 ❘ 53

A CATHOLIC MOM SPEAKS

❘ BY SUSAN HINES-BRIGGER

Lord, Help Me, I Have Teenagers

E

very day when I come home from work, I am welcomed

by Kacey, my youngest, with great enthusiasm and hugs.

Her 10-year-old sister, Riley, gives me a slightly less gregarious greeting, but one that at least conveys the message that she is happy I made it home. The excitement seems to dwindle, though, as I make my way down the hall.

I open my 13-year-old son, Alex’s, door, where I am met with more of a grunt than a greeting.

“How was school?”

“Same as usual.”

Any following questions receive the same short and vague answers.

“Good talk,” I say, sarcastically. He is already back to checking his phone, so I’m sure he didn’t hear me anyway.

Feeling somewhat defeated, I close the door and continue on down the hallway to my 17-year-old daughter’s room. When I walk in, Maddie takes out her earbuds and looks at me.

“What?” she asks.

“I just wanted to know how your day was.”

“Good.”

Seeing as I am probably not going to get much more out of the conversation, I quietly exit the room.

Reality Check This scene is all too familiar to me these days, as well as to most of my friends with teenagers. Life with two teenagers, and one gearing up nicely for those years, is certainly challenging. But I try to remind myself that it’s nothing personal, that they’re trying to find themselves while still stuck under their parents’ rules and roof.

I try to remember that, at their age, I didn’t act as loving toward my parents as I should or could have. A 54 ❘ January 2016

friend’s mom has talked about times she closed herself in the bathroom and cried over the turmoil between her and her daughter during those teenage years. They are now very close, and she often serves as counsel to both my friend and me when we express frustration and despair about our belief that we are the most inept mothers of the most unruly kids ever.

I suspect all moms endure this same struggle. In fact, I can still pic-

ture the lit candle in front of a statue of Mary on our buffet. I always wondered why it was lit during what seemed like especially contentious times between my parents and me and my sisters. Years later, I asked my mom about it. She said it was a reminder for her to turn to the mother of Jesus—who certainly caused his mother her share of worry and heartache—during tough times.

Another thing I always try to remind myself is that, if I have any St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

GIVE ME STRENGTH Being a parent is a tough job, especially when it comes to dealing with teenagers. Any support we can get is always welcome, even if it’s just offering up a prayer to remind us of the blessings of this important role.

I found this prayer in Roy Petitfils’ book What Teens Want You to Know (But Won’t Tell You) and keep a copy by my bedside for those especially trying days. Perhaps it can bring comfort to another parent on this same journey.

“Lord help us to really see deep into the hearts of teens,

ILLUSTRATIONS BY MARY KURNICK MAASS

in the same way you search and probe our own hearts.

Give us the grace to want to see you and your Spirit as you dwell within each of the teens in my life. Amen.”

hopes of fostering a relationship with my teens, I need to understand that I don’t know everything. Sure, I have a lot more life experience and knowledge about certain things, but it means nothing if I’m not open to hearing different perspectives. My teenagers have opinions on, well, everything. It serves me—and them—well when I take the time to stay quiet and just listen. I may not agree. I may try to explain my reasoning, all the while reminding myself that, while they are my children, they are not me.

Show Up You know what I remember most about my teenage years, though? I

tal Digi as Extr remember that my parents were always there. No matter how I treated them—and I suspect it was pretty bad at times—I could count on them to be there for me to fall back on, to turn to, to offer guidance when needed, as well as space when necessary.

I now follow in their footsteps. So I will worry. I will sit up and wait to hear the key hit the door. I will wonder if I’ve provided the proper example. I will pray that they will make smart choices and be strong in the face of the challenges and temptations of the teenage years. And I will make my way down the hall every day after work, just in case one day they have something to say. A

Click here for resources about connecting with your teenagers.

Click the button below to listen to Susan’s “Marriage Moments.”

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 46)

Fr ancisca n Media .org

January 2016 ❘ 55

YEAR OF MERCY

❘ BY RICK SNIZEK

Burial for an Unknown Child The Corporal Works of Mercy ■ Feed the hungry ■ Give drink to the thirsty ■ Clothe the naked ■ Shelter the homeless ■ Visit the sick ■ Visit the imprisoned ■ Bury the dead CNS PHOTO/ RICK SNIZEK, RHODE ISLAND CATHOLIC

The Spiritual Works of Mercy ■ Admonish the sinner ■ Instruct the ignorant ■ Counsel the doubtful ■ Comfort the sorrowful ■ Bear wrongs patiently ■ Forgive all injuries ■ Pray for the living and the dead Bishop Thomas J. Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island, blesses the casket containing the remains of a fetus found in the collection area of a wastewater treatment facility.

N

56 ❘ January 2016

Francis to the mercy of God, so that this beloved child may find finally a home in his kingdom,” Bishop Tobin prayed.

The bishop said he chose the baby’s name in honor of Pope Francis’ reference to our “throwaway culture.”

“This child is certainly a victim of that throwaway culture,” he said. A

tal Digi as t Ex r

Click here for a longer version of this article.

CNS story by Rick Snizek, editor of the Rhode Island Catholic, the newspaper of the Diocese of Providence.

POPE FRANCIS ON MERCY “Let us thank the Lord for all those who have labored in these months to clear away the rubble, to visit the sick and dying, to comfort the grieving, and to bury the dead.”

—Pope Francis, meeting with priests, religious, seminarians, and families of survivors of Typhoon Haiyan, Philippines, January 2015

St A n t h o n y M e s s e n g e r . o rg

CNS PHOTO/PAUL HARING

early five months after the body of an unborn child was found floating amid the sewage in a wastewater treatment plant in Rhode Island, the infant dubbed “Baby Francis” was laid to rest.

Despite an investigation, no one is clear how the unborn child ended up at the Bucklin Wastewater Treatment Facility on January 12, 2014, according to the East Providence Police Department. At the time, Bishop Thomas J. Tobin of Providence promised the child a “decent and proper burial,” and offered prayers for his parents and the situation that led them to dispose of the infant.

In a simple ceremony on June 10, in a section of Gate of Heaven Cemetery set aside for the repose of babies, Bishop Tobin presided over a Christian burial service for the child.

A tiny white casket, flanked by flowers and a small teddy bear, rested upon a portable pine altar during the burial service.

“Now, we must entrust the soul of Baby

BACKSTORY

Where Do We Find Mercy?

L

ook across to the opposite page, and I’ll tell you a story of how it got there. We’re one month into the Jubilee Year of Mercy. Pope Francis proclaimed this jubilee because he wants Catholics, as he said,

to be “messengers of mercy.” That certainly is what St. Anthony Messenger

strives to be; it’s even in our name! St. Anthony, in the footsteps of St. PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER HEFFRON

Francis, spent his life proclaiming God’s mercy, both in words and in deeds.

Lots of people do the same today. Who are they? Where are their stories? How best might we share some sense of contemporary, merciful action in these pages? Honestly, we work at this all of the time, but, after last March’s announcement of the jubilee, we editors sat around a table and tossed ideas around. What way could this magazine help tell this story in the context of the jubilee celebration?

A regular, short feature—a department, as we say—was the answer, starting in December, along with the jubilee year. We turned to the classic presentation of mercy in our Catholic tradition, the spiritual and the corporal works of mercy, to organize it. Each month, we decided, we’ll focus on how some individual or group puts into flesh one CNS PHOTO/CRISTIAN GENNARI

of the acts of mercy that are drawn from the min-

Pope Francis officially proclaimed the 20152016 Holy Year of Mercy last March, in St. Peter’s Basilica.

istry of Jesus. Jeanne Kortekamp created a marvelous design, included the Vatican logo and a highlighted list, telling the work being featured.

Now the hard part: getting the stories, and photos of them. We use the US bishops’ Catholic News Service (CNS) for our popular “Church in the News” feature. Always, we scratch only the surface of their offerings. So we hired a skillful East Coast freelancer to scan their stories that appear on the newswire, spot the best ones to exemplify our monthly theme, condense them to fit into our column, and choose a photo that CNS provides. The longer, full story is posted in our digital edition, free to our subscribers. Associate Editor Christopher Heffron is coordinating and polishing it all.

You’ll see a rich offering of mercy each month as this column unfolds this year. We are grateful to all of the CNS reporters and editors who have a hand in it. And thanks to Christopher and Jeanne, too.

Editor in Chief @jfeister

Fr ancisca n Media .org

January 2016 ❘ 57

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