Anchor 08.27.10

Diocese of Fall River

The Anchor

F riday , August 27, 2010

FDA approves abortion drug

By Christine M. Williams Anchor Correspondent WORCESTER — A recently approved drug, billed as an emergency contraceptive, has Pro-Lifers up in arms because it can cause abortions. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared the use of ellaOne on August 13.

The drug is meant to prevent pregnancy when taken within five days of intercourse. Advocates say ellaOne is an improvement over current emergency contraceptives, such as the morning after pill. Because the window in which it can be taken is longer than for medications like Plan B, it has been termed the “week after pill.”

Critics say ellaOne is much more closely related to the abortion drug RU486 than to Plan B. They add that women will be misled by the FDA’s mislabeling of the drug as an emergency contraceptive.

In an article, Susan E. Wills,

the United States Conference of Catholic Bishop’s assistant director for education and outreach, said ellaOne can end the life of an embryo already implanted in the womb.

“EllaOne is a selected progesterone receptor modulator (SPRM). An SPRM blocks progesterone receptors and thereby starves a developing baby of this needed protein. According to the FDA, only one SPRM has been approved for drug use in the United States, and it is RU486 — a known producer of abortions for first-trimester pregnancies,” she said.

The new drug is more lethal than emergency contraceptives precisely because it prevents a woman’s body from producing the progesterone necessary to support an embryo through the first 10 weeks of pregnancy, she said.

“It is simply false and deceptive to promote EllaOne as Turn to page 18

BATTLE PLAN — Jocelyn Trindade, Cassandra Borges, and Marian Desrosiers, diocesan director of the Pro-Life Apostolate, are in the early stages of preparation for a Pro-Life “boot camp” for youth in the Diocese of Fall River next year. (Photo by Dave Jolivet)

Pro-Life youth movement planning future strategies to promote a ‘culture of life’

By Dave Jolivet, Editor

FALL RIVER — Twenty-year-old Jocelyn Trindade, and Cassandra Borges, 16, have just finished boot camp. They aren’t soldiers in the war on terrorism, but they’re preparing to face a foe just as deadly — the fight against the destruction of millions of hu-

man lives each year — abortion.

Both young women have been very active in the Pro-Life movement for some time now, each recipients of the Diocese of Fall River’s Cardinal John O’Connor Youth Pro-Life Award. It’s their passion Turn to page 20

Diocese continues to support mission work through Propagation of the Faith Office

By Kenneth J. Souza Anchor Staff

KNIGHT DELIVERY — Representatives from the Massachusetts Knights of Columbus recently presented Bishop George W. Coleman with a $10,000 check to be used to provide clothing for those in need within the Fall River Diocese. The donation was apportioned from a $1 million nationwide fund-raising program earmarked for those areas with active food pantries and clothing drives. Pictured here presenting the check to Bishop Coleman are, from left, Bill Donovan, immediate past state deputy for the Knights of Columbus, and Joseph M. Donnelly, district deputy for the Massachusetts Knights of Columbus. (Photo by Kenneth J. Souza)

NEW BEDFORD — Nestled within a bank of rooms that once housed the upper grades of the former parochial school at St. Mary’s Parish is the diocesan Propagation of the Faith Office — a small but busy operation that handles everything from scheduling annual missionary visits to parishes to the oversight of an entire parish in Honduras that serves a population roughly the size of the City of New Bedford.

For the past 33 years, Msgr.

John J. Oliveira, pastor at St. Mary’s, has served as the office’s director, having taken over the reins from his immediate predecessor, the late Msgr. Raymond T. Considine, upon his retirement.

“It’s all about making Christ known,” Msgr. Oliveira said. “We do that work sometimes by providing shelter and clean water, by providing care for those with AIDS, or by providing for agricultural stimulus, along with the sacra-

ments. As it’s been said, you can’t hear God’s word if your stomach is empty.”

According to Msgr. Oliveira, the essential purpose of the Propagation of the Faith Office is to profess the Catholic faith to others,

domestically and abroad, and to evangelize people.

“It’s a pontifical society that comes out of the Holy See,” Msgr.

Oliveira said. “We take care of the World Mission Sunday collection Turn to page 18

MISSION CONTROL — Corinne Lebeau, administrative assistant, and Msgr. John J. Oliveira, P.A., director, examine the new poster for this year’s Mission Sunday collection in the diocesan Propagation of the Faith Office in New Bedford. Among the office’s many tasks is the coordination of visiting missionaries to parishes and the annual collection to benefit missionary work.

(Photo by Kenneth J. Souza)

News From the Vatican

2

August 27, 2010

Pope prays for Mary’s intercession against ‘absurd logic’ of violence Castel Gandolfo, Italy (CNA/EWTN News) — Benedict XVI made a special plea to Mary for her intercession for peace in the world on Sunday, the Feast of the Queenship of Mary. Explaining her role as queen of the world and her participation in her Son’s mystery, he asked for the Blessed Virgin’s help to persuade men to build a “civilization of love.”

Speaking of the significance of the Marian feast before the Angelus, Benedict XVI explained that on this day the Church contemplates the Mother of Christ crowned by her Son, a crown which represents her role in “universal sovereignty.”

The fact that this year’s feast, like the Assumption last week, falls on the Sabbath gives it a “greater light from the word of God,” said the pope.

“In particular,” he explained, “the icon of the Virgin Mary Queen finds a significant confirmation in today’s Gospel, where Jesus asserts, ‘behold, those who are last will be first, and those who are first will be last’.”

This “typical” expression of Christ can be found phrased in different ways throughout the Gospels, observed the pope, so it “clearly reflects a theme dear to his prophetic preaching.”

And, he pointed out, “the Madonna is the perfect example of this evangelical truth ... that God lowers the proud and the powerful of this world and raises the humble.

“The small and simple girl of Nazareth became the queen of the

world. This is one of the marvels that reveal the heart of God.” The “sovereignty of Mary” is “completely relative to that of Christ,” who was exalted by the Father above every creature, the pope explained. “By the design of grace, the Immaculate Mother was fully associated with the mystery of the Son … (She) shared with the Son not only the human aspects of this mystery, but, through the work of the Holy Spirit in her, also the profound intention, the divine will, in a way that all her existence, poor and humble, was elevated, transformed, glorified, passing through the ‘narrow gate’ that is Jesus himself.”

“Yes,” said the pope, “Mary was the first to pass through the open ‘way’ of Christ to enter into the Kingdom of God, a way accessible to all men, to all who trust the Word of God and work to put it into practice.”

Throughout Christian history, he concluded, there has been public veneration of the Virgin Mary and “today we wish more than anything to renew, as children of the Church, our devotion to her whom Jesus left us as mother and queen.

“We entrust to her intercession the daily prayer for peace, especially where the absurd logic of violence is most rampant; so that all men are persuaded that in this world we must help each other as brothers to build a civilization of love.

“Maria, Regina pacis, ora pro nobis!” the pope exclaimed before leading the Angelus prayer.

St. Francis Xavier Church

125 Main Street, Acushnet, MA 02743 Sat., 4 September 2010• 508-995-7600

7:50 am

Church: Fatima Video Presentation.

9:00 am

Church: Procession of Our Lady. Angelus. Crowning Ceremony. Sung Litany of Loreto. The Five Joyful Mysteries.

10:00 am

Mass of Our Lady: Main Celebrant and Preacher: Msgr. Gerard O’Connor, Pastor; Consecration of Parish to Our Lady.

11:10 am

Church Hall: Lunch break (please bring bag lunch). Bookstore will be open.

12:15 pm

Exposition and Procession of the Blessed Sacrament.

12:40 pm

Sermon on Our Lady by Fr. Joshua, FI. Silent Adoration.

1:20 pm

Meditations of the Passion of Our Lord.

1:55 pm

Church Hall: Break. Bookstore will be open.

2:15 pm

The Five Glorious Mysteries. Act of Consecration. Benediction.

2:50 pm

Enrollment in the Brown Scapular and Conferment of Miraculous Medal. Procession of Our Lady.

- Confessions available throughout the day - Finish approx 3:10 pm Wheelchair accessible SELECTION OF VENUES FOR 2010 & 2011: Saturday, 2, Oct 2010 St. Margaret’s, Buzzards Bay, MA Saturday, 6 Nov 2010 Holy Cross, Easton, MA Saturday, 4 Dec 2010 Our Lady of the Assumption, Osterville, MA Saturday, 1 Jan 2011 Our Lady’s Chapel, New Bedford, MA

for those who serve — The Church of San Pellegrino is pictured at the Vatican recently.

The chapel, which has existed in some form for more than 1,200 years, now serves Vatican police and firefighters. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Pope affirms first Communion for children at age of reason Castel Gandolfo, Italy (CNA/EWTN News) — The Holy Father remembered Pope St. Pius X and reviewed his Church reforms and renewals during a recent general audience catechesis. Pope Benedict highlighted the importance of St. Pius X’s decree that set the “age of reason” as the appropriate time for children to receive first Communion.

The general audience was held in the courtyard of the Apostolic Palace at Castel Gandolfo as is customary at this time of year. The space was filled with pilgrims carrying flags and banners and waving scarves.

During the catechesis, Benedict XVI spoke of Pope St. Pius X, who from the time of his ordination at 23 years old, “showed that deep love of Christ and the Church, that humility and simplicity and that great charity towards the most in need, that were characteristic of his entire life.”

Although he accepted his election to the papacy with difficulty because he did not feel himself to be worthy of the position, Pope Benedict XVI said, “he left an indelible mark in the history of the Church” through a pontificate that “was characterized by a notable effort for reform, summarized in his motto ‘Instaurare omnia in Christo’ (Renew all things in Christ).”

Pope Benedict pointed to Pius X’s reorganization of the Roman Curia, how he began work to re-examine the Code of Canon Law and his revision of the protocol for priestly formation. He also spoke of the pope-saint’s work to develop a universal catechism after having witnessed the great need for a reference point of the faith

amidst widespread emigration.

“The Catechism called ‘from Pius X,’ was for many a sure guide in learning the truth of the faith for its simple, clear and precise language and for its expositive effectiveness,” recalled Pope Benedict.

He was also reminded of the attention Pius X gave to liturgical reform, in an effort “to guide the faithful to a more profound prayer life and to a fuller participation in the sacraments.”

Referencing the 1903 motu proprio “Tra le sollecitudini,” he explained that Pius X asserted through it that “the true Christian spirit has its first and indispensable source in the active participation in the sacrosanct mysteries and in public and solemn prayer in the Church.

“For this,” continued Benedict XVI, “he recommended receiving the sacraments often, promoting daily participation in holy Communion, (being) well prepared, and anticipating opportunely the first Communion of children at seven years of age, ‘when the child begins to reason.’”

In marking the 100th anni-

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versary of the Pius X-approved decree “Quam singulari” earlier this month, Cardinal Antonio Cañizares, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments wrote about the same subject in the Vatican’s L’Osservatore Romano newspaper. He suggested that the Church must confirm Pius X’s decree and even possibly contemplate lowering the age further to ensure the graces for children as they reach the age of reason amidst the difficulties of today’s world.

Concluding the catechesis, the Holy Father said: “Dear brothers and sisters, St. Pius X teaches all of us that the base of our apostolic action in the various fields in which we work must always be for us an intimate personal union with Christ, to cultivate and grow day after day this nucleus of all of his teaching, of all of his pastoral genius.

“Only if we are in love with the Lord will we be capable of bringing men to God and opening them up to his merciful love.”

OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER OF THE DIOCESE OF FALL RIVER Vol. 54, No. 32

Member: Catholic Press Association, Catholic News Service

Published weekly except for two weeks in the summer and the week after Christmas by the Catholic Press of the Diocese of Fall River, 887 Highland Avenue, Fall River, MA 02720, Telephone 508-675-7151 — FAX 508-675-7048, email: theanchor@anchornews.org.

Subscription price by mail, postpaid $20.00 per year, for U.S. addresses.

Send address changes to P.O. Box 7, Fall River, MA, call or use email address

PUBLISHER - Most Reverend George W. Coleman EXECUTIVE EDITOR Father Roger J. Landry fatherrogerlandry@anchornews.org EDITOR David B. Jolivet davejolivet@anchornews.org OFFICE MANAGER Mary Chase marychase@anchornews.org ADVERTISING Wayne R. Powers waynepowers@anchornews.org REPORTER Kenneth J. Souza kensouza@anchornews.org Send Letters to the Editor to: fatherrogerlandry@anchornews.org PoStmaSters send address changes to The Anchor, P.O. Box 7, Fall River, MA 02722.

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August 27, 2010

The International Church

3

U.S. must leave behind peace, security as troops exit, says Iraqi bishop

By Carol Glatz Catholic News Service VATICAN CITY — The United States has a duty to leave behind peace, not chaos, when troops are finally withdrawn from Iraq, said an Iraqi bishop.

“We desire, we ask, and we scream for peace and security,” Chaldean Auxiliary Bishop Shlemon Warduni of Baghdad said in an interview with Vatican Radio August 19.

U.S. combat troops are scheduled to leave Iraq at the end of the month, formally ending Operation Iraqi Freedom. About 50,000 U.S. troops will remain in Iraq until the end of 2011 to continue training and assisting Iraqi security forces.

Bishop Warduni said war does nothing but destroy everything.

“There are no jobs, there are car bombs, kamikaze attacks and other acts of violence. If foreign troops leave, they have a duty to leave peace and security behind them,” he said.

He also expressed concern about the political deadlock between Iraqi leaders who have not been able to form a government since parliamentary elections in March.

“It’s very difficult to live somewhere where there is no law and no government,” he said, adding that terrorist elements have been taking advantage of the lack of a stable central authority.

“The terrorists come and go as they please,” he said.

Overturning the dictatorial regime of Saddam Hussein in order to put democracy in its place did not work, said the Iraqi bishop.

“Democracy needs to be taught, it needs to be planted, not imported,” he said. He compared life in Iraq under Saddam as like living “in a huge jail.”

“And what happens when a prison is suddenly thrown open?” he asked. It is like a dam that opens without warning and unleashes huge waves of destruction, he said.

The only way for Iraq to begin anew is for all sides to set aside

their partisan interests and focus on what is best for Iraq as a whole, he said.

The country needs to create a strong stable government that enforces the law, he said, and Iraqis need the assistance of the whole world “to help snuff out the wars.”

Meanwhile, Iraq’s new ambassador to the Vatican, Habbeb Mohammed Hadi Ali al-Sadr, said once Iraqi forces are able to guarantee greater security, then normalcy and the rebuilding of the nation can begin with help, cooperation and investments from Western countries.

The ambassador spoke at a July 14 press event in Rome.

The Iraqi government has been looking for ways to work with the Vatican and has expressed hope for a visit by Pope Benedict XVI to Iraq, he said. One Vatican source, however, told Catholic News Service August 20 that a papal visit was very unlikely, especially given the precarious security in the region.

Al-Sadr said the government has taken steps to preserve Iraq’s Christian heritage and culture. Every year about a dozen men are sent to Rome to further their education as priests, and the country wants to promote religious tourism, specifically a pilgrimage to the birthplace of Abraham in Ur, he said.

The ambassador, who met with Pope Benedict July 2 when he presented his diplomatic credentials in a private audience, said he asked the pope to urge Christians who have fled the country to return to Iraq.

He said Iraqi Christians have an important role to play in the cultural, technological and economic progress of the country.

“Iraq, in its revival, cannot do it without them,” he said.

To help facilitate their return, he said the government is committed to finding them employment, providing land on which to build a home and offering the equivalent to $1,300 in Iraqi currency.

There is no campaign of “religious extermination” against Chris-

heading for home — U.S. soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 116th Infantry Regiment, help one another with their gear August 15 near Nassiriya, Iraq, before they leave the country for Kuwait.

Iraq signed a bilateral security agreement in 2008 that paved the way for a full U.S. withdrawal by the end of 2011. (CNS photo/ Thaier al-Sudani, Reuters)

tians because, if there were, Christians would be the only ones facing attacks, he said.

“The terrorists attack all Iraqis indiscriminately,” he said.

Al-Sadr said terrorist elements are coming from outside of Iraq, and they only added Christians to their hit lists because an act of terror against Christians gets more media

attention than killing Muslims.

In this way, “without realizing it, the mass media and Western organizations have supported the terrorists’ ploy,” he said.

The Church in the U.S.

4

August 27, 2010

Appeals court grants stay on same-sex marriages in California

By Mark Pattison Catholic News Service

San Francisco the week of December 6.

The legal errors in Walker’s ruling, protectmarriage.com said in its brief seeking a stay of same-sex marriages, are “palpable and destined for reversal.”

The stay, it added, is needed “to avoid the confusion and irreparable injury that would surely flow from the creation of a class of purported same-sex marriages entered in reliance on the District Court’s decision

what courts are loath to do is to jerk people around — ‘now you WASHINGTON — The Aucan do it, now you can’t’ — a gust 16 decision by a threevisible example of what hapjudge panel of the 9th U.S. pened in summer of ’08,” when Circuit Court of Appeals to same-sex marriage in Califorprevent the state of California nia was legal until the vote on from conducting same-sex marProposition 8. riages while an appeal is under “The basis of marriage has way drew cheers from same-sex never been love, it’s been socimarriage opponents. ety’s permission for a couple to “California voters spoke have children,” said Raymond clearly on Prop 8, and we’re Dennehy, a philosophy profesglad to see their votes will resor at the Jesuit-run University main valid while the legal chalof San Francisco. “Once contralenges work their way ception was accepted, up through the courts,” nvalidating the people’s vote you had a formal sepasaid an August 16 statebased on just one judge’s opin- ration of sex from proment by Andy Pugno, and stripped ion would not have been appropriate and creation general counsel for proaway the claims that would have shaken the people’s confi- homosexuality was imtectmarriage.com.

Proposition 8, which dence in our elections and the right to moral.” was championed by pro- vote itself,” Pugno said.

Dennehy told CNS tectmarriage.com, was in an August 13 teleapproved by California phone interview from voters in November 2008. Pro- but in direct contravention of a San Francisco that the sametectmarriage.com is a defen- lawful provision of the Califor- sex marriage issue is “the culdant in the current case, known nia constitution and the mani- mination of the contraceptive as Perry v. Schwarzenegger. fest will of the people of that mentality.”

“Invalidating the people’s state.”

“I think a lot of has to do with vote based on just one judge’s “We feel it would be harm- the fact that there’s nowhere opinion would not have been ful to the same-sex persons where people of this generaappropriate and would have involved,” Carol Hogan, com- tion can go to be instructed in shaken the people’s confidence munications director for the sexual morality,” he said, faultin our elections and the right to California Catholic Confer- ing Catholic schools and priests vote itself,” Pugno said. ence, public policy arm of the for failing to teach and preach Chief U.S. District Judge state’s bishops, told Catholic effectively on the issue.

Vaughn Walker struck down News Service in an August 13 “We have to have places here the same-sex marriage ban telephone interview from Sac- people get a moral and spiriAugust 4, and he ruled August ramento, Calif. tual compass about sexuality,” 12 that same-sex marriages in “The 9th (Circuit) will give Dennehy said. In a past era, he California could resume unless a stay if they are convinced that added, “people just couldn’t a higher court were to issue a there is a likelihood that the walk away from marriage — it stay within six days. judge’s decision will be over- was hard to get a divorce — and The arguments will occur in turned,” she added. “Usually that’s all changed now.”

“I

changes coming — With the introduction of the new Roman Missal the order and structure of the Mass will not change.

Catholics can expect some changes in the wording of prayers and responses beginning at Advent next year. Pictured are people attending Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington. (CNS photo/Nancy Wiechec)

Worshippers at Spanish-language Masses in U.S. won’t use new missal yet WASHINGTON (CNS) — Although the third edition of the Roman Missal will become standard at English-language Masses in the United States beginning in Advent 2011, those participating in Spanish-language Masses here will have to wait a little longer for a new translation.

While the Vatican has given its “recognitio,” or confirmation, to the English translation that will be used in the United States, the Mexican bishops’ conference is still awaiting approval of its translation of the Latin text of the missal, said Father Richard Hilgartner, associate director of the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat on Divine Worship.

Once the Mexican text receives approval, the U.S. bishops “plan to take a good look” at it and might publish a Spanish-language edition of the Roman Missal for the United States based on that translation, although no final decision has been made, he said.

But the Mexican bishops are about two years behind the United States in the translation and approval process, Father Hilgartner added.

Even after the new Spanishlanguage text comes into use, most Catholics attending U.S. Masses in Spanish will not hear any many differences in wording as English-speaking Catholics will. That’s because the Spanish missal translations currently in use do not diverge as sharply from the original Latin as some English translations did.

For example, Father Hilgartner said, English-speaking U.S. Catholics will be learning a new response when the priest says at several points during the Mass, “The Lord be with you.” Instead of the current response of “And also with you,” the people will say, “And with your spirit.” But the Spanish has always been “Y con tu espiritu,” which translates to “And with your spirit.”

The new English translation of the Roman Missal “helps us to recognize that the text of the liturgy is bigger than any one culture or any one country,” the priest added. “The church of this generation may seem to have been separated by language, but we’re celebrating the same liturgy in our own local languages.”

August 27, 2010

5

The Church in the U.S.

Use of new Roman Missal to begin in U.S. at Advent 2011

By Nancy Frazier O’Brien Catholic News Service WASHINGTON — Catholics in the United States will begin using the long-awaited English translation of the Roman Missal on the first Sunday of Advent in 2011, Cardinal Francis E. George of Chicago said August 20.

The cardinal’s announcement as president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops marks the formal beginning of a more than 15-month period of education and training leading to the first use of the “third typical edition” of the Roman Missal at English-language Masses in the United States on Nov. 27, 2011.

The missal, announced by Pope John Paul II in 2000 and first published in Latin in 2002, has undergone a lengthy and rigorous translation process through the International Commission on English in the Liturgy, followed by sometimes heated discussions over particular wording at USCCB general assemblies during much of the past decade.

The USCCB said April 30 that the Vatican has given its “recognitio,” or confirmation, of the new English translation of the missal, but final editing by Vatican officials was continuing at that time.

In a decree of proclamation sent to the U.S. bishops August 20, Cardinal George said, “The use of the third edition of the Roman Missal enters into use in the dioceses of the United States of America as of the first Sunday of Advent, Nov. 27, 2011. From that date forward, no other edition of the Roman Missal may be used in the dioceses of the United States of America.”

He added that the U.S. Catholic Church “can now move forward and continue with our important catechetical efforts as we prepare the text for publication.”

Bishop Arthur J. Serratelli of Paterson, N.J., chairman of the USCCB Committee on Divine Worship, expressed gratitude about the final Vatican approval.

“I am happy that after years of preparation, we now have a text that, when introduced late next year, will enable the ongoing renewal of the celebration of the sacred liturgy in our parishes,” he said.

The changes to be implemented in late 2011 include new responses by the people in about a dozen sections of the Mass, although changes in the words used by the celebrant are much more extensive.

At several points during the Mass, for example, when the celebrant says, “The Lord be with you,” the people will respond, in

a more faithful translation of the original Latin, “And with your spirit.”

The current response, “And also with you,” was “not meant as ‘you too’ or something like ‘back at you,’” Father Richard Hilgartner, associate director of the USCCB Secretariat of Divine Worship, told Catholic News Service. Rather it is “an invocation to the priest as he celebrates the Mass, a reminder that he is not acting on his own, but in the person of Christ” — a distinction that the new language will highlight, he said.

“The order and structure of the Mass will not change at all,” he added, but Catholics will see some new texts for prayers, new observances for saints added to the church calendar in recent decades and such additions as a Mass in thanksgiving for the gift of human life and an extended vigil for Pentecost, similar to the Easter Vigil.

Since mid-April, Msgr. Anthony Sherman, director of the USCCB divine worship secretariat, and Father Hilgartner have been conducting workshops around the country for priests and diocesan leaders on implementation of the new missal. The workshops will continue into November.

Msgr. Sherman said participants often tell him that they had seen introducing the new missal as “an absolutely impossible task” before the workshop but said afterward, “I think I can actually do this,” especially because of the wealth of resource materials that will be available to them.

The USCCB has prepared a parish implementation guide that includes a detailed timeline, bulletin inserts, suggestions for homilies and adult education classes on the liturgy and a wide variety of other resources. Audio, visual and print resources for priests, liturgical musicians and laypeople also are available now or in the works.

Sister Janet Baxendale, a Sister of Charity of New York who teaches liturgy at St. Joseph Seminary in Dunwoodie, N.Y., and its Institute of Religious Studies, is a consultant to the bishops’ Committee on Divine Worship. She said the new translation has been needed for a long time.

When the Second Vatican Council endorsed a new missal and permitted Catholics around the world to begin celebrating Mass in their local languages, the translation work that followed “was at its best a rush job,” she said. The Vatican’s translation principles at the time

also favored “a looser construction, with the thought that in this way it could be adapted to various people more readily,” she added.

“As time went on, it became evident that ... in many instances, the richness and power of the Latin text didn’t really come through,” Sister Janet said. “This was true of all the translations, not just the English.”

The new translation offers “more poetic texts, more beautiful texts,” she said.

Father Hilgartner said Pope Benedict XVI has placed his own personal stamp on the liturgical changes by adding two new options for the dismissal prayer at the end of Mass, emphasizing the “connection between the Mass and living the Christian life.”

In place of the current “The Mass is ended, go in peace,” celebrants will be able to choose from four options, including the pope’s suggestions — “Go and announce the Gospel of the Lord” and “Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life.”

There has been a lot of enthusiasm at the workshops for those added texts — “an audible kind of ‘oooh,’” Father Hilgartner said. “There’s a reaction of some awe and enthusiasm for just these two phrases, and I think that’s worth getting excited about.” graduate degree programs

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6

The Anchor A long-awaited Advent

There’s a common phenomenon that occurs when a movie is made based on a best-selling book. Those who have never read the book go to the movie and often appreciate the story on its own merits, even if, as happens frequently, many of the elements that gave life to the original work were not included or changed outright. Those who have read the work, however, while they may still appreciate the film as a coherent whole, often acutely feel the absence of those eliminated or emendated elements, which, even though non-essential, are part of the story. They’re often left commenting how the film could have been improved had those original elements been more faithfully rendered.

That cinematic experience has long been the liturgical experience of Roman Catholics with the new order of the Mass that followed the Second Vatican Council. Those with or without exposure to the text of the Latin original can and do appreciate and love the Mass for what the Mass is and can certainly derive enormous spiritual nourishment from the structure of the rite and the English translations of the order of Mass and the variable prayers. Those, however, who are familiar with the Latin typical edition have been in many places disappointed that the Scriptural, patristic and poetic richness of the original has not been adequately translated. That is, until now.

On Friday, August 20, Cardinal Francis George, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, announced that the Vatican had given final approval for the new English translation of the Roman Missal. The changes will go into effect in U.S. parishes on Nov. 27, 2011, which will be the first Sunday of Advent and the beginning of a new liturgical year. The delay of 15 months is to give liturgical publishing companies plenty of time to prepare beautiful and sturdy new missals and to provide musicians and composers, priests and faithful the opportunity to accustom themselves to the new translations, understand the reason behind the changes within the context of a profound liturgical catechesis, and experience their implementation as a smooth rather than an abrupt occurrence. At The Anchor, we will be inaugurating a series specifically on the changes, another on the history of the liturgical movement and a third on liturgical questions-and-answers, to help our readers learn what changes are on the way and why, within the large context of the Church’s theology and practice of the liturgy.

With the new translations, the structure of the Mass will remain the same and the vast majority of the words prayed by the faithful will either remain identical or have only slight variations. The biggest changes will occur in the prayers said by the priest, which have been thoroughly retranslated in order to help them correspond more faithfully to the Latin original and the ancient texts on which the Latin is based.

When the Roman Missal was translated into English for the first time in the early 1970s, translators worked under a principle of “dynamic equivalence,” in which they sought adequately to render the meaning of the Latin words in terms and phrases immediately accessible to English Mass-goers. They broke up lengthy sentences into short ones. They reduced the vocabulary of the Latin original, using the same English word to express various Latin originals. They eliminated intensifying expressions, such as the use of multiple adjectives to modify the same noun. They produced a very intelligible, direct and at times colloquial text that has served us fairly well over the span of four decades.

But there were a few important things that were lost in translation and needed to be remedied.

First, there was a loss of a certain sacred vocabulary and sentence structure distinguishing the way we address God from the way we address others. It is important in the Church’s liturgical prayer — especially in an age when there is a dramatic loss of the sense of the sacred — that the language of our vocal prayers reflect the reverential awe we need to have in approaching God’s divine majesty as beloved children.

Second, there was a loss of “catholicity” or “universality” when the principle of “dynamic equivalence” was used by various language groups, which led to noticeable variations in the prayerful experience of Mass for those attending Mass in different tongues. For example, at the beginning of the Mass when the priest first greets the people, in English the people have responded “and also with you,” in Spanish, “and with thy spirit,” and in Portuguese, “blessed be God who has reunited us in the love of Christ.” During the penitential rite, English and French speakers have said, “through my own fault” striking their breast once; Portuguese speakers have twice said the expression and twice stricken their breast; Spanish and Italian speakers have done both three times. At the end of the offertory, when English speaking priests have said, “Pray, brothers and sisters, that our sacrifice may be acceptable to God, the Almighty Father” and the faithful have responded, “May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands, for the praise and glory of his name, for our good and the good of all his Church.” French priests have instead stated, “Let us pray together as we offer the sacrifice of the whole Church” and French faithful have responded “for the glory of God and the salvation of the world.” In German, the most popular option for this important dialogue has been for the priest and people to skip it all together, with the priest’s simply saying “Let us pray” and the people responding nothing.

These changes, both individually and collectively, are not minor or inconsequential. Because the vernacular translations vary so much — veering from the Latin standard in assorted ways and to different degrees — the experience of the Mass in the various languages varies well beyond the change in idiom. This was never intended and is one of the items that the Church was seeking to remedy in these revisions, done under a principle of “formal equivalence” that seeks to have all translations adhere much more tightly to the original. To the extent possible, the only thing that varies from one vernacular translation to another is the given word in a language, not the thought and not the liturgical structure. This is crucial because the Church believes as she prays — the ancient principle of “lex orandi, lex credendi” — and when there’s substantial variance in the way the Church prays the Mass, there will be consequences in the faith across language groups.

Third, the new translations are also trying to rectify another lost element: the readily-discernible link between liturgical language and sacred Scripture. In the Latin Missal, many of the Mass texts are taken verbatim from the inspired words of the Bible, which provide the full context for them. Many of these biblical-liturgical links were missed in the original vernacular renderings.

One example of this, in English, happens with the prayer, “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you.”

The new translation will conclude, “… under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.” This literal translation from the Latin is taken directly from the humble prayer of the centurion when he asked Jesus to heal his servant (Mt 8:8). In praying these words, we are explicitly calling to mind that we are addressing the same omnipotent and merciful Jesus he addressed.

The more the liturgy prays explicitly with the inspired words of the Bible, the easier it will be for priests and faithful to ground their lives in that saving revelation and to speak it.

The new translation of the Roman Missal responds adequately to these issues and is a substantial improvement over what we are presently using. It took eight years to accomplish, but those eight years were well-spent. It should result in a more beautiful, more sacred and more catholic experience of the Mass.

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August 27, 2010

Who is this all about?

bout a year ago, just after I had As a former high school chaplain, I finished celebrating the holy often heard from the students, “I don’t get Mass, I was asked by a member of the anything out of the Mass” or “It is so hard congregation, “Father, I noticed that when to pay attention or stay focused.” I don’t you say the Mass, you really don’t seem believe for a minute that this response is to be looking at us a whole lot. Why is limited to teen-agers, even though they that?” My initial reaction and response may express it in a more straightforward was “Well, when I celebrate the Mass, I manner. The same is true, however, of any am speaking to our Lord and not with the event or activity that we attend. If we are congregation.” In response to this very unfamiliar with what is happening or to good question, I attempted to clarify this the real beauty in how it is executed, then, common misconception that the Mass is certainly, we will not appreciate or be able primarily a dialogue between the priest and to enter into it. the congregation.

For example, I remember the first With the exception of just a few dialogi- professional soccer game that I went to in cal parts, i.e., “the Lord be with you ... lift Italy. I knew the basic point of the game up your hearts …” the Mass is not a diawas to kick the ball into the opponents’ logue between the priest and the congrenet and I knew that you couldn’t use gation as if it were simply a performance your hands, but that was the extent of my reenacting the Last Supper. The Mass is a awareness of the game. I didn’t understand dialogue between us and Almighty God, a strategy or the concept of being offsides dialogue in which the priest is leading, but or how the individual players functioned one in which everyone is participating. together as a team. There was an initial Maybe we have never thought of it in excitement about being in a huge stadium these terms. Maybe we were formed in a with thousands of screaming Romans, but way of thinking after that initial that leads us excitement to believe that faded away, Putting Into Mass is esI was quite the Deep sentially about bored. “us,” about I imagine what “we” get that this feelBy Father out of it, about ing is similar Jay Mello how it makes to that of those “me” feel. But who “get nothif we listen closely to the prayers that are ing out of the Mass” or find it “boring.” said during the Mass it becomes abunWhen one is unfamiliar with the beauty dantly clear that we are speaking above all and the sacredness of such an encounter to God the Father. with God, then that response is almost In a conference given this past January natural. The question that I continually to celebrate the Year For Priests, Msgr. asked myself as a high school chaplain, Guido Marini, pontifical master of Liturgi- trying to foster in the students an appreciacal Ceremonies, spoke of this very topic, tion and love for the Mass, was “How do explaining that, “theologically speaking, we reclaim the sense of wonder and awe of the holy Mass, as a matter of fact, is althe Mass that the generations of Catholics ways addressed to God through Christ our before us experienced?”

Lord, and it would be a grievous error to Over and over again, I came to the imagine that the principal orientation of the same two-fold conclusion. On the part sacrificial action is the community.” of ministers of the Church, first we must As we attempt to “put into the deep” persistently provide and embrace an ongoand plunge into the unfathomable and saing catechesis for Catholics of all ages cred mystery of the Mass, it is crucial that and states of life. How can we live out we first understand the very nature of the our faith and celebrate it liturgically if we liturgy and to whom it is being directed. If are unaware of what we truly believe as we are truly to encounter our Lord in the Catholics? The second thing that is necesbreaking of the bread as did the disciples sary is to provide reverent and solemn on the road to Emmaus, our hearts and celebrations of the Mass allowing its natuminds must be open to and formed by the ral beauty to lead us into contact with the liturgical actions and prayers themselves. presence of God. There is nothing I or any The Mass is ultimately about the worship other priest can do to make the Mass more and adoration of God, not about any emobeautiful or engaging or interesting than it tional response it may invoke. already is on its merits. At each Mass Jesus Msgr. Marini explains on this point that Christ becomes truly present — there is “everything in the liturgical act, through nothing more awesome than that. the nobility, the beauty, and the harmony These are the things the Church proof the exterior sign, must be conducive to vides. Each of us, however, has the responadoration, to union with God: this insibility actively to seek to grow in our faith cludes the music, the singing, the periods and not just go about things as passive of silence, the manner of proclaiming the members of the Church. If we are to “get Word of the Lord, and the manner of pray- more” out of the Mass, we ought first to ing, the gestures employed, the liturgical strive to understand the Mass by reflecting vestments and the sacred vessels and other upon how we approach Mass in the first furnishings, as well as the sacred edifice place. We need to ask the question, “Is this in its entirety.” Everything that is done, or about worshiping and praising God?” or supposed to be done at Mass is directed to “Is it about me and how it makes me feel?” helping us lift up our hearts and minds to Father Mello is a parochial vicar at St. God. Patrick’s Parish in Falmouth.

August 27, 2010

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The grandfather of the ‘Catholic imagination’

hen we think about “the Catholic imagination,” we might think about the traditional elements of the practice of our faith and how multi-sensory they are. The aromas of the burning incense. The golden rays of the monstrance. The vivid colors of frescoes and stained glass.

The human form that made our iconography so scandalous.

The architecture of our oldest churches. The sonorous echoes of organ pipes, chanting, chimes, bells, and the unmistakably Roman meter of the Latin Mass. All of it swirls together like a sacred, atmospheric poem. Poetry (like the poetry of the Psalter or Song of Songs) originated in sacred impulse, collective memory, and the communal dissolve of the many into the one. No doubt, then: the poetic impulse — both the impulse to make it and the desire to receive it — would be nourished by an imagination formed amidst the grandeur of Catholic culture.

In fact, seen in this light, the lush sound of poetic language, its typically rich and metaphorically layered imagery, and its passionate themes is the inevitable, secular extension of that culture, an artistic overflow that could not

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The Anchor

lannery O’Connor’s first novel “Wise Blood” revolves around a character named Hazel Motes who preaches a “Church without Christ,” where you don’t need to be saved, not when you’ve got a car at least.

Hazel’s car is eventually totaled, and he ends up blinding himself.

I was reminded of this when I read Charles P. Pierce’s “What I believe,” an article in the Boston Sunday Globe Magazine of July 11, 2010. I actually like Pierce, as I first encountered him through his bemused sports commentary on NPR’s “Only a Game” with Bill Littlefield But the subject of his recent article is not sports, but rather “Why I remain a Catholic.” He gives some reasons, among them the “most fundamental rule of my Catholicism — nobody gets to tell me that I’m not a Catholic … no pope can tell me I’m not a Catholic.”

Far be it from me to say that he’s not a Catholic. I definitely subscribe to Jesus’ saying, “Judge not, that you not be judged.” In any case, I don’t mean to single out Pierce: His views, I think it fair to say, are widely shared in Massachusetts, home of Kennedy-style, pickand-choose Catholicism. But the idea that no pope could tell someone that he’s not a Catholic seems to me to be — well, not

be kept to designated times and Dante’s letters report that there appointed rituals. It would have are multiple modes of interpretato permeate all areas of life. It is tion for the epic poem outside of very easy to underestimate the its obvious allegorical format; influence that overflow has had on four, to be exact: 1) historical, 2) Western Civilization — or to miss moral, 3) literal, and 4) anait altogether. gogical (which means when the When it comes to poetry in invisible is explained in terms particular, we can consider Dante of the visible). These modes are Alighieri the grandfather of the “Catholic Imagination,” not just in the Catholic tradition but in secular Western Literature, where he has influenced generations of

By Jennifer Pierce poets, visual artists, and fiction writers. Though those of us who read English translations might miss it, not random; it just so happens Dante’s lush poetic vision in the that these were also four modes original Italian is often cited as of Scriptural interpretation in the the Western poetic ideal in meter medieval era. It may seem arin scansion. The central themes of rogant to us, that a poet would athis masterpiece, La Divina Comtempt to emulate sacred scripture media (“The Divine Comedy”), in his writing. (In one way human are inescapably Catholic: Dante beings today have become even narrated our lives as a journey more egocentric; in another, we from hell to heaven, illustrating in aim entirely too low.) This was, unforgettable detail the Catholic however, an emanation of the view of what our Greek and Romedieval vision, which used anaman ancestors considered “the logs and metaphors to understand Underworld,” and what we know the cosmos. God was the Divine as hell and the liminal space at the Artist who encoded all creation gateway of heaven, purgatory. with both literal and metaphoric

On Great Catholic Writers

meanings. The great artist should emulate the Divine Artist and layer his work with meaning and significance, creating a system of creative correspondences. Each of the elements of his work should have a relationship to natural, theological, and philosophical meanings in the world.

Another characteristic of the Medieval time period was the impulse to merge classical thought with Christian values.

Dante represented this impulse toward continuity directly by using characters from GrecoRoman mythology and history, like Paris and Helen of Troy and the historic poets, Virgil, Homer, Ovid, and Lucan. These characters intermingled with Roman Catholic saints, the Church fathers, and historic figures contemporaneous with Dante himself. As Catholic critic and writer Dorothy L. Sayers has noted, he used these characters with great narrative efficiency; his medieval audience knew these figures and Dante wasted no time introducing them. He also expressed, however, what has elsewhere been called “the fullness of time” in showing not only the

journey of one man through hell to heaven, but in showing the entire history of man’s salvation through the singular figure of himself.

As if to demonstrate the “Catholicity” of the work, Dante’s “Divine Comedy,” though heralded as a work of genius in the Renaissance, suffered a precipitous decline in the period after the Reformation known as the Enlightenment. Dante was considered medieval and therefore, irrational, superstitious, gaudy, and overwritten, and many Protestant theologians thought such “Roman” art to be idolatrous.

Thankfully, however, Dante’s vision was resurrected through the admiration of poets, writers, and artists, who could not help but be captivated by his wildly complex and vivid imagination. Despite a temporary absence in our culture, the influence of Dante’s work still persists today. Dante’s map from hell to heaven can be found everywhere in Western fiction, drama, film, and television from Renaissance art to “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and even “Tom and Jerry.”

Jennifer Pierce is a parishioner of Corpus Christi in East Sandwich, where she lives with her husband Jim and two daughters.

The Church without Christ

both Christian and Catholic. exactly Catholic. More like a When President McKinley Protestant idea: private judgment and all that.

One wonders, could God himself tell someone that he’s not a Catholic? Forget about the pope for a moment.

What would Jesus say?

By Dwight Duncan Turns out Pierce apparently doesn’t care.

He says the answer to sought to justify the Spanishthe question “Why I remain American War in 1898, he a Catholic” lies somewhere talked about the need to between the “new atheists” on the one hand, and “fundamental- “educate the Filipinos and uplift and civilize and Chrisist Christianity” on the other. tianise them.” Paul Johnson “As to the latter, I think I can comments, “No European say without equivocation that imperialist … would have I simply don’t want what they dared to justify himself in call a personal relationship with such a manner, rightly fearJesus Christ … I do not need a personal Lord and savior. Not in ing accusations of humbug.”

What McKinley meant was that sense, anyway.”

“Protestantize” them, because He wants to belong to a the Filipinos had been CathoChurch without Christ, where lic (and thus Christian) for he doesn’t need salvation. He’s 400 years. Contra Pierce and not alone in this, of course.

McKinley, Catholic means Hazel Motes was the same way.

Christian.

But this is beyond ProtestantLast Sunday’s Gospel acclaism, I think. It’s an attitude mation states that Jesus is “the that doesn’t seem to be even way, the truth and the life.” He Christian. What possible value is the “narrow gate” to salvation. is there in being Catholic if you “There is no other name under disavow Christ? This goes for heaven given among men by Catholic institutions as well, which we must be saved” (Acts of course. When colleges talk 4:12). Jesus’ very name means about being in the Jesuit tradi“God saves.” No Christ, no tion, that must mean that, like salvation.

St. Ignatius of Loyola, they’re

Judge For Yourself

Six months previously, on Jan. 10, 2010, Charles Pierce wrote another piece in the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, this time about the then-upcoming Senate election to succeed Ted Kennedy. Nine days before Republican Scott Brown won that election, Pierce wrote, “The notion that Massachusetts would elect a Republican to fill the seat left vacant

by Edward Kennedy was the property of people who buy interesting mushrooms in interesting places”— in other words, a delirious notion. Well, Charlie Pierce was wrong about that.

Turns out he was the delirious one. Judge for yourself whether he or the pope is more deluded on what it means to be Catholic.

Dwight Duncan is a professor at UMass School of Law Dartmouth. He holds degrees in civil and canon law.

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oday’s passage from the last section of the letter to the Hebrews describes the “festal gathering” in glowing terms, while Psalm 68 portrays God’s “holy dwelling” as “a home to the forsaken,” to prisoners, the poor, and the needy.

It is easy to hear echoes of this portrayal in Jesus’ words: “When you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind” — the humble who will never be able to pay back the favor. It seems that the heavenly gathering is more likely to look like Christmas dinner at a homeless shelter than an elegant wedding banquet. It is a rather humbling portrayal.

In our culture of high achievement and ambitiously getting ahead, humility has taken on some unattractive connotations. As explanatory synonyms for the word “humble,” the dictionary offers such words as meek, deferential, and submissive. Yet humility is

August 27, 2010

The Anchor

Slicing humble pie

certainly one of the most imof this true humility is when portant of the Christian virtues, we celebrate the Eucharist even while it is probably one — when we say just before of the most misunderstood.

Communion: “Lord, I am not There is a healthier way of worthy to receive you, but understanding the term humilonly say the word and I shall ity, one that connotes neither be healed.” And God says the self-effacement nor false modesty. Humility is the realization Homily of the Week that not everything that Twenty-second Sunday happens in life is all in Ordinary Time about you. Things may work out well but we

By Deacon may not have been the Arthur L. LaChance Jr. primary reason for their success. Things may fail, but the failure may word, and that word heals us not have been our fault. and makes us worthy. ThereHumility is not, therefore, fore, the actual reality is that something weak and negative. we are worthy with the worth Humility is merely accepting that God graciously gives the truth. It is simply recogus. In this sense, humility is nizing reality as it actually is. liberating and this is certainly And that reality is that we are cause for positive celebration completely and continuously and thanksgiving instead of dependent on God who freely negative groveling in debilitatand gratuitously gives of his ing guilt. goodness.

Humility teaches us that we One of the best examples

do not earn anything from God or gain anything ourselves by practicing religion and performing good deeds. Humility tells us that it is all a completely free gift of God, given to us entirely on God’s own initiative, with absolutely no claim or merit of our own. This is the meaning of the parable in today’s Gospel about those who arrogantly take the places of honor at the table — thinking that it is their right as a reward for all they have done. Humility tells us, on the other hand, that we are like the beggar, the crippled, the lame, and the blind, called simply to accept, as a completely unmerited gift, the place at the banquet to which God invites us.

Humility also tells us that just as we have received without merit, so too we must give without repayment.

Humility prompts us to self-

less service of others simply because it sees that same God-given worth and value in each person. So instead of selfishly seeking our own good we seek the good of others — in matters secular and temporal and in matters religious and spiritual.

In the final analysis, then, humility must not be defined in the negative terms of worthlessness and lowliness, but rather in the positive terms of active worth. This is certainly what our first reading today implies when it says, “Conduct your affairs with humility ... humble yourself ... and you will find favor with God” (Sirach 3:1718). And this is why Jesus says, “All those who exalt themselves shall be humbled and those who humble themselves shall be exalted” (Luke 14:11).

Deacon LaChance serves at Corpus Christi Parish in East Sandwich.

Upcoming Daily Readings: Sat. Aug. 28, 1 Cor 1:26-31; Ps 33:12-13,18-21; Mt 25:14-30. Sun. Aug. 29, Twenty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Sir 3:17-18,20,28-29; Ps 68:4-7,10-11; Heb 12:18-19,22-24a; Lk 14:1,7-14. Mon. Aug. 30, 1 Cor 2:1-5; Ps 119:97-102; Lk 4:16-30. Tues. Aug. 31, 1 Cor 2:10b-16; Ps 145:8-14; Lk 4:31-37. Wed. Sept.

1, 1 Cor 3:1-9; Ps 33:12-15,20-21; Lk 4:38-44. Thur. Sept. 2, 1 Cor 3:18-23; Ps 24:1b-4b,5-6; Lk 5:1-11. Fri. Sept. 3, 1 Cor 4:1-5; Ps 37:3-6,27-28,39-40; Lk 5:33-39.

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ast month, I was happy to join with former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar, Nobel Peace Prize laureate David Trimble, Italian philosopher and political leader Marcello Pera, and several other international figures in launching a global “Friends of Israel” Initiative, which debuted in the United States in a July 8 Wall Street Journal op-ed article. The initiative, begun under Aznar’s leadership, intends to challenge the campaign of moral and political delegitimation to which the State of Israel has been subjected in recent years — a campaign which my colleagues and I believe has grave moral and strategic

In defense of Israel’s legitimacy implications for the entire was established by internaWest. tional law (United Nations As we stated in our joint Resolution 181) in 1947. That Journal op-ed, we are an decision recognized that the eclectic group: none of us Jewish people had a right to speaks for any Israeli govestablish a sovereign state ernment; all of us have our on a land in which they have disagreements with Israeli policy. More importantly, however, we are agreed on the following, basic points: — Israel is a mature, established democracy

By George Weigel and an integral part of the community of democracies that is cenlived, and to which they have tered historically in the West; had a historic claim, for milas such, Israel deserves to be lennia. To dismiss this decision treated as any other normal as a matter of guilt over the western country.

Holocaust — a common theme — Israel’s right-to-exist in the current campaign of delegitimation — is to misread history and to undercut the authority of international law.

— Israel, which has a clear right to self-defense, is beset today by a unique combination of threats: it must defend its people from attack while defending its very right to exist. No other state in the world faces this dual challenge. To deny Israel’s right to confront some of the world’s most vicious terrorist groups in order to ensure the safety of its citizens is to corrode international norms from within — a process that is already

The Catholic Difference

well-advanced at the United Nations, to that organization’s shame.

— The assault on Israel is one part of a more general assault on the West, on democracy, and on the moral and culture heritage that grew from the fruitful interaction of Jerusalem, Athens, and Rome. One especially threatening part of this assault is the effort to use human rights claims and claims of universal criminal jurisdiction as weapons against Israeli democracy. Should these efforts succeed, similar efforts will certainly be turned against other western democracies.

— Peace in the Middle East, to which all of us are firmly committed, is not a matter of Israel-and-thePalestinians only. Responsible Israelis and responsible Palestinians both know that there will be no peace in the Middle East absent a pan-Arab recognition of Israel’s sovereign legitimacy.

— Israel and the West are both confronted with two particularly grave threats in the early 21st century: the threat of Islamist jihadism, which has already caused enormous suffering while altering patterns of daily life throughout

the world, and the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran, led by men who believe that a new holocaust of the Jews will hasten the advent of the messianic age. Israel must not be put into a position of facing these threats alone. Those in the West who do not understand this should ponder the lessons of the late 1930s more carefully.

— The campaign of delegitimation against Israel includes aspects of that antiSemitism that has fouled parts of western culture for centuries and that must be forthrightly condemned by all who share the moral values of the Judaeo-Christian tradition.

The “Friends of Israel” initiative is no blank check for the present Israeli government, or for any future Israeli government. Rather, it is an effort, by men and women across the spectrum of responsible political opinion, to restore a measure of moral integrity to an international environment that is becoming increasingly toxic because of untruths and rank prejudices. The success or failure of such an appeal to moral reason promises to be an interesting bellwether.

George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

August 27, 2010

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The Anchor

As the world turns Sunday 29 August 2010 — or running water. She cooked Old Dighton Village — Chop on a wood stove, dipped her suey invented in New York City own candles, wove her own by chef of visiting Chinese Amcloth, and hand-sewed her own bassador in 1896. clothes. She favored calico ometimes you hear it dresses and starched white bonsaid, dear readers, that someone was born in the wrong century. It’s not a compliment. There Reflections of a are rare individuals, Parish Priest however, who, recognizing that they were in fact

By Father Tim born too late, choose to Goldrick live in an earlier time.

I’ve known people who time-travel. nets. She played the dulcimer, One such person was chilcrafted dolls, and preferred to go dren’s book author and prolific barefoot. illustrator Tasha Tudor. Born Another time-traveler of in 1915, she decided to live my acquaintance was Adelma instead in the 1830s. She raised Grenier Simmons. In 1930, four children in a Vermont Adelma quit her day-job as a farmhouse with no electricity buyer for a fancy department

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The Ship’s Log

store and moved to another time and place. Her family purchased an abandoned farm (the 18th-century homestead was being occupied by chickens) in a quiet corner of Connecticut. They intended to raise vegetables, herbs, and goats. One summer, a severe drought killed everything but the herbs. Adelma (a devout Episcopalian) took this as a sign from God and turned to growing herbs.

Her herbal-themed luncheons and lectures became renowned and the farm a destination. Adelma always wore her signature mozzetta (shoulder cape) and zucchetto (beanie).

She wrote more than 30 books and pamphlets on herbal lore, recipes, and horticulture. She

Who needs a 1,500-ft. birthday candle?

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to and write letters to? esterday was Blessed And there are those who Mother Teresa’s 100th haven’t attained “sainthood,” yet birthday, and countless cellived holy, virtuous lives. Most ebrations took place across the notably for me is Blessed Kateri globe, including a Mass celTekakwitha. Her sainthood ebrated by Bishop George W. Coleman at St. Lawrence Martyr cause was initiated in 1943, and it’s still in question. My feeling Church in New Bedford, with a is that she will never attain ofnumber of Sisters from the Misficial sainthood status, but again, sionaries of Charity, the order that doesn’t matter much to me. founded by Blessed Teresa. It Her life was totally dedicated was the same place the saint-toto Christ and she lived that life be visited in June of 1995. in an environment that was not There’s no question celreceptive to it in the least. That ebrations of this sort should be doesn’t stop me from admiring enjoyed to the four corners of her and seeking her intercession this tiny planet. There can be no argument Mother Teresa was one of the most selfless, giving souls to ever walk this earth. And she was arguably the biggest little person the world has ever seen.

By Dave Jolivet At press time, it was quite expected that the Empire State Building in in prayer, wearing a medal with New York City would not be lit her image, and having a statue in white and blue in her honor. of her prominently displayed in But for a last-minute miracle, my home. there would be no 1,500-foot God has called each of us birthday candle for the petite to our own ministry, and has nun. gifted us with our own persona, That really doesn’t matter to strengths, and weaknesses. Most me. And no one would care less of us will never be declared a about that than Mother herself. saint, yet our role in Christ’s She was a human beacon for her Church is as important as any entire existence, radiating the of the great Catholics who have light of God to everyone. gone before us.

She was one of those rare In this time between Mother’s individuals who grabbed hold of 100th birthday and the 13th the Word of God and lived it to the fullest, like her peer JPII, and anniversary of her death on September 5, it may be good others like Padre Pio, St. John for us to pause and say a prayer Vianney, St. Maria Goretti, and of thanksgiving and encouragebiblical figures like the Blessed ment for the saints around us.

Mother and St. Paul.

There are my parents, who But we are not all called to for the first 22 years of my life, be these individuals. Can you brought me up right (and still imagine if we all lived as St. do), and my wife Denise who Paul did? Who would we preach

My View From the Stands

put up with me for the last 32 years of my life.

There are my co-workers, my Anchor family — Mary, Wayne and Ken — who rarely, if ever, receive recognition and thanks from the public for their wonderful example of dedication and hard work getting this publication out every week.

There are the elderly parishioners, who, without fail, drop an envelope into the collection basket each Sunday, when they could very well use that themselves in these shaky economic times.

There are the young adults, some with a tattoo, or two or three, and perhaps a nose ring or a lip ring, who serve tirelessly at soup kitchens or work with underprivileged children without fanfare. In fact they may even be looked upon by some as “not looking like a Christian.”

There’s my daughter Emilie who isn’t afraid to befriend a timid classmate and invite him or her to sit with her at lunch, even though she’s quite shy herself.

There are so many people who do so many little things with the heart of Christ that they add up to great things.

There will be no fantastic light display for them on their birthdays either. And like Mother Teresa, they couldn’t care less.

Most of these people will never be famous for what they do — except in the eyes of God. And for that, he’ll not illuminate a building for them, he’ll draw them into his everlasting light.

Well done, unofficial saints.

happened to have been born in the wrong century but corrected the situation.

In the 1940’s, people considered herbs to be nothing but weeds. Adelma once made a lovely wreath of dried herbs as a gift for a friend in New York City. The woman wrote back to thank her, but reported that unfortunately all the “weeds” in the wreath had dried up and died during shipment, so she burned the gift in the fireplace.

Simmons celebrated medieval feast days and calendar festivals all year long. She had so much fun she decided four seasons were insufficient. She added a fifth season — Christmas. In fact, she wrote a book entitled “Herb Gardening in Five Seasons.” I have an autographed copy.

I, too, am a time-traveler of sorts. I was born in the wrong century but I couldn’t bear to live without my air conditioner, SUV, cell phone, or computer so I keep my feet firmly planted in the 21st century, but in my mind I make soirées into times past.

The 18th century is a nice place to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there.

I grow a few herbs. I like the colors and textures of the leaves.

Most of all, I enjoy the distinctive aromas. Nothing in the world smells like rosemary or lavender except rosemary or lavender. The fact is I don’t smell good. Let me rephrase that. I lost most of my sense of smell decades ago. Now I appreciate any aroma that manages to get through.

Nature is cyclic. Seasons in New England repeat. What goes around comes around. The same is true of the Church liturgical calendar. To savor the season, you must keep your five senses alert.

Creation reflects the Creator.

Weren’t the hydrangeas spectacular this year? The weather seems to have been perfect for

them. One lonely hydrangea bush blooms by my front door.

I don’t know who planted it, but I suspect it was recycled from a sanctuary display.

At dusk, I see the Evening Star in the western sky. Actually, it’s not a star at all but the planet Venus. No matter, “Evening Star” sounds more poetic.

I see the bats swooping through the darkening sky.

Country people don’t run screaming at the sight of a bat.

Bats are part of the cycle of nature. Bats devour harmful garden insects. If none are available, they munch mosquitoes. It seems to me there are fewer bats than I remember from my childhood. I used to watch the bats billow from the unused chimney of St. Anthony Church in New Bedford and fill the air like a cloud of black smoke. Depletion of the bat population cannot be good. Everything in nature, including bats and human beings, has a unique purpose.

Even the roadside “weeds” catch my attention. I love the true-blue color of chicory.

My mother told me that during World War II, folks added chicory to ground coffee as an extender.

Goldenrod is also lovely but people mistakenly believe it aggravates their allergies. Goldenrod doesn’t; ragweed does.

One garden escapee I admire is Queen Anne’s lace. Anne of Denmark (1574-1619), queen consort of King James I, was an expert lace-maker. The delicate “wild carrot” flowers reminded folks of Her Majesty’s tatting, so they took to calling it Queen Anne’s lace.

As the world of nature turns once more, this lesson I learn: One person’s weed is another’s flower.

Father Goldrick is pastor of St. Nicholas of Myra Parish in North Dighton.

10

The Anchor

August 27, 2010

‘God Squad’ logo may change, but priest’s mission remains the same ST. FRANCIS, Wis. (CNS) — Two years ago, Father Luke Strand, then a deacon in his last year of studies to become a priest of the Milwaukee Archdiocese, came into the spotlight for his unusual looking car.

Riding around town in a black Volkswagen Beetle

with a Roman collar painted on the hood, a “God Squad” logo on the sides, and a personalized license plate GODLVYA proudly proclaiming his mission, he attracted attention on the roads.

The car, along with his laid-back nature and outgoing personality, sparked faith-filled conversations with friends and strangers alike.

Now an associate pastor at Holy Family Parish in Fond du Lac, Father Strand is again in the public eye for his God Squad vehicle: The logo is too similar to Best Buy’s Geek Squad trademark.

In mid-August, Father Strand received a letter from the Minnesota-based consumer electronics company requesting that he “cease-and-desist” his God Squad logo, because of copyright infringement.

The shape of the logo, font and colors, all on a black Volkswagen Beetle, were too similar to their well-known Geek Squad cars, according to the complaint sent through the company’s legal department.

Whether it’s television, newspapers, talk radio or Internet message boards, Father Strand has garnered national attention. Many compare his situation to that of David and Goliath, in which the young priest is pitted against a greedy corporation and its lawyers.

Father Strand, however, doesn’t see it that way.

For now, Father Strand, who consulted a lawyer

about his case, has removed the decals from his car and will redesign the God Squad logo. While he is grateful that people care so much about his public legal situation, he feels that many are making this out to be a bigger deal than it is.

“I was surprised,” Father Strand said in an interview with the Catholic Herald, Milwaukee’s archdiocesan newspaper recalling when he first opened the letter from Best Buy. “Obviously, I didn’t expect it.”

After consulting with a lawyer, he took the logo off his car.

“We were really using the car as a way to bring the Gospel message to the streets,” he explained. “To develop relationships with people and spark conversations with people, and offer them an opportunity to approach someone from the Church and maybe talk

god squad — Father Luke Strand, second from left, poses with his seminary classmates and his first "God Squad" car in April 2008, shortly after the men were ordained deacons. (CNS photo/courtesy St. Francis Seminary/Emerald Isle Marketing)

about what’s going on in their life.

“I just found it to be a phenomenal opportunity to really spark those conversations with people who might be questioning their life, want to talk a little about where they are in their relationship with God,” he added.

A statement released by Best Buy’s public relations department stated: “As a matter of practice, Best Buy aggressively defends all of our trademarks, including the Geek Squad logo.”

“We sent a notification letter to Father Strand and God Squad because of the unfortunate similarities between their logo and ours. This was a really difficult thing for us to do because we appreciate what Father Strand is trying to accomplish with his mission,” it read.

“But at the end of the day, it’s bad precedent to let some groups violate our trademark while pursuing others. We’re now working closely with Father Strand’s organization to modify the God Squad logo so that it still works for him and yet doesn’t violate the Geek Squad logo. We’re confident that together we’ll come up with a good (dare we say heavenly?) solution for everyone.”

Throughout the two years he has been driving the God Squad car, conversations with curious onlookers taught him that it wasn’t the car that mattered, but his easygoing approach that truly struck a chord, according to Rhea Behlke, director of stewardship at Holy Family Parish.

“It wasn’t really the logo itself or the type of car itself that was important as much as the fact that it provided people an opening to talk about their faith, or to approach a priest when they might not otherwise do so. He would like to find a way to be continually creative in bringing the Gospel to the streets,” she explained.

Although Father Strand will have to go without his logo until a new one can be redesigned, he is adamant that his mission — uniquely recognizable on the streets or not — will continue.

“The new evangelization is not about one car with God Squad written on it, but really about leading people to an encounter with Jesus, and that’s what we’re about as priests, what we are about as Catholics, the Church, and that’s where I want to put my time and energy,” he said.

11

The Anchor

August 27, 2010

Papal Masses in Britain will use some new English texts B y Cindy Wooden C atholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — People attending Pope Benedict XVI’s Masses in Scotland and England in September will get a chance to hear and sing a few of the newlytranslated Mass texts, according to the pope’s chief liturgist.

Msgr. Guido Marini, papal master of liturgical ceremonies, told Catholic News Service August 19 that the prayers sung in English at the papal Masses in Great Britain will use the translations from the new Order of the Mass approved by the Vatican in 2008.

“The songs from the Order of the Mass — for example the Gloria — will be from the new translation, which was approved a while ago,” he said.

The words for the rest of the Mass prayers “will be from the text currently in use,” he said, because when the papal Masses were being planned, the Vatican had not yet granted final approval to the bishops of Scotland, England and Wales for the complete English translation of the Roman Missal.

Although the new translation of the Order of the Mass, which contains the main prayers used at Mass, was approved by the Vatican two years ago, bishops’ conferences in English-speaking countries decided to wait to introduce the prayers until the entire Roman Missal was translated and approved.

The new translation of the Mass was designed to follow more closely the text in the original Latin.

In the Gloria, which Msgr. Marini said would be

sung during the papal trip, the new English text begins: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to people of good will. We praise you, we bless you, we adore you,

we glorify you, we give you thanks for your great glory, Lord God, heavenly King, O God, almighty Father.”

The text currently in use begins: “Glory to God in

the highest and peace to his people on earth. Lord God, heavenly King, almighty

God and Father, we worship you, we give you thanks, we praise you for your glory.”

12

The Anchor

August 27, 2010

Dominicans recall how music man Mitch Miller helped them make a record NEW YORK (CNS) — Mitch Miller probably will be remembered best as the man who made America sing along.

His 1960s television show, with old favorites performed by a men’s chorus as the lyrics appeared on the screen, brought out the crooner in everyone. He produced numerous best-selling albums that came complete with song sheets.

But Miller, who died in New York July 31 at age 99, also produced a record that won him a special place in the hearts of a congregation of Sisters as benefactor and friend. The story involves an almost chance liaison — or a providential one — between the Catholic sisters and Miller, a jovial, successful record executive who was the son of a Russian Jewish immigrant, and his wife.

It all happened in the New York Archdiocese in the early 1960s.

The Dominican Sisters of Newburgh, founders of Mount St. Mary College there, launched a fundraising campaign for the construction of a novitiate and a college building. Their superior, Mother Leo Vincent Short, had the idea of augmenting the effort by forming a chorus of sisters to cut a record and sell it.

She spoke with Sister Jeanne d’Arc McCann, a gifted music director in the congregation, and they decided that the idea could work.

But it’s one thing to sing, and another to produce a professional recording. The sisters needed help, and they prayed for it. Mother Leo Vincent later wrote that the answer to those prayers “appeared — with beard.”

Miller did indeed sport a neatly trimmed goatee. He was widely known for his program, “Sing Along With Mitch,” and for his recordings. But he also was a prominent producer with Columbia Records who helped launch the careers of chart-topping singers including Tony Bennett, Rosemary Clooney and Patti Page.

It happened that he was a friend of Father John Cannon, an archdiocesan priest, who was a musician and the brother of Sister Rose Anita Cannon, a Newburgh Dominican.

Father Cannon suggested the Sisters ask Miller for advice. Mother Leo Vincent, Sister Jeanne d’Arc and Sister Rose Anita met with him.

Miller offered more than advice; he offered the use of his recording studio and whatever help he could provide.

In the end, he even put the Sisters’ chorus on his television show.

“How it all fell together is just miraculous,” said Sister Jean Meyer, the congregation’s archivist and a member of the chorus.

The Sisters met with Miller in November 1961. More than a year

of hard work followed before the recording was made in 1963. Sister Jeanne d’Arc held auditions and selected about 65 Sisters for the chorus.

In an interview with Catholic New York, newspaper of the New York Archdiocese, Sister Jean said that most of the singers were fulltime teachers at schools in New York, New Jersey or Connecticut.

They traveled to Mount St. Mary on Saturdays to practice.

Sister Jeanne d’Arc compiled a list of possible songs, and Miller chose those he thought would be most appealing to the general public. The album tracks include “Climb Ev’ry Mountain,” “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands,” “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” “Whistle a Happy Tune” and Mozart’s “Alleluia.”

Miller also suggested the theme for the album, and that became its title: “Joy.” The chorus members — called “The Singing Sisters” — traveled by bus to Manhattan and recorded the 15 tracks on the album in a single day at Miller’s Columbia studio. They were accompanied by a pianist from the congregation, Sister Ann Leo Ruppert.

Almost half a century later, the Sisters still recall Miller’s warmth and goodness.

“He was so kind to us,” Sister Maryann Ronneburger said. “He had a catered lunch ready for us when we got there. He was just wonderful.”

Sister Monica Socinski, who teaches Mediterranean languages, remembers Miller as “a wonderful, friendly, easygoing person.”

“He seemed to be smiling all the time, and very happy with us, and we got that sense of rapport with him,” she said.

When the record was released, the Sisters gave concerts at or near the schools they staffed to boost sales. The record also was sold at churches. It raised about $200,000 for the building campaign, a large amount in the 1960s.

Miller sent the Sisters a kinescope, or a film recording, of their television performance. He also gave them a check for $5,000 to “help to pay for a few bricks on whichever building you decide to apply it,” he told them in a letter.

The Sisters built Guzman and Aquinas halls. Since then Mount St. Mary has enlarged Aquinas and added new buildings and programs.

Also, the Newburgh Sisters merged with two other Dominican congregations in 1995 to form a new congregation, the Dominican Sisters of Hope.

Vinyl records were eclipsed by new recording technologies, and Sister Jean had a CD made of the original album to preserve it, but only a few copies remain.

she’s baaaack — Lil Woods, Asa Butterfield, Oscar Steer and Emma Thompson, right, star in a scene from the movie “Nanny McPhee Returns.” For a brief review of this film, see CNS Movie Capsules below. (CNS photo/Universal)

CNS Movie Capsules NEW YORK (CNS) — The following are capsule reviews of movies recently reviewed

by Catholic News Service.

“Lottery Ticket” (Warner Bros.)

Broad comedy centers on a hardworking, good-natured 18-year-old (rapper Bow Wow) from an Atlanta housing project who wins the lottery but must survive a long holiday weekend before he can collect. He must evade the wiles of a menacing thug (Gbenga Akinnagbe) and a natty crime boss (Mike Epps) with the help of a retired boxer (Ice Cube) for whom he runs errands. Director Erik White’s efforts to bridge materialism and spiritual growth are awkward, and viewers seeking an entertaining and perceptive social satire will be disappointed.

Nongraphic nonmarital sexual activity, much profanity, at least one use of the F-word, frequent crude and crass language, numerous sexual and contraception references and some violence. The Catholic News Service classification is L — limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 — parents strongly cautioned. Some material may

be inappropriate for children under 13.

“Nanny McPhee Returns” (Universal) The eerie but magically effective matron of the title (Emma Thompson) transports herself to wartime Britain, where she comes to the rescue of a frazzled rural mother (Maggie Gyllenhaal). With her husband (Ewan McGregor) away at the front, she is failing spectacularly to cope with the raucous squabbling between her three children (Asa Butterfield, Lil Woods and Oscar Steer) and a duo of snobbish London cousins (Rosie TaylorRitson and Eros Vlahos). The cousins are freshly arrived evacuees whose parents have sent them to the countryside for safety. Further straining mom’s nerves are the efforts of

her scheming brother-in-law (Rhys Ifans) to pressure her, for reasons of his own, into signing away the family farm in dad’s absence. As written by Thompson and directed by Susanna White, this second screen adventure based on Christianna Brand’s “Nurse Matilda” series of children’s books tells a sweetly nostalgic tale underpinned by lessons about cooperation, sharing, courage and the need to believe in happy endings, with only some mildly gross barnyard humor and slapstick violence to give parents pause. The Catholic News Service classification is A-I — general patronage. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG — parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

Diocese of Fall River TV Mass on WLNE Channel 6 Sunday, August 29 at 11:00 a.m.

Celebrant is Father Edward A. Correia, pastor of St. Michael Parish in Fall River

August 27, 2010

The Anchor

13

U.S. Dominican province welcomes its biggest class of novices in decades

By Adeshina Emmanuel Catholic News Service WASHINGTON (CNS) — Statistics show a drastic fall in the number of people entering religious life since the 1960s, yet during ceremonies August 7, the Dominican Province of St. Joseph formally accepted 21 men as novices — the province’s largest novitiate class since 1966.

Father Bill Garrot is the province’s outgoing vocations director. He is the man who the current vocations director appointed this summer, Father Benedict Croell, said played a key role in the “harvest” that yielded the 21 novices, who received the Dominican habit during an ancient ceremony called “vestition” at St. Gertrude’s Priory in Cincinnati.

In response to dismal novitiate numbers, in 2003 the Province of St. Joseph decided to hire Father Garrot as a full-time vocations director to engage in more rigorous recruitment efforts than a part-time director could.

Before Father Garrot was appointed, the province had suffered through “chaotic period” from 1993 to 2002, where the province transitioned between three or four different vocations directors and novitiate numbers were about five per year.

“This kind of woke everybody up,” Father Garrot said in an interview with Catholic News Service in Washington at the New York-based province’s House of Studies.

Father Garrot said those numbers rose to about eight to 10 a year during his time at the province, from 2003 to 2010. The 2009 novice class had 11 men in it, a total almost doubled in 2010.

“Stability in a vocation program does matter. I was appointed as a full-time vocations director, but not many diocese or religious orders seem to have the luxury of appointing a man to do full-time recruitment work,” he said.

He admitted that his efforts have played a part in bringing such a large class to the province, but, the biggest factor has been the Dominican’s theological tradition, much of which is rooted in the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas, Father Garrot said.

“There has been talk among some that the Second Vatican Council represented a break with the past and the introduction of something completely new for the Church,” he said. “It’s a shift, there’s renewal, there are graces given, the Holy Spirit works and raises up new things — but there’s still continuity here. And the Dominicans are the beneficiaries of their own continuity — of 800 years.”

In 1965, the year Vatican II ended, there were 12,271 religious brothers in the United States, compared with 4,690 in 2010, and 58,632 total priests, compared with 39,993 in 2010, according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University.

Despite efforts in other Catholic orders since the council to alter their own traditions and teachings with the aim of appealing to a younger, wider audience, for the Province of St. Joseph, “there was not a whole lot of toying or monkeying with the liturgy,” Father Garrot said, adding that he thinks some other orders have actually hurt their recruitment efforts by straying from their tradition.

“All I can hope is that we’re riding the crest of what will happen for everyone else in due time as they reclaim their tradition

and settle,” he said.

Communal prayer and the wearing of religious habits are traditional aspects of Dominican life, for example, that Father Garrot said attracted many of the novices, who are to take their first vows in a year.

The current vocations director, Father Croell said that the traditional attracts men because “we’re living in uncertain times right now, very secular times, and there’s a number of factors that young men are looking for.”

“They’re looking for something transcendent, they’re looking for a purpose in their life — a lot of people are searching,” he said.

Aside from its size, the novitiate class is special in several others ways, according to those familiar with the novices.

Members of the class are younger than usual, ranging from ages 22-30, with an average age of 24, whereas most classes range from ages 22-42, with an average age of 27.

Also, many of the novices have graduated from college within the past year. In past novitiate classes, the province has typically averaged two people who just graduated from college, but this group has 11. Father Garrot noted that overall the class is “highly educated” and mentioned that three of the men are coming to the order with doctorate degrees.

Juan Carmona, 30, a Harvard graduate, holds one of those doctorates — in cell and developmental biology. He came to the United States from Mexico when he was seven years old.

Carmona was attracted to the Dominicans because of “the great emphasis that they place on education and making sense of the world,” he said.

“In today’s world you have learning for the sake of learning and you have an empty self glorifying experience. The human person is elevated but there’s no transcendent truth,” he told CNS. “What (this class) has in common is a great desire to serve the church and a great desire to really help souls and a great passion for learning the truths of the faith and teaching that to people.”

Santiago Rosado, 22, studied theology at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.

He became interested in the priesthood in high school, but where he was, there were no men religious to serve as an example, he said. After considering life as a diocesan priest, Rosado decided that belonging to a religious community was preferable to “being alone in a parish.”

Like Carmona, he was attracted to fraternal life.

“Having those brothers there as resources and support was something that initially attracted me,” he said.

He met a Dominican priest studying for his doctorate at Notre Dame who encouraged him to join the Dominicans. Rosado was already familiar with the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas from his studies and found himself pulled by the “diversity of thought” within the Dominican intellectual tradition.

Michael Weibley, 22, graduated from Walsh University in Ohio in May before becoming a Dominican novice.

He said for his first few years at Walsh, he “fell away from his faith.” College life, including academics, “a lot of partying” and being on the baseball team, were all distrac-

tions from his faith he said. That was until toward the end of this sophomore year he realized he wasn’t really happy and began looking for what was going to make him happy in life.

“I started asking the hard questions,” he said.

Weibley, who was raised Catholic, found himself returning to the Church.

He said being on his university baseball team helped him draw parallels to the fraternal life of a Dominican friar and drew him to picking up a vocation. He was also pulled by the traditional aspects of Dominican life.

“The province really does what the Church asks. They do what the Dominicans have taught to do throughout the years,” he said.

committed — A postulant receives his Dominican habit at St. Gertrude’s Priory in Cincinnati on the eve of the feast of St. Dominic, August 7. (CNS photo/courtesy of the Province of St. Joseph)

14

The Anchor

August 27, 2010

Relic of cross stolen from Boston cathedral recovered in Vermont

By Jim Lockwood Catholic News Service BRAINTREE — One of the Archdiocese of Boston’s most cherished relics, missing for more than a month, has been returned.

The relic of the true cross, which had been housed in a reliquary in the Blessed Sacrament Chapel at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston’s South End, was turned into the Vermont State Police. Officials from the cathedral retrieved the relic August 15.

The relic, a splinter of wood believed to be from the cross on which Jesus was crucified, was

returned to its original reliquary at a prayer service August 18 at the cathedral.

“I think we’re thankful it’s been returned,” said cathedral pastoral associate Bob Travers before the prayer service. “We want to get it back to where it was originally so people can venerate the cross and pause and reflect in prayer.”

According to an incident report released by the Vermont State Police, the relic was recovered August 9 after they received a call about a domestic argument at a Royalton, Vt., trailer park involving Earl Frost, 34. Frost,

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a transient who turned the relic over to Vermont State Police, claimed he received it from another person in Rhode Island.

According to the incident report, Frost said he had wanted to give the relic directly to the cathedral instead of to law enforcement.

Because Vermont State Police did not have confirmation of the relic’s authenticity at the time they received it from Frost, they did not have enough evidence to hold him for possession of stolen property. Once cathedral officials confirmed the relic’s authenticity, the Vermont State Police determined they had enough evidence to arrest Frost.

On August 17, Vermont State Police learned that Frost was filling a prescription at a Hanover, N.H., pharmacy. Frost was subsequently arrested by the Hanover Police Department. Vermont police later learned there was an unrelated warrant for his arrest in New Hampshire.

As of August 20, Frost was being held on the New Hampshire warrant, but a warrant was still being sought in Vermont.

“We are grateful for the great work of the Boston Police Department in their search for the relic,” said Terrence Donilon, spokesman for the archdiocese, in a statement.

“Their professional and diligent work made this effort successful. We also extend our appreciation to the Vermont State Police who assisted in the recovery effort,” Donilon added.

When cathedral officials arrived at police barracks, they were asked to confirm the relic’s authenticity and place a dollar value on the artifact for legal purposes. While cathedral officials estimated the relic’s worth to be between $2,300 and $3,800, they

also said its value is “priceless,” since the papal ring that stamped the wax seal on the rear of the relic’s encasement was destroyed after the pope’s death. That seal and the red cord that attaches to it, Travers said, verifies the authenticity of the relic.

The relic of the true cross was believed to have been taken from the cathedral June 30. It was discovered missing from its reliquary at the base of a crucifix in the cathedral’s Blessed Sacrament Chapel by a staff member on the morning of July 1.

There were no signs of forced entry, so it was believed the relic was removed during the day when the cathedral was open.

Since then, the cathedral had hosted prayer services every Wednesday with the intention of recovering the relic, Travers said.

With the relic having been recovered, the previously sched-

uled August 18 prayer service was dedicated to thanking God for the safe return of the relic, Travers said.

August 18 was also the feast day of St. Helena of the True Cross, the mother of the Roman emperor Constantine, who is credited with originally finding relics of the true cross in Jerusalem.

The cathedral’s relic was brought from France in the 1800s, a gift from the cathedral’s first pastor, Father Claude de la Poterie, the French priest who celebrated the first public Mass in Boston on Nov. 2, 1788.

In his statement, Donilon also expressed the local church’s willingness to forgive the perpetrators.

“God has blessed us with his love and capacity to forgive,” he said. “We prayerfully carry on his call for forgiveness for those responsible.”

back home — A relic of the true cross stolen from the chapel of the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston in July has been returned and is pictured at the cathedral rectory August 18. Vermont State Police recovered the relic August 9 from 34-year-old Earl Frost who later fled. He was arrested August 17 in New Hampshire on an unrelated warrant. (CNS photo/Gregory L. Tracy, The Pilot)

This week in

Diocesan history

50 years ago — Twenty-five young women 10 years ago — St. Pius X Parish in South from the diocese participated in ceremonies at Yarmouth prepared to celebrate one of several Mother of Mercy Novitiate of the Sisters of Mer- diocesan Jubilee Year Masses with Bishop Sean cy in Cumberland, R.I. Four postulants received P. O’Malley, OFM Cap., on September 3. the habit of the community, 14 pronounced temporary vows, while seven took final vows.

One year ago — Radio station WVBF 1530 AM in Taunton began airing re-broad25 years ago — Bishop Daniel A. Cronin casts of Servant of God Father Patrick Peydedicated the altar inside the reconstructed ton’s radio show featuring the likes of Bob Immaculate Conception Parish in New Bed- Hope, Jack Benny, Bing Crosby and other ford. Renovations completed under the pur- “stars” of the 40s and 50s, paired with recitaview of pastor Father Manuel P. Ferreira tions of the rosary recorded by two Taunton included refacing the sanctuary walls with parishes and the fourth-graders of St. Mary’s marble imported from Portugal.

School.

August 27, 2010

15

The Anchor

Three parishes form Cape-based ministry collaborative

By Kenneth J. Souza Anchor Staff

to the one recently launched between two New Bedford BARNSTABLE — In what parishes — St. Mary’s and St. is becoming a growing trend in Joseph-St. Therese — that now the diocese, three Cape Codshare a school. based parishes — Our Lady of “Right now we have about the Assumption in Osterville; 70 kids in Faith Formation,” Our Lady of Victory in CenFather Lacroix said. “There’s terville; and St. Francis Xavier about 140 at Our Lady of the in Hyannis — have recently Assumption. We’re looking into joined forces to create the how we can do things together Barnstable Catholic Collaboraand share resources. For extive for Ministry, a joint effort ample, they have the GIFT proto provide more streamlined gram — that’s something we services for their collective pamight want to become involved rishioners. with.”

According to the According to Rodrigroup’s mission stategues, the BCC is curany of my parishioners ment, while the work of rently trying to identify will go to Mass at Our potential areas within the three parishes will remain mostly separate, the Lady of the Assumption or Our each of the four major combined BCC aspires Lady of Victory and vice versa,” elements of parish life — to concentrate on provid- Father Lacroix said. “So we’re evangelization, worship, ing select services to the and service already experiencing a sense of community wider group of Cape Cod — in which they can colCatholics according to interchange among parishes. We laborate. the core elements of the thought a formed collaborative “First, it will concenChurch: evangelization, might be a good way to enhance trate on a social for the worship, community and parishes, and is in our individual parishes — looking three service. the midst of brainstorm“We first met a little at what each parish has in common ing possibilities,” he said. more than a year ago and and what each has to offer.”

Father Lacroix noted we’ve met about three they haven’t yet acted on times to date with repreany of their initial discussentatives and the pastors of each other, rather than being in sions and the group is still in the three parishes,” said Father competition, together to serve the process of pulling togethDaniel W. Lacroix, pastor of the faithful better.” er and “getting to know each St. Francis Xavier Parish in “Many of my parishioners other.” They hope to sponsor a Hyannis. “We’re just begin- will go to Mass at Our Lady of joint social event with all three ning the process of coming the Assumption or Our Lady parishes at some point in the together and the idea was to of Victory and vice versa,” Fa- near future to bring everyone bring the three parishes in the ther Lacroix said. “So we’re together and get the word out greater township of Barnstable already experiencing a sense about what they’re hoping to together.” of interchange among parishes. accomplish.

Father Lacroix explained We thought a formed collab“We’re just beginning the how each parish within the three orative might be a good way dialogue and communication at Barnstable villages — Oster- to enhance our individual par- this point,” he said. “The idea ville, Centerville and Hyannis ishes — looking at what each is our parishes are all separate — has its own unique make-up. parish has in common and what but equal and we’re just lookWhile one has a decidedly old- each has to offer.” ing at ways to better reach out er congregation and one skews One possible idea the group to our parishioners.” a bit younger, the third falls is exploring is a shared Faith No matter how much the somewhere in between. initial work of the BCC ultiFormation initiative, similar “The mind-set is there is a township of Barnstable, but there are three separate villages — Osterville, Centerville, and Hyannis,” he said, that seem to share many similarities due to their close proximity to each other.

“The work of the BCC is complementary to the work of the individual parish pastoral councils,” said Doug Rodrigues, diocesan director for pastoral planning, who has been involved with the BCC since its inception. “Each will feed

“M

early birds — Members of the Junior National Honor Society at St. John the Evangelist School in Attleboro reported to school early to help prepare for the beginning of the school year. The students assisted with unpacking of school supplies and new books for the classrooms. Pictured is seventhgrader Michael Nelson assisting Principal Sister Mary Jane Holden with a book delivery.

mately transforms the pastoral situation, Rodrigues thinks this sharing of resources may inspire other neighboring par-

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“This may or may not become a prototype for other parishes throughout the diocese,” he said.

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Youth Pages

August 27, 2010

St. Vincent’s fifth annual Motorcycle Run a success

ROAD SERVICE — Pictured are some of the more than 250 motorcycles that hit the streets recently to raise funds for St. Vincent’s Home in Fall River.

FALL RIVER — On August 15, 237 motorcycle enthusiasts and their passengers joined St. Vincent’s for the fifth annual Motorcycle Run raising more than $20,000 to benefit children, youth, and families.

The 50-mile run began at 10 a.m. in Fall River with an escort from the Fall River and Westport Police departments as well as additional support from the Dartmouth Police Department Traffic Division. Volunteer Road Guards from the Viking Riders of Rhode Island and the Wicked Wild Weekend Warriors provided additional safety support at key intersections.

The run wound through the scenic roads of Freetown to the

shores of Dartmouth and Westport, ending back at St. Vincent’s in Fall River. St. Vincent’s fifth Annual Motorcycle Run was sponsored by S & S Concrete Forms Construction.

Bikers enjoyed a cookout at the finale along with a silent auction and raffle featuring more than 70 items donated by area businesses. Children’s Choice Award trophies for favorite bike as judged by the youth of St. Vincent’s were presented to the first, second, and third choice winners at the conclusion of the event. Fun was had by all who took part — all the while raising much needed funds to support programming for the children of St. Vincent’s.

hog heaven — A pair of police motorcycles (beneath the St. Vincent’s sign) are parked in front of hundreds of motorcycles that took part in the recent St. Vincent’s Home Motorcycle run to raise funds for the Fall River institution. (Photo by Dave Jolivet)

chapel changes — Thanks to the proceeds from Bishop Feehan High School’s 25th annual Dinner Auction, the chapel at the Attleboro school received some much needed updating.

The list of improvements included replacing and repairing walls, painting, refinishing pews and kneelers, new carpeting, brighter energy-efficient lighting, and an updating of the altar. Other portions of the $114,000 profit are being directed toward upgrading instructional technology in the classrooms.

L

ast month, I explained why it makes sense to me to believe in the resurrection. This month, I want to explain why I believe that the Eucharist is the true presence of Christ. Belief in the Eucharist is a stumbling block between Christian denominations. The Catholic Church teaches that the bread and wine at Mass, through the power of the Holy Spirit and the ministry of the priest, actually become the Body and Blood of Christ. Where did we get such a notion? From the Gospels, especially the Gospel of John, and from the words of Christ that are recorded there.

In John, Chapter 6, Jesus tells the crowd “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever, and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world. Amen, amen I say to you, unless you

Why I believe — Part 2

eat the flesh of the Son of Man For those who need more, and drink his blood, you do not there have been eucharistic have life within you.” You remiracles all over the world. One ally need to read the entire sec- of the most well-known is the tion from verse 22 to the end, miracle in Lanciano, Italy about but the bottom line is, many 750 A.D. A monk was having people returned to their former way of life and ceased to follow Jesus.

They just walked away.

If everything Jesus was saying in this Gospel was meant to be taken symbolically and not

By Jean Revil literally, don’t you think Jesus would have explained that to them?

Instead, he just looked at his doubts about the true presApostles and asked them if they ence. While offering Mass for were going to leave too. Jesus the village, during the prayers knew what he was saying; it of consecration, the bread and wasn’t a mistake or a misunder- wine changed before his eyes standing. He left us his Body into flesh and blood. Those in and Blood and told us “whothe congregation witnessed ever eats my flesh and drinks it as well. We can witness it my blood remains in me and too, if we travel to that church, I in him.” How much clearer where the flesh and blood still could it be? exist today. To me, that is just

Be Not Afraid

Cloistered nuns in France sign recording deal for chant album WASHINGTON (CNS) — Decca Records, the label that helped to make Bing Crosby and The Who top pop acts, has turned its attention to a convent of cloistered nuns in France for what may be the next big thing: Gregorian chant.

In July, Decca announced the signing of the sisters from Abbaye de Notre-Dame de l’Annonciation — the Abbey of Our Lady of the Annunciation — a Benedictine convent from a remote region of France near Avignon, to a recording contract.

The nuns’ first CD, “Voices — Chant From Avignon,” is scheduled to be released November 8.

In a press release announcing the deal, Decca executives waxed enthusiastic.

“When you hear the sound of nuns chanting, it’s like an immediate escape from the challenges, stresses, noise and pace of modern living. You’re given a glimpse of a secret world of peace and calm,” said a statement from Tom Lewis, Decca’s head of A&R, music industry shorthand for “artists and repertoire.”

Speaking of repertoire, the Benedictines’ CD, according to Decca, will feature “the most ancient form of Gregorian chant ... the first music ever to be written down.” The nuns sing this form of chant eight times a day during the liturgy of the hours.

The signing of a cloistered convent of nuns to record an album poses distinct challenges.

For one thing, visitors — even family — must communicate with the sisters through a grill. “I

17

Youth Pages

August 27, 2010

passed the contract through the grill, they signed it and passed it back,” said a statement from Dickon Stainer, managing director of Decca Records.

Decca said the French cloister was the winner in a worldwide search to find the world’s finest female singers of Gregorian chant. The search took in more than 70 convents in Europe, North America and Africa.

“We never sought this, it came looking for us,” said a statement from the convent abbess, whose name was not disclosed by Decca.

“At first we were worried it would affect our cloistered life, so we asked St. Joseph in prayer. Our prayers were answered, and we thought that this album would be a good thing if it touches people’s lives and helps them find peace.”

To avoid intrusion into their daily lives, the nuns will film their own TV commercial and photograph their own album cover.

The signing of the French cloister may represent a new surge in interest in Gregorian chant. The phenomenon started in 1994, when EMI, the British label that signed The Beatles, released “Chant,” a series of longago chant recordings made by the Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos in Spain. The CD was a worldwide smash and crept up to third in the U.S. weekly album sales charts, earning triple-platinum status in the United States for more than 3 million copies sold.

Even though the record industry has been in a decade-long

slump, the Cistercian monks of Stift Heiligenkreuz Abbey, a 12th-century monastery near Vienna, sold more than a million copies of their CD, “Chant: Music for Paradise,” in 2008.

The European release was titled “Chant: Music for the Soul.”

The Decca label is part of the mammoth Universal Music Group, which takes in such labels as Motown, Mercury, A&M, Verve, Fantasy, Concord and Rounder, encompassing virtually every genre of contemporary and classical music. Some of the nuns’ current label-mates include Elton John, the Rolling Stones, U2, Amy Winehouse and convent-educated contemporary pop icon Lady Gaga.

miracle upon miracle. There is no way that there should be anything left if the miracle happened around 1,200 years ago.

It was kept without preservatives, without the ability to seal it away from the effects of the atmosphere. But there it is, in its own special tabernacle, still visible today.

Need more? In 1970 a group of scientists was given permission to study the miracle. They found that the flesh and blood saved over all these years are real human flesh and blood. The flesh is from the heart muscle, the blood is type AB. The chemical properties and proteins that would be found in fresh blood are found in the sample when it is liquefied. That just doesn’t happen.

When we bleed, the chemical proprieties and proteins break down within an hour. This

blood is more than a thousand years old.

Christ gave us his heart in the Eucharist. He gave us his Body and Blood. He gave us all that he has and all that he is. He still gives himself to us every day, on every altar at every Mass, and in every tabernacle in the world. We need to look with the eyes of faith, knowing that Christ said the Eucharist is his Body and Blood, that this is what the Church teaches about the Eucharist, and this is what holy and learned saints have devoted their lives to. Lives have been transformed by the Eucharist. Miracles have happened through the Eucharist.

Why would we not believe?

The truth is right before us.

Jean Revil teaches theology and is campus minister at Bishop Stang High School.

Comments welcome at: jrevil@ bishopStang.com.

The Anchor is always pleased to run news and photos about our diocesan youth. If schools, parish Religious Education programs, or Vacation Bible Schools have newsworthy stories and photos they would like to share with our readers, send them to: schools@anchornews.org

18

The Anchor

August 27, 2010

FDA approves abortion drug

Diocesan Propagation of the Faith very active

continued from page one

continued from page one

an ‘emergency contraceptive,’” Willis wrote, adding that Plan B functions primarily by disrupting ovulation and sometimes prevent implantation, causing an early abortion. Plan B has not been found to end the life of an implanted embryo.

Pharmacists for Life International called ellaOne the “chemical cousin” of RU486.

On their website, the organization condemned the FDA’s approval of the drug. “Our disgust for the deadly FDA action is profound and beyond the ability to verbalize.” Their site also reminds viewers that the oft-quoted 50 million abortions since Roe v. Wade does not include chemical abortions caused by abortion pills, emergency contraceptives and even the birth control pill. They estimate the number at more than five times that.

“The lives lost in this way — the numbers have to be unfathomable,” Allison LeDoux, director of the Diocese of Worcester’s Respect Life Office and Office of Marriage and Family, told The Anchor. “I think people generally in this culture have such a false sense of what these contraceptive drugs do.”

Part of the reason for the confusion is that medical groups no longer define pregnancy as beginning at conception. They use a false definition to claim contraceptive drugs are not aborti-

Revised and updated ...

facients, she said.

“In the 1960s the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists ‘redefined’ pregnancy as beginning with implantation, which occurs approximately one week after conception,” LeDoux explained in an article on emergency contraceptives for the National Catholic Bioethics Center.

LeDoux told The Anchor that a woman taking hormonal contraceptives can have an abortion before she knows she is pregnant.

Conception can occur within the same day as intercourse, and ellaOne is approved for up to five days after intercourse.

“The fact that you can’t clinically detect pregnancy until implantation makes this very problematic. In that five-day window, these silent abortions are occurring and women don’t even realize it,” she said.

In addition to the fact that ellaOne causes abortion, Pro-Lifers are also concerned about the drug’s effects on women and their unborn children who survive.

The FDA claims that ellaOne is safe and efficacious, noting that it can cause headache, nausea, abdominal pain, fatigue and dizziness. They also note that the prescription-only drug is not intended for routine use.

The drug, ulipristal acetate, has been available in Europe under the brand name ellaOne since May 2009. It is manufactured by

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Paris-based Laboratoire HRA Pharma and will be distributed in the U.S. by Watson Pharma Inc., of Morristown, N.J. So far, there have been three major clinical trials of the drug.

But the patient information that comes with the drug acknowledges that after taking ellaOne, two percent of women studied became pregnant and that, “The risks to a fetus when ellaOne is administered to a pregnant woman are unknown.”

And because ellaOne has been labeled an emergency contraceptive, LeDoux raised concerns that it may someday be required at Massachusetts hospitals.

State law already mandates that all hospitals, including Catholic hospitals, must dispense emergency contraceptives to victims of sexual assault.

“Given the slippery slope in our culture, it would not surprise me if it was an attempt by the state to require hospitals to dispense ellaOne,” she said. “It could be a horrendous threat to Catholic healthcare.”

The Church teaches that a woman’s fertility is healthy, natural and God-given. And Catholic teaching holds that all persons, no matter their stage in life, are invaluable.

“Human life is always good,” Pope Benedict XVI said at the Pontifical Academy for Life’s 2006 congress. “God’s love does not differentiate between the newly conceived infant still in his or her mother’s womb and the child or young person, or the adult and the elderly person. God does not distinguish between them because he sees an impression of his own image and likeness in each one.”

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during the next to last weekend in October, which is sent to Rome and then allocated to each diocese where it will be used for mission work. The Holy Father issues a message for that Sunday and Catholics around the world become conscious in a very special way of their baptismal responsibilities to share the faith.”

Noting that the World Mission Sunday collection is one of the few that’s taken throughout the entire Catholic Church, Msgr. Oliveira said it speaks to the importance of the effort in raising money to continue spreading the Gospel message.

“Until the turn of the century, [the recipient] even included the United States — because we were initially a mission country,” Msgr.

Oliveira said. “The Propagation of the Faith Office in Rome still works with different mission dioceses today.”

Previously located within the same building as the diocesan chancery offices, Msgr. Oliveira said the Propagation of the Faith Office was relocated to his parish about five years ago. This summer, the diocesan permanent diaconate office — another for which Msgr.

Oliveira serves as director — set up shop in the same location.

“It’s very convenient to have both here and we’re honored as a parish to now host two diocesan offices,” he said. “We’re grateful the diocese has allowed both of them to be here and it certainly makes it more convenient for me to work with these two entities as well as the parish.”

Although Fall River’s mission office remains essentially a twoperson operation — with Msgr.

Oliveira serving as director and Corinne Lebeau as his administrative assistant — it is responsible for overseeing the Holy Childhood Association, the Society of St. Peter the Apostle, the diocesan Missionary Cooperative Program, and the financial operations for the diocesan-sponsored St. Rose of Lima Parish in Guaimaca, Honduras.

“The Holy Childhood Association does some work here with our children — especially during Lent — to connect them with children in the missionary world,” Msgr.

Oliveira said. “The Society of St. Peter the Apostle works to foster vocations and assist seminarians in mission countries.

“Under the Missionary Cooperative Program we invite missionaries into our diocese every year. Every parish is assigned a missionary to speak about their cause. I must get about 250 requests every year from different societies, dioceses, and religious orders looking for assistance with their missionary work. My responsibility is to assign them to a parish during the

summer months — usually between June and September — so they can come and have a special collection for their cause.”

One of the biggest endeavors of the Propagation of the Faith Office is the operation and funding of the diocesan mission in Honduras, which will mark its 10th-year anniversary in October.

“As an office we also support the mission of St. Rose of Lima Parish in Guaimaca,” Msgr. Oliveira said. “We pay the salaries for the priest and the Sisters working there, we also pay the budget for the house every quarter. The diocese takes care of the pension and medical payments for the priests.

While I know they have several fund-raising efforts of their own — the school bell project, and so on — our responsibility is to cover the normal expenses needed to run a parish. So I’m very grateful to the donors here in the diocese who have supported this effort over the years.”

Msgr. Oliveira said the generosity of people within the Fall River Diocese — even during these difficult economic times — is a constant blessing for their missionary work.

“People have been very generous and we have a great history in our diocese and the priests have always been very supportive of the annual mission collection,” he said. “People have been very good to the missions. We don’t get a lot of the donations that we used to — especially bequests in wills — because the costs of health care are such now that it’s difficult for people to make extra donations.”

While the World Mission Sunday collection remains their greatest source of revenue, Msgr. Oliveira said they also receive regular monthly donations and they offer a few other ways to support the diocesan mission effort.

“There are some people who send in monthly donations to help the missions,” he said. “Little by little, every contribution counts.

We also try to make the missions known through the purchase of memorial ciboriums and chalices that are displayed at a funeral home.

The person’s name is engraved on it and it will be used by a missionary priest and be remembered at Mass. Sometimes flowers go away so quickly and are so expensive — this is another alternative. We also offer perpetual memberships that support the work of the mission office.

“We try to do different things to help promote the work of the Church throughout the world in making Christ known to all. We’ve been very blessed as a diocesan pontifical society with being able to do what we’ve been able to do for so many years.”

Kenyans, family gather to remember U.S. Mill Hill priest killed in 2000 NAIROBI, Kenya (CNS) — Kenyan Church leaders and friends and family of a U.S. missionary slain 10 years ago gathered at a Mass to remember him and to pray that the priest’s killer is brought to justice.

Although a 2007 inquest into the death of U.S. Mill Hill Father John Kaiser recommended a fresh investigation into his death, “no substantive action has been taken in regard to these findings and recommendations,” said Archbishop Zacchaeus Okoth of Kisumu, chairman of the Kenyan bishops’ justice and peace commission.

“It’s depressing to note that 10 years down the line, we are yet to be told as to who killed our brother” along the busy Nairobi-Naivasha highway Aug. 24, 2000, said Archbishop Okoth.

“We pray hard that one day, the truth will be told as to who killed our beloved brother,” he told those in attendance August 19 at Holy Family Minor Basilica.

Father Anthony Chantry, international superior general of the Mill Hill Fathers, said in a statement that it was disturbing to see the lack of progress in finding Father Kaiser’s killers.

“On behalf of those who continue to seek justice for Father Kaiser, I call upon the government of Kenya to do all in its power to find, try and punish those responsible for Father Kaiser’s murder.

To this end, I strongly urge the government of the United States of America to ensure that the FBI

In Your Prayers Please pray for these priests during the coming weeks Aug. 30 Rev. Frederick Meyers, SS.CC., Former Pastor, Our Lady of the Assumption, New Bedford, 2008 Aug. 31 Msgr. Armando A. Annunziato, Pastor, St. Mary, Mansfield, 1993, Rev. Thomas M. Landry, O.P., Former Pastor, St. Anne, Fall River, 1996 Sept. 1 Rev. Jorge J. de Sousa, Pastor, St. Elizabeth, Fall River, 1985 Rev. James F. Lyons, Retired Pastor, St. Patrick, Wareham, 2008 Sept. 3 Rev. Thomas J. McGee, D.D., Pastor, Sacred Heart, Taunton, 1912 Sept. 4 Rev. Joseph P. Tallon, Pastor, St. Mary, New Bedford, 1864 Rev. John J. Maguire, Founder, St. Peter the Apostle, Provincetown, 1894 Sept. 5 Rev. Napoleon, A. Messier, Pastor, St. Mathieu, Fall River, 1948

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August 27, 2010

cooperate fully in these new investigations,” said his statement, read by Father Liam Cummins, regional superior.

Because Father Kaiser was an American, the FBI was called in to investigate his death and theorized that the priest had committed suicide. The 2007 inquest discounted that theory and said the 67-year-old priest was murdered by a third party.

The priest’s nephew, Christopher Kaiser, who attended the Mass, told Catholic News Service, “We as family members are not looking to be compensated ...

but simply to see that justice is done on the issue.”

“Our prayer and hope is that one day, the culprits will be brought to book,” he added.

Throughout his 36-year stay in Kenya, Father Kaiser, a native of Perham, Minn., was an outspoken champion of the rights of the poor and dispossessed. He criticized government officials and ministers on several occasions, most notably when giving evidence to a commission of inquiry into politically motivated tribal clashes in the Rift Valley province.

Around the Diocese 9/4

COURAGE, a welcoming support group for Catholics wounded by same-sex attraction who gather to seek God’s wisdom, mercy and love, will next meet on September 4 at 7 p.m. For location information call Father Richard Wilson at 508-992-9408.

9/9

The Lazarus Ministry of Our Lady of the Cape Parish in Brewster is offering a six-week bereavement support program called “Come Walk With Me,” that begins September 9 and runs through October 14 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. The program meets at the parish center and is designed for people who have experienced the loss of a loved one within the past year. Pre-registration is required. Contact Happy Whitman at 508-385-3252 or Eileen Birch at 508-394-0616 for additional information.

9/13

Theology on Tap, a discussion series to help single and married young adults in their 20s and 30s learn more about and grow in the Catholic faith, will take place on September 13 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at Sam Diego’s Restaurant, Route 132 in Hyannis, and again on September 14 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Olive Garden, Route 140 in Taunton. Dr. Ernest Collamatti will present “Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good People?” on both nights. For more information call Crystal Medeiros at 508-678-2828.

9/16

The diocesan Divorced and Separated Support Group will show a video on “Surviving Divorce” by John Bradshaw on September 16 at 7 p.m. at St. Julie Billiart Parish, 494 Slocum Road, North Dartmouth. The video illustrates the pitfalls to avoid on the road to recovery while giving the tools needed to survive divorce.

A discussion will follow and all are welcome.

9/17

An Italian Harvest celebration, Vendemmia Italiana, will be held at Holy Cross Parish Center in Easton on September 17 from 7 p.m. to midnight. There will be dinner and dancing, featuring the band Cosmos, a silent auction and a raffle. Proceeds benefit the parish. For more information call John Ventresco at 508-238-4413.

9/19

The Legion of Mary will have a Day of Recollection on September 19 from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at Cathedral Camp Retreat Center, East Freetown. The day is open to members and non-members and will include a talk by Father Joseph Medio, formerly of New Bedford now serving the Archdiocese of Boston. For reservations call 508-995-2354.

9/21

Adoption by Choice, an adoption and pregnancy counseling program of Catholic Social Services of the Diocese of Fall River, will hold an information session for those interested in domestic newborn or international adoptions on September 21 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at Catholic Social Services, 1600 Bay Street, Fall River.

Please call 508-674-4681 or visit www.cssdioc.org to register or for more information.

9/24

St. Bernard’s Parish, 30 South Main Street in Assonet, will host its Harvest Festival beginning with an outdoor middle school dance on September 24 from 6:30 to 10 p.m. The festival grounds will be open September 25 and 26 beginning at 11 a.m. both days, with a Pumpkin Fun Run slated for September 26 at 1:30 p.m.

For more details visit www.igroops.com/igroops/stb or call 508-644-5585.

Eucharistic Adoration in the Diocese Acushnet — Eucharistic adoration takes place at St. Francis Xavier Parish on Mondays and Wednesdays 9:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.; Fridays 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m.; and Saturdays 8 a.m. to 2:45 p.m. Mondays and Wednesdays end with Evening Prayer and Benediction at 6:30 p.m.; Saturdays end with Benediction at 2:45 p.m.

ATTLEBORO — St. Joseph Church holds eucharistic adoration in the Adoration Chapel located at the (south) side entrance at 208 South Main Street, Sunday through Thursday from 6 a.m. to midnight, with overnight adoration on Friday and Saturday only.

Brewster — Eucharistic adoration takes place in the La Salette Chapel in the lower level of Our Lady of the Cape Church, 468 Stony Brook Road, on First Fridays following the 11 a.m. Mass until 7:45 a.m. on the First Saturday of the month, concluding with Benediction and Mass.

Buzzards Bay — Eucharistic adoration takes place at St. Margaret Church, 141 Main Street, every first Friday after the 8 a.m. Mass and ending the following day before the 8 a.m. Mass.

East Freetown — Eucharistic Adoration takes place at St. John Neumann Church every Monday (excluding legal holidays) 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. in the Our Lady, Mother of All Nations Chapel. (The base of the bell tower).

EAST TAUNTON — Eucharistic adoration takes place First Fridays at Holy Family Church, 370 Middleboro Avenue, following the 8:30 a.m. Mass until Benediction at 8 p.m.

FAIRHAVEN — St. Mary’s Church, Main St., has eucharistic adoration every Wednesday from 8:30 a.m. to noon in the Chapel of Reconciliation, with Benediction at noon. Also, there is a First Friday Mass each month at 7 p.m., followed by a Holy Hour with eucharistic adoration. Refreshments follow.

FALL RIVER — St. Anthony of the Desert Church, 300 North Eastern Avenue, has eucharistic adoration Mondays and Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., and on the first Sunday of the month from noon to 4 p.m.

FALL RIVER — Holy Name Church, 709 Hanover Street, has eucharistic adoration Monday through Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. in the Our Lady of Grace Chapel.

FALL RIVER — Good Shepherd Parish has eucharistic adoration every Friday following the 8 a.m. Mass until 6 p.m. in the Daily Mass Chapel. There is a bilingual Holy Hour in English and Portuguese from 5-6 p.m. Park behind the church and enter the back door of the connector between the church and the rectory.

HYANNIS — A Holy Hour with eucharistic adoration will take place each First Friday at St. Francis Xavier Church, 21 Cross Street, beginning at 4 p.m.

MASHPEE — Christ the King Parish, Route 151 and Job’s Fishing Road has 8:30 a.m.

Mass every First Friday with special intentions for Respect Life, followed by 24 hours of eucharistic adoration in the Chapel, concluding with Benediction Saturday morning followed immediately by an 8:30 Mass.

NEW BEDFORD — Eucharistic adoration takes place 7 to 9 p.m. Wednesdays at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, 233 County Street, with night prayer and Benediction at 8:45 p.m., and confessions offered during the evening.

NEW BEDFORD — There is a daily holy hour from 5:15-6:15 p.m. Monday through Thursday at St. Anthony of Padua Church, 1359 Acushnet Avenue. It includes adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, Liturgy of the Hours, recitation of the rosary, and the opportunity for confession.

SEEKONK ­— Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish has eucharistic adoration seven days a week, 24 hours a day in the chapel at 984 Taunton Avenue. For information call 508336-5549.

NORTH DIGHTON — Eucharistic adoration takes place every First Friday at St. Nicholas of Myra Church, 499 Spring Street following the 8 a.m. Mass, ending with Benediction at 6 p.m. The rosary is recited Monday through Friday from 7:30 to 8 a.m.

OSTERVILLE — Eucharistic adoration takes place at Our Lady of the Assumption Church, 76 Wianno Avenue on First Fridays following the 8 a.m. Mass until Benediction at 5 p.m. The Divine Mercy Chaplet is prayed at 4:45 p.m.; on the third Friday of the month from 1 p.m. to Benediction at 5 p.m.; and for the Year For Priests, the second Thursday of the month from 1 p.m. to Benediction at 5 p.m.

Taunton — Eucharistic adoration takes place every Tuesday at St. Anthony Church, 126 School Street, following the 8 a.m. Mass with prayers including the Chaplet of Divine Mercy for vocations, concluding at 6 p.m. with Chaplet of St. Anthony and Benediction. Recitation of the rosary for peace is prayed Monday through Saturday at 7:30 a.m. prior to the 8 a.m. Mass.

WAREHAM — Adoration with opportunities for private and formal prayer is offered on the First Friday of each month from 8:30 a.m. until 8 p.m. at St. Patrick’s Church, High Street. The Prayer Schedule is as follows: 7:30 a.m. the rosary; 8 a.m. Mass; 8:30 a.m. exposition and Morning Prayer; 12 p.m. the Angelus; 3 p.m. Divine Mercy Chaplet; 5:30 p.m. Evening Prayer; 7 p.m. sacrament of confession; 8 p.m. Benediction.

WEST HARWICH — Our Lady of Life Perpetual Adoration Chapel at Holy Trinity Parish, 246 Main Street (Rte. 28), holds perpetual eucharistic adoration. We are a regional chapel serving all of the surrounding parishes. All from other parishes are invited to sign up to cover open hours. For open hours, or to sign up call 508-430-4716.

WOODS HOLE — Eucharistic adoration takes place at St. Joseph’s Church, 33 Millfield Street, year-round on weekdays 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. No adoration on Sundays, Wednesdays, and holidays. For information call 508-274-5435.

20

The Anchor

August 27, 2010

Diocesan youth attend national Pro-Life Boot Camp continued from page one

for protecting the unborn and for the respect of womanhood that prompted Marian Desrosiers, diocesan director of the Pro-Life Apostolate to ask Bishop George W. Coleman for his blessings to send the pair to the eighth annual Pro-Life Boot Camp, held earlier this month on the campus of the University of Dallas in Irving, Tex. “Having known Jocelyn and Cassandra for a while, I’m so inspired with their faith,” Desrosiers told The Anchor. “It’s a faith that comes from the heart. Bishop Coleman was delighted to send them to boot camp. We know they have the ability to come back and enliven us with information on how to reach our youth with the Pro-Life message. I’m thrilled with their ideas and their fresh response. It’s a wonderful blessing to be associated with them.”

Trindade and Borges attended the week-long boot camp along with 110 other youth and 150

counselors from across the country. The camp is designed for high school-aged students and older.

This year the talks and testimonies centered around Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body. Activities included praying at area abortion clinics, talks and testimonies on Pro-Life and Theology of the Body issues, skits, volunteer projects, Mass and sacraments.

“I’ve been very interested in the Pro-Life movement since 2005,” Trindade said. “It’s always touched me and I know prayer comes first.

But I wanted to do more. I wanted to be a voice for the voiceless, their hands and feet.”

“My parents are faith-filled Catholics and I’ve prayed outside abortion clinics with them in the past,” relayed Borges. “It’s always moved my heart to be involved with such an important issue.”

Both young women told The Anchor that just getting to Dallas was a trial. “There were so many obstacles that cropped up to prevent us from going,” said Trindade.

“It was like the devil trying to stop us, but through the working of the Holy Spirit, we made it and learned and felt so much,” added Borges.

Each experienced the boot camp from a different perspective. “As a 20-year-old, I was assigned as a junior staff person,” said Trindade. “It was good that we saw things from different angles,” said Borges, and it was great to see so many other young people from all over the country involved. Now we can bring these perspectives to our own diocese and share them.”

The campers experienced “a powerful impact” on their lives.

While praying at a Texas abortion “mill,” the pair witnessed a clinic employee so touched by the Pro-Life witness she encountered that she quit that day and shared with those praying at the clinic, “I can’t do this anymore.”

She also said that one or two more employees were thinking of doing the same.

“We also witnessed five moms who turned around and left the clinic before entering,” said Trindade. “I don’t know if they ended up keeping their babies, but at least they were thinking about what they were doing. And another beautiful thing was that there were so many teen-age boys with us, and they were intensely involved. I truly believe the youth in this country are rising up.”

“The Pro-Life movement is not just about saving babies,” said Borges. “We must also focus on the women and the cross they are facing. We have to convert their hearts as well. Learning about the Theology of the Body, we learned

how beautiful women are, and why God made them — to bring life into this world. There has to be an increased awareness of how special women are, and how they must be respected.”

Parishioners of St. Anthony’s Parish in New Bedford, Trindade is a student at UMass-Dartmouth and Borges is a senior at New Bedford High School. Both, in a secular environment, know it’s not just what one says that reaches people, but how one acts. “As Catholics, we must be radical,” said Trindade. “But not just with words, but how we present ourselves. People will look at you and think, ‘I want what she has.’”

“It all starts with respect,” added Borges. “Respect for one’s self and respect for others.”

The young women are currently working with Desrosiers and assistant director Jean Arsenault on developing a Pro-Life Boot Camp for youth next year in the Diocese of Fall River.

“Jocelyn and Cassandra came back so filled with hope and ideas, and we want to share that zeal with others,” said Desrosiers.

“They will lead the board planning the camp under the direction of the Pro-Life Apostolate. We will work together to help articulate Pro-Life and Theology of the Body issues. Hopefully by next year we can put together a one- or two-day boot camp to get started.

It will be a session of ‘head to heart’ learning.”

“There is such a spiritual battle going on, especially in our home state of Massachusetts,” said Trindade. “But the youth in this country want something more.

They want a purpose in life, and they will find it in the Pro-Life movement.”

“What we learned in Dallas, we want to spread around,” said Borges. “We can’t take life for granted. We have to appreciate it. Through prayer we learn to know what God wants from and for us.”

“Striving to be saints is what it means to be Catholic,” added Trindade. “Some day I want people to look back on my life and say, ‘There was a woman who knew what it was to be fully human.’”

Both young women came back from Texas rejuvenated and Spiritfilled. In just a few moments with each, one can easily sense their joy of life. Not just theirs but all life.

They may not have had to do hundreds of sit-ups and push-ups, or run five miles with a five-pound backpack, but their spiritual determination received a workout and they are ready to share that with their peers.

They realize the task may be daunting, but as Borges so aptly put it, “God’s got our backs.”