The Catholic Spirit – March 1, 2012

How to evangelize online

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The Catholic Spirit News with a Catholic heart

March 1, 2012

This year’s religious jubilees

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TheCatholicSpirit.com

States, others join fight against contraceptive mandate

Welcoming the Elect

By Nancy Frazier O’Brien Catholic News Service

Dianne Towalski / The Catholic Spirit

Feb. 26 marked the Rite of Election, a step in the journey toward full communion into the Catholic Church, which culminates in the Easter Vigil on April 7. Archbishop John Nienstedt (shown) and Auxiliary Bishop Lee Piché greeted catechumens from parishes throughout the archdiocese at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis and the Cathedral of St. Paul in St. Paul, respectively. For more on the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults process, see pages 12A-13A.

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Seven states have filed suit against the Department of Health and Human Services’ mandate that nearly all health insurance plans cover contraceptives free of charge, saying that it violates religious freedom and leaves “countless additional religious freedoms vulnerable to government intrusion.”

Joining the attorneys general Archbishop of Nebraska, Nienstedt South Carolina, writes about Michigan, Texas, Florida, Ohio the mandate and Oklahoma — See page 2A in the lawsuit were a Catholic nun, a lay missionary working with the Fellowship of Catholic University Students, Pius X Catholic High School in Lincoln, Neb., and the Omaha-based Catholic Mutual Group, a self-insurance fund that covers more than 125 dioceses or archdioceses and 200 Catholic religious congregations in the U.S. and Canada.

The latest lawsuit was filed as protests against the HHS mandate mounted. More than 4,500 women signed a letter calling on President Barack Obama, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Congress “to allow religious institutions and individuals to continue to witness to their faiths in all their fullness.”

In addition, 18 U.S. senators asked Obama to rescind the mandate, sayPLEASE TURN TO PRESIDENT’S ON PAGE 23A

stupid things I’ve done . . . . . . and that I never want to do again

By Jesuit Father James Martin Two months ago I turned 51. That feels pretty old to me. But at least I’m a bit more experienced and, I hope, a little wiser than I was at 21. With that in mind, here are six stupid things I have done that I never want to do again. Maybe you’ve done some of them, too. But I’ll bet we’d both be happier if we don’t ever again.

1. Compare.

Ever heard the saying “Compare and despair”? Comparing yourself to someone else usually means that you imagine the other person is better off, more satisfied — in a word, happier.

But here’s the problem: We end up comparing what we know about our life, which is a mixed bag of good and bad, with a fantasy of someone else’s supposedly “perfect” life.

PLEASE TURN TO DON’T ON PAGE 22A

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MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

President’s ‘compromise’ really no compromise at all

That They May All Be One Archbishop John C. Nienstedt

President’s proposed solution still violates religious freedom and fails to protect conscience rights

I had just finished celebrating Mass on Friday, Feb. 10, at our annual chancery retreat day when I received word that President Obama had revised his health care insurance mandate. My first reaction was one of gratitude and relief. I said a prayer of thanksgiving for the president’s openness to compromise. However, such feelings were soon dissipated as it became apparent that this compromise was really no compromise at all.

You will recall that last August the Department of Health and Human Services had announced that, with the new federal health care program, all insurance policies would have to include coverage for contraceptives, sterilizations and drugs that induce abortions.

Catholic parishes and parish schools were exempted because they employ persons of their own faith and serve clients of that same category. But Catholic hospitals, colleges and charities, along with for-profit Catholic institutions, Catholicowned businesses and church institutions that self-insure, did not fit that narrow definition and, therefore, would be forced to purchase coverage for drugs that according to church teaching are intrinsically evil.

ization and even drugs that induce abortion. This involves what is called “material cooperation� in an immoral act.

In addition, the insurance companies would, in all probability, add the cost of the “free� drugs to the employer’s premium. Thus, the proposed solution really doesn’t solve the moral dimensions of this mandate, since the Catholic employers would still have to violate their consciences by co-operating in an immoral act. The issue is not so much, then, one about contraceptives as it is about religious freedom and the legal protection of the inviolability of the conscience.

Archbishop Nienstedt’s schedule ■Friday, March 2-11: Rome, Italy: “Ad limina� visit with bishops of Region VIII. ■Sunday, March 11: 7 p.m., St. Paul, University of St. Thomas: “Lectio divina.� ■Monday, March 12: 6 a.m., St. Paul, St. John Vianney College Seminary: Holy hour and Holy Eucharist, followed by breakfast.

11:35 a.m., St. Paul, St. Paul Seminary, Holy Eucharist followed by lunch with seminarians. ■Tuesday, March 13: 8:30 a.m., St. Paul, Archbishop’s Residence: Scheduling meeting with staff.

1:30 p.m., St. Paul, Chancery: Archbishop’s Cabinet meeting. ■Wednesday, March 14: 9 a.m., New Brighton, St. John the Baptist: Clergy Study Day. 3:30 p.m. St. Paul, Chancery: The Catholic Spirit board of directors meeting. ■Thursday, March 15: 3 p.m. St. Paul, Chancery: Archdiocesan Finance Council meeting.

Legislation needed

“The proposed solution really doesn’t solve the moral dimensions of this mandate, since the Catholic employers would still have to violate their consciences by cooperating in an immoral act.

�

ARCHBISHOP JOHN NIENSTEDT

No solution The so-called “compromise� issued on Feb. 10 would compel religious employers to refer these employees

The Catholic Spirit The Catholic Spirit’s mission is to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. It seeks to inform, educate, evangelize and foster a spirit of community within the Catholic Church by disseminating news in a professional manner and serving as a forum for discussion of contemporary issues.

Vol. 17 — No. 5 MOST REVEREND JOHN C. NIENSTEDT Publisher BOB ZYSKOWSKI Associate publisher

JOE TOWALSKI Editor

Materials credited to CNS copyrighted by Catholic News Service. All other materials copyrighted by Catholic Spirit Publishing Company.

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to their insurance company, and the insurance company will be obliged to provide such coverage at no cost.

But, in essence, the religious groups would still be forced to offer insurance that covers birth control, steril-

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Father Rinaldo Custodio will celebrate his 50th anniversary of priestly ordination with an 11 a.m. Mass on March 4, followed by a reception, at St. John the Baptist in Savage. Father Custodio was ordained a priest March 3, 1962.

He has served at St. John the Baptist in Savage, St. John the Baptist in New Brighton, Visitation in Minneapolis, St. Raphael in Crystal, Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, Holy Redeemer FATHER CUSTODIO in Montgomery and Immaculate Heart of Mary in Minnetonka. He also served as chaplain at Benilde-St. Margaret’s School in St. Louis Park.

Father Custodio retired from full-time ministry in 2005. Currently he is house liaison at the Leo C. Byrne Residence for retired priests in St. Paul.

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Father Custodio to mark 50 years as a priest

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Let’s be clear — there are already precedents for the government to provide reasonable concessions to religious groups relative to the protection of deeply held religious beliefs.

The Amish do not carry health insurance, and the government doesn’t force them to do otherwise. Christian Scientists are permitted within the new health care reform bill to heal by prayer alone. Quakers and conscientious objectors are allowed to refrain from military service during wartime. So why can’t the same respect be given to Catholics and other religious groups in this instance?

I urge our readership to contact the

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A Feb. 16 News Note stated that Father Jerome Fehn was recently promoted to lieutenant colonel, the highest rank currently held by a priest in the National Guard. The announcement should have stated it is the highest rank held by a priest in the Minnesota Army National Guard.

Currently, Father Fehn is the only priest-chaplain in the Minnesota Army National Guard.

“We live, in fact, in a world starved for solitude, silence and private: and therefore starved for meditation and true friendship.”

C.S. Lewis, “The Weight of Glory”

Local MARCH 1, 2012

News from around the archdiocese

The Catholic Spirit

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Pastor writes icon to nourish bodies, souls in Kenya, here Father Perkl, have visited Kitui.

“Once you’re there [in Kitui], your heart just gets bigger,” said Janie Carlson, SEAS care team coordinator, who went to Kitui in 2005 with Father Perkl and three others as part of an archdiocesan delegation. “God just infuses your heart with so much. It’s almost indescribable. Your heart never goes back to what it was before you went there.”

By Dave Hrbacek The Catholic Spirit

When parishioners at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Hastings walk into the office of their pastor, Father James Perkl, for the sacrament of reconciliation, they can’t help but notice walls filled with icons he has written (that is the term used for the creation of an icon).

And, as they prepare for absolution, he brings them to the foot of the cross — literally. It is in the form of an icon he FATHER PERKL wrote in 2007 that depicts Jesus on the cross with Mary and the Apostle John standing beside him, which hangs over his desk.

There’s more. As they turn to walk back out of his office at the conclusion of the sacramental meeting, they can stop and look at his newest creation — The Pentecost Icon. In fact, that represents the next step in their spiritual journey.

Father Perkl made the 3-foot by 3foot icon with the archdiocese’s partnership with Kitui, Kenya, in mind.

A larger reproduction of it was installed in the church and blessed by Bishop Lee Piché on Feb. 18, and a similar reproduction will be given to the Diocese of Kitui. A delegation from Kitui is scheduled to come to Minnesota in September of this year, and Father Perkl will present the icon to them when they visit SEAS. “The icon represents the physical

Icon to heal ‘literally’

nature of our Kitui partnership,” Father Perkl said. “You can see the disciples drinking together in the icon as if they are drinking water from one of the dams that we made in the Kitui Diocese.”

Partners in Christ The icon depicts Jesus sitting around a table with the 11 Apostles and his mother, Mary. The 12 red lines going from the center to each of the apostles and Mary represents the consumption of Christ’s precious

blood. And, at the top of the icon is a dove, which represents the Holy Spirit, carrying the Eucharist to those gathered around the table.

African features are noticeable on the faces of those at the table, but they also represent all nations gathered together in unity, Father Perkl explained. It is clear from the icon and his comments that the partnership with Kitui runs deep. In fact, SEAS has been involved in the partnership since it started in 2004, and several people from SEAS, including

What touched her deeply was seeing the joy in the faces of villagers, and a love for the church that caused many to walk for miles in 110-degree heat to come to Mass.

Carlson’s love for Kitui and her memories of the trip were reignited

by Bishop Piché’s remarks about his own visit to Kitui.

Meanwhile, Father Perkl’s passion for icon artistry continues as he works on yet another icon, which he will call Guardian Angel. He started writing icons about 12 years ago and has completed 11 icons, nine of which hang on his office wall.

And, he hopes that the Pentecost icon will hang on many other walls.

The parish is selling reproductions of the icon, with proceeds going to the Diocese of Kitui. It’s part of what Father Perkl and the parish call contemplation in action.

“We want prayer to lead into action,” he said. “By making these icons available, this icon will actually heal the sick, spiritually and also physically, because the money that’s used for buying the icons will go to buy medicine, food and drink for the people in Kitui.”

Order an icon For more information and to order a reproduction of the Pentecost icon, visit WWW.SEAS PARISH .ORG.

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Local

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

Bullies give DeLaSalle student essay ammunition

By Tricia Lyngen For The Catholic Spirit

Semaj Moore, a junior at DeLaSalle High School in Minneapolis, earned first place among more than 7,400 entries in the 2012 high school essay competition sponsored annually by the Maryknoll Society.

Moore’s essay entitled, “How Might Jesus Respond to Bullying,” is a deeply personal and faith-filled account about the bullying he endured in grade school and how he grew from that experience.

He recalled being singled out and ridiculed when he was just a third-grader. Moore soon learned that some of the teasing came because, “some children lead really bad lives at home.” His response was to try to understand and know the bullies.

“When you endure things like that [bullying], God gives you wisdom and empathy so you can treat others kindly without judging them,” he said. Moore now suspends his judgment of others. He said that if he notices others being picked on, he will offer advice, listen and

encourage the person to try to understand the bully and even invite the bully to hang out.

“This takes a lot of strength and it’s scary,” he said.

“But that’s what Jesus taught us to do. Being bullied has actually helped me become less judgmental of others.”

After completing his essay, Moore was hopeful, but not convinced that he would win. “I was honest and spoke from my heart about my faith and my experiences of being bullied,” he said.

Moore is hopeful that other students can learn from his essay, which will be published in the May/June issue of Maryknoll Magazine and then on the website, WWW.MARYKNOLLSOCIETY.ORG. Winning the Bishop Patrick J. Byrne Award and $1,000 means a lot to Moore and his family members, many of whom attended the presentation ceremony with representatives from the Maryknoll Society Feb. 22 at the school, he said.

Teachers and classmates at DeLaSalle, say that Moore has an infectious smile and engaging personality that PLEASE TURN TO BEING ON PAGE 5A

Dave Hrbacek / The Catholic Spirit

Semaj Moore, a junior at DeLaSalle High School, took his experiences of being bullied and turned them into an essay worth $1,000.

Archdiocesan Men’s Conference promises to challenge and lift your spirit The Catholic Spirit Men, for a booster shot to your faith life, show up at the Cathedral of St. Paul the morning of Saturday, March 31. Come expecting to be challenged, too.

Matthew Kelly is likely to both lift your spirit and put a burr under your spiritual saddle as well. Kelly, the author of “Rediscover Catholicism,” “The Rhythm of Life” and other spiritually awakening works, will be one of the presenters that day at the 2012 Archdiocesan Men’s Conference.

Archbishop John Nienstedt, Father Bill Baer and radio host Dave Lee are also on the agenda for the conference that’s titled,

“Rise Up, O Men of God.” Registration begins at 7 a.m. and there is time for eucharistic adoration, confession and the rosary before the archbishop presides at Mass at 8 a.m.

Breakfast follows, then the presentaKELLY tions before closing by noon. All men high school age and older are invited; register online at HTTP://BIT.LY/WQJYBL; cost is $15. Walk-ins

“The solid education in theology and my own faith tradition will increase my ability to build bridges among diverse groups of people ... I hope to find a career working to unite people of different cultures, religions and world views.”

Sarah Farnes ’12 Master of Arts in Theology

Answer Your Call.

Realize your ministry goals with a graduate degree from The Saint Paul Seminary School of Divinity, which offers programs in theology, religious education and pastoral ministry.

Information Night and Course Sampler 5:15 p.m., Tuesday, March 6 R.S.V.P. to gradtheology@stthomas.edu or (651) 962-5063 ext. 2 For more information, visit www.saintpaulseminary.org.

are welcome.

Kelly is an unabashed cheerleader for the Catholic faith. In “Discover Catholicism” he wrote: “. . . for the past two thousand years, wherever you find Catholics, you find a group of people making enormous contributions to the local, national and international community,” and “There is nothing wrong with Catholicism that can’t be fixed by what is right with Catholicism.”

But he also wrote: “We have a responsibility to demonstrate that walking with God and following the life and teachings of Jesus Christ is the best way to live.”

Daily Mass Aboard Ship

15 Days

In addressing why more people aren’t coming to church, Kelly answers, “Because you and I have failed to show them the relevance of the life and teachings of Jesus Christ in the 21st century. As a church, we have failed to show them how Jesus, the sacraments, the Gospel, the Eucharist and Catholic spirituality in general can ease their pain, make them whole again, and bring meaning and purpose to their lives.”

There’s more where that came from.

Come and see March 31.

For more information, call (651) 291-4488, email MFL@ARCHSPM.ORG, or check HTTP:// BIT.LY/Z5SDSR.

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Local

MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

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Internet ‘immigrant’ calls Catholics to evangelize natives

By Pat Norby

Catholic principles for effective use of new social media

The Catholic Spirit

Bishop Lee Piché told Catholic high school religion teachers, Feb. 21, that they, like St. Paul and the first apostles, must adapt to the culture to evangelize.

The native language of the first apostles was Aramaic. But when Jesus sent them out to preach the Good News, they had to brush up on the language of the day — Greek, said the bishop who opened a study day with blogger Thomas Peters at St. Peter in Mendota entitled “Social Media and the New Evangelization.”

“Cyberspace is like going into another country,” the bishop said. “People have described the young generation that uses social media as the natives . . . the rest of us are like the immigrants.”

As a self-proclaimed immigrant who was getting his first iPhone later that day, Bishop Piché said he may not fully understand the language of the Internet, but Pope Benedict XVI has urged all Catholics to use social media to promote the new evangelization.

With an estimated 850 million Facebook users and 300 million Twitter users, the Catholic Church must work to get at the heart of Christ’s message — in 140 characters or less — the bishop said.

Technology use is not new Peters, founder of the American Papist blog, said Christ used cutting edge technology: “He used boats to get around the Sea of Galilee to where he needed to be.”

Catholics have always been leaders in media, he said. Bishop Fulton Sheen and Mother Angelica used new technology to reach Christians.

“New media and social media are just one more step in that journey,” he said.

New media and social media are interchangeable terms that describe peoplepowered media, he added.

Peters started blogging about what he was reading in college while earning two master’s degrees. (You can read his posts at HTTP://CATHOLICVOTE.ORG/DISCUSS — under “Featured Posts,” click on “Thomas Peters Blog Channel.”)

He quickly learned that a lot of his readers were his age and not well-educated in the Catholic faith. One study he read said young people today spend as much as nine hours online.

“If Facebook were a country, it would be the third largest in the world,” he said.

“We need missionaries on this continent.”

In his 2002 message for the 36th World Communications Day, Pope John Paul II said that if there is no room for Christ’s voice and face on the Internet there is no room for man.

“Our job is to be the voice and face of Christ online,” Peters said. “Christ doesn’t have a Facebook account or a Twitter account, but we can and we do.”

When people ask Peters why he thinks Catholics can change the cultural balance,

1. Positive things are more likely to get passed along than negative things.

Turn any negative to a positive.

Prayer knows no distance.

Talk about your faith positively, personally.

2. Know your faith.

Be an authentic witness.

Young adults have the same questions they had as high school students.

Be ready to quickly answer complex and interesting questions.

3. Unity is important.

Catholics are “public fighters and private charitable lovers.”

Learn to debate in charity.

Pray first and use gentler words.

“Catholics don’t have to have incredibly savvy technology.

What we have is the truth, a truth that is desperately needed and rarely heard. One of the powers of social media is that good ideas can rise democratically to the top.

”

THOMAS PETERS

Turn a page ■ “The Church and New Media” by Brandon Vogt.

■ “Infinite Bandwidth: Encountering Christ in the Media” by Eugene Gan. — Book suggestions by Thomas Peters

he said he tells them: “Catholics don’t have to have incredibly savvy technology.

What we have is the truth, a truth that is desperately needed and rarely heard. One of the powers of social media is that good ideas can rise democratically to the top.”

Catholics go viral, too He explained that when the Catholic Vote blog was created in 2008 to inspire Catholics to practice faithful citizenship and vote their values, a video on the Catholic Vote site by Grassroots Films was sent to 300 friends.

“From there it went viral,” he said. “In the first three months, it received 3 million views,” he said. “The way we got from 300 to 3 million was precisely because of Catholics carrying the weight for us and being evangelizers in their own right.”

When Peters includes a quote on his blog from Blessed Mother Teresa or St. Alphonsus Liguori (founder of the Redemptorist order) or Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati (a young Italian Catholic), people often re-Tweet them to friends.

“The things that are commonplace inspirational to us are really water in the desert to a lot of people we encounter online,” he said.

The broad challenge to new evangelization, he said, is that people think they know who Jesus is and they think they know what the church is. You first have to overcome their stereotypes, like the idea that Catholics don’t have a sense of humor, Peters said.

“We have to re-explain from the beginning who God is and why people should care. We have to re-explain from the beginning what the church is and why it’s such a powerful force for good,” he said.

One YouTube video that went viral (with about 15 million hits) was titled “Why I love Jesus but hate the church.”

Not as many people (about 500,000) have seen the video that was done in response by a young priest in a rap sing-song, in defense of the church, Peters said.

“What we as Catholics have to do is re-

4. Be creative and energetic.

Your joy and passion is infectious.

Cardinal Timothy Dolan has a joy about him that makes it hard to hate him.

Speak with grace and kindness.

5. Be proudly Catholic.

We are called to be evangelized and to conversion, also.

Why would someone be interested in becoming Catholic if the people they know who are Catholic are not proud of their faith?

6. Strength in numbers.

Catholics sometimes are marginalized as fringe members of the mainstream.

Show that we are not the fringe.

When Archbishop John Nienstedt refused Communion to people wearing a rainbow sash, Peters sent out a petition to support him that got a response from 40,000 people.

When a campaign began to boycott a Mother Teresa stamp, Peters rallied 150,000 people to sign a petition in favor of it.

7. Creative minorities shape culture.

McDonald’s and Taco Bell offer fish additions at Lent.

Check in on Facebook when you attend Stations of the Cross this Lent.

8. Online life should not interfere with offline life.

spond to what’s happening in the culture and create our own good media,” he said.

“The guy who created the original video . . . watched the counter response . . . [and] said maybe he didn’t understand what the church was.” If someone is presented with the truth, there can be “a little conversion of the heart,” Peters said.

Being bullied? You are not alone and you have options CONTINUED FROM PAGE 4A lights up the hallways with his warmth, compassion and optimism.

Moore and his family selected DeLaSalle because he sensed that “the older students provide guidance and are very friendly and welcoming to the younger ones. It’s another family here, a school that would

never tolerate bullies.”

DeLaSalle has also enhanced his faith life.

“On my own I read the Bible sometimes, but the teachers at De have helped me to dive deeper into my faith,” he said.

Moore said that writing the essay on bullying allowed him to draw on that

faith, reflect on something difficult, and make sense of it to help others.

“Even Jesus did not understand that people could not care, could not understand, could not accept him. Yet, he said he came to love others. I could relate to Jesus more fully when I thought more about his response,” he said.

The one message Moore wants people to get from reading his essay is, “That you are not the only one [being bullied], you are not alone and that you can learn and grow from the experience.”

Tricia Lyngen teaches theology and Spanish at DeLaSalle High School in Minneapolis.

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MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Providence player scores 1,000 for charity

By Dave Hrbacek

It came as no surprise that AnnMarie Healy scored her 1,000th point recently as a member of the Providence Academy girls basketball team.

Needing only 164 points at the start of the season to get there, her 12.5 scoring average per game suggested it would happen sometime in January.

In fact, she is such a prolific and efficient scorer that her coaches were able to predict the exact game in which she would reach the milestone — Jan. 6 against Brooklyn Center.

Sure enough, she got there in the first half of her team’s 68-28 win, with fans holding up congratulatory signs when she hit 1,000.

“It was a really fun night,” said the 6-foot senior. “I played the first half, scored the 1,000th point, then sat on the bench the whole second half.”

That time on the bench gave her a chance to think about the Dave Hrbacek / The Catholic Spirit answer to this question: What Senior AnnMarie Healy of Providence Academy in Plymouth recently reached would she do with the $1,000 that 1,000 career points and was awarded the opportunity to donate $1,000 to the came with her achievement? charity of her choice, thanks to an anonymous donor. She chose Handmaids Knowing she was approaching of the Heart of Jesus in the Diocese of New Ulm. the mark, an anonymous donor came forward and told school ofopen to that calling. I’m not afraid of that. I will leave it ficials that a donation of $1,000 would be made to the up to him [God]. They [sisters] have never pressured me charity of Healy’s choice after she achieved the milestone. to do anything. I still love to visit them. Going with For that reason, assistant coach, and former head coach, them to New York was an unforgettable experience.”

Kurt Jaeger sat Healy down for a talk early in the season.

The next journey she hopes to take is to the Target It was then that he witnessed an example of an attribute that rivaled her skills with a basketball — humility.

“My exact words to her were, ‘AnnMarie, I just wanted to let you know that you’re closing in on a milestone and I want to talk to you about that a little bit,’” he said.

“And, her response to me was she had no idea what milestone I was talking about.

After hearing that she was approaching 1,000 points, “Her immediate reaction to me was, ‘Oh, we don’t want to make a big deal out of that. I don’t score unless I have teammates that pass me the ball.’ That’s just her, to a ‘T.’ That’s just her personality,” Jaeger said.

As Healy turned her thoughts toward charities, several came to mind. The winner, thanks, in part to her uncle, Father Andrew Cozzens of the St. Paul Seminary, was the Handmaids of the Heart of Jesus in the Diocese of New Ulm. Father Cozzens helped the sisters form the order in 2010, then introduced his niece to them.

“I prayed about it and I just thought it would be the best decision,” Healy said. “They are building a new convent for themselves and I thought this [$1,000 gift] would benefit them.”

Said Father Cozzens: “It certainly makes me proud to be her uncle. She didn’t tell me she was doing this. I found out when Mother Mary Clare [Roufs, leader of the order] called me and said, ‘Do you know what your niece AnnMarie is doing?’”

Open to religious vocation A bond was formed when the sisters invited Healy and a friend to join them on a trip to New York. She got to see firsthand how the nine women, ranging in age from 24 to 32, are giving their lives fully to God and the church.

“It’s inspiring to see such young, beautiful women willing to dedicate themselves to Christ and give themselves completely to him,” Healy said.

Hearing her describe the sisters so positively naturally prompts a question about her own vocation.

“So, am I going to be a nun?” she said. “I am definitely

By Jennifer Janikula For The Catholic Spirit

The Catholic Spirit

Humility trumps skills

Holy Family girls basketball team finds focus off the court

Center later this month for the state girls basketball tournament. Providence Academy went last year and lost in the semifinals to eventual state champion Braham, which likely would stand in the Lions’ path again this year. But, Jaeger likes his team’s chances, this year, with the five starters averaging between eight and 12.5 points a game.

“We’ve been the preseason No. 1 in [Class] AA this year and we have remained there all year,” he said. “But the concept that we play within is there are really no stars. We want everyone to contribute and do what they can to help the team.”

Meeting life’s challenges And, Healy’s role is to be the go-to player when the game is on the line. It’s a natural expectation given her talent and poise under pressure.

“Time and score don’t mean anything to her,” Jaeger said. “She knows what her role is, she knows what her job is, and she’ll do that the same way with all the pressure in the world on her as she will the first shot attempt of the game. I think that’s part of her gift. She only has one gear when it comes to competing, and it’s just full throttle all the time.”

Come fall, Healy will take that full-throttle attitude out east to Harvard. She turned down basketball scholarship offers from several schools, plus turned down schools that seemed to be a good fit for her Catholic faith. However, a visit to Harvard convinced her that her faith not only would be welcomed, but that she would be in good company there.

“I went to the student Mass at Harvard and it was packed full with college students; the priest gave an awesome homily,” she said. “The youth ministry is really strong and active. There are Bible studies and [eucharistic] adoration four times a week. There definitely is a light [of faith] at Harvard.

“In anything I have done, I have not chosen the easy path. Harvard will definitely challenge me academically.

But the best things usually come out of hard work and sweat.”

In high school sports, the basketball season stretches from mid-November through “March Madness” — up to 18 weeks and 26 games. It challenges teams to stay focused, and a successful coach must develop a strategy to keep her team fresh and motivated to compete.

Coach Jenny Swartout has a unique approach for keeping players focused — service.

In her first year as head coach of the girls varsity basketball team at Holy Family Catholic High School in Victoria, Swartout manages the pressure of the long season with team service projects.

“These girls work hard in the classroom and on the court,” Swartout said. “The service projects help them focus on the greater good by being charitable. They remember how fortunate they are to play basketball together — to have shoes, uniforms and transportation.”

This season, the team has raised $1,900 for the American Cancer Society, purchased Christmas gifts for 23 children through the Community Action Partnership Agency, hosted a basketball booth at the St. Victoria’s festival and collected food for the Chaska Food Shelf.

“The service projects remind us that there is more in life than basketball,” said junior point guard Aly Anton. “It’s a nice break from our routine and we are more focused the next time we come in the gym.”

Building relationships The service projects also build relationships between the players and their families.

During Advent, Swartout cut practice short and sent the players out to purchase gifts for families in need.

Senior center Katharine Leary remembered running around the store with her teammates, “I really enjoyed it. Helping others made my Christmas better.”

“Some teams do sleep-overs for team bonding, we build our team and do good for the community,” added Anton.

The fundraiser for the American Cancer Society brought parents together, too.

“My mom is a breast cancer survivor,” said junior post Hannah Meidl. “She organized the cancer awareness event.

[Senior] Megan McCabe’s mom volunteered to help and now they are friends.”

Cancer has afJim Bovin for the Catholic Spirit fected the Leary Anne Velazquez, left, and Caitfamily as well. “My lin Hartman, basketball players dad is a prostate at Holy Family Catholic High cancer survivor,” School in Victoria collect Leary said. canned food after practice.

Annie Henrickson who attended the event on behalf of the American Cancer Society, described the players: “They are amazing young women. They are so passionate and spirited.”

“Coach Swartout is building strong women on and beyond the court,” said Kathleen Brown, president and principal of Holy Family. “Bonding with others through service is a habit we hope to instill.”

The players see the connection between sports and service. “Basketball has become more. It’s not just physical — it’s spiritual, too,” Leary said. Meidl added, “We grow in faith while playing a sport we love.”

“As grateful as I am for being a cardinal, I really want to be a saint. I mean that, but I have a long way to go.”

Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York

Nation/World MARCH 1, 2012

News from around the U.S. and the globe

New cardinals called to greater service Catholic News Service

Love and service The consistory took the form of a prayer service. After the Gospel reading, in what the Vatican described as an allocution, not a homily, the pope told the cardinals that love and service, not an air of greatness, are to mark their lives as cardinals.

“Dominion and service, egoism and altruism, possession and gift, self-interest and gratuitousness: These profoundly contrasting approaches confront each other in every age and place,” Pope Benedict said, but the cardinals must model their lives on that of Jesus, loving others to the point of giving up his life for them.

Cardinal O’Brien told reporters afterward that the ceremony and the pope’s remarks underlined that becoming a car-

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Briefly Maryland leaders pledge to put same-sex marriage issue on fall ballot

By Cindy Wooden Pope Benedict XVI created 22 new cardinals from 13 countries — including three from the United States and Canada — placing red hats on their heads and calling them to lives of even greater love and service to the church.

The churchmen who joined the College of Cardinals Feb. 18 included Cardinals Timothy Dolan of New York; Edwin O’Brien, grand master of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulcher of Jerusalem and former archbishop of Baltimore; and Thomas Collins of Toronto.

In their first official act in their new role, CARDINAL O’BRIEN the new cardinals were asked to join their peers in giving the pope their opinion, in writing, on the canonization of seven new saints, including Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha, an American Indian, and Blessed Marianne Cope of Molokai, Hawaii. The pope announced at the consistory that the canonization ceremony would be celebrated Oct. 21 at the Vatican.

Cardinal Dolan mentioned the consultation on the canonization of Blessed Kateri, who was born in what is now New York state, and Mother Marianne, who served there before going to Hawaii.

“As grateful as I am for being a cardinal,” he told reporters later, “I really want to be a saint. I mean that, but I have a long way to go.”

St. Peter’s Basilica was filled to overflowing for the ceremony, and several thousand people sat in a sunny St. Peter’s Square watching on large video screens.

Choirs from New York and from several Italian dioceses provided music for the service.

At the end of the ceremony, the College of Cardinals had 213 members, 125 of whom were under the age of 80 and, therefore, eligible to vote in a conclave to elect a new pope.

The Catholic Spirit

The Maryland Catholic Conference’s executive director, vowing to work with others to bring the measure to a referendum, said the people of the state “will be outraged” at how quickly the bill to legalize same-sex marriage made it through the Legislature to final passage.

The state Senate approved it 25-22 the evening of Feb. 23 after deliberating just 48 hours. The House of Delegates had already approved the bill Feb. 17, and Gov. Martin O’Malley, the bill’s sponsor, has pledged to sign it quickly into law. Maryland would join Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, Iowa, New Hampshire, Vermont, Washington state, along with the District of Columbia, in allowing samesex couples to marry.

More than 55,000 signatures will need to be collected to put the measure on the November ballot — a number that will easily be obtained, said Mary Ellen Russell of the Catholic conference.

Bishops look at role of family in evangelization

CNS photo / Alessandro Bianchi, Reuters

U.S. Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York laughs next to his his mother, Shirley Dolan, as he arrives to attend a special audience with Pope Benedict XVI in Paul VI hall at the Vatican Feb. 20.

dinal “is not a reward, it brings on greater responsibilities —something the pope experiences every day.”

Cardinal Dolan, who delivered the main address on evangelization at a meeting of the College of Cardinals the day before, said “the Gospel and the homily were very sobering” because they recalled the words of Jesus that “we’re not in it for the prestige, we’re not in it for the honor, we’re not in it for the glory. We’re in it to serve.”

In all things, Pope Benedict had told them, “the new cardinals are entrusted with the service of love: love for God, love for his church, an absolute and unconditional love for his brothers and sisters, even unto shedding their blood, if necessary,” a fact underlined by the red color of the biretta — a three-cornered hat — and the red cardinal’s robes.

“He is servant inasmuch as he welcomes within himself the fate of the suffering and sin of all humanity. His service is realized in total faithfulness and complete responsibility toward mankind,” the pope said.

“The free acceptance of his violent death becomes the price of freedom for many,” he told the new cardinals, praying that “Christ’s total gift of self on the cross”

would be “the foundation, stimulus and strength” of their faith and that it would be reflected in their love and charity toward others.

Close collaborators During the ceremony, Pope Benedict placed rings on the fingers of the 22 new cardinals and assigned them a “titular church” in Rome, making them full members of the Rome clergy and closer collaborators of the pope in governing the universal church.

Cardinal O’Brien’s titular church is the historic Church of St. Sebastian on the Palatine Hill. Cardinal Dolan became the titular cardinal of the Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe in the Monte Mario neighborhood.

The new cardinals, the pope said, “will be called to consider and evaluate the events, the problems and the pastoral criteria which concern the mission of the entire church.”

The pope asked the new cardinals “to serve the church with love and vigor, with the transparency and wisdom of teachers, with the energy and strength of shepherds, with the fidelity and courage of martyrs.”

Making final preparations for the world Synod of Bishops on new evangelization Oct. 7-28, a committee of cardinals and bishops discussed how difficult it is today to transmit the faith to others.

In a discussion about challenges to faith and to handing on the faith, the council members focused particularly on the role of the family, said a Vatican press release issued Feb. 27.

Within the family, it said, young people “learn both the content and the practice of the Christian faith. The irreplaceable work of the family is continued in the catechesis offered by church institutions and, especially, through the liturgy with the sacraments and the homily.”

Vatican diplomat attends Friends of Syria summit A Vatican diplomat attended an international summit seeking an end to Syria’s yearlong civil war. Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, apostolic nuncio to Egypt and the Holy See’s delegate to the Arab League, was an observer at the so-called Friends of Syria meeting Feb. 24 in Tunis, Tunisia, said the Vatican’s top spokesman, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi.

The meeting of representatives of about 60 Western and Arab states called for an immediate cease-fire and demanded that Syria open humanitarian corridors. The nations also pledged to increase aid and to set up relief depots in areas along the Syrian border.

— Catholic News Service

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Nation/World

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

Vatican workshop looks at helping couples overcome infertility

By Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service

The majority of the world’s fertility specialists have spent so much time and effort trying to promote and perfect in vitro fertilization that they have wasted resources and time that could have been used to find ways to prevent and treat infertility, a U.S. physician told a Vatican audience.

“Infertility is a symptom of an underlying condition,” and too many physicians do not even attempt to find the cause and treat it; they simply recommend in vitro fertilization, said Dr. Thomas Hilgers, a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life and director of the Paul VI Institute for the Study of Human Reproduction in Omaha, Neb. Hilgers was one of 16 speakers at a workshop Feb. 24 sponsored by the Pontifical Academy for Life to discuss the latest research on the causes, prevention and treatment of infertility.

According to the academy, infertility affects about 15 percent of the population in the industrialized world and up to 30 percent of the population in some developing countries.

“We want to offer a contribution to try to reduce as much as possible this phenomenon, which makes it impossible for so many people to procreate a child and to satisfy their just desire for responsible parenthood,” Bishop Ignacio Carrasco de Paula, academy president,

“I would hope that not just Catholic doctors, but doctors generally, would look again at the advances in treatments that really restore a woman’s healthy fertility, which the church is entirely in favor of.

”

RICHARD DOERFLINGER Associate director of the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities

told the Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano.

Moral treatment available In an interview with Catholic News Service, Hilgers said, “There are 9.5 million women in the United States who have some type of fertility problem. Of those 9.5 million women, less than 0.5 percent of them had a baby last year by IVF,” a method in which a woman’s eggs are removed, united with sperm in a laboratory, and then implanted in the womb of the mother or a surrogate.

The Catholic Church teaches IVF is immoral, first of all because fertilization does not take place through the sexual union of a husband and wife, but also because of the number of fertilized embryos that usually are destroyed or frozen.

“Women go to the IVF clinic with an underlying disease and they walk away

Join us for a Lenten

Taizé Prayer Led by Fr. Ray East and David Haas

Father Ray East is a priest in the Archdiocese of Washington, DC. He is the pastor of St. Therese of Avila Parish in the Anacostia neighborhood of Washington, D.C., and a nationally known speaker and preacher.

This prayer form comes from an ecumenical community in Taizé, France. It is contemplative in nature, filled with musical mantras, litanies, prayer, intercession and silence. Taizé Prayer has become popular in parishes and other communities of faith in the United States and other parts of North America.

from these clinics with the same disease,” Hilgers told participants at the workshop.

Hilgers said his Natural Procreative Technology, presented at the conference, is the result of more than 35 years’ work on treating the causes of infertility, including endometriosis, tubal adhesions and polycystic ovaries. NaPro Technology includes diagnostic methods as well as pharmacological and surgical treatments aimed at allowing couples to conceive naturally.

Richard Doerflinger, associate director of the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat for ProLife Activities and a member of the pontifical academy, said many people mistakenly believe that in the field of sexuality and fertility, the Catholic Church is against the use of advances in medicine and science.

“That’s not it at all. It’s about keeping the two essential meanings of sexuality

— the unitive and procreative — together,” he said.

Procreation “is more than just another bodily function. This is something with an inherent meaning and must be treated with respect and care. The treatments the physicians are speaking about here today — hormonal treatments, surgery, changing behaviors that can interfere with fertility — these are all things the church can enthusiastically endorse.”

Problems with IVF Workshop speakers presented treatments and cures that are scientifically and medically valid, “but they have been neglected in the secular world in favor of a great deal of hype over in vitro fertilization,” he said.

Research is beginning to demonstrate some of the problems with in vitro fertilization, he said. “Pregnancy rates are really very low, live-birth rates are even lower, the great majority of embryos produced by IVF are discarded or lost and now studies are beginning to come out documenting increased risk of birth defects and other problems in the babies conceived that way,” Doerflinger said.

“I would hope that not just Catholic doctors, but doctors generally, would look again at the advances in treatments that really restore a woman’s healthy fertility, which the church is entirely in favor of,” he said.

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David Haas is a campus minister at CDH and is the Director of "Music Ministry Alive!" He is also a nationally known composer of liturgical music, workshop leader, and recording artist.

7:00 p.m.

Sunday, March 18, 2012 Cretin-Derham Hall Activity Center 550 S. Albert St., St. Paul 55116 Please use the entrances on Albert St.

This event is free and open to the public.

A reception will follow

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“Not much has actually changed in my relationship with my brother, either. Only in prayer, then you present entirely different concerns to the dear Lord now.”

Msgr. Georg Ratzinger

This Catholic Life MARCH 1, 2012

Opinion, feedback and points to ponder

Teddy bears and tabernacles Recounting their rural Bavarian childhood and subsequent lifelong friendship, the elder brother of Pope Benedict XVI offers a privileged look at the personal side of the spiritual leader of 1.3 billion Catholics.

“My Brother, the Pope,” scheduled for publication March 1 by Ignatius Press, is based on interviews with Msgr. Georg Ratzinger by German writer Michael Hesemann and was originally published in German last year.

Joseph, the future Pope Benedict, was “very slight and delicate” at birth, Msgr. Ratzinger says, and was “often sick” as an infant, with diphtheria among other ailments.

Later on, Joseph’s favorite toys were stuffed animals, and he was particularly attached to a pair of teddy bears.

Msgr. Ratzinger describes family life with their parents and older sister Maria as free of any overt conflict, “since each one settled that himself and with God in personal prayer. We did not talk about such things. . . . Such problems became a part of our prayer.”

Glimpses of the boys’ destinies came early on.

When a cardinal visited their small town in 1931, arriving in a black limousine, 4-year-old Joseph exclaimed, “I’ll be a cardinal someday!” Nevertheless, Msgr. Ratzinger says, his brother was never ambitious, and external honors have been “always unwelcome” to him.

equipped with a rotating tabernacle,” Msgr. Ratzinger recalls. “Naturally we used water instead of wine for the make-believe consecration.”

The future Pope Benedict, now a proficient amateur pianist and lover of Mozart, “did not take to music quite as spontaneously as I did,” says Msgr.

Ratzinger, who went on to become the choirmaster of the Regensburg, Germany, cathedral. His brother “was a little more restrained, although he is a very musical person,” Msgr. Ratzinger says.

Recounting Hitler’s rise to power in 1930s Germany, Msgr. Ratzinger says that their father regarded the dictator as the “Antichrist” and refused to join the Nazi party.

“But so as not to put our family completely at risk, he advised Mother to join the women’s organization,” Msgr. Ratzinger says, noting that the women “did not talk about Hitler but instead exchanged recipes, chatted about their gardens, and sometimes even prayed the rosary together.”

It was only reluctantly that the two boys obeyed requirements to join the Hitler Youth and later served in the German military during World War II, Msgr. Ratzinger says. The pope’s brother was present at the Allied bombardment of the monastery on Monte Cassino, Italy, in 1944.

Practicing pranksters and priests

Hum-drum and spectacular

“My brother was somewhat better behaved than I,” Msgr. Ratzinger says, yet he recounts a boyhood prank in which the two tricked a local farmer into losing track of his oxcart.

Recreation of a more edifying sort came when the boys played at being priests, using a toy altar made for them by an uncle.

“It was a really beautiful high altar, which he even

Msgr. Ratzinger recounts anecdotes about their time together as adults: watching a German television series about a police dog named “Inspector Rex” and dividing tasks in the kitchen — the monsignor drying the dishes that his brother, by then a cardinal, washes.

In 2005, after the death of Blessed John Paul II, Msgr.

Ratzinger was sure that his brother was too old to be elected pope. When he heard the new pontiff’s name

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“My Brother, the Pope” by Msgr.

Georg Ratzinger, originally published in German and to be released March 1 by Ignatius Press (WWW.IGNATIUS.COM), takes the form of an interview, along with editorial commentary, by co-author Michael Hesemann [272 pp. $24.95].

A few of Pope Benedict’s favorite childhood things

By Catholic News Service

The Catholic Spirit

CNS photo

pronounced on live television, he admits that he was “disheartened.”

“It was a great challenge, an enormous task for him, I thought, and I was seriously worried,” he says.

Readers get a glimpse inside the papal household as Msgr. Ratzinger describes his brother’s daily routine (read the excerpt on this page).

Msgr. Ratzinger says that his brother has not been indifferent to the many criticisms that he has received during his career, as prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and then as pope.

Pope Benedict is “personally very sensitive, but he also knows from which corner these attacks come,” Msgr.

Ratzinger says. “That way he overcomes it more easily, he rises above it more simply.”

Contributing to this report were Carol Glatz, Francis X. Rocca and Cindy Wooden in Rome.

Excerpts from ‘My Brother, the Pope’ offer inside look at life in the Vatican

How do you address him then?

I call him Joseph, of course; anything else would be abnormal!

preparation for the large audience on Wednesday morning. For example, he has to practice the pronunciation of the foreign languages in which he will greet the pilgrims and the pilgrimage groups — of course, he does not speak them all fluently. For this purpose, he listens to the correct pronunciation on a tape and then practices it, so as to avoid making big mistakes and to be understood correctly.

What does the pope’s normal daily routine look like?

Early in the morning around 7, he celebrates holy Mass in his private chapel, and afterward he makes a short meditation and, finally, prays the breviary until breakfast at around 8. Until then, we are together, when I happen to be visiting him; then we say goodbye at that point in time, and each goes to his apartment.

Then he prepares for the events of the day, for instance, for the visitors he will receive in a personal audience: Who are they and what is their concern or the request they come to make? That, of course, requires a thorough preparation and an equally careful follow-up.

On Tuesdays, there is also the

At 1:15 p.m. on weekdays, the midday meal is served — on Sunday, earlier at 1 — and afterward, he takes a short walk through the garden on the roof of the Apostolic Palace, because “Post coenam stabis vel passus mille meabis” (After eating you should rest, or else walk a thousand steps). Then comes the siesta, but he does not use the whole siesta time to rest; instead, he also writes letters and postcards and reads all sorts of things. I get the impression, in any case, that he works for part of the siesta time. In the summer, we always prayed the breviary at around 4 in the afternoon, while at 5 he takes a walk either in the Vatican Gardens or the garden of Castel Gandolfo, during which he prays the rosary together with his secretary, Msgr.

By Catholic News Service Following are exclusive excerpts from the English translation of “My Brother the Pope” by Msgr. Georg Ratzinger and coauthor Michael Hesemann, which will be released March 1 by Ignatius Press.

CNS photo / courtesy of Michael Hesemann

Msgr. Georg Ratzinger, the brother of Pope Benedict XVI, is pictured at his home in Regensburg, Germany.

Georg Ganswein. In the winter, on the other hand, when it gets dark early, this walk takes place at 4. Toward 6, the regularly scheduled audiences are held.

In the morning, there are the private audiences, in which he receives most importantly the bishops who come from abroad and heads of state, and so on, while the afternoon is reserved for the regularly scheduled audiences in which the heads of the various curia offices give

their reports and offer suggestions in matters in which the pope must make a decision.

The evening meal is at 7:30; at 8 he watches the news. At around 8:30, he takes another short walk on the roof or, in the winter, in the corridors of the house.

Afterward, compline, the night prayer of the church, is prayed, and with that his work day actually ends. Usually we sit down in the living room and talk for a while.

It is said that he reads aloud to you from the breviary since your vision is no longer very good, while you play music for him.

That is right; he prays the breviary aloud: after Mass in the morning, vespers in the afternoon, and compline in the evening, because I can no longer pray them alone. In the evening, before we go to sleep, he sometimes asks me to play a song for him. Then I play for him on the piano a hymn or a folk song, for instance, “Im schonsten Wiesengrund,” or night songs like “Der Mond ist aufgegangen” or “Adieu zur guten Nacht,” just very simple things. In Advent or the Christmas season, of course, I play Christmas carols instead, whatever suits the occasion.

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THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

Opinion-Letters

/ This Catholic Life

Time to fold on gambling option for new Vikings stadium hile the State Legislature and local governments continue to debate possible funding options for a new Minnesota Vikings stadium, one source of revenue should be off the table: gambling.

Some legislators in St. Paul, however, continue to place their bets on an expansion of gambling to help cover the costs of a new stadium, which carries a price tag around $1 billion. One of the latest proposals, introduced last Monday, is to use funds from a “racino” — a horse track that includes slot machines — to help pay for a stadium. Other ideas put forward include using revenue generated from electronic bingo and pull-tabs, and even a new Twin Cities casino run in partnership with the White Earth tribe.

At first glance, gambling revenue may seem like a good option to help pay for a stadium, which the Vikings say they absolutely must have to stay competitive and remain playing in Minnesota. It reduces the need to raise taxes and relies on the ostensibly voluntary participation of those choosing to play. And, not surprisingly, a large-scale operation stands to generate a lot of money.

Gambling, however, is a poor example of public stewardship. State, county and municipal budgets are ultimately moral documents that reflect the values and priorities of the people for whom they are created. If the thinking is that all Minnesota benefits from building a stadium and keeping the Vikings, then all Minnesotans should shoulder the costs

W Editorial Joe Towalski

Gambling is a poor example of public stewardship and comes with high social costs

“If the thinking is that all Minnesota benefits from building a stadium and keeping the Vikings, then all Minnesotans should shoulder the costs — not just those hoping, despite long odds, to hit a big jackpot.

”

JOE TOWALSKI

— not just those hoping, despite long odds, to hit a big jackpot.

Cost to society Large-scale gambling also doesn’t come without costs to local communities and the state, which must deal with the social consequences of gambling addictions and the harm gam-

A ‘faith app’ would be helpful ne of the lesser effects of the adoption of the new translation of the Roman Missal is the ubiquitous presence of worship aids.

These laminated cards, found in virtually every parish, contain the prayers of the Mass to assist the congregation to be, literally, on the same page.

These worship aids take us off autopilot for prayers, pointing out how common Stephen Kent it is to respond without thinking. Stumbling over rubrics may be embarrassing but essentially harmless. Not so is the mindless, not looking into the meaning of faith.

Since aids for worship are found within a church on Sundays, what about a faith aid for taking the results of that worship into the world during the week? Call it “a belief aid.”

We are called to bring our faith into the world. Pope Benedict XVI recently emphasized the need for an “engaged, articulate and wellformed Catholic laity” with the courage and critical skills to articulate the “Christian vision of man and society.”

To do this, we have to know what we are talking about in order to counter the unholy trinity of pragmatism, utilitarianism and consumerism as described by Cardinal Timothy Dolan.

“It is a bedrock feature of modern political and legal theory that only neutral, utilitarian principles can provide a basis for public policy discussions and law, and that appeals to transcendent values, such as religion, cannot legitimately be presented,” he said recently at Fordham University Law School.

O

Opinion

Built into human life What gives believers the right to bring their faith to civic affairs? Seattle Archbishop Peter Sartain noted at a Washington state Senate hearing, that “not everyone holds our faith and beliefs, but the universal principles that form the basis for our position are readily discernible by all people. They transcend any particular society, government or religious community; in fact, they are built into human life itself.”

National Football League quarterbacks, despite their megamillion-dollar salaries, still carry a list of plays on their wrist into a game. They practice daily but still see the need for immediate reference about how to act in specific situations.

Words into action A quick fact-check is necessary for an election year, maybe not on wristbands, but perhaps a “faith app” on mobile devices.

Such a good belief aid is the Catholic Social Teaching Principles podcasts. Paulist Father Larry Rice reflects briefly on the major themes of Catholic social teaching, and how they should shape our lives as citizens of the world and as people of God. It can be downloaded at: WWW.USCCB.ORG/ISSUES-AND-ACTION/FAITHFULCITIZENSHIP/PODCAST-ISSUES.CFM. Worship aids help us say the right words. Belief aids help us put those words into action.

Stephen Kent, now retired, was editor of archdiocesan newspapers in Omaha and Seattle. He can be contacted at: CONSID ERSK@GMAIL.COM.

bling can do to low-income households.

While the vast majority of people who gamble don’t fall into the category of “problem” or “pathological” gamblers, the small number who do have an impact on the rest of us.

A recent blog post by Minnesota’s Joint Religious Legislative Coalition,

of which the Minnesota Catholic Conference is a sponsoring body, cited a study that found the social costs of gambling outweigh its social benefits by about three-to-one. Problem gambling, the JRLC noted in a 2005 paper, is associated with criminal behavior, large debts and domestic violence. It cited a study estimating the cost to society for a pathological gambler is $11,304 per year and $3,222 for a problem gambler.

When problem or pathological gambling — or even one night of excessive gambling — involves low-income individuals, the impact on them and the rest of their household, including spouses and children, can be devastating.

Other approaches This doesn’t mean we need to outlaw gambling. But it also doesn’t mean the government should be giving approval to practices that undermine the welfare of some of its citizens, including those who pay for the consequences of problem gambling, as it seeks to fund projects and initiatives. It must consider other options.

The new Vikings stadium faces an uphill battle. Politicians and voters must decide how, and even whether, to fund it in a difficult economy when the financial benefits to the general public aren’t clear and when other priorities also demand funding.

But for the gambling option as a source of revenue, it’s time for all the players to fold.

U.S. bishops right in taking stand I applaud the various bishops in America for vocally standing up for our faith, and in defiance of the recent ruling by the Obama administration regarding exemptions from providing health care coverage for contraception and sterilization.

But, honestly, what did we expect from this president, who was very clear where he stands regarding protection of human life? American Catholics know that we get what we vote for, and we deserve what we get.

Letters

STEVE HOUSE St. Michael, St. Michael

Rich-poor gap shows politics at its worst In the Feb. 16 edition the article “Is the rich-poor gap widening?” — and especially the accompanying chart — is revealing and also very scary. It glaringly highlights that the propaganda machine of the White House is busy and unfortunately working. For the last three years the present administration has inundated us with what they call “data” that purports the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer.

It jumps out at you in the chart. Bear in mind that Obama took office in 2009. In the “all” category of those who feel the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer, between 2009 and 2011 there was an increase of 19 percent who said they felt strong or very strongly that that is the case.

The increase in the “white” category was 22 percent and in the “independent” category the increase is 23 percent. These extremely high increases just happen to be targeted voters in the 2012 presidential election.

I hope people aren’t so naïve as to think increases like that just happen.

It has been, and will continue to be a constant drumbeat out of Washington that this is a newly generated problem and that only this White House can correct it. This is the lowest form of politics and class warfare imaginable. Our country is in big trouble. Not only are our values as citizens being undermined and weakened, so is our religion. We must get it right this time.

JIM FREGEAU St. Bridget of Sweden, Lindstrom

This Catholic Life / Commentary

MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

11A

Parading through Minnesota homes, tracking the Joneses pring is almost here and the sweet home-show season is upon us! Time to inspect the Joneses’ mansion and discover just how far behind we’ve fallen.

This month we’ll be allowed to try on bigger homes for size, drooling over the amenities on our wish lists and finding new ones to add. And you can linger a little — pull open the jewelry drawer, step inside the master-bathroom shower — because the Joneses haven’t moved in yet.

Last fall my husband and I joined his parents for Minnesota’s Parade of Homes. We seized one of those magical October afternoons when the slanted sun makes everything glow, piled into their Lincoln and pointed it west, toward Lake Minnetonka and Minneapolis’ richest suburbs. It was time to see how the other half lives.

We started at a suburban community called Locust Hills, where an empty lot had been reduced from $650,000 to $480,000. My father-inlaw, a farmer, crinkled his face at the price.

We ended our excursion with the most expensive — an 8,000-squarefoot classical home in Edina that cost $2.4 million. I read the description from the magazine as we pulled up to the corner lot: “This spectacular custom Dream Home will melt your heart and stir your soul.”

too much or not enough, something that would be hard to clean. So much Brazilian cherry you’d live in fear of scratching it, you’d long for a little carpet to warm your feet. So many amenities — wet bar, indoor gym — you’d never leave home, you’d become antisocial.

S Twenty Something Christina Capecchi

We must protect ourselves against idolatry and coveting what others have

Gods of granite

A little cold Dream Home, an official Parade of Homes term that necessitates capitalization, is code for costs-$5-a-person-to-enter. That wasn’t the only pretension awaiting us: Unlike other Parade homes, where you leave your shoes outside the front door, we were instructed to carry our shoes in a plastic bag while we toured the home.

My husband refused to be undignified by the mandate, so he stashed his sneakers in a bush.

He had the right idea. It’s hard to be swept away by the make-believe Parade of Homes world and pretend this fortress is your own when you’re

carrying your shoes in a grocery sack.

I don’t know that our souls were stirred, but we did get lost. About two-thirds of the way through it was hard to determine where we had come from, where we were headed and where my father-in-law had gone. (He was checking out the garage.)

The home was impressive, but not quite my style. A little cold.

Deep down, that’s the response I was hoping for. You parade through the Joneses’ home with the secret goal of spotting something, anything to critique.

You look for something that cost

But parading through the Joneses’ home can be risky business, at odds with the First Commandment — making gods of granite — and the 10th, the prohibition against coveting a neighbor’s goods. (That includes the kitchen and closet, pantry and porch.)

I want to be like my husband’s aunt, who indulged neighbors in an in-depth tour of their big new home, then smiled and offered the heartfelt remark: “We’re really happy for you!”

Life is a collaboration, not a competition, and Lent is the perfect time to fast from comparisons and focus on the many blessings we do have: good friends, warm homes and a reason to step outside every now and then.

Christina Capecchi is a freelance writer from Inver Grove Heights, Minn. She can be reached at WWW.READCHRISTINA.COM.

Forming consciences for faithful citizenship braham Lincoln said in the Gettysburg Address that American government is “of the people, by the people, for the people.” But such a political system requires learned and virtuous citizens to make informed choices about the politicians they elect as representatives, as well as the public policy matters that should receive the most attention.

To assist Catholics in fulfilling this task in 2012, the nation’s Catholic bishops have continued their tradition of releasing a document every presidential election cycle entitled, “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.”

The document seeks to educate Catholics about the importance of forming their consciences around the basic principles and moral framework of Catholic social doctrine. It also prioritizes an array of issues that Catholics should consider when making choices about whom to vote for and how to participate as a “faithful citizen” in the public arena.

But what exactly is conscience and how is it formed?

A Faith and the Public Arena Jason Adkins

What exactly is conscience and how is it formed?

Doing good, avoiding evil According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “Conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act that he is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed” (No. 1778). It “enjoins him at the appropriate moment to do good and to avoid evil” (No. 1777).

The exercise of conscience first re-

quires the acknowledgement by each person that there are such things as good and evil, true and false, and right and wrong.

Unfortunately, the recent study “Lost in Transition” by Notre Dame sociologist Christian Smith shows many young people today do not think within these categories and are practically incapable of moral reasoning.

The common-sense recognition of an objective moral order that binds human action is no longer common. “Conscience” has become the trump card people use when they wish to live by their subjective preferences instead of doing what they ought to do.

There is no longer “the truth,” but rather “my truth” and “your truth.”

People scoff at the idea of papal infallibility, but seem to believe in the infallible judgment of each person’s conscience.

Surely, a person must act in accord with conscience even when it is mistaken, but there must be a source of judgment of conscience other than the subjective reflections of each individual person.

Without an objective moral truth that could guide human action and which can be appealed to, we would all be subject to the arbitrary whims of those in power. But moral truth exists. We can discover it through both faith and reason; it is the foundation of authentic liberty.

Helping us grow in freedom Fortunately, the church, as mother and teacher, is always there to help us in the lifelong task of

Letter, study guide are available In 2008, Archbishop Harry J. Flynn wrote a pastoral letter, “The Moral Conscience.” It has been recently re-released along with a study guide for individual and small-group reflection.

The letter and study guide are great tools for Catholics to use to understand what conscience is, how it is formed and how it is properly exercised in the life of every person. The pastoral letter is available at HTTP://WWW.ARCHSPM.ORG/_ULS/ RESOURCES/HJF-MORALCONSCIENCE-PASTORAL-LETTER-2008 05.PDF. Copies of the study guide and letter can be obtained from Sharon Wilson in the archdiocesan Office of Marriage, Family and Life by calling (651) 291-4506.

forming our consciences. Because we are so often unable to recognize or understand why a particular action is good or evil, the church instructs us in the virtues and provides us with the principles we need to live in a way that serves the pursuit of justice and human dignity.

According to the late Father Richard Neuhaus, “[F]aithful assent is not a matter of standing to attention, clicking one’s heels, and saluting at the appearance of every doc-

ument from Rome. Rather, it is a matter of thinking for myself so that I can think with the church, the prior assumption being that the church possesses a teaching charism and authority that warrants my assent.”

Far from being an imposition on our freedom of action, the church’s loving guidance is an aid to our freedom. Authentic freedom is the capacity to do what one ought and to live in accord with God’s will, not the ability to do whatever one pleases.

Therefore, the two indispensable preconditions for the proper formation of conscience are recognizing the reality of an objective moral order, and making an act of faith in the church’s ability to guide us into truth.

Once achieved, the task then turns to actually forming one’s conscience through prayer and education about the ways in which our individual lives and the social order are properly ordered to promote justice, human flourishing, and the common good.

Studying and reflecting on the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the bishops’ document “Faithful Citizenship” are two wonderful places to start this process.

When we properly form our consciences, we will begin to reconstruct the social order along Catholic principles, and restore all things in Christ.

Jason Adkins is executive director of the Minnesota Catholic Conference.

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RCIA not just for new Catholics:

By Julie Carroll The Catholic Spirit

Every year, hundreds of adults and children in the archdiocese begin a journey to full membership in the Catholic Church.

This year 745 people are preparing to receive the sacraments of initiation during the Easter Vigil.

The process, called the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults, or RCIA, is divided into four stages: Precatechumenate or Inquiry, Catechumenate, Purification and Enlightenment, and Mystagogy.

Along the way, those making the journey mark their progress by participating in liturgical rites, or rituals, which involve the entire church.

Since 1988, the RCIA has been the standard process in the United States for adults and children ages 7 and older to enter the Catholic Church.

Before the Second Vatican Council, people seeking to join the Catholic Church met individually with a priest, who would prepare them and initiate them in private. Around the time of the council, some bishops requested that the early church’s formation process be restored as a way to introduce the faith to people with no Christian background, according to Jackie Graham, RCIA network coordinator for the archdiocese.

“It was based on such sound practices of adult learning that bishops all over the world picked up on it, and the U.S. Catholic bishops adapted it for all the different situations that you have in this country and in Western countries,” said Graham, who served as liturgist at Guardian Angels in Oakdale.

Baptized and unbaptized individuals go through the RCIA at their own pace, asking questions, learning about the church’s teachings, and preparing spiritually for the sacraments of baptism, confirmation and Eucharist celebrated at the Easter Vigil. The entire church community supports them during this process, which is guided by the Holy Spirit.

“As the community supports and walks closely with the participants on their journey, it is also called to self-examination and renewal of faith,” according to an RCIA blog Graham maintains.

“The RCIA has the potential to transform a church if it’s done correctly,” she said in an interview with The Catholic Spirit.

“Most people have been baptized as infants, and the beauty of the RCIA is that they’re seeing people come into the church who are actually willing to put themselves out there, to be in the assembly on Sunday with these different rites, and maybe even . . . publicly testify to their own conversion.

Most Catholics have never had to do that,” Graham said.

“The transforming part is that they can look at these people and say, ‘If these people are willing to do this to become a Catholic,

I must have something really valuable.’”

In fact, the RCIA has proven so successful in preparing people to enter the church that many parishes have begun modeling their faith formation programs on it, Graham said. Some even assign “sponsors” to new parishioners to help acquaint with the parish.

Below are explanations of the four stages of the RCIA, the various rites involved, and Graham’s suggestions for all Catholics seeking to deepen their faith through this process.

Precatechumenate or Inquiry During this stage, those seeking to become Catholic are encouraged to ask questions they have about the faith. Depending on the parish, this can occur either in a group setting or individually with the parish’s RCIA coordinator.

The inquiry stage can happen at any time of the year and does not involve a curriculum.

Parishes assign sponsors to accompany inquirers throughout the RCIA process and answer their questions. Later in the process, unbaptized individuals also choose godparents, who provide spiritual support beyond the RCIA for life.

When the inquirers are ready, they celebrate their first rite — the Rite of Acceptance Into the Order of Catechumens if they’re going to be baptized and/or the Rite of Welcoming Baptized but Uncatechized Adults Into Candidacy for Full Communion.

Before Mass, they are introduced to the assembly and are asked to share a little about their faith journeys.

Then their sponsors make the sign of the cross on their ears, eyes, lips, heart, shoulders, hands and feet. The priest also makes the sign of the cross on each person.

After the homily, they are presented with Bibles and dismissed so they can discuss as a group the Scripture readings they heard at Mass.

Suggestions: ■ Look for enrichment opportunities in your parish or neighboring parishes on topics that pique your interest, such as spirituality, death and dying, end-of-life issues, liturgy, Mary and the saints, or Catholic social teaching.

■ Read The Catholic Spirit and listen to Relevant Radio, 1330 AM in the Twin Cities, to learn more about the Catholic faith.

Catechumenate The Catechumenate is a period of formation. During this time, catechumens and candidates study Scripture and Catholic doctrine.

Father James Perkl, pastor of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Hastings, co

“It’s not about information as much as it is about formation,” Graham explained. “We can get information from the Internet. We can only get formation from people who are willing to guide us through discerning our own souls, our own minds, our own hearts, learning about who God is, who Jesus is, and what they are for us. . . . It’s about forming our consciences and learning what the Catholic Church teaches so that we can be informed citizens, we can make moral choices.”

On the first Sunday of Lent, the diocesan church celebrates the Rite of Election with catechumens from parishes throughout the diocese. In the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, this takes place both at the Cathedral of St. Paul in St. Paul and the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis.

That morning in th the catechumens sign signifying their comm celebrate an optional the catechumens and the cathedral or the b publicly recognized bishops then sign the

Suggestions:

■ Read and reflec Scriptures before Ma found at http://uscc readings.

■ Spend time in pr readings you heard o them with your family

■ Start a Bible stud

MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

A process for deepening faith Suggestions: ■ Plan for your Lenten prayer, fasting and almsgiving.

■ Schedule time for eucharistic adoration.

■ Make a retreat. See the calendar on page 18A for a list of retreats offered in the archdiocese.

Mystagogy During this final RCIA period, which formally lasts through the Easter season, the newly initiated continue their catechesis as a group to deepen their understanding of the sacraments.

The new Catholics examine in detail all they experienced during the Easter Vigil, learn about the other sacraments of the church, and are invited to participate in parish ministries.

Mystagogy is not limited to new Catholics, Graham said. “You and I are also in a period of Mystagogy, and that period is going to continue until we die.

“That is the formation that Catholics go through their entire lives. We’re always learning something new about our church, about the sacraments, and getting new insights. . . . So it’s not really an ending; it’s a process.”

Suggestions: ■ Engage in spiritual reading, especially on the sacraments, Catholic social teachings, and the writings of the saints, church fathers and contemporary theologians.

Dave Hrbacek / The Catholic Spirit

onfirms RCIA candidate Rebecca Perez during the Easter Vigil Mass last year.

heir respective parishes, n the Book of the Elect, mitment. Parishes may Rite of Sending before candidates proceed to basilica, where they are by the bishops. The e Book of the Elect.

ct on the Sunday ass. Readings can be cb.org/bible/

rayer with the on Sunday. Discuss y.

dy.

Purification and Enlightenment Christian formation becomes more intensive during the period of Purification and Enlightenment. The elect and candidates may go on a retreat during this time. Their families are encouraged to support them in their journeys.

There are four rites during this period. On the third, fourth and fifth Sundays of Lent, the elect participate in the Scrutinies. After the Gospel readings, they are invited to come forward and kneel while their sponsors place their hands on the elect and candidates’ shoulders and the assembly prays for them.

There is also an optional penitential rite on the second Sunday of Lent for people who are baptized and preparing for full communion. Similar to the Scrutinies, the bap-

tized are invited to kneel before the assembly, who pray while the priest lays hands on the candidates.

During the Easter Vigil, the unbaptized make a profession of faith. After the Liturgy of the Word they receive the sacrament of baptism, during which they are anointed with oil; clothed with a white garment, signifying that they are putting on Christ; and presented with a lit baptismal candle.

The candidates make a profession of faith.

Then the newly baptized, called neophytes, and the candidates are confirmed. The priest lays his hands on each one, prays that the Holy Spirit come upon them, and anoints them with chrism oil.

Then they receive the final sacrament of initiation: Eucharist.

■ Become more involved in your parish’s social mission and liturgy and faith formation programs.

■ Volunteer to sponsor a catechumen or candidate.

■ Perform works of charity and service and/or get involved in the political process to bear witness to the church’s social justice teachings.

More online For Lenten-themed videos, visit TheCatholicSpirit.com/Lent2012. Also watch upcoming issues of The Catholic Spirit to read more about individuals who will be initiated into the church at the Easter Vigil, April 7.

13A

“We have only to believe. And the more threatening and irreducible reality appears, the more firmly and desperately we must believe.”

Jesuit Father Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

The Lesson Plan 14A

The Catholic Spirit

Reflections on faith and spirituality

MARCH 1, 2012

Psalmist sets example for keeping faith amid turmoil ow is it, today, that the psalmist can say to us, “I believed even when I said I am sorely afflicted” (Psalm 116:10)?

It seems more likely that we would put faith aside when we meet with misfortune.

Why should we maintain our faith when evil befalls us?

That dichotomy is not one lived by the psalmist. He chooses to keep faith in the midst of his affliction because of where he has placed his hope.

Psalm 116:11 says: “I said in my alarm ‘No one can be trusted.’” This verse implicitly reveals that the psalmist has not Deacon Joe Backowski placed his hope in mere human beings, but in God. Humans fail, but God is always faithful.

Lent is a good time for us to examine where we have placed our hope.

Have we placed our hope in money, social systems, government or in friends and family?

If we have neglected to place our hope in God, then Lent is a great time to redirect our hope so that it may be in Christ

H

Sunday Scriptures

and the mysteries that we celebrate during the Triduum. The central mystery of the Triduum is that God, made man, was sentenced to death, was crucified and buried: quite an affliction I’d say!

Yet, Jesus knew the Father so intimately that he trusted that the Father would raise him on the third day — and he did!

Die for new life in Christ Therefore, for us who allow ourselves to be incorporated into Christ’s death, we can know by the revelation of the Paschal Mystery that we, too, will be raised up.

That is the essence of Christian hope — that even though we will die, if we die in Christ, we will live!

Thus, as Lent continues, allow the hunger pangs of fasting and the temptation of a plush cheeseburger on a Friday be opportunities for examining where you have placed your hope.

Then, in the silent room of your heart, invite the Holy Spirit in so as to make Jesus Christ your final hope.

Deacon Joe Backowski is in formation for the priesthood at The St. Paul Seminary for the Diocese of St. Cloud. His home parish is Holy Family in Little Falls and his teaching parish is St. Andrew in Elk River.

Daily Scriptures Sunday, March 4 Second Sunday in Lent Genesis 22:1-2, 9a, 10-13, 15-18 Romans 8:31b-34 Mark 9:2-10 Monday, March 5 Daniel 9:4b-10 Luke 6:36-38 Tuesday, March 6 Isaiah 1:10, 16-20 Matthew 23:1-12 Wednesday, March 7 Perpetua and Felicity, martyrs Jeremiah 18:18-20 Matthew 20:17-28 Thursday, March 8 John of God, religious Jeremiah 17:5-10 Luke 16:19-31 Friday, March 9 Frances of Rome, religious Day of abstinence Genesis 37:3-4, 12-13a, 17b-28a Matthew 21:33-43, 45-46 Saturday, March 10 Micah 7:14-15, 18-20 Luke 15:1-3, 11-32 Sunday, March 11 Third Sunday of Lent

Exodus 20:1-17 1 Corinthians 1:22-25 John 2:13-25 Monday, March 12 2 Kings 5:1-15b Luke 4:24-30 Tuesday, March 13 Daniel 3:25, 34-43 Matthew 18:21-35 Wednesday, March 14 Deuteronomy 4:1, 5-9 Matthew 5:17-19 Thursday, March 15 Jeremiah 7:23-28 Luke 11:14-23 Friday, March 16 Day of abstinence Hosea 14:2-10 Mark 12:28-34 Saturday, March 17 Patrick, bishop Hosea 6:1-6 Luke 18:9-14 Sunday, March 18 Fourth Sunday in Lent 2 Chronicles 36:14-16, 19-23 Ephesians 2:4-10 John 3:14-21

Readings

For reflection

Sunday, March 4 Second Sunday in Lent ■ Genesis 22:1-2, 9a, 10-13, 15-18 ■ Romans 8:31b-34 ■ Mark 9:2-10

When have you put faith and hope in another person and place and been disappointed? Try letting God take over one thing for you this week.

Lent should be time of grace, defeating temptation, pope says

By Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service

The 40 days of Lent are a time of spiritual renewal in preparation for Easter, but they also are a time to recognize that evil is at work in the world, and even the Catholic Church faces temptations, Pope Benedict XVI said.

The pope explained the meaning of Lent during his weekly general audience Feb. 22, Ash Wednesday.

Like the people of Israel during their 40year exodus and like Jesus during his 40 days in the desert, the Catholic Church and its members experience the grace of God, but also are besieged by evil around them and are tempted by power and selfishness, the pope said.

Jesus, before beginning his public ministry, withdrew to the desert for 40 days.

Fasting, “he nourished himself on the word of God, which he used as a weapon to defeat the devil,” the pope said.

Pope Benedict said experience of God’s grace and of temptation is not unique to modern Catholics or to the church.

During their 40 years in the desert, the people of Israel were guided by God, fed with manna and given water from a rock, but they also were tired, complaining and tempted to return to idol worship, the pope said. And, spending 40 days in the desert before beginning his public ministry, Jesus experienced the closeness of

God, but also faced the devil’s temptations of “power, success and dominion.”

“This ambivalent situation also describes the condition of the church journeying through the desert of the world and history. In this desert, we believers certainly have the opportunity of having a profound experience of God, who strengthens our spirit, confirms our faith, nourishes our hope and animates our charity,” the pope said.

However, he said, “the desert is also the negative aspect of the reality that surrounds us: the aridity, the poverty of words and values, the secularism and materialism” that attempt to convince people that God does not exist.

Still, “the desert time can be transformed into a time of grace” because God’s love is more powerful than the temptations of the world, the pope said.

At the end of the audience, Pope Benedict met with Msgr. Keith Newton, head of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham. Members of the ordinariate, established in January 2011 for the pastoral care of former Anglicans in England and Wales, were making a pilgrimage to the Vatican to thank the pope.

From the Vatican

The Lesson Plan

MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

15A

Operation Rice Bowl programs develop communities worldwide The Catholic Spirit

SPOTLIGHT ON ZAMBIA

Since 1975, Operation Rice Bowl, the Lenten program of Catholic Relief Services, has helped to improve people’s ability to access food in communities around the world and in the United States.

Seventy-five percent of the donations to ORB help fund food security projects around the world, while 25 percent remain in the diocese in which they were collected.

As the official international Catholic relief and development agency of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Catholic Relief Services works with local, national and international Catholic institutions and structures, as well as other organizations, to assist people on the basis of need, without regard to race, religion or nationality.

CRS development projects include helping farmers improve crop yields, bringing clean water to communities, microfinancing to encourage the growth of small businesses, providing basic health and nutrition services through mother and child health initiatives, addressing the many needs of people affected by HIV and AIDS and providing resources and training for educational programs.

In each issue during Lent, The Catholic Spirit is sharing CRS’ work through a personal story of someone who has benefited from one of their programs and a recipe from a country that agency serves.

Vietnam was featured in the previous issue and El Salvador will be highlighted in the next issue. See THECATHOLICSPIRIT.COM to review the feature on Vietnam.

Zambia: Ifisashi 2-3 cups water 1 cup chopped peanuts 2 tomatoes, chopped 1 onion, finely chopped 2 bunches fresh collard greens or spinach), washed and chopped Salt to taste

Philip Laubner / CRS

2 cups cooked rice Bring water to a boil in a medium pot and add the peanuts, tomatoes and onion. After a few minutes, add the chopped greens. Stirring occasionally, continue cooking for about 15 to 20 minutes, or until peanuts are soft and mixture has become a thick buttery sauce.

Serve hot over rice.

Yield: 4-5 servings.

Photo by Kim Pozniak / Catholic Relief Services

In’utu Kokola and her husband are farmers living in Mongu, Zambia. Recently In’utu Kokola opened a shop in the market where she sells vegetables and corn meal from her farm. She didn’t believe this day would ever come, but it did thanks to a Savings and Internal Lending Community started with the help of Catholic Relief Services. In a SILC, the group saves money and makes small, interest bearing loans together. With her market stall, In’utu Kokola and her husband now have a reliable income to feed their family, buy medicine and pay school fees for their grandchildren.

My name is In’utu Kokola and I live in Mongu, Zambia. My husband and I are farmers, but we aren’t able to grow enough food on our land to support our family. I was very happy when CRS came to our village and helped us start a Savings and Internal Lending Community.

My SILC group meets every two weeks, and the members put the money they have saved into our bank.

Group members may also request loans to help them start small businesses. They must explain how much money they will need and how they plan to use it, and the rest of the group votes on whether or not to grant the loan.

The loans are paid back with interest, which increases the amount of money in our bank. We keep careful records of how much money each person puts into our savings and how much we loan out.

We also have a “social fund,” from which members can take loans to pay for doctor’s visits for sick family members and other emergencies.

With the loan I received, I opened a shop in the market where I sell vegetables and corn meal.

I now have money to feed my family, buy medicine and pay school fees for my grandchildren.

Being part of this SILC group is a really great way for me to provide a better life for my family.

Shining a spiritual spotlight on abstinence on Lenten Fridays

By Father Michael Van Sloun For The Catholic Spirit

Lent raises the spotlight on Fridays. It is a day of abstinence from meat for all those age 14 and older.

In many parishes it is a day of special devotions such as the Stations of the Cross or adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. Fridays hold a prominent place in the hearts of Christians.

Spiritually, Friday ranks behind Sunday, the first and most important day of the week. Sunday is set aside to commemorate the central mystery of our faith, the joyful aspect of the Paschal Mystery, the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

After Sunday, the next most important day of the Christian week is Friday, the day to remember the other half of the Paschal Mystery, the somber part, the suffering and death of Jesus on the cross on Good Friday.

Why no meat on Fridays?

Friday is a solemn weekly memorial of the crucifixion, a day to praise and thank God for his son, Jesus, the Good Shepherd, our Savior, who freely laid down his life for us.

Over the centuries, traditions and devotions have emerged for Fridays to give respect and tribute to Jesus

for all that he endured on our behalf and to venerate his saving cross.

Abstinence is the best-known and longest-standing spiritual practice associated with Fridays.

Since Jesus sacrificed his flesh on the cross on Good Friday, Catholics refrain from eating flesh meat on Fridays in his honor. Flesh meat includes the meat of mammals and poultry.

This spiritual practice began in the First Century, and for a long while it was mandatory for every Friday throughout the year. Mandatory abstinence was discontinued in 1966.

The 1983 revised Code of Canon Law makes Ash Wednesday and Good Friday days of abstinence for those 14 and older (C. 1251 and 1252), and the U. S. Catholic Conference of Bishops extended abstinence to all Fridays in Lent.

Because Jesus died for our sins on a Friday, that day stands out as a special day for contrition and sorrow for past wrongdoing, as well as the day to perform acts of penance and abstinence is a form of penance. While abstinence is required only on the Fridays of Lent, it is both optional and highly recommended throughout the rest of the year. Other forms of penance for Fridays include prayer, fasting, other forms of self-denial, almsgiving and

good deeds.

Mass is ultimate prayer The ideal way to pray on Fridays is to attend daily Mass.

Other Friday devotions include the Stations of the Cross; the rosary, particularly the Sorrowful Mysteries; Scripture reading, particularly the Passion Narratives; litanies, particularly the Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus; and prayer before a crucifix.

In many parishes, Friday is the most popular day of the week for Masses or prayer services at hospitals or nursing homes. It is also a common day to bring Communion to the sick and shut-ins, distribute food and clothing to the needy, and perform other works of mercy.

Friday has spiritual significance because we remember that we are saved through the wood of the cross. The tree of our defeat has become our tree of victory; where life was lost, there life has been restored (former Preface for the Triumph of the Cross).

In our hearts we sing, “Lift high the cross, the love of Christ proclaim!” In the cross is our salvation!

Father Michael Van Sloun is pastor of St. Stephen in Anoka.

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MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Debt poses roadblock for many considering religious life munities first contacted in June 2011.

By Dennis Sadowski Catholic News Service

A night of bingo and the generosity of friends helped Sister Katie Press achieve her dream of a religious vocation.

Otherwise, she might still be paying off $19,000 in loans from graduate school, and her entry into the Apostles of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in Hamden, Conn., might be far on the horizon.

As things stand now, 28-year-old Sister Katie is 18 months into a two-year novitiate with the order. And she’s debt-free.

“I tried to make sure that debt wasn’t the number one thing standing against me,” she told Catholic News Service, explaining how she embarked on a yearlong fundraising effort to make sure her student loan was paid off before she entered the religious community in August 2009.

Like many religious orders, the Apostles of the Sacred Heart of Jesus requires that new members be debt-free because it doesn’t have the resources to pay off loans.

Sister Katie developed a plan that had her working three part-time jobs, sending letters to friends seeking donations and writing a blog, “Support Katie’s Habit.”

Her story was picked up by the Georgia Bulletin, newspaper of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, where she grew up, and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch daily newspaper while she was studying for her master of divinity degree at the Aquinas Institute of Theology, leading to more contributions.

“Without religious men and women who have been the backbone of our church through education, ministry and service, the church is going to be deprived in the future.

”

HOLY CROSS BROTHER PAUL BEDNARCZYK

Friends in St. Louis helped with the bingo night, which raised $4,000.

“I have such a tremendous sense of gratitude,” Sister Katie said. “It’s overwhelming that people would be so generous.”

Other religious vocation candidates have been forced to end their pursuit of religious life because of their educational debts, according to a study commissioned by the National Religious Vocation Conference. Results were released Feb. 22.

Some are turned away Researchers Mary Gautier and Melissa Cidade of the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate found that of the religious orders that answered their survey, seven in 10 — 69 percent — turned away at least some people who inquired about a vocation because of educational debt.

One-quarter of men’s religious communities turned away as many as half of their applicants with debt; another one-fifth turned away more than 75 percent of ap-

plicants with debt, the study found.

On the other hand, two-thirds of religious orders with at least one formal applicant in the last decade turned no one away because of their educational debt, according to the researchers.

The issue of educational debt poses a major concern for the church and the future of vocations, said Holy Cross Brother Paul Bednarczyk, the conference’s executive director.

“Educational debt certainly has proven to be an obstacle for some of those desiring to enter religious life,” Brother Bednarczyk said.

“Without religious men and women who have been the backbone of our church through education, ministry and service, the church is going to be deprived in the future,” he said.

The study compiled responses from 477 religious communities of men and women, about 56 percent of the 865 com-

Itinerant Catholic preacher ministers at shopping mall

By Ed Langlois Catholic News Service

Amid a thrum of commercialism, an amiable priest spent most of the month of January waiting patiently. His hope was to talk about faith and life with anyone who took an interest.

Dominican Father Antoninus Wall, former president of a school of theology, has made the Lloyd Center Mall in Portland, Ore., his mission the past two years. His routine includes five hours at the mall on weekdays and seven hours on Saturdays listening to people and discussing joy, family life, evil, sin, the role of the laity, sickness, death, humor, morality and scores of other topics.

“When St. Paul went to Athens, where was the first place he went?” asked the priest, an 86-year-old scholar. “The Agora,” he said, referring to the ancient city’s marketplace and civic center.

The Portland mall is within the bounds of Holy Rosary Parish, staffed by the Dominicans, the order of preachers founded in the 13th century to spread the Gospel in European cities and universities.

“St. Dominic would be in the marketplace,” said Father Wall.

“A parish is not just a place where people come, it’s a basis of evangelization,” said Father Wall, who led the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Berkeley, Calif., from 1980 until 1986.

Comfortable conversations At the mall, John De Guzman of Portland came to Lloyd Center one weekday morning and sat down with the priest for a chat. De Guzman felt curious about Jews and Arabs and got a sensible, respectful treatise from the well-read cleric.

As he listened to those who spoke with him, Father Wall’s blue eyes looked at

The researchers found that 15,139 inquires were made to religious institutions between Jan. 1, 2000 and 2011 and that one in three people making the inquiries had educational debt averaging $28,000.

Eventually, 5,276 people applied for admission into a religious community and 32 percent had educational debt averaging more than $20,000, the study said.

In some cases, a religious order might agree to pay off the debt in total or in part, such as interest payments, the researchers learned. If a candidate leaves formation, he or she usually is asked to pay back any amount the order paid, but rarely do they do so, the Conrad Hilton Foundation-funded study found.

The overall findings are no surprise to the vocations conference. Brother Bednarczyk said vocation directors for years have pointed to educational debt as a growing challenge in the recruitment of new members, who on average are 30 years old and hold at least a bachelor degree.

Concerns over educational debt pose a concern for society as well, he said, pointing to delayed marriages and the avoidance of certain professional fields because of lower compensation.

The conference already has begun drafting a guide that lists best practices for leaders of religious communities to help them deal with people burdened by debt.

Arkansas ministry to parents of a stillborn expanding Catholic News Service

CNS photo / Ed Langlois, Catholic Sentinel

Dominican Father Antoninus Wall listens to John De Guzman in early January at Lloyd Center Mall in Portland, Ore.

them intently, despite the chaos.

“This is remarkable,” said De Guzman, a member of Holy Rosary Parish. “I think this is something the church should be doing everywhere.”

Others came to discuss personal problems, such as marriage struggles, with Father Wall, who is as comfortable talking about relationships as he is about Thomas Aquinas. “Millions of people have never talked to a priest in their whole life,” he told the Catholic Sentinel, archdiocesan newspaper of Portland.

The priest is not allowed to approach shoppers or hold signs. So he just waited for people to come to him. “The Catholic faith just makes sense when you sit down and talk about it,” he said.

He was born in San Francisco to parents who had come from Ireland. He entered the Dominicans and in 1947 was sent to

Rome to study theology. One of his classmates was a young man named Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II. In 1986 — after years of teaching, administrating and parish work — Father Wall became a missionary preacher. He has traveled all over the nation and to India. He is now on a preaching mission at St. Patrick Church in Fredericksburg, Va. He long thought the church should establish a presence in U.S. shopping malls, so he commits each January to Portland.

On weekdays, he wore his black clerical garb and sat across from Macy’s on the mall’s second floor. Saturdays, he rented a kiosk on the first floor near the ice rink.

Ideally, Father Wall said, the Dominicans would like to raise enough money to have a permanent space at Lloyd Center, where they could offer counseling, Mass and seminars.

Regina Binz started the Holy Sews ministry at Our Lady of the Holy Souls Church in Little Rock in 2008 to provide Arkansas hospitals with clothes designed to fit stillborn babies, but the Holy Spirit had other ideas, she said, as interest in the ministry has grown beyond the state.

In April 2007, she and her husband, Kevin, found out their baby no longer had a heartbeat. Ryan was delivered stillborn at 17 weeks. The clothing the nurses had was much too big for him. She knew she wanted to do something so another mother didn’t have to experience that.

Binz’s mother, Sarah Lichti, was in an Extension Homemakers Club and helped her work out designs over about a year.

Binz and a friend she was with on Thanksgiving 2008 decided to visit Mercy Medical Center in Rogers about the clothing for stillborns.

“The nurse looked at us in disbelief and said, ‘Really?’ Then she told us there was a woman in labor right now and the baby would be stillborn,” Binz said. “I knew what I was doing was right and that mother needed that layette.”

Our Lady of the Holy Souls Church helped Binz, providing meeting space, support and funds to buy supplies. As word got out about the program, others joined in to help. They created a website, HTTP://HOLYSEWS.ORG, to spread the word.

“It blossomed and grew. And is continuing to grow beyond Arkansas,” she said.

The group provides hospitals with a layette, which they give to mothers in a keepsake box. The set includes a tunic, cap, blanket and teddy bear at no charge, and each set is blessed before it is donated.

“You can map your life through your favorite movies, and no two people's maps will be the same.”

Mary Schmich

Arts & Culture Exploring our church and our world

MARCH 1, 2012

National shrine in Chicago named for Mother Cabrini reopening in fall

The Catholic Spirit

17A

Characters in Web-based series face issues that mirror Lenten themes

By Michelle Martin

Catholic News Service

Catholic News Service

A new Web-based dramatic series offers a unique Lenten experience to believers as well as seekers.

Produced by Loyola Productions in association with the Midwest Jesuits and Loyola Press, the post-apocalyptic drama “40” premiered its first episode on the series website, 40THESERIES.COM, and social media sites on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22.

The series — filmed on location in Los Angeles early last December — centers on the journey of seven strangers who appear to be the only survivors of a mysterious, calamitous event in an empty Los Angeles, devoid of people.

Two new episodes will appear each week during Lent on the “40” website, YouTube, Vimeo and Facebook until the finale airs April 4, which is Wednesday of Holy Week. The episodes air on Mondays and Wednesdays.

For generations to come, it will seem an odd place for a shrine: tucked in the shadow of a high-rise condo building in an affluent area of Chicago’s Lincoln Park.

But the National Shrine of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, scheduled to reopen Sept. 30, marks the spot where Mother Cabrini, the first American citizen to be canonized and the universal patroness of immigrants, died. As such, it is the only one of Chicago’s many shrines to be built on a spot of historical significance to the person that it honors.

The shrine building, constructed as an addition to Columbus Hospital in 1955, closed in 2002 after the hospital closed and was sold to developers.

It will reopen this fall with a new entranceway and lobby — built as part of the ground floor of the neighboring condo building — and with a new mission, said Sister Joan McGlinchey, a member of the general counsel of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart, the order Mother Cabrini founded and brought to the United States in 1889.

Enhancing the journey

Mother Teresa of her time Mother Cabrini died in 1917 and, when she was canonized in 1946, Catholics from all over the area filled the city’s Soldier Field for a Mass of thanksgiving.

When the shrine reopens, Mass will be offered every weekend, and the shrine will be primarily a place of prayer and pilgrimage.

“It’s not a museum,” Sister Joan told the Catholic New World, Chicago’s archdiocesan newspaper. “But it is a place where we will have people visiting to learn about Mother Cabrini.”

There’s a lot for most people to learn. Sent to the United States by Pope Leo XIII to minister to immigrants, she traveled for nearly 30 years throughout the country and the world, founding orphanages, schools and hospitals. Father Theodore Ploplis, who will be the shrine’s rector, said she was like the Mother Teresa of the turn of the last century, and was well known to politicians and

CNS photo / Karen Callaway / Catholic New World

Construction workers are seen outside the newly renovated National Shrine of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini in Chicago Jan. 19. The 56-year-old shrine, scheduled to reopen in the fall of 2012, is dedicated to the first American citizen to be declared a saint.

civic leaders in Chicago, one of her main bases of operation.

Father Ploplis also hopes to welcome non-Catholics and nonbelievers who might want to see the art and architecture of the shrine, which features walls made of Carrara marble, excavated from the same quarry used by Michelangelo; frescoes depicting the life of Mother Cabrini; and an Italian pipe organ, the only one of its kind in the United States.

the other

Holy Land

More information on the “40” series and the full schedule of airdates is available at 40THESERIES.COM.

With Father Dennis Dempsey

by it red pir nso ic S Spo Cathol The

IRE L AND:

Jesuit Brother Michael Breault, an award-winning writer/director, developed the Lenten series to offer something new and engaging. “‘40’ is not just a series; it’s unique in that it also serves as a Lenten allegory,” Brother Breault told The Tidings, newspaper of the Los Angeles Archdiocese.

“At the heart of each episode are questions and scriptural meditations designed to enhance a person’s Lenten journey.”

The characters deal with issues that mirror Lenten themes, such as exile and journeying, loss and grief, hunger and thirst, mortification and fasting, sin and redemption, the path through the desert and the Way of the Cross.

"When the world is crashing down around them, they have a need to come together to search for answers," said Jesuit Father Eddie Siebert, founder of Loyola Productions and "40" executive producer.

September 21 — October 2, 2012 For further information, please contact:

Martie McMahon The Catholic Spirit Phone: 651-291-4441 mcmahonm@archspm.org also go to: TheCatholicSpirit.com/ExploreIreland

18A

Calendar

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

Dining out KC Pro-life breakfast at St. Augustine, South St. Paul — March 4: 7:30 a.m. to noon at Fourth Avenue and Third Street N. Cost is $6 for adults and $3 for children under 12.

Ham and egg breakfast and koblihy sale at Immaculate Conception, Lonsdale — March 4: 8:30 a.m. to noon at 116 Alabama St. S.E. Cost is $8 for adults and $4 for children ages 4 to 10. Take-out available.

Spaghetti dinner catered by Fat Lorenzos at St. Helena, Minneapolis — March 10: 5 to 7:30 p.m. at 3204 E. 43rd St. Cost at the door is $30 per family, $10 for adults and $8 for seniors and children 12 and under.

Religious education breakfast at Mary, Queen of Peace, Rogers — March 11: 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 21304 Church Ave. Free will offering.

Corned beef and cabbage dinner at St. Joseph, Miesville — March 11: 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. at 23955 Nicolai Ave. E. Cost is $12 for adults and $5 for children ages 6 to 12.

Lenten dinners Lenten soup supper at Holy Cross, Minneapolis — Wednesdays of Lent through March 28: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 1630 4th St. N.E. Mystery soup supper at St. Jerome, Maplewood — All Thursdays of Lent: Stations of the Cross at 5:30 p.m. followed by soup supper at 380 E. Roselawn Ave. Soup Supper at The Basilica of Saint Mary — all Fridays of Lent: 6 to 6:45 p.m. at 88 N. 17th St. Mass at 5:30 p.m. and Stations of the Cross at 7 p.m.

Lenten dinner at Holy Family Maronite, Mendota Heights — All Fridays of Lent: 5 to 7 p.m. at 1960 Lexington Ave. S. Fish fry at Knights of Columbus Hall, Bloomington — All Fridays of Lent: 5 to 9 p.m. at 1114 American Blvd.

Fish dinner at St. Bernard, St. Paul — All Fridays of Lent: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at the parish center on Rice and Geranium.

Fish dinner at St. Stephen, Anoka — All Fridays of Lent: 5:30 to 7 p.m. at 525 Jackson St. Fish fry at Sacred Heart, Rush City — All Fridays of Lent: 5 to 7 p.m. at 425 Field Ave.

followed by discussion.

Don’t miss Archdiocese sponsors annual Family Forum The Archdiocesan Office for Marriage, Family and Life is hosting the annual Family Forum from 9 a.m. to noon March 24th at St. STENSON Peter in Mendota.

Featured speaker Jim Stenson is an educational expert, speaker and writer on family concerns. He has authored numerous books such as “Upbringing,” “Compass: A Handbook on Parent Leadership” and “Lifeline: The Religious Upbringing of Your Children.” He will speak on balance within the family.

Register at WWW.ARCHSPM.ORG before March 16.

Correction: The date of Cathedral Family Day and community open house was incorrect in the Feb. 16 edition. The event is March 4, not March 14.

Fridays of Lent: 5 to 6:45 p.m. at 19921 Nightingale St. N.W. Fish fry at St. Peter, Forest Lake — All Fridays of Lent: 5 to 7 p.m. at 1250 South Shore Drive.

Fish fry at St. Pascal Baylon, St. Paul — All Fridays of Lent: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 1757 Conway St. Fish fry at St. Michael, Pine Island — All Fridays of Lent: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 451 Fifth St. S.W. Fish fry at Holy Cross, Minneapolis — All Fridays of Lent: 5 to 7 p.m. at the Kolbe Center, 17th Avenue and Fourth Street. N.E. Fish fry at Holy Family, St. Louis Park — All Fridays of Lent: 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at 5900 W. Lake St. Seafood buffet at Holy Name of Jesus, Wayzata — All Fridays of Lent: 5 to 7:30 p.m. at 155 County Road 24.

Fish and spaghetti dinner at St. Raphael, Crystal — March 2: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 7301 Bass Lake Road.

Fish dinner at St. Bonaventure, Bloomington — March 2: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 901 E. 90th St. Fish fry at Our Lady of Peace, Minneapolis — March 2: 5 to 7:30 p.m. at 5435 11th Ave. S. Fish fry at Knights of Columbus Hall, Shakopee — March 2: 5 to 7:30 p.m. at 1760 Fourth Ave. E. Fish dinner at Mary Queen of Peace, Rogers — March 2: 5 to 7 p.m. at 21304 Church Ave. Fish fry at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton School, Hastings — March 2: 3:45 to 5 p.m. and 5:15 to 7:30 p.m. at 600 Tyler St.

Fish fry at St. Charles, Bayport — All Fridays of Lent: 4 to 8 p.m. at 409 N. Third St.

Fish fry benefit dinner at Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Maplewood — March 2: 4 to 8 p.m. at 1725 Kennard St.

Fish fry at St. John the Baptist, Hugo — All Fridays of Lent: 5 to 8 p.m. at 14383 Forest Blvd.

Fish dinner at St. Joseph of the Lakes, Lino Lakes — March 2: 5 to 8 p.m. at 171 Elm St.

Fish fry at St. John, Hopkins — All Fridays of Lent: 5:30 to 7 p.m. at 6 Interlachen Road.

Fish dinner at St. Bonaventure, Bloomington — March 2: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 901 E. 90th St.

Fish dinner at St. Albert the Great, Minneapolis — All Fridays of Lent: 4:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the corner of E. 29th Street and 32nd Avenue S.

Fish fry at St. John the Baptist, Dayton — March 9: 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at 18380 Columbus St.

Fish fry at St. Matthew, St. Paul — All Fridays of Lent: 4 to 7:30 p.m. at 510 Hall Ave. Fish fry at Epiphany, Coon Rapids — All Fridays of Lent: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 1900 111th Ave. N.W. Fish fry at St. Patrick, Oak Grove — All

Program on proposed marriage amendment at Good Shepherd, Golden Valley — March 6: 7 p.m. at 145 Jersey Ave. Jason Adkins, executive director of the Minnesota Catholic Conference, will speak.

Fish fry at Knights of Columbus Hall, Shakopee — March 9: 5 to 7:30 p.m. at 1760 Fourth Ave. E. Fish fry at St. Joseph, New Hope — March 9: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 8701 36th Ave. N. Fish fry at St. Peter School, North St. Paul — March 9: 4 to 7 p.m. at 2620

Margaret St. N. Fish fry at St. Joseph, New Hope — March 16: 4:30 to 7 p.m. at 8701 36th Ave. N.

Other Lent events Lenten retreat: ‘Is Jesus Calling you Closer?’ at St. George, Long Lake — March 2 to 4: 6 to 8 p.m. Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday at 133 N. Brown Road.

Vincentian Father Augustine Vallooran from Divine Retreat Center in Kerala, India will facilitate. Cost is $30 per person/$40 per couple at the door. Call (763) 443-5847.

‘Wondrous Love’ Lenten concert at St. Olaf, Minneapolis — March 3: 7:30 p.m. at 215 S. Eighth St. Features the parish choir and the concert choir from Viterbo University, LaCrosse, WI. Galtier Society Lenten morning of reflection at Holy Family, St. Louis Park — March 3: 8 to 11 a.m. at 5900 W. Lake St. Father Peter Laird will lead a guided reflection and meditation. All are welcome.

Health Care Workers’ Lenten Retreat at Our Lady of Grace, Edina — March 17: 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at 5071 Eden Ave. Includes Mass, Adoration, Sacrament of Reconciliation and insights from Michael Degnan, University of St. Thomas. Sponsored by Curatio, an Apostolate for Catholic Health Care Workers. Cost is $35. Register at WWW.CURATIOAPOSTOLATE.COM. Lenten retreat at St. Peter, Richfield — March 17 and 18: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and noon to 4 p.m. Sunday at 6730 Nicollet Ave. S. Saturday topics include God’s love, salvation and more. Sunday topic is growth in new life and transformation in Christ. Registration required by March 15. Visit WWW.STPETERSRICHFIELD.ORG.

Parish events ‘Love Thy Neighbor: A Christian and Muslim Dialogue’ at Annunciation, Minneapolis — March 4: 11:30 a.m. at 509 W. 54th St. Features Terence Nichols and Adil Ozdemir, co-directors of the Muslim Christian Dialogue Center at the University of St. Thomas and Sheik Odeh Muhawesh, also from St. Thomas. A short presentation will be

National speaker Katrina Zeno at Nativity of Our Lord, St. Paul — March 10: 9 a.m. to noon at Stanford Avenue and Prior Avenue S. She will share insights about Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body. Visit NATIVITY-MN.ORG for information. $10 donation at the door.

Strings, Pipes and a Glorious Tenor at the Cathedral of St. Paul, St. Paul — March 11: 2:30 p.m. at 239 Selby Ave. Features tenor cantor Nicholas Chalmers, director of Sacred Music Lawrence Lawyer, violinists Michal and Elizabeth Sobieski and Laura Handler, principal cellist of the Lyra Baroque Orchestra. For information, visit WWW. CATHEDRALHERITAGEFOUNDATION.ORG. ‘Not Your Ordinary Garage Sale’ to benefit St. Jerome music program — March 8 to 10: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily at 1911 Rice St., Roseville. (Sale does not take place at St. Jerome). Features signed limited edition artworks, an original oil painting and more.

Benefit Gala at St. Stephen, Minneapolis — March 17: Event begins with Mass at 5 p.m. at 2211 Clinton Ave. Silent auction and dinner to follow. Entertainment by Mulhern Irish dancers. Cost is $100 per person, proceeds support the new bilingual Family Life Center. Visit WWW.SS-MPLS.ORG/ BENEFIT for information.

Prayer/ liturgies All night vigil with the Blessed Sacrament at Our Lady of Guadalupe, St. Paul — March 2 and 3: 7 p.m. Friday to 8 a.m. Saturday at 401 Concord St. Knights of Columbus traveling rosary at St. Columba, St. Paul — March 4: 2 p.m. at 1327 Lafond Ave. Meditation on the Stations of the Cross with Steve Ray at St. Michael, St. Michael — March 6: 5 p.m. at 11300 Frankfort Parkway N.E. Evening includes scriptural rosary, confessions, Mass and meditation on the Stations of the Cross.

Healing Mass at Holy Name of Jesus, Wayzata — March 8: Rosary at 6:30 p.m. followed by Mass at 7 p.m. at 155 County Road 24. Father Don Piché will be the celebrant.

Taizé prayer at St. Hubert, Chanhassen — March 8 and 29: 7 p.m. at 8201 Main Street. Candle lit service includes sung prayer, silence, readings and reflection.

Calendar Submissions DEADLINE: The Catholic Spirit is biweekly.

Items should be submitted

by Noon Thursday, seven days before the anticipated Thursday date of publication.

Recurring or ongoing events must be submitted each time they occur.

LISTINGS: Accepted are brief notices of upcoming events hosted

by Catholic parishes and institutions.

Items are published on a space available basis.

ITEMS MUST INCLUDE the following to be considered for publication in the calendar: • Time and date of event.

• Full street address of event.

• Description of event.

• Contact information in case of questions.

E-MAIL: SPIRITCALENDAR@ ARCHSPM.ORG. (No attachments, please.)

FAX: (651) 291-4460.

MAIL: “Calendar,” The Catholic Spirit, 244 Dayton Ave., St. Paul, MN 55102.

Knights of Columbus traveling rosary at St. Mary, St. Paul — March 11: 2 p.m. at 261 Eighth St. E.

Singles Lenten Dinners

50-plus Second Sunday Supper event at St. Joan of Arc, Minneapolis — March 11: 5 p.m. social hour, 6 p.m. dinner and 7 p.m. program featuring the Roe Family singers and string band. 4537 Third Ave. S. Cost is $10.

Call (952) 884-5165 or visit WWW.SECONDSUNDAY.ORG.

Calendar

“[Vocation] comes from a voice in here calling me to be the person I was born to be, to fulfill the original selfhood given me at birth by God.” Thomas Merton

Jubilees A Catholic Spirit special section

MARCH 1, 2012

The Catholic Spirit

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Congratulations men, women religious celebrating anniversaries The Catholic Spirit congratulates the following members of women’s and men’s religious communities who are serving in or are from the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and are celebrating jubilees this year.

WOMEN RELIGIOUS Benedictine Sisters, St. Benedict's Monastery, St. Joseph WWW.SBM.OSB.ORG

50 years Sister Lucy Revering

Benedictine Sisters, St. Paul's Monastery, St. Paul WWW.OSB.ORG/SPM

60 Years Sister Laverne Hudalla Sister Catherine Schoenecker 25 years Sister Catherine Nehotte

Contemplative Sisters of the Good Shepherd, Oak Park Heights

50 years Sister Anita Smisek

50 years Sister Louise Bauer

Franciscan Sisters, Little Falls

Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, St. Louis

60 years Sister Elise Saggau 50 years Sister Gertrude Brixius Sister Donna Guyott 25 years Sister Michelle L’Allier

WWW.CSJSL.ORG

Franciscan Sisters, Rochester

80 years Sister Agnes Paul Schloesser 75 years Sister Ruthella Lamm 70 years Sister Aline Baumgartner Sister Clare Bloms Sister Rosanne Fox Sister Mary Anne Hanley Sister Elizabeth Clare Heutmaker Sister Catherine Jenkins Sister Doris Taylor Sister Doris Van Hout Sister Maria June Wilson Sister Esperance Wittry 65 years Sister Mary Madonna Ashton Sister Beth Babcock Sister Julie Boo Sister Helen Thomas Bronk Sister Ann Coffey Sister Marguerite Corcoran Sister Catherine Coté Sister Mary Estelle Dwyer Sister Marie Henri Grenier Sister Jean Marie Hare Sister Eleanor Lincoln Sister Catherine Litecky Sister Celia McDevitt Sister Michele Murphy Sister Annabelle Raiche Sister Mary Beneva Schulte

WWW.ROCHESTERFRANCISCAN.ORG

50 years Sister Geneva Berns Sister Judy Chiodo 25 years Sister Sara Ruble

Franciscan Sisters, Sylvania, Ohio WWW.OSFDBQ.ORG

50 years Sister Kathleen Casey

Little Sisters of the Poor, Chicago

70 years Sister Maria Michael Kobal 65 years Sister Paulina Benoot

WWW.LITTLESISTERSOFTHEPOOR.ORG

Good Shepherd Sisters, Oak Park Heights

Poor Clares, Minneapolis

WWW.BUONPASTOREINT.ORG

60 years Sister Helen Weier

75 years Sister Frances Groesbeck 70 years Sister Mariella Houle

Dominican Sisters, Sinsinawa, Wis. WWW.SINSINAWA.ORG

60 years Sister Mariann Franzgrote

50 years Sister Regina Eckholdt Sister Marguerite Virginia Ferber WWW.POORCLARESMINNEAPOLIS.ORG

Sisters of Mercy, West / Midwest Community WWW.MERCYWESTMIDWEST.ORG

60 years Sister Margretta Dwyer

Sisters of the Living Word, Arlington Heights, Ill. WWW.SLW.ORG

50 years Sister Adele Marie Rothan

Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, St. Paul WWW.CSJSTPAUL.ORG

PLEASE TURN TO CELEBRATIONS ON PAGE 21A

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Jubilees

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

Personal invitation best to attract religious vocation Communities offer many opportunities to get involved with their members

By Susan Klemond For The Catholic Spirit

While the Internet plays an increasing role in connecting religious orders with potential members, representatives of several area communities are developing programs that offer men and women a personal human introduction to their life and charisms.

“You can’t fall in love with someone you’ve never met,” said Benedictine Brother Paul-Vincent Niebauer, vocation director at St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville.

While some religious communities find opportunities to involve college students in their life and work because of their association with local campuses, all are attracting men and women through a variety of programs, retreats and even just by mingling at youth events.

One way the Benedictine Sisters of Pontifical Jurisdiction build relationships with young women at the College of St. Benedict is through their Benedictine Friends program, in which freshmen are matched with a sister for one-on-one and group meetings, said Benedictine Sister Lois Wedl, vocation director at the community based in St. Joseph.

Along with telling their stories on their website, WWW.SBM.OSB.ORG, the sisters also

offer retreats at St. Ben’s and speak about vocations at area high schools, she said.

The community will offer women considering religious life the opportunity to live with the sisters during the Easter Triduum, April 5 through April 8.

Close encounters One of the main ways young Minnesota women are drawn to the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia, a Nashville Tenn.-based order, is by seeing how four of its sisters are living out their life with joy in Stillwater, said Dominican Sister Perpetua Stang a first-grade teacher at St. Croix Catholic School in Stillwater.

The sisters offer retreats and days of recollection, such as the one they’re hosting on March 17 at their convent in Stillwater.

They also meet young people at youth events and while attending summer college courses, she said.

Women join the sisters for prayer at their convent. They also can visit their website, HTTP://NASHVILLEDOMINICAN.ORG, to learn more about the teaching order, Sister Perpetua said.

In St. Paul, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet offer young adult spirituality that involves women in the community’s life and mission through the Celeste’s Dream program, said St. Joseph Sister Jill Underdahl, vocation director. Many programs are offered at the Sisters of St. Joseph campus, which is connected to St. Catherine University.

A café group meets the first Tuesday evening of the month (check WWW.CSJST PAUL.ORG for time and location), and a

Dave Hrbacek / The Catholic Spirit

Dominican Sister Perpetua Stang talks to first-grade student Ella Rammer at St. Croix Catholic School in Stillwater.

community garden makes working outdoors a spiritual experience. The sisters also lead high school and adult retreats, and conversation circles.

In June, the community will host a world ecological renewal summit for high school youth. Many of the women who

are drawn to the community are concerned about the sufferings of people and of the earth, Sister Jill said.

Today, nearly all inquiries about vocations with the Benedictine monks at PLEASE TURN TO TECHNOLOGY ON PAGE 21A

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Mary Estelle Dwyer Marie Henri Grenier Jean Hare Eleanor Lincoln Catherine Litecky Celia McDevitt Michele Murphy Annabelle Raiche Mary Beneva Schulte Miriam Shea Ann Clare Smith Serena Zilka

~ 60 ~ Avis Allmaras Margaret Belanger Vera Chester Nancy Davis Katherine Egan Joanne Emmer Mary Heinen Kathleen Judge Karen Kennelly ~ 65 ~ Mary Madonna Ashton Elizabeth Kerwin Sylvia Krawfcyk Beth Babcock Mary Louise Matt Julie Boo Kathleen McDonald Helen Thomas Bronk Dolores Oakes Ann Coffey Justina Overhultz Marguerite Corcoran Ann Redmond Catherine Coté

Mary Sarto Revier Marion Riley Susan Smith Anne Elise Tschida Donna Vosika

~ 10 ~ Celia Abbot Corrine Cavanagh Ginny DeGennaro Mari Ann Graham Susan Grumann Beryl McHale ~ 50 ~ Terry Ruttger Linda Napier Karen Woehler Susan Neisen Adele Marie Rothan Dot Wolking Marilyn Woolley (SL) Mary Ellen Ward ~5~ Jackie Bohrer Mary Catherine CONSOCIATE Casey ANNIVERSARIES Robin Connell ~ 20 ~ Joyce Dahlberg Sandy Dodson Donna Hauer Bernetta Kambeitz Barbara Cheryl Maloney McIlquham Mary Kaye Kate O’Connell Medinger Patricia Wiegand ~ 15 ~ Mary Kay FortierSpalding Fran Kraus Peg Schwendeman Florence Stephens

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MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DIRECTOR OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION Christ Our Light Catholic Parish, a newly merged parish serving the communities of Princeton/Zimmerman, MN, is seeking a Director of Religious Education: 10 to 12 month full-time position with the opportunity of adding Pastoral Associate tasks as candidate desires.

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Technology at its best for abbey CONTINUED FROM PAGE 20A

St. John’s Abbey come through the Internet, Brother Niebauer said. Both the order’s website, WWW.SAINTJOHNSABBEY.ORG, and programming are necessary and both are revamped regularly.

St. John’s University students get to know about the community through campus programs, he said. Through St. John’s Benedictine Volunteer Corps, in which young men spend a year at one of the international order’s monasteries, they learn about the monastic life and in some cases have decided to join, he said.

Fifteen men are currently in formation at the abbey.

St. John’s Abbey will offer a Triduum live-in retreat for men April 5 through 8.

Celebrations CONTINUED FROM PAGE 19A Sister Miriam Shea Sister Ann Clare Smith Sister Serena Zilka 60 years Sister Avis Allmaras Sister Margaret Belanger Sister Vera Chester Sister Nancy Davis Sister Katherine Egan Sister Joanne Emmer Sister Mary Heinen Sister Kathleen Judge Sister Karen Kennelly Sister Elizabeth Kerwin Sister Sylvia Krawfcyk Sister Kathleen McDonald Sister Dolores Oakes Sister Justina Overhultz Sister Ann Redmond Sister Marion Riley Sister Susan Smith Sister Anne Elise Tschida Sister Donna Vosika 50 years Sister Linda Napier Sister Susan Neisen Sister Mary Ellen Ward

School Sisters of Notre Dame, Central Pacific Province WWW.SSNDCENTRALPACIFIC.ORG

21A

Religious contacts Sisters of the Order of St. Benedict Sister Lois Wedl (320) 363-7100 HTTP://SBM.OSB.ORG Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia Sister Perpetua vocation@op-tn.org (615) 256-0147 HTTP://NASHVILLEDOMINICAN.ORG Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet Sister Jill Underdahl (651) 696-2873 WWW.CSJSTPAUL.ORG/CELESTE.ASPX Benedictine Monks, St. John’s Abbey Brother Paul-Vincent Niebauer (320) 363-2011 WWW.ABBEYVOCATIONS.COM

60 years Sister Joan Fink Sister Beverly Ann Fries Sister Germaine Mulcahey Sister Cathryn O’Donnell 50 years Sister Judith Bakula Sister Gloria Degele Sister Deanna Donahue Sister Carolyn Fasnacht Sister Kathleen Mary Kiemen Sister Thomasin Sergot Sister Loretta Marie Strobel

Missionary Sisters of St. Peter Claver, St. Paul 50 years Sister Susan Wal

MEN RELIGIOUS Benedictine Monks, Collegeville 25 years Father Greg Miller

Christian Brothers, Chicago 60 years Brother Paul Grass Brother James Roszak

Dominican Fathers and Brothers, Chicago 60 years Brother Kevin Carroll

Jesuit Fathers and Brothers, Milwaukee WWW.JESUITSWISPROV.ORG

70 years Father Edward Sthokal 50 years Father Philip F. Dreckman Father Patrick M. McCorkell

Oblates of Mary Immaculate, Washington, D.C. 60 years Brother Anthony Szklarski

Redemptorists, Denver WWW.REDEMPTORISTSDENVER.ORG

60 years Father Joseph Stenger

Servants of the Eucharist and the Blessed Virgin Mary, Puerto Rico 25 years Father Luis A. Curbelo

22A

MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Don’t be preoccupied with living your ‘should have’ life CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1A

5. Make fun of people.

“Be open to change and

Why do we do this? Because we know all about our own problems, but other people’s problems are harder to see. As a result, our real life always loses out. That leads to despair. Besides, there’s probably someone comparing his or her life to your supposedly perfect one — which shows you how ridiculous it all is.

growth by all means, but treasure friends who love you for who you are. St. Francis de Sales, the gentle and lighthearted 17th-century saint, once said: ‘Be who you are and be that perfectly well.’

2. ‘Should’ on yourself.

It’s easy to imagine yourself making a choice that would have taken you to a different place in your life. I should have married this person; I should have taken that job; I should have moved. This is called “shoulding all over yourself.” (Say it aloud and the negative meaning becomes clearer.)

Reflecting on our choices is an important way to grow, but you cannot live your real life if you’re busy living in your “should have” life. Jesus of Nazareth once said you cannot serve two masters. You can’t live two lives, either.

3. Get people to like you.

I spent all of my teens, most of my 20s, a great deal of my 30s and too much of my 40s trying to get people to like me. But forcing people’s affection never works.

Besides, it takes too much energy to tailor yourself to what you think people will like. Your true friends like you already.

Be open to change and growth by all means, but treasure friends who love you for who you are. St. Francis de Sales, the gentle and lighthearted 17th-

”

FATHER JAMES MARTIN

century saint, once said: “Be who you are and be that perfectly well.”

4. Be a jerk.

You’re tired. You’re rushed. You’ve got a cold. You’re late. You’re angry about something your boss said. Yes, you are miserable. That doesn’t mean you have to be a jerk to everyone else. It really doesn’t. Sure, share your frustrations and struggles with close friends, but don’t make everyone else’s life more miserable by passing on your misery. Once I joked to a friend, “Boy, my life is such a cross!” “Yes,” he said, “But for you or others?”

Nothing brings me lower than a few minutes of mocking another person (particularly if the person is not present). But the snappy putdown has a high value in our culture, and famous snubs are often repeated approvingly. Much of our current political climate consists in politicians mocking their opponents. (That’s been a big help, hasn’t it?) Malicious speech is an easy way to wound. If you feel powerless to resist badmouthing someone, ask yourself three questions: Is it kind? Is it necessary? Is it true?

6. Be hard on yourself.

One of my Jesuit mentors used to say, “Be easy with yourself, Jim.” If you’re reading this list and taking it at all seriously, you may be beating yourself up about stupid things that you’ve done in the past. (Believe me, my list is just as long as yours.) But you also want to change yourself, which is good. So be careful to “trust in the slow work of God,” as the Jesuit Pierre Teilhard de Chardin used to say. (He was also a paleontologist, so he knew about things moving really slowly.)

If you ever get discouraged about your rate of change, just think about trees — yes, trees. In the summer they’re green. In the fall they’re red. And no one sees them change.

Jesuit Father James Martin is culture editor of America. Reprinted from America Feb. 13 with permission of America Press, Inc., 2012. All rights reserved. For subscription information, call 1-800-6279533 or visit WWW.AMERICAMAGAZINE.ORG.

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23A

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

President’s revised rule ‘leaves few viable options’ for those with religious concerns CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1A ing that its implementation “will unjustly impact religiously affiliated organizations and individuals.”

The mandate requires no-cost coverage of all contraceptives approved by the Food and Drug Administration, including some that can cause an abortion, as well as sterilizations, as part of preventive health services for women. A narrow religious exemption applies only to those employed by houses of worship.

In a revision announced Feb. 10, Obama said religious employers could decline to cover contraceptives if they were morally opposed to them, but the health insurers that provide their health plans would be required to offer contraceptives free of charge to women who requested such coverage. He also announced a oneyear “safe harbor” before enforcement of the mandate would begin for religious employers.

The lawsuit by the seven attorneys general, all Republicans, followed earlier suits filed by Belmont Abbey College in North Carolina and Colorado Christian University in Denver; the Eternal Word Television Network in Birmingham, Ala.; and Ave Maria University in Naples, Fla. “The First Amendment has, for centuries, served as a rampart against government interference with religious liberty,” says the brief filed with the U.S. District Court for Nebraska. “The federal government’s regulation is an unprecedented invasion of the plaintiffs’ First Amendment rights to free speech, free exercise of religion and free association.”

Sister Mary Catherine of the School Sisters of Christ the King in Lincoln and FOCUS missionary Stacy Molai of Omaha say in the lawsuit that they would drop their health insurance coverage if the contraceptive mandate is not overturned.

Molai has “an incurable chronic condition” and health insurance coverage “is critical in order for Molai to avoid financial ruin and possibly life-threatening consequences,” the lawsuit says.

Women speak The open letter from women was organized by Helen Alvare, who teaches law at George Mason University School of

Law, and Kim Daniels, former counsel to the Thomas More Law Center, under the banner Women Speak for Themselves (HTTP://WOMENSPEAKFORTHEMSELVES.COM).

“No one speaks for all women on these issues,” the letter says. “Those who purport to do so are simply attempting to deflect attention from the serious religious liberty issues currently at stake.

“Each of us, Catholic or not, is proud to stand with the Catholic Church and its rich, life-affirming teachings on sex, marriage and family life,” it added. “We call on President Obama and our representatives in Congress to allow religious institutions and individuals to continue to witness to their faiths in all their fullness.”

Alvare said the effort to collect signatures for the letter began with an email to a few of her and Daniels’ friends and grew exponentially.

“Almost every email [reply] contained a letter expressing the woman’s enormous relief at the chance to speak for herself,” Alvare said in a news release. “It is moving to read more than 1,000 emails — particularly from doctors, nurses and teachers — expressing their gratitude for the Catholic Church’s willingness to stand down the government’s claim to speak for all women and women’s health.”

The letter from 18 Republican senators said the president’s revised rule “leaves few viable options for religiously affiliated organizations and individuals to avoid using their funds to pay, directly or indirectly, for services they consider morally objectionable.”

Among the options would be to drop health insurance coverage for their employees or to limit hiring only to Catholics in order to fit the administration’s “narrow definition of a religious employer,” they said.

“Because religiously affiliated hospitals and other organizations are major employers in many communities, . . . it is hard to comprehend why this administration would deliberately implement a policy that would have such a detrimental impact,” the senators said.

Cardinal urges Senate to pass bill protecting conscience in health care

By Nancy Frazier O’Brien Catholic News Service

The chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities called on members of the U.S. Senate recently to solve conscience protection problems with the federal health reform law by passing the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act. By resolving a “needless dispute,” Congress and the Obama administration “could return to the most pressing of all the real problems — the CARDINAL fact that many milDINARDO lions of Americans still lack basic coverage for health care,” Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston said Feb. 15.

In a three-page letter to senators, Cardinal DiNardo said the legislation might come up for a vote soon, “either as a freestanding bill or an amendment.”

Calling the bill “needed, reasonable and carefully crafted,” he said it “simply ensures that new requirements” under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act “are not used to take away a freedom of conscience that Americans have enjoyed under federal law until now.”

The bishops “saw the need for this legislation,” the cardinal said, when Congress passed health care reform and “authorized new lists of federally mandated benefits for all health plans without including language to preserve rights of conscience.”

The cardinal rejected the final rule announced Feb. 10 by President Barack Obama that would allow organizations with religious objections to the Department of Health and Human Services’ requirement that all health insurance plans cover contraceptives and sterilization to decline to cover them, but then compel the insurers to provide contraceptives free of charge to women they insure.

Under that plan, religious employers will be required to “include the same objectionable coverage as purely secular employers do — but the decision to do so

will simply be taken away from them, as the coverage will be inserted into their plan directly by the insurer over their objections,” he said.

The objecting employers will still pay for the coverage, he added, because it “will be integrated into their overall health plan and subsidized with the premiums paid by employer and employee for that plan.”

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius first announced the contraception requirement along with a religious exemption Jan. 20. Catholic and other religious leaders say the exemption is written so narrowly that institutions such as hospitals, schools and social service agencies would not qualify. Since Obama announced his final rule, questions have been raised over how it will pertain to self-insured parties, like many dioceses and Catholic organizations.

Cardinal DiNardo called the contraception requirement “a radical departure from current law, under which a health plan that excludes contraception can be sold even to federal employees if the carrier has any religious objections to such coverage.”

“In short, we are back to square one — except that the rule so many hoped would change to accommodate Americans’ right of conscience is no longer subject to change, except by legislation,” he said.

Offering clarification The Respect for Rights of Conscience Act stipulates the list of mandated benefits under the health reform law will not forbid those who provide, sponsor or purchase health coverage from negotiating a health plan that is consistent with their religious beliefs and moral convictions.

The cardinal also offered rebuttals to some misinterpretations about what the proposed law would and would not do: ■ It would not “provide any support for discriminatory decisions to withhold basic coverage from some while giving it to others,” such as a decision to deny lifesaving care to people with AIDS or the virus that causes it.

■ It would not “allow anyone to deny coverage for high-cost treatments, using morality and religion as a pretext.”

U.S. isn’t only country where religious freedom is being tested dom in those Catholic schools.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2A White House and to express these concerns, calling for a more complete revision of the mandate.

At the same time, I urge our readership to contact their respective representative and senators to ask them to support bill HR 1179 in the House and S. 1467 in the Senate, a bill entitled “The Respect for Rights of Conscience Act.” I believe this is the best way to protect the rights of conscience in regard to this federal health care mandate.

The latest information and action alerts on this issue can be found at the Minnesota Catholic Conference’s website: HTTP://MNCC.ORG/ISSUES/LIFE-BIO-ETHICS. On a final point, we are not the only North American country where Catholics are being tested in terms of religious freedom. In Canada, the legislature voted a few years ago to alter the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples.

“I urge our readership to contact their respective representative and senators to ask them to support bill HR 1179 in the House and S. 1467 in the Senate, a bill entitled ‘The Respect for Rights of Conscience Act.

’”

ARCHBISHOP JOHN NIENSTEDT

Recently, Catholic schools there have been told they must establish “gay-straight clubs” for students with same-sex attraction, as well as for transgendered students.

These are clubs in which a lifestyle choice deeply damaging to human dignity is being put forward as acceptable and even laudable, despite the strong objections of the church.

On Jan. 25, the Ontario Catholic School

Trustees Association (OCSTA) tried to broker a compromise by suggesting that the student-led clubs focus instead on the combating of bullying related to racism, gender, disability and, indeed, sexual orientation. The OCSTA insisted that the “gay-straight” alliance is “not acceptable in Catholic schools.” The government, however, rejected the compromise, thus imperiling the practice of religious free-

In essence, the state has told Catholic schools that the position of the church on this issue does not matter. What matters is that the state has the authority to decide, even when it means that the rights of the Catholic conscience are trampled upon.

Many people have said that altering the definition of marriage here in the state of Minnesota would have little impact on the culture or the free expression and practices of churches.

But I believe our Catholic brothers and sisters to the north would argue otherwise in light of this recent experience. This is just one more reason for ensuring that the definition of marriage as a union between one man and one woman should be guaranteed by a constitutional amendment.

God bless you!

“We ask for everyone’s prayers in order to bring healing to the families of the victims, to the Chardon [Ohio] community, and to the family of the young man who is reported to be responsible for this terrible tragedy.”

Bishop Richard Lennon of Cleveland, Ohio, concerning a shooting at Chardon High School Feb. 27 that left three dead.

Overheard 24A

The Catholic Spirit

Quotes from this week’s newsmakers

Cuban church more public in changing culture Catholic News Service The Catholic Church in Cuba that Pope Benedict XVI will visit March 26-28 is, to put it simply, more. Since Pope John Paul II’s visit in 1998, the church is more unified, more public, more likely to work with the government in accomplishing specific goals, more involved in providing assistance to the Cuban people, more comfortable in its place in society.

“We hope and pray it will be peaceful, and we continue to practice our faith. The rest is not in our hands. It is in God’s hands alone.”

— Bishop Sylvester Magro of Benghazi, Libya, reflecting on the country’s future one year after its revolution

In interviews and casual conversations with Catholic News Service in mid-February, just about everyone — including nonbelievers — in the places Pope Benedict will visit expressed hope for what his trip might trigger. People said they saw important changes the last time a pope visited Cuba.

They spoke of a Cuban people around the world unified by the Virgin of Charity in El Cobre — La Caridad as she is affectionately called. Pope Benedict’s stop in Cuba has been described by the Cuban bishops as a personal pilgrimage to share in this year’s celebrations of the 400th anniversary of La Caridad.

CNS photo / Nancy Phelan Wiechec

Deacon Felix Humberto Gonzalez Barduena anoints a child during a baptismal service at the Shrine of Our Lady of Charity in El Cobre, Cuba, Feb. 11. A majority of children are baptized in Cuba, but far fewer receive other sacraments. Pope Benedict XVI is scheduled to visit the shrine during his trip to Cuba March 26-28.

Hill-Murray senior forward wins Ms. Hockey award Hill-Murray senior forward Hannah Brandt was named Ms. Hockey during the Feb. 26 awards banquet at the RiverCentre in St. Paul. Brandt was one of five finalists, including her good friend Hanna Brodt of Roseville Area High School, who sat near her during the event, which is sponsored by Let’s Play Hockey, the Minnesota Wild, The Shock Doctor and Catholic Spirit DCS Image.

Brandt, who will join the University of Minnesota Gophers on the ice this fall, scored 59 goals for the Pioneers.

Brandt’s teammates were among her many supporters at the banquet, along with her former youth coach, Vic Brodt, of Roseville and Winny Brodt, a former Ms. Hockey winner in 1996.

Hill-Murray coach Bill Schafhauser said that Brandt is a “great ambassador” for the Maplewood school.

“I’m just glad that she’s going to be at Minnesota so people can continue to watch her,” Schafhauser said.

In addition to Bandt and Brodt, the

News Notes

“The service of charity is a privileged form of evangelization in the light of the teaching of Jesus, who will count what we have done for our brothers and sisters — especially the smallest and most overlooked — as something done for him.”

— Pope Benedict XVI, speaking Feb. 24 to members of a Rome-based charity

Its bishops, priests and laypeople, while still wary of pushing official tolerance too far, are more confident in teaching the faith in a way they believe can help shape the future of all of Cuba. Above all, it is more hopeful.

“It is a blessing for all Cubans,” said Juan Alberto Alba, whose infant godson was one of 33 children baptized Feb. 11 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Charity of El Cobre, where the pope will visit March 27. “In the past it was bad to be Catholic, but the faith has grown.”

MARCH 1, 2012

other Ms. Hockey finalists were Jonna Curtis of Elk River/Zimmerman, Milica McMillen of Breck and Lee Stecklein of Roseville.

Erika Allen won the Senior Goalie of the Year award as a member of Roseville’s Raiders.

One music career ends while another to begin, again Michael Silhavy, a member of the archdiocesan Parish Services Team and music director at St. William in Fridley, will begin a position as music editor at GIA Publications in Chicago, July 1. Although his ministry at St. William will continue until Pentecost Sunday, his 17 years with the archdiocese will end March 2.

Women in Athletic Leadership Feb. 1 at the Capital rotunda. Connie Parsley and Rene Gavic were honored with “Breaking Barriers” awards. Parsley has been teaching science and coaching golf at Visitation for nearly 25 years. Parsley’s current and former students praise her dedication. Erin Grimes, who graduated in 2008, said she admires the way her beloved coach made an individualistic sport communal by having golfers clean a section of Dodd Road together. Gavic has served as dean of students and coach of cross country and track during her career at Visitation, which began in 1987. During her tenure, she has been named section coach of the year four times (2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006), and 10 of her runners have been named allstate athletes.

Two Visitation coaches honored for their leadership to women

Online at THECATHOLICSPIRIT.COM

Two longtime coaches from the state’s only all-girls school, Convent of the Visitation School in Mendota Heights, were among 21 leaders who have promoted women and girls in athletics to be honored by the Minnesota Coalition of

■ Read an interview with Russ Breault, who is doing multi-media presentations on the Shroud of Turin in the archdiocese.

■ Memorial service honors Jerry and Barb Heil. Also watch the web for updates.

“What ‘Faithful Citizenship’ does is give us different questions to ask. It’s not are you better off than you were four years ago? [It’s] are we better off?

Are the unborn protected? Are the poor left to die? Is religious freedom protected? It’s CARR questions of life and death and war and peace. It’s not just the economy, stupid, even in this moment of economic distress. It’s about who moves ahead and who gets left behind.”

— John Carr, executive director of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Department of Justice, Peace and Human Development, speaking recently about the bishops’ election year document “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship”

“Twenty-thousand donations have come in from everyday working laypeople. These people believe in Catholic education and want to fight to make our schools healthy again. . . . We have a long way to go to put these four high schools and our whole school system on a strong footing. But this is the kind of deep, grass-roots commitment we need to renew our educational ministry.”

— Archbishop Charles J. Chaput of Philidelphia, speaking at a Feb. 24 press conference about the establishment of a new independent foundation to support Catholic education in the archdiocese

Annual Report

Letter from Archbishop John Nienstedt

Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Fiscal year 2011

The generous support of Catholics allowed us to achieve revenue stability despite an uncertain economy Dear Friends in Christ, I am pleased to present to you the annual financial report for the archdiocese that covers the most recent fiscal year which ended June 30. Your generosity constantly inspires me in all I do as your spiritual leader.

I am grateful to all archdiocesan Catholics for their continuing and generous support to their parishes and schools in 2011, which allowed our total revenue for the past fiscal year to match revenue for the previous year despite the persistent economic malaise and uncertainty. This revenue stability was achieved even with a small decrease in the assessments that our parishes provide for the operating costs associated with my responsibilities, and in total gifts for our annual Catholic Services Appeal. The slight decrease in gifts to our Appeal reflects an acceleration of the solicitation phase last year as compared with previous years.

Expenses in total were consistent with those of the previous fiscal year, even with some significant variations, such as a $600,000 reduction of Cathedral debt, $300,000 for payment of expenses to send a contingent of teens to Madrid to participate in World Youth Day, and $450,000 in combined expenses for website development and network systems that will help us communicate far more effectively with all of the many publics within the archdiocese.

Encouragingly, our multi-year focus on parish accounts is reflected in part in that our general and administrative costs decreased by $2.7 million from the prior fiscal year. Yet, this report represents much more than numbers and graphics. It highlights many examples of faith-filled good works taking place in the many projects and programs of compassion and charity that we, the Body of Christ, do in this archdiocese.

The priests and religious who attend to your spiritual needs, our Catholic school teachers, administrators and DREs, the Catholic Charities employees who selflessly give their time to help the needy, those dedicated volunteers supporting marriage, family, youth and life, and our Catholic hospital, retirement and nursing facility caregivers all join together to carry out the Lord’s work and minister to very real and varied needs of this archdiocese.

I also want to recognize the work of the Archdiocesan Finance Council and Investment Committees; these two groups of very dedicated lay men and women continued to provide exemplary and valuable oversight in respectively managing the archdiocese’s budget and portfolio of investments above and beyond expectations.

When teamwork like this happens, God’s promises can be realized through our financial and prayerful support for so many of his sons and daughters. I will do all I can to ensure that this continues each day in parishes, schools and other Catholic institutions across the 12 counties of the archdiocese.

This grace-filled work is what we are called to do each day as Catholics, and you have always responded so willingly to that calling. I promise to continue to do my part as a faithful steward of your generous support.

The Catholic Spirit 1B — March 1, 2012

Cordially yours in Christ,

4-page pullout section

The Most Reverend John C. Nienstedt Archbishop of St. Paul and Minneapolis Dianne Towalski / The Catholic Spirit

2B

Annual Report

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Condensed Statement of Activities as of June 30, 2011 and 2010 2011 Revenues and Gains Contributions Parish assessments Catholic Services Appeal net of parish rebates Program revenues, fees and others Investment income and gains (losses) General Insurance Program

Condensed Statement of Financial position as of June 30, 2011 and 2010 2010

$ 3,568,817 12,709,785

$ 3,965,531 13,504,232

6,859,208 5,466,881 3,358,722 7,987,814

7,390,161 4,742,283 2,992,414 7,851,142

Total Revenues, Gains and Other Support

39,951,227

40,445,763

Expenses Archdiocesan Programs General and Administrative Fundraising General Insurance Program

26,550,050 2,002,479 1,136,679 6,837,095

23,228,531 4,685,070 976,849 7,600,469

Total Expenses

36,526,303

36,490,919

Increase (Decrease) in Net Assets

$ 3,424,924

$ 3,954,844

2011 Assets Cash and equivalents Restricted cash Receivables, net of reserves Loans receivable from parishes and related entities, net of reserves Investments and interest in perpetual trusts General Insurance Program assets Prepaid expenses Land, property and equipment, net Total Assets

2010

$12,758,008 167,835 8,106,228

$10,870,065 166,552 7,834,251

7,423,029

7,307,618

18,452,313 4,846,981 210,537 9,562,209 61,527,140

16,727,570 5,739,912 226,428 8,244,341 57,116,737

4,506,854 4,662,453

2,383,878 4,662,304

1,723,437 568,525 5,740,000

1,794,198 402,844 6,039,998

3,537,601 20,738,870

4,470,169 19,753,391

Net Assets Unrestricted Designated to General Insurance Program 13,766,057 Other 23,125,662 Temporarily Restricted 2,014,353 Permanently Restricted 1,882,198 Total Net Assets 40,788,270

12,615,338 20,806,307 2,292,923 1,648,778 37,363,346

Liabilities and Net Assets Liabilities Accounts payable and accrued liabilities General Insurance Program liabilities Catholic Services Appeal rebates to parishes Collections held for others Notes payable Deposits due parishes and other related entities Total Liabilities

Total Liabilities and Net Assets

$61,527,140

$57,116,737

Notes to condensed financial statements for the years ended June 30, 2011 and 2010 Organization The St. Paul and Minneapolis archdiocese is an ecclesiastical division of the Roman Catholic Church comprised of 12 Minnesota counties. It was established in 1850 and elevated to an archdiocese in 1888.

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis (the “Archdiocesan Corporation”) was incorporated under the laws of the State of Minnesota as a religious corporation in 1883. The Archdiocesan Corporation exists as part of the jurisdiction of its archbishop over the spiritual and temporal affairs of the ecclesiastical division. While the Archdiocesan Corporation owns temporal goods (personal and real property) and conducts spiritual and charitable activities of its own, it does not own parishes, schools, and other separately administered and organized operations of the Roman Catholic Church within the geographic area.

with other funds of the Archdiocesan Corporation. While assets and reserves for the program are shown on the financial statements of the Archdiocesan Corporation, they are held for the benefit of the program and its participants.

Financial statements The financial statements of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for the above periods were audited by independent certified public accountants who rendered unqualified opinions on the financial statements. The accompanying condensed statements of financial position and activities are prepared from the audited financial statements but, in the interest of brevity, do not contain a similar level of detail and are not accompanied by complete explanatory footnotes. Accordingly, the opinion of the independent certified public accountants is not presented.

Basis of presentation The financial statements include all administrative and program offices and departments of the Archdiocesan Corporation. The financial statements do not include the assets, liabilities and operations of the parishes, schools, and other separately incorporated and administered operations of the Roman Catholic Church within the archdiocese. The Archdiocesan Corporation is related to these organizations and entities through some common board members.

The financial statements recognize restrictions on certain net assets of the Archdiocesan Corporation. Where contributions carry temporary or permanent restrictions on use, the related net assets are carried separately.

The Archdiocesan Corporation secures coverage and comprehensive, uniform risk protection for affiliated entities throughout the archdiocese, including parishes and schools through an activity known as the Archdiocesan General Insurance Program. The program has a separate committee of advisors. In addition to the accounts identified in the condensed financial statements, the program has $13.5 million of funded reserves that are co-invested

Other related entities Benefits The Archdiocesan Corporation administers several independent activities that are organized as trusts for pensions and other benefits for affiliated entities throughout the archdiocese. There are individual trustee boards for these functions, namely the Pension Plan for Priests of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, Pension Plan for Lay Employees of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, and the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Medical Benefit Plan Trust. At December 31, 2010, these plans had actuarial present value of accumulated plan benefits of approximately $193 million which is calculated at an interest rate of 8 percent; earlier years were calculated at 9 percent. The value of the underlying invested assets were adversely effected by the severe general market decline which began in mid-calendar 2008 and partially corrected in calendar 2009 and 2010, such that the pension plans were underfunded by approximately 40 percent at Dec. 31, 2010. The funding

obligation is of a multi-employer nature and is expected to be satisfied by 2025. Current contributions and cash investment income are adequate to fund current obligations. The contribution rate to pension plans was significantly increased effective July 1, 2010. Effective Jan. 31, 2011, participation in the Lay Employees Pension Plan was frozen.

Other programs The Archdiocesan Corporation acts as a conduit for special collections in the parishes designated by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (“USCCB National Collections”) or for local purposes. During 2011, $5.1 million was contributed by parish communities for such collections and sent to the Archdiocesan Corporation for remittance. This amount includes $3.4 million for retirement of debt at the Cathedral parish resulting from building restoration.

The Growing In Faith Campaign was initiated in 2001 and is currently in the collection phase. While the Archdiocesan Corporation is not a direct beneficiary of the campaign, its development department manages the campaign effort and a separate cash function. The goal of the campaign was $115 million and as of June 30, 2011 approximately $110 million was pledged which, after allowances and discounts, had an estimated realizable present value of $90 million. Pledges of approximately $210,000 were collected in 2011 and $1.6 million is expected subsequent to June 30, 2011.

The Archdiocesan Corporation acts as agent for The Catholic Spirit in collection and transmittal of an assessment on parishes for subscriptions to the newspaper.

During 2011, $1.1 million was paid to the newspaper.

Commitments The Archdiocesan Corporation has entered into a number of contracts with lending institutions to assist affiliated parishes and schools with credit for facility additions.

This includes loan guarantees that aggregate approximately $57 million at June 30, 2011.

Annual Report

MARCH 1, 2012 • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

3B

Archdiocesan finance officer report The following comments elaborate on the condensed financial statements of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2011

By John F. Bierbaum At June 30, 2011, the financial condition of the archdiocese is improved, and the financial result of activities in the fiscal year then ended resulted in a surplus of $3.4 million. The bulk of the surplus can be attributed to the insurance program ($1.1 million) and appreciation of investments ($1.9 million).

Revenues and gains Total revenue for 2011 reached $39,951,000 as compared to $40,446,000 in 2010.

After significant increases in 2010, the primary sources of revenue, parish assessments and the Catholic Services Appeal (CSA) were down 6 percent and 7 percent respectively in 2011. The slight decrease in assessments is reflective of decreased contributions at parishes during the economic downturn in 2009 (base year for assessments).

CSA receipts, as reported, are after deductions for rebates to parishes and allowances.

On a pre-deduction basis, the CSA generated $9.5 million, greater than goal and prior year by $200,000. Both speak to the generosity of the Catholic community despite the severe economic conditions and slow recovery.

Other income sources were similar to the prior year in the aggregate, although program income included in excess of $300,000 from participant fees for the World Youth Day in Madrid. Investment income included nearly $800,000 in gain from sale of an excess property.

Operating expenses Operating expenses totaled $36,526,000 in 2011 as compared to $36,491,000 in 2010. Program costs increased $3.2 million while non-program costs decreased $2.5 million, and insurance claims decreased $700,000.

Initiatives in program costs included strategic planning for schools and parishes, participation in World Youth Day, and investment in systems that could not be capitalized. Non-program costs declined primarily due to stabilization of accounts due from parishes, thus not requiring further adjustment for losses.

Following is a narrative that explains the purpose of the various offices of the archdiocese. Also, an accompanying chart depicts the expenditures by program, including a correlation to use of the net CSA revenues.

The archdiocese accomplishes its mission through the following offices and programs:

Programs and other activities Clergy services The role of this department is to assist the archbishop in the needs and supervision of clergy in all aspects of ministry and pastoral care, which includes the following: • Center of Clergy Formation: Institute of Ongoing Formation for Clergy and the Institute of Diaconate Formation. Each entity of the center will provide an integrated approach to priestly and diaconate formation to include newly ordained priest gatherings, new pastors programs and ongoing formation opportunities for the presbyterate/diaconate.

• Clergy Education: St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity tuition, room and board; St. John Vianney Seminary room and board; Graduation Education program; continuing education; sabbatical program; international enculturation; and a bi-annual presbyteral assembly.

• Chaplaincies: Hospital chaplaincy; prison chaplaincy; and oversight of the Comprehensive Priest Assignment Board.

• Supervision of Various Specialized Ministries: Support for above services and including the following offices and related organizations: international clergy, Leo C.

Byrne Residence, retired clergy, Office of Vocations, and clergy medical and dental and other benefits and support.

Community services The agencies within this department help men, women and children most in need within the local communities, including the poor, hungry, homeless and those with special needs. The archdiocese provides cash and noncash support to Catholic Charities and CommonBond Communities (a housing agency for low- and moderateincome families, the elderly and the handicapped.) In addition, support is provided to parishes stressed by debt or operational issues.

Education The Department of Education includes offices which support the education and formation of children within the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. This support would include: schools administration, catechesis and providing programmatic oversight of the Legacy Grant,

to the faithful and to many others within the community.

It also listens to these audiences and communicates through a professionally staffed Communications Office and through distribution of assessment for The Catholic Spirit, the official archdiocesan bi-weekly newspaper.

Non-program and other General and administrative The offices of the archbishop, bishops, moderator of the curia/vicar general, treasurer, administration and finance, and accounting services are included in the general and administrative reporting. Adjustment of the carrying value of amounts due from parishes and other entities are reflected in the category.

Development and stewardship The department of development and stewardship supports the programs of the archbishop’s Catholic Services Appeal, parish financial consulting, stewardship forum, endowment efforts and other fundraising programs. The expenses within the development and stewardship category comprise the archdiocese’s fundraising expense.

General Insurance Program The General Insurance Program of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis provides comprehensive, uniform coverage of all of the parishes and related entities in the archdiocese, as well as the Central Archdiocesan Corporation. The coverage includes building and contents, burglary, personal property, student accident, auto, public library, boilers and workers’ compensation.

Financial position

an initiative supporting and transforming our Catholic urban schools. Major responsibilities of this department are to identify systemic needs of the Catholic school system and also to provide subsidies and grants to archdiocesan parish rural and elementary schools, archdiocesan high schools and the campus ministries programs.

Parish services and outreach The parish services and outreach department provides an outreach ministry to members of the archdiocesan community, many of which are minority groups, specialized ministries and coalitions. Included are the offices of, or subsidies to: Hispanic ministry, Indian ministry and Archdiocesan Council of Catholic Women. Additionally, included is the Office of Parish Services, which supports the work of the strategic planning initiative, parish consulting archdiocesan offices, outreach ministries and parish personnel.

Marriage, family and life This department provides support by assisting the laity and parishes through the offices and programs of: marriage preparation, laity, family, youth and young adults, respect life, pro-life groups, biomedical ethics, and outreach for disabilities. In addition, World Youth Day, National Catholic Youth Conference and other youth events are coordinated through the staffing and support of the department.

Central Services The department of central services provides support and services to the central corporation staff and the parishes. The department includes the offices of, or subsidies to: finance, accounting services, printing services, communications, computer services, Metropolitan Tribunal, human resources, special services, maintenance, other collections and diocesan dues. Additionally, this department provides administrative services to the General Insurance Program, the lay and priest pension plans, the archdiocesan medical benefit plan, and other centralized programs within the archdiocesan community.

Community relations This is the outreach and communications division for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, and it conveys the messages of the archbishop and the archdiocese

Net assets of the Archdiocesan Corporation were $40,788,000 at the end of fiscal 2011, or $3,425,000 greater than a year earlier. The bulk of the increase was in unrestricted and temporarily restricted net assets, as discussed above, while permanently restricted net assets (endowments and perpetual trusts) increased $233,000 due to an increase in the market value of underlying investments.

After adjusting the change in net assets for revenue and expense items that did not result in or require cash, operations in 2011 generated $4,145,000 of additional cash, compared with a surplus of $5,484,000 cash in 2010. The difference between years was caused by the activities discussed above.

In addition to the $4,145,000 of cash sourced by operating activities, $1,031,000 was realized from the sale of excess real estate and investments. Cash was used in the amount of $1,998,000 to improve archdiocesan property, equipment and systems, $989,000 of parish deposits were repaid, and $300,000 of external debt was repaid. Thus, the cash position of the archdiocese improved by $1,889,000 since 2010. The added liquidity will relieve pressure on cash balances that are experienced at certain times within a fiscal year. Further, the increase in cash will make it possible to continue to address specific parish and ministry issues.

The archdiocese has for many years extended guarantees as credit enhancements for third-party loans to parishes and schools. The exposure to this contingent liability was reduced by $9 million to $57 million at the end of 2011.

In summary During 2011, the quality of the archdiocesan balance sheet continues to be improved, and significant progress was made in addressing debt at the Cathedral of St. Paul and investing in systems improvements in the areas of fundraising and standardized parish accounting, as well as communication through the Internet and continued strategic planning. Serious questions remain about the financial viability of certain parish and school organizations. Because parish assessments are required for support of the archbishop’s primary obligations and functions, the collection of assessments is crucial. Thus, parish financial viability will continue to be a key focus in the coming years.

John F. Bierbaum is chief financial officer of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

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Annual Report

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • MARCH 1, 2012

“This grace-filled work is what we are called to do each day as Catholics, and you have always responded so willingly to that calling. I promise to continue to do my part as a faithful steward of your generous support.”

ARCHBISHOP JOHN NIENSTEDT