The Catholic Spirit - December 20, 2018

December 20, 2018 • Newspaper of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis

O Holy Night

‘Ask the Archbishop’ Newly released book features letters from Catholic elementary students and answers from their shepherd.

— Page 13A

Young adults speak In response to an open letter he received, Archbishop Bernard Hebda holds two listening sessions for young adult Catholics.

— Page 5A

Honorable discharge Three priests in the archdiocese retire from military service as chaplains.

— Page 7A

Priests ponder Christmas Three local pastors offer reflections on entering into the celebration of Christ’s birth.

— Page 11A

On path of healing Hill-Murray football player gets support and prayers after suffering a brain hemorrhage.

— Page 12A

2018 Financial Report Archdiocesan chief financial officer elaborates on financial statements for the fiscal year.

— Pages 1B-4B

Merry Christmas!

The Catholic Spirit is taking a three-week break.

The next issue is Jan. 10.

This Nativity scene is depicted in a stained glass window at St. Peter in North St. Paul. It was installed in 2008 when the new church was built, and it is located at the front of the church to the right of the altar. The parish obtained the window from a church in Pennsylvania.

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

2A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

PAGETWO LOOKING back The following stories were the top 10 most read local news stories at TheCatholicSpirit.com in 2018.

1

Father William Baer dies unexpectedly. On Jan. 14, 2018, the pastor of Transfiguration in Oakdale died in the rectory before the day’s 8:30 a.m. Mass. Tributes to the 60-yearold poured in, especially from men who had been seminarians at St. John Vianney College Seminary in St. Paul while Father Baer was rector from 1999 to 2010. Many recalled him as an effective preacher who inspired conversion.

2

Bismarck priest appointed St. Paul Seminary’s new rector — but then recalled to home diocese. In January, Msgr. Thomas Richter began serving as the major seminary’s vice rector as he prepared to replace outgoing rector Msgr. Aloysius Callaghan in July. But in April, Archbishop Bernard Hebda announced that Bishop David Kagan of Bismarck had asked Msgr. Richter to return to North Dakota to serve a parish. In July, Father Joseph Taphorn, a priest of the Archdiocese of Omaha, was announced as the new rector. He will be installed Feb. 11.

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

AMONG TWINS GREATS Joe Mauer, center, who retired from the Minnesota Twins in October, returned to CretinDerham Hall in St. Paul Dec. 18, where the Twins announced they are retiring his jersey number (7). Standing with him are former Twins who also had their numbers retired: manager Tom Kelly, left, outfielder Tony Oliva, pitcher Bert Blyleven and first baseman Kent Hrbek. In front of Mauer, a 2001 CDH graduate, are his twin daughters Emily, left, and Maren, right, and niece Eleanor Meisinger.

3

Catholic Studies founder Don Briel reflects on dying well. Ahead of his Feb. 15 death from leukemia, Briel, 71, who retired in 2014 from a long teaching and administrative career at the University of St. Thomas, including directing its flagship Center for Catholic Studies, shared final thoughts on the rise and future of Catholic Studies, his love for Cardinal John Henry Newman and embracing the process of dying.

4

Sisters leaving Visitation Monastery in Mendota Heights. When the sisters moved from a previous site in St. Paul to Mendota Heights in 1966, the sisters numbered 45, a count that has steadily dwindled to three remaining occupants, ages 76 to 88. By midJanuary, they expect to finalize moves to health care facilities or another monastery.

Leaders of Visitation School, which the sisters founded, emphasize that their influence will continue to shape Visitation students.

5

Seminary professor made auxiliary bishop of Hartford, Connecticut. Father Juan Miguel Betancourt Torres, 48, taught Scripture at St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity from 2008 until Sept. 18, 2018, when Pope Francis announced the appointment. The Puerto Rico native is a priest of the Servants of the Holy Eucharist and of the Blessed Virgin Mary and also served as pastor of St. Francis de Sales in St. Paul. He was ordained a bishop in Hartford Oct. 18.

6 DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

PAWS FOR OTHERS First-graders at St. Charles Catholic School in St. Anthony gather for a petting session with a Fox Red British Labrador brought to the school Dec. 10. Nicknamed “Charger” by the school, it will be used as a service dog and given to a military veteran with physical and/or emotional challenges. Students raised money to purchase the dog. The project was led by Laura Hennes, a middle school math teacher at St. Charles. Partnering with the school to pair the dog with a veteran is an organization called Paws Assisting Wounded Warriors.

7

A new school aims to educate south metro Catholics. Located on the campus of Mary, Mother of the Church in Burnsville, Unity High School plans to open in the fall of 2019. Archbishop Hebda approved the beginning of a three-phase process to determine whether the school would gain official recognition as a Catholic high school in the archdiocese.

MILESTONES Celebrating 75 years

8

St. Charles, Bayport: As the Catholic population grew in the Stillwater area, Archbishop John Murray founded St. Charles in nearby Bayport in 1943. Father Francis Miller, the first pastor, served 65 families. The parish temporarily used The People’s Congregational Church until parishioners built a church in 1952. The parish has grown to 257 households.

St. Charles manages a tri-parish cemetery in Stillwater with St. Michael and St. Mary parishes.

St. Michael, Kenyon: Catholics in Kenyon established their parish in 1943, 38 years after the first Mass was celebrated in town at an old opera house. Kenyon Catholics typically went to other towns for Mass before Father Michael Lawler became the parish’s first pastor.

The parish built its current church in 1955. Today, St. Michael shares a priest with Divine Mercy in Faribault.

CORRECTION In “Former Wisconsin priest arrested on 30-year-old abuse accusation” in the Dec. 6 issue, it was incorrectly reported that television station KSTP is in Minneapolis. It is in St. Paul.

The Catholic Spirit apologizes for the error.

The Catholic Spirit is published semi-monthly for The Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis Vol. 23 — No. 24 MOST REVEREND BERNARD A. HEBDA, Publisher TOM HALDEN, Associate Publisher United in Faith, Hope and Love

MARIA C. WIERING, Editor

Bishop Cozzens says the Archbishop Nienstedt investigation was ‘doomed to fail.’ In the wake of controversy stirred by retired U.S. nuncio Archbishop Carlo Maria V Vìganò and related questions around his role in the 2014 investigation of allegations of sexual misconduct against Archbishop John Nienstedt, who resigned as archbishop of St. Paul and Minneapolis in 2015, Bishop Andrew Cozzens made his first public statement about the investigation Aug. 31. Bishop Cozzens emphasized that in hindsight, the process had weaknesses from the start, with archdiocesan leaders lacking experience and having “no authority to act.” He said the situation illustrates the need for an independent review board for allegations against bishops, a structure for which he advocated during the U.S. bishops meeting in November.

Pope Francis recognizes the martyrdom of former Cretin High School teacher. De La Salle Christian Brother James Miller, 37, was murdered while serving a Catholic boys school in Guatemala in 1982. Prior to his ministry there, he taught Spanish at Cretin in St. Paul from 1966-1971 and 1979-1980. He founded the school’s soccer program. Known as “Brother Fix-It,” he also did maintenance work around the school. The papal recognition is expected to pave the way for his beatification.

9

Catholic Cemeteries to begin offering ‘natural burial’ in fall. The Catholic Cemeteries set aside a section of Resurrection Cemetery in Mendota Heights for burial that eschews embalming, vaults and other non-biodegradable materials in order to accommodate a movement toward a simpler, “greener” burial process.

10

Scandals have turned scrutiny on seminary culture and formation. Leaders at The Seminaries of St. Paul explain the efforts taken in recent years to ensure that local seminaries’ overall culture and the formation process are healthy, and they are shaping future priests in a way that helps them form appropriate and authentic relationships with each other and their some-day parishioners.

Materials credited to CNS copy­righted by Catholic News Service.

All other materials copyrighted by The Cath­olic Spirit Newspaper.

Subscriptions: $29.95 per year: Senior 1-year: $24.95: To subscribe: (651) 291-4444: Display Advertising: (651) 291-4444; Classified Advertising: (651) 290-1631.

Published semi-monthly by the Office of Communications, Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, 777 Forest St., St. Paul, MN 55106-3857 • (651) 291-4444, FAX (651) 291-4460.

Per­i­od­i­cals pos­tage paid at St. Paul, MN, and additional post offices.

Post­master: Send ad­dress changes to The Catholic Spirit, 777 Forest St., St. Paul, MN 55106-3857.

TheCatholicSpirit.com • email: tcssubscriptions@archspm.org • USPS #093-580

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 3A

FROMTHEBISHOP ONLY JESUS | BISHOP ANDREW COZZENS

God entered our ‘mess’ to save us — and he still does

I

remember the first time I visited Bethlehem. I got out of the taxi into a noisy, dusty, dirty city square guarded by Israeli soldiers — not exactly the scene I pictured in my head as a child singing “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” Upon entering the Basilica of the Nativity, visitors have to bend down to get into the door, which was designed small to keep camels out. It is one of the oldest continually-used churches in Christendom. Built by St. Helena in the fourth century, it frankly looks 1,700 years old. The walls are almost black from the candle soot, and the floor is filthy and worn from millions of pilgrims.

In the center of the church is an altar, and beneath the altar is a cave, and as you go down into the cave by a narrow staircase, you see another altar. And under that altar is a star, and written in the star are the words “Hic de Virgine Maria Iesus Christus natus est”: “Here Jesus Christ was born of the Virgin Mary.”

And this is the key point: Right there, in the middle of the dirt, the noise and the smell, God was born as a baby. God and his love for us are so real that you can actually draw a circle on the ground and say, “God was here.”

This truth of the Incarnation strikes me every year, but especially this year as I am praying and sacrificing for our Church. I have talked to many people who have spoken to me about how the struggles in our Church in 2018 have tested their faith, and others have told me they know people who have walked away from what

seems like an all-too-human institution. In this context, the celebration of Christmas is a helpful — and hopefilled — reminder of two truths central to our faith.

First, salvation comes from God and not from us.

Christianity is the story of God drawing near to us to save us. He has come after us. As the parable of the lost sheep makes clear, he left the 99 to come after us, the one sheep who was lost. He went so far as to share our human nature, with all its limitations. He lowered himself so much that he was even willing to die for our sins, as St. Paul explains in Philippians 2 and Romans 5.

As St. John Paul II pointed out 24 years ago, while reflecting on the second millennium since Christ’s birth, this truth separates Christianity from every religion in the world. “Here we touch upon the essential point by which Christianity differs from all the other religions, by which man’s search for God has been expressed from earliest times,” he said in “Tertio Millennio Adveniente.” “Christianity has its starting-point in the Incarnation of the Word. Here, it is not simply a case of man seeking God, but of God who comes in Person to speak to man of himself and to show him [man] the path by which he may be reached.”

Christianity is not just about our search for God; it is about God’s search for us. This is the reason for our hope today: “He who did not spare his own Son but handed him over for us all, how will he not also give us everything else along with him?” (Rom 8:32).

Second, God is not afraid to enter into our mess to save us. The Christmas story makes this abundantly

clear when it points out that Mary “wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn” (Lk 2:7). Here is the incredible paradox that marks the life of Jesus and reveals the mercy of God: The one who spoke into being the heavens and the earth, whose glory surpasses our wildest imagination, whose coming was announced by choirs of angels singing his praises, was born in a stable.

It was the animals who adored him and the poorest of the poor, the shepherds who brought him gifts.

Dios entró en nuestro ‘lío’ para salvarnos, y él continua a

El cristianismo es la historia de Dios acercándose a nosotros para salvarnos. Él viene después de nosotros.

Como deja en claro la parábola de la oveja perdida, dejó a los 99 para perseguirnos, la única oveja que estaba perdida. Llegó a compartir nuestra naturaleza humana, con todas sus limitaciones. Se redujo tanto que incluso estuvo dispuesto a morir por nuestros pecados, como explica San Pablo en Filipenses 2 y Romanos 5.

Como lo señaló San Juan Pablo II hace 24 años, mientras reflexionaba sobre el segundo milenio desde el nacimiento de Cristo, esta verdad separa al cristianismo de todas las religiones del mundo. “Aquí tocamos el punto esencial por el cual el cristianismo difiere de todas las demás religiones, por el cual el hombre en busca de Dios se ha expresado desde los primeros tiempos”, dijo en “Tertio Millennio Adveniente”. “El cristianismo tiene su punto de partida en la Encarnación de la Palabra.

Aquí, no se trata simplemente del caso del hombre que busca a Dios, sino de Dios que viene en persona para hablarle al hombre de sí mismo y mostrarle el camino por el cual puede ser alcanzado “.

El cristianismo no se trata solo de nuestra búsqueda de Dios, se trata de la búsqueda de Dios por nosotros.

Esta es la razón de nuestra esperanza hoy: “El que no escatimó a su propio Hijo sino que lo entregó por todos nosotros, ¿cómo no nos dará también todo lo demás junto con él?” (Rom 8:32).

Segundo, Dios no tiene miedo de entrar en nuestro lío para salvarnos. La historia de Navidad aclara abundantemente este punto cuando señala que María “lo envolvió en pañales y lo puso en un pesebre, porque no había lugar para ellos en la posada” (Lc 2, 7). Aquí está la increíble paradoja que marca la vida de Jesús y revela la misericordia de Dios: el que habló para ser los cielos y la tierra, cuya gloria supera nuestra imaginación más salvaje, cuya venida fue anunciada por los coros de ángeles que cantan sus alabanzas, fue Nacido en un establo. Fueron los animales quienes lo adoraron y los más pobres de los pobres, los pastores quienes le trajeron regalos.

El mundo y toda su gloria siempre lo rechazarán, pero él nunca nos rechazará. Su nacimiento revela que siempre está listo para entrar en nuestro mundo pecaminoso para que nos devuelva a sí mismo. Esta es una causa de nuestra esperanza. La debilidad y el pecado presentes en nuestro mundo y en nuestra Iglesia no son

obstáculos para él; más bien, son lugares a los que quiere venir para mostrar su misericordia e invitar a sanar de arrepentimiento. Esto también es verdad de nuestros corazones. La debilidad y el pecado presente en mi corazón no son un obstáculo para él.

Recuerdo la primera vez que visité Belén. Salí del taxi a una plaza ruidosa, polvorienta y sucia, custodiada por soldados israelíes; no es exactamente la escena que imaginé en mi cabeza cuando era un niño cantaba “Oh, pequeña ciudad de Belén”. Al entrar en la Basílica de la Natividad, los visitantes tienen para agacharse para entrar por la puerta, que fue diseñada para mantener alejados a los camellos. Es una de las iglesias más antiguas en uso en la cristiandad. Construido por Santa Elena en el siglo IV, francamente se ve 1.700 años. Las paredes son casi negras debido al hollín de la vela, y el piso está sucio y desgastado por millones de peregrinos.

En el centro de la iglesia hay un altar y debajo del altar hay una cueva, y cuando entras en la cueva por una escalera estrecha, ves otro altar. Y debajo de ese altar hay una estrella, y escritas en la estrella están las palabras “Hic de Virgine Maria Iesus Christus natus est”: Aquí Jesucristo nació de la Virgen María.

Y este es el punto clave: Justo allí, en medio de la suciedad, el ruido y el olor, Dios nació como un bebé.

Dios y su amor por nosotros son tan reales que realmente puedes dibujar un círculo en el suelo y decir: “Dios estuvo aquí”.

Esta verdad de la Encarnación me golpea todos los años, pero especialmente este año cuando estoy orando y sacrificándome por nuestra Iglesia. He hablado con muchas personas que me han hablado acerca de cómo las luchas en nuestra Iglesia en 2018 han probado su fe, y otros me han dicho que conocen a personas que se han alejado de lo que parece ser una institución demasiado humana. En este contexto, la celebración de la Navidad es un recordatorio útil, y lleno de esperanza, de dos verdades fundamentales para nuestra fe.

Primero, la salvación viene de Dios y no de nosotros.

The world and all its glory would always reject him, but he will never reject us. His birth reveals that he is always ready to enter into our sinful world in order to bring us back to himself. This is a cause of our hope.

The weakness and sinfulness present in our world and in our Church are not obstacles to him; rather, they are places he wants to come to show his mercy and invite healing repentance. This is also true of our hearts. The weakness and sinfulness present in my heart is no obstacle to him.

In the midst of the many struggles of our modern world and our Church, let us not lose hope. Jesus Christ does come to save us. He came 2,000 years ago and entered into our mess. He comes to our hearts through the sacraments of confession and the Eucharist. He comes every time we turn to him in honest prayer seeking him. He comes to save us from our sins and unite us to himself. He is not discouraged by the weakness of our world, but he is drawn to come and save us. Come Lord Jesus!

En medio de las muchas luchas de nuestro mundo moderno y nuestra Iglesia, no perdamos la esperanza.

Jesucristo viene a salvarnos. Vino hace 2,000 años y entró en nuestro lío. Él viene a nuestros corazones a través de los sacramentos de la confesión y la Eucaristía. Él viene cada vez que nos dirigimos a él en oración honesta, buscándolo. Él viene a salvarnos de nuestros pecados y nos une a sí mismo. Él no está desanimado por la debilidad de nuestro mundo, sino que está dispuesto a venir y salvarnos. ¡Ven Señor Jesús!

OFFICIAL Archbishop Bernard Hebda has announced the following appointments in the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis:

Effective January 2, 2018 Reverend Gregory Abbott, appointed chaplain to the University of Minnesota Medical Center in Minneapolis.

This is a transfer from his previous assignment as pastor of the Church of the Ascension in Norwood Young America and the Church of Saint Bernard in Cologne.

Reverend Joseph Fink, appointed parochial vicar of the Church of the Ascension in Norwood Young America and the Church of Saint Bernard in Cologne. This is in addition to his current assignments as parochial vicar of the Church of the Maternity of the Blessed Virgin and the Church of the Holy Childhood in Saint Paul.

Reverend Stanley Mader, appointed temporary parochial administrator of the Church of the Ascension in Norwood Young America and the Church of Saint Bernard in Cologne.

This is in addition to his current assignment as pastor of the Church of Saint Joseph in Waconia.

4A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

LOCAL

SLICEof LIFE DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Taking joy door to door

Carolers from St. Charles Borromeo in St. Anthony sing Dec. 15 for Alan Crescini, left, a member of the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis with his wife and children. A group of 27 from St. Charles, including Father Troy Przybilla, the pastor, hit the streets near the church after the 5 p.m. Mass to bring the Advent and Christmas spirit to people in the neighborhood. Walking onto Crescini’s porch is parishioner Rita Maloney, 11, with pamphlets explaining the Catholic faith and listing Christmas Mass times at St. Charles. A couple in the parish, Lynette and Andrzej Noyszweski, organized the event as a way both to spread joy and evangelize. “People were very, very happy,” said Lynette, foreground right, of neighborhood residents who came to their doors when the carolers stopped by. “They all graciously thanked us. It went well and people loved it.”

Discover the power, meaning and depth of sacred liturgical tradition in your life!

Two presentations by visiting author, journalist and composer Dr Peter Kwasniewski

“Why Catholic Tradition is Not Optional or Incidental—Especially in the Liturgy” Wednesday, January 9th Sponsored by Church of All Saints, Minneapolis 6:30 p.m. traditional Latin Mass at All Saints, followed by 7:30 p.m. presentation two blocks away at St Maron’s Catholic Church 600 University Avenue NE, Minneapolis.

Open to the general public.

“Ten Ways to Get More Out of Mass, with the Help of Catholic Tradition” This evening event reserved to men and boys Thursday, January 10th Church of St Anne, Hamel, MN 6:45 p.m. Rosary, 7 p.m. presentation, beer and social Inquire with the parish about monthly men’s Latin Mass.

Dr Kwasniewski, founding professor at Wyoming Catholic College and author of “Noble Beauty, Transcendent Holiness: Why the Modern Age Needs the Mass of Ages”

LOCAL

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Archbishop holds listening sessions with young adults

By Joe Ruff The Catholic Spirit Archbishop Bernard Hebda listened, shared and reflected for more than two hours Dec. 10 with young adults concerned about healing the hurt and rebuilding the trust that has been lost in the Church sexual abuse scandal.

“I’m really grateful that you made the time to be together tonight,” the archbishop told more than 30 people gathered at the Archdiocesan Catholic Center in St. Paul.

A group of young adults from a number of parishes wrote an open letter to the archbishop Sept. 10 that promised their support and encouraged steps toward transparency and accountability.

The letter also encouraged increased lay involvement in parish financial and priest assignment decisions, expanded professional training for priests on sexual abuse and misconduct issues, and effective ways to address the crisis.

Part of the archbishop’s response was the Dec. 10 meeting, and another gathering with adults age 18 to 39 was to be held Dec. 19 at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis.

“As I hope you have heard, I was deeply touched by the letter I received,” the archbishop said.

“I found it to be really reassuring, especially the part that offered me the accompaniment of young adults.”

The archbishop opened the Dec. 10 meeting by addressing key points of the letter, and participants then answered a series of questions in roundtable discussions that led to sharing with the larger group. The evening ended with a Q&A session.

Suggestions included an archdiocesan-wide year of penance and healing in the wake of claims of clergy sexual abuse that led to the archdiocese filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in January 2015, as well as a more uniform response from pastors and parishes to the need for repairing relationships wounded by clergy sexual abuse.

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 5A

in BRIEF Archbishop Hebda blesses Nigerian women’s group ST. PAUL — Archbishop Bernard Hebda blessed 50 members of a new Nigerian Catholic women’s organization Nov. 25 at St. Peter Claver in St. Paul. Known as the Catholic Women Organization, the group devotes itself to Our Lady of Perpetual Help and catechizing children and supporting families. “Those are things we do at home in Africa, in Nigeria,” said Stella Obadiya, president and founder of the local CWO. The group grew out of the Nigerian Catholic community, which celebrates Mass at St. Peter Claver. Obadiya said she saw a need for fellowship among Nigerian Catholic women, which inspired her to start the group.

Youth rally set for March DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Archbishop Bernard Hebda talks with Tucker Moore, left, of the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, Christopher Damian of St. Thomas More in St. Paul, Kirby Hoberg of Holy Family in St. Louis Park and Nathan Cornwell, also of Holy Family, before the start of a listening session with young adults Dec. 10 at the Archdiocesan Catholic Center in St. Paul.

The archbishop said steps are being taken to address those concerns. He promised to seek additional feedback from young adults to proposed responses to their concerns expressed in the meetings at the Archdiocesan Catholic Center and the Basilica.

Several attendees also asked that the investigation of Archbishop John Nienstedt, who resigned from his role in the archdiocese in June 2015, be reopened and the preliminary findings be published.

Archbishop Hebda said factors to weigh in those requests include the cost of reopening an investigation and assurances of confidentiality that were provided to people who were interviewed.

Several people suggested that Church leaders help young adults bring their talents to ministeries by spelling out precise needs for possible roles, such as pastoral councils, and offering leadership training.

And one person said the most effective way to attract young people to the Church is issuing a

“challenging call to holiness,” so that all roles can be seen through the lens of a higher calling.

David Riehm of Nativity of Our Lord in St. Paul attended the meeting with his wife, Adrianna, and their 7-month-old daughter, Isabella. He said it was a positive gathering.

“I really appreciated that the archbishop was so open to questions,” he said.

Jenessa Wieser, a member of the young adult group at the Basilica of St. Mary, said she was grateful for the opportunity to share directly with the archbishop.

“I think the most important thing about these types of sessions is not just to speak about our concerns, but to receive feedback on what the archdiocese is thinking about,” she said.

The Church is acknowledging that clergy sexual abuse must be addressed, Wieser said.

“We haven’t forgotten this is an issue,” she said. “We’re not trying to hide it anymore.”

BLOOMINGTON — Keynote speakers, praise and worship, adoration of the Eucharist and reconciliation will be among the highlights of a new youth rally for middle school youth in March. Rise Up Twin Cities will be held at the Radisson Blu Mall of America from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. March 23. Bloomington-based Partnership for Youth is sponsoring the new event. More information is available at partnershipforyouth. org/rise-up.

DeLaSalle, Holy Angels students receive Vikings community award MINNEAPOLIS — Three area Catholic high school football players were among six recipients of the Vikings Community Captains award Dec. 16. The honors went to seniors Julian Wright of DeLaSalle High School in Minneapolis and twins Jake and Mitch Hendrickson of Academy of Holy Angels in Richfield for their excellence on the field, in the classroom and in the community. Each student athlete received a $1,000 scholarship for college and a $1,000 grant for donating to charity.

Wright will donate to Jack and Jill of America Inc., an organization with which he also volunteers. The organization serves AfricanAmerican mothers with children ages 2-19. The Hendricksons are using their grants to support Hill-Murray School senior Zach Zarembinski as he recovers from a traumatic brain injury. (See story on page 12A.)

Father La Fontaine remembered as gentle, faithful priest

By Joe Ruff The Catholic Spirit Father Paul La Fontaine, remembered as a gentle, faithful priest who enjoyed music, literature and old movies, died Dec. 10 in St. Paul. He was 72.

Solemn vespers and a visitation were held Dec. 16 in St. Mary’s Chapel at St. Paul Seminary in St. Paul. A funeral Mass at St. Charles Borromeo in St. Anthony was held Dec. 17 with Archbishop Bernard Hebda presiding.

FATHER PAUL A native of LA FONTAINE Minneapolis, Father La Fontaine served five parishes in his 46 years as a priest, and he was a spiritual director at the seminary after retiring in 2014. He also was a longtime chaplain for Courage, a ministry for people with

same-sex attraction.

“I think first and foremost he was a faithful priest,” said Deacon Stephen Najarian of St. Charles Borromeo, who served with Father La Fontaine for most of the late priest’s 14 years at the parish.

“He was a very kind man. He was not someone who enjoyed or looked for disputes,” though he could hold his ground when necessary, Deacon Najarian said. “In his relationships with people, he had a smile, a ready handshake and a kind word.”

He also was a strong pro-life supporter and a staunch defender of traditional marriage, Deacon Najarian said.

Bonnie Brever, a member of St. Charles Borromeo, said she and her husband, Tom, grew to know Father La Fontaine as a friend as well as a pastor.

They swapped DVDs of old movies and television series, and shared dinners and conversations.

“He was a wonderful shepherd of our faith community, but also a gentle man, a gentle soul,” she said. “How do you explain gentleness? How do you explain warmth? He was just a good friend.”

Ordained in 1972, Father La Fontaine served as associate pastor of the Cathedral of St. Paul from 1972 to 1979 and Sacred Heart in Robbinsdale from 1979 to 1984. He was pastor of St. John Vianney in South St. Paul from 1984 to 1992, St. Columba in St. Paul from 1992 to 2000 and St. Charles Borromeo from 2000 to 2014.

Father Scott Carl, vice rector of the seminary and a teacher who also helps with formation, said he vacationed several times with Father La Fontaine and knew him for years.

“He loved to pray standing up and walking around,” Father Carl recalled.

Something of a historian and a ham radio operator who was one of the first local priests with an iPhone, Father La

Fontaine enjoyed exploring new places and found everything interesting, he said.

“He loved anything he was associated with,” Father Carl said.

Father La Fontaine’s sister-in-law, Mary LaFontaine, a member of Annunciation in Minneapolis, said the priest enjoyed music, art, literature, old movies, and Laurel and Hardy.

But his great love was for the Church, and his priesthood, which he shared with everyone.

“We will all miss Paul’s funny little quips about almost anything, his quotes of old radio and TV commercials, and his jokes,” she said. “We loved having him share our extended family gatherings and simple suppers.”

Father La Fontaine was preceded in death by his parents, Nicholas and Mary Dolores (McNeely) La Fontaine; his brother, David; and infant sister Mary Carol. In addition to his sister-in-law, survivors include nieces and nephews.

LOCAL

6A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Archbishop Nienstedt’s ministry restricted in archdiocese

By Maria Wiering The Catholic Spirit Until “all open allegations are resolved,” Archbishop John Nienstedt is not free to exercise public ministry in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, Archbishop Bernard Hebda clarified in a letter to the faithful Dec. 14.

The 11-member Archdiocesan Ministerial Review Board, which addresses allegations of clergy misconduct, was consulted and recommended that Archbishop Hebda publicly clarify that Archbishop Nienstedt, like any priest facing similar allegations, is not free to engage in public ministry in this archdiocese until pending allegations are resolved.

Archbishop Hebda said he agrees with the recommendation. The restriction took effect Dec. 13.

“While this may cause some pain, my hope is that this decision prompts further action by those with authority over Archbishop Nienstedt to resolve this question,” Archbishop Hebda said in the letter, which also announced new steps the archdiocese is taking to minister to clergy sexual abuse survivors.

The action “is not intended to convey an indication or presumption of guilt,” Archbishop Hebda said.

The clarification of Archbishop Nienstedt’s local public ministry restrictions refers to a 2014 investigation into allegations that he had engaged in sexual misconduct with adults as a priest in Detroit and Rome, and as a bishop of New Ulm. Archdiocesan leaders engaged two separate law firms in the investigation. Archbishop Nienstedt, who resigned his position as leader of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis in June 2015, has maintained that he is innocent of the allegations.

The investigation was forwarded to the U.S. nunciature but has not been made public.

“As far as I know, any effort by the Vatican to further address the allegations was suspended in June 2015 when Archbishop Nienstedt resigned his office,” Archbishop Hebda said in the letter. “Thus, the matter remains unresolved for the accusers, for Archbishop Nienstedt and for the public.

I share the frustration that is felt by them, and believe this situation highlights the need for a better-defined process and independent mechanism to resolve allegations against bishops.”

While the 2014 investigation involved allegations of sexual misconduct with adult males, the letter pointed out an allegation against Archbishop Nienstedt involving minors that surfaced only after his resignation. The allegation was made not to the archdiocese but to the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office. It became public in 2016 when the relevant

documentation was released by Ramsey County. At that time, Archbishop Hebda, who has led the archdiocese since Archbishop Nienstedt’s resignation, shared the released materials with the nunciature.

According to the allegation, Archbishop Nienstedt, as bishop of New Ulm, undressed in front of two teenage boys at a hotel during World Youth Day in Cologne, Germany, in 2005. The three had been caught in a rainstorm, and, according to the allegation, Archbishop Nienstedt invited the boys to his room, where Archbishop Nienstedt undressed and then the boys undressed in front of him before putting on hotel robes as they waited for their clothes to dry. The individual said that at the time he felt uncomfortable with the situation, and that he told his mother about it when he returned home because he thought it was inappropriate. According to Archbishop Hebda’s letter, Archbishop Nienstedt denies the situation occurred.

The restrictions on Archbishop Nienstedt’s local ministry reflect the approach archdiocesan leaders would take with any priest facing similar allegations, Archbishop Hebda said.

“My opinion is that this allegation needs to be fully addressed before a definitive resolution of Archbishop Nienstedt’s suitability for ministry can be made,” he said.

After serving as bishop of New Ulm from 2001-2007, Archbishop Nienstedt was appointed coadjutor archbishop of St. Paul and Minneapolis in 2007, and became its archbishop in 2008. He resigned in June 2015 after the Ramsey County attorney charged the archdiocese for failing to protect children in the case of former priest Curtis Wehmeyer, who has been convicted of abusing three boys in 2010-11.

When the charges against the archdiocese were dismissed in 2016, the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office publicly released documents related to its investigation of the archdiocese. Among them was a summary of a Dec. 29, 2015, interview with an individual who described the World Youth Day situation.

In the letter, Archbishop Hebda said he has been repeatedly asked whether there were restrictions on Archbishop Nienstedt’s ministry. “My answer has always been that although I do not know of any, I am the wrong person to ask: Bishops report to the Holy Father, not to each other. I have no general juridical authority over Archbishop Nienstedt or any other bishop outside the archdiocese,” he said. “I can, however, exercise some control over the types of public ministry permitted in this archdiocese” which led him to restrict Archbishop Nienstedt’s local ministry.

Archbishop Nienstedt has continued to exercise ministry outside of the

archdiocese, most recently concelebrating the Dec. 4 funeral of Bishop Robert Morlino of Madison, Wisconsin. From 2016 to 2018, he was a contractor with the California-based Napa Institute. The institute stated Aug. 15 that he would no longer be serving it.

The local restrictions put in place by Archbishop Hebda have no effect on Archbishop Nienstedt’s ministry outside of the archdiocese. In the Archdiocese of Detroit, where he resides, Archbishop Nienstedt, at the request of Archbishop Allen Vigneron, has already agreed “to abstain from public ministry.” That agreement was made public by the Detroit Archdiocese Oct. 24.

Bishop John LeVoir of New Ulm announced Dec. 17 that Archbishop Nienstedt would also not be permitted to exercise public ministry in the Diocese of New Ulm until allegations against him are resolved.

In a Dec. 14 statement, Archbishop Nienstedt called Archbishop Hebda’s decision to remove him from ministry “appropriate,” given the archdiocese’s protocols, “even though I am not currently practicing public ministry in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.”

“I welcome an investigation into this allegation, as I have welcomed all impartial investigations into allegations made against me,” he said. “At the same time, I do deny the veracity of this allegation. That being said, I don’t want to speak poorly of the men making these accusations.”

He continued: “It’s also difficult to defend myself because these allegations are of the ‘he said, he said’ nature. It is my word against the accusers and, as much as they seem to want to discredit me, I don’t want to harm them. I am relieved, however, that Archbishop Hebda will be sharing the 2014 archdiocesan investigation to an independent review board. I welcome an impartial look at the facts and the opportunity to defend myself.”

In the Dec. 14 letter, Archbishop Hebda emphasized his strong support for an independent, national lay-led review board to address misconduct allegations against bishops. The structure was one of the items the U.S. bishops discussed but — at the request of the Holy See — did not move to incorporate during their fall meeting in Baltimore.

“In order to fully address bishop accountability, the Church needs a national board empowered to act, much as our well-respected Ministerial Review Board has been empowered to address allegations involving our priests and deacons,” he said. “The Church cannot fulfill its mission without public trust.”

Archbishop Hebda hopes such a structure could definitively address the allegations against Archbishop Nienstedt.

He said he would share the entire 2014 archdiocesan investigation of Archbishop Nienstedt with such a review board, and that until it is created, he will continue to advocate for it.

“In this way, my hope is that resolution of the allegations against bishops and any additional investigation can be handled in a way that is fair to all and worthy of public trust,” he said.

“I share the disappointment of many that more progress has not been made at the national and international levels to address bishop accountability,” he continued. “It is my prayer and hope that the February meeting Pope Francis is convening with bishops from around the world produces tangible results. We need a review board at the national or regional level ... with the authority and credibility to investigate allegations of misconduct against bishops and make fitness-forministry recommendations to the Holy Father.”

Archbishop Hebda released the letter as the archdiocese nears the end of a nearly four-year process of reorganization under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.

In January 2015, the archdiocese filed for bankruptcy protection in the wake of mounting claims of clergy sexual abuse dating back as far as the 1940s. In May 2018, the archdiocese announced it had reached a $210 million settlement, and the reorganization process is expected to be completed by Christmas.

In the letter, Archbishop Hebda outlined several additional efforts the archdiocese is taking “to change the culture that fostered the clergy abuse crisis,” including a new position in the archdiocese’s Office of Ministerial Standards and Safe Environment that aims to “ensure that the voice of survivors of clergy sexual abuse will be regularly heard within archdiocesan leadership,” he said.

He also reiterated that any survivor who at any time entered into a confidentiality provision with the archdiocese is released from that provision. He also restated his willingness to meet with any survivor who would like to do so, and he is available Friday afternoons in February, March and April for these meetings. He is also available to meet at other times and at locations other than the Archdiocesan Catholic Center. Survivors interested in meeting with the archbishop should call the Catholic Center at 651-291-4400 or email archbishop@archspm.org.

Archbishop Hebda also said that plans are underway in the archdiocese for “spiritual outreach” in 2019 that will “include opportunities, both at the parish and archdiocesan levels, for reparation, spiritual renewal and prayers for healing.”

More than 1,000 attend Catholic Charities annual St. Nick fundraiser The Catholic Spirit More than 1,000 people helped raise $1 million for Catholic Charities of St. Paul and Minneapolis at the agency’s annual St. Nicholas Dinner Dec. 13.

The dinner is a great opportunity to celebrate the community’s generosity, said Tim Marx, Catholic Charities’ president and CEO. “This year’s crowd of more than 1,000 people is a

true testament to a community that cares,” Marx said.

Held at the St. Paul RiverCentre in St. Paul, the event included Pat and Sandy Baldwin of Our Lady of the Lakes in Nisswa receiving the Life of Distinction Award for their commitment to Catholic Charities’ St. Joseph’s Home for Children, an emergency shelter and support center in Minneapolis.

Originally from Minneapolis, where Pat attended DeLaSalle High School and Sandy attended Southwest

High School, the Baldwins also were recognized for funding the integration of a trauma-informed, stressreduction framework into Catholic Charities’ day-today work with children.

St. Paul & Minnesota Foundations, a longtime supporter of Catholic Charities and other community organizations, was honored with the Community Service Award for its efforts, including initiatives focused on relieving homelessness.

LOCAL

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 7A

Retiring military chaplains reflect on their service

By Joe Ruff The Catholic Spirit When Father Jerome Fehn accepted a U.S. military Legion of Merit Medal Dec. 1, he said it was more for those with whom he served than for himself, even as the award recognized his exceptional service during 20 years as an Army National Guard chaplain.

“When you are in the Army as a chaplain to soldiers, you don’t look for recognition or awards,” he said. “You help each individual as best you can.”

The 20-minute ceremony in Joint Force Headquarters of the Army and Air National Guard at the Minnesota State Capitol in St. Paul capped a career for Father Fehn that included deployments to Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan. Father FATHER Fehn, 66, retired JOHN ECHERT in August from the military as a lieutenant colonel.

He is one of three military chaplains from the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis who retired this year. Father John Echert retired in FATHER EUGENE THEISEN October after spending most of his adult life in the military, including 28 years as a chaplain in the Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard, with deployments in Kuwait, Qatar and Germany. And Father Eugene Theisen retired in April after 30 years in the Air Force, including 19 as a chaplain.

Each of the priests continues to minister in the archdiocese. And at least three other archdiocesan priests are serving as military chaplains.

Father Fehn, who works as a hospital chaplain at Fairview-Southdale Hospital in Edina and Park Nicollet Methodist Hospital in St. Louis Park, where he has served for 33 years, said the archdiocese

has generously provided chaplains to the U.S. military for decades. The tradition goes back at least as far as the Civil War, when before being named a bishop, Archbishop John Ireland served as a chaplain with the First Minnesota Regiment. Retired Fathers Patrick Ryan and Patrick Hessian both served as the chief of chaplains in the U.S. Army, Father Fehn said.

Father Fehn’s duties have included praying for soldiers’ safety and presiding at Masses, military honors, memorial services and funerals for fallen soldiers.

He was awarded the Bronze Star for his service in a combat zone in Iraq.

He and his Army National Guard unit hold the military record for continuous deployment — 23 months — after six months of training in Mississippi and 17 months in Iraq from 2006 to 2008, Father Fehn said.

Father Echert, 61, pastor of Holy Trinity and St. Augustine in South St. Paul, said he is “proud to be among the many veterans who served their country,” but he will miss the military that has been such a big part of his life.

He retired as a lieutenant colonel.

From his earliest years he wanted to serve in the Air Force and be a priest, and he was able to realize both wishes by serving as a military chaplain, he said.

He first entered military service at age 17, enlisting and serving four years in the Air Force. He followed that with eight years in the seminary that included a chaplain internship program, then served in the Air Force Reserves, and later the Air National Guard.

Father Echert’s late father, John, served in the Air Force overseas in World War II and the Korean War. He worked as a mechanic on the aircraft, the Enola Gay, that dropped the first atomic bomb on an enemy target, Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945.

Father Echert was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal at his retirement ceremony at the Minnesota Air National Guard’s 133rd Airlift Wing base at the Minneapolis-St. Paul Joint Air Reserve Station in Minneapolis.

He continues to perform duties as

COURTESY MINNESOTA NATIONAL GUARD.

Father Jerome Fehn receives the Legion of Merit Medal Dec. 1 from Major General Neal Loidolt, deputy adjutant general of the Minnesota National Guard, at Joint Force Headquarters of the Army and Air National Guard in the Minnesota State Capitol in St. Paul. a chaplain for the Air National Guard when needed. He expects another priest to fill his position in the next year or so.

But priests are needed in the chaplain service, Father Echert said, and he has reached out for volunteers among priests the past two years. To qualify, priests need the permission of their bishop or religious superior, and an endorsement from the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA. They also must meet physical and other requirements.

Father Theisen, 53, retired as a major after serving as a chaplain for three years in the reserves and 16 years on active duty in Wyoming, Korea, Guam, North Dakota, England and Texas. He was deployed twice to Iraq, once to Afghanistan, and once to Puerto Rico

Is your mailbox missing out?

s of Saint Paul and Minneapoli r of the Archdiocese August 23, 2018 • Newspape

Faith and football Kevin

coach Vikings quarterbacks values Stefanski shared Catholic died right with colleague who camp. before the start of training Page 16 —

Pope speaks on abuse

Catholics Pope Francis addresses sexual abuse in letter about clergy and laity and how Church leaders should respond.

Did you know that most of

— Page 3

Venezuela crisis

leaves many Economic collapse n mission hungry at archdiocesa for parish, as pastor searches answers and help.

The Catholic Spirit

— Pages 12-13

Back to school

new Catholic schools adding technology as programs, leaders, return. they prepare for students’ — Pages 14-15

Right tool for the job

applying A 2018 St. Thomas grad to improve engineering expertise in Senegal. farming for women — Page 17

Little Sisters’ milestone

anniversary Order celebrates 150th 135 years of ministry in U.S., including elderly poor. in St. Paul caring for — Page 18

Look for the next issue of The Catholic Spirit Sept. 13. at Follow breaking news TheCatholicSpirit.com.

for hurricane relief. Upon retirement, he received the Meritorious Service Medal and fourth oak leaf cluster.

Now parochial vicar of St. Wenceslaus in New Prague, St. Scholastica in Heidelberg and St. John the Evangelist in Union Hill, Father Theisen said he discerned that after 30 total years in the Air Force, including active and National Guard duty before he became a priest, he was no longer called to serve in that fashion. He is honored to have served God, family and country in the military, and he is excited now about serving the local Church, he said.

Fathers Fehn and Echert also said they were proud to serve. Father Echert said leaving is bittersweet, but it is time.

“I will miss this ministry,” he said.

WHERE TO BEGIN? al steps, With candles on Cathedr offer Catholic young adults Church prayers for wounded

By Matthew Davis The Catholic Spirit

20, about 120 Catholics of s the sun set Aug. steps of the Cathedral gathered on the survivors of clergy St. Paul to pray for the Church. for a cleansing of sexual abuse and Corey Pennsylvania-native issued Among them was the grand jury report state Furdock, for whom sexual abuse in that clergy detailing Aug. 14 to home. hit especially close

A

PHOTOS BY DAVE HRBACEK

| THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

readers receive free subscriptions through their parishes?

ABOVE About 120 young at the adults kneel and pray St. Paul Cathedral of St. Paul in called Aug. 20 during a vigil “Evening Prayer for the and Survivors of Clerical Abuse It is the Healing of the Church.” part of an ongoing effort adults to among Catholic young and pray, educate, dialogue to gather together in response clergy recent revelations of ongoing the and sexual abuse crisis in the Church.

LEFT Brett and Bridget Hutchinson of St. Thomas with More in St. Paul pray on other young adults gathered of the steps of the Cathedral St. Paul Aug. 20.

rophe’ of abuse to address ‘moral catast Cardinal explains planthat “one root cause” of this catastrophe PLEASE TURN TO VIGIL

ON PAGE 7

leadership.” “is the failure of episcopal addressed to all In a lengthy letter three DiNardo laid out Catholics, Cardinal by the bishops’ goals just established in a series of Executive Committee week of Aug. 13. the meetings held early investigation” into The first is a “full ” Archbishop “the questions surrounding cardinal E. McCarrick, a former Theodore Church. of Washington. He the laity, lay and retired archbishop the The plan “will involve Vatican,” Committee will ask and the said the Executive experts, the clergy an apostolic visitation of GalvestonVatican to conduct a Cardinal Daniel DiNardowill be presented “in concert with” plan into these questions Houston said. This identified for their bishops at their general group of laypeople to the full body of lay-run National in Baltimore in to expertise by the USCCB’s assembly meeting will be “empowered Review Board who of November. t involvemen act.”

He said the “substantial that enforcement, With a credible allegation the laity” from law be will disciplines ON PAGE 10 psychology and other PLEASE TURN TO USCCB essential to this process. now, it is clear right that He also said

By Julie Asher Catholic News Service

U.S. Conference of The president of the three Aug. 16 announced Catholic Bishops ive plan to key goals and a comprehens ” of the catastrophe address the “moral hitting the U.S. new abuse scandal

CNS

of Galveston-Houston, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo Conference of Catholic president of the U.S. at the s the closing Mass Bishops, concelebrate in Orlando, Fla. 2017 Catholic convocation

That’s because parishes in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis can send the paper to 40% of their parishioners at no cost to them.

To get on your parish’s list and receive each issue of this award-winning newspaper for free, contact your parish office.

thecatholicspirit.com

8A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

NATION+WORLD Climate rulebook not ambitious enough

By Jonathan Luxmoore Catholic News Service Catholic participants and observers criticized a “lack of ambition” by government negotiators at a U.N. conference on climate change.

The conference ended Dec. 15 with agreement on a rulebook to implement the 2015 Paris climate accord.

The final document that emerged from the 24th U.N. Conference of Parties, or COP24, in Katowice, Poland, strives for a balance among the needs and concerns of the most developed nations, emerging nations and poor countries.

“Many people expected a complete derailment of this conference, so the fact that countries were able to agree on a rulebook shows there’s still some spirit of commitment,” Rebecca Elliott, communications director at the Global Catholic Climate Movement, told Catholic News Service Dec. 17.

“But they should have gone further,” she added. “The Church has always stressed the importance of solidarity, and this is what we’ll be working towards in future — for new ambitions to be placed on the table, and new signs that countries are committed to protecting vulnerable people around the world.”

The rulebook sets out how governments will measure, report and verify their emissions-cutting efforts under the Paris agreement, which comes into force in 2020, but it falls short of what scientists have said is needed to rein in climate change.

An estimated 23,000 people, including a delegation from the Holy See, participated in the conference.

Elliott noted that Catholic representatives, including the Vatican contingent, had “brought a moral imperative to the conversation” on the need to respond to the challenges that global warming already poses to people

HEADLINES Pope celebrates his 82nd birthday with dozens of children at Vatican clinic. After wishing everyone at St. Martha Dispensary for needy children a merry Christmas Dec. 16, the day before his birthday, Pope Francis said, “And, I also hope that no one gets indigestion from a cake that big. Thank you!”

CNS

Protesters outside the proceedings Dec. 8 of the COP24 U.N. climate change conference in Katowice, Poland.

in the world’s poorest countries. It was a perspective that rulebook negotiators discussed widely during talks that extended well into the night of Dec. 15, more than a day after the conference was to end.

Another Catholic group, Brusselsbased CIDSE, welcomed the final agreement, especially because an October report from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned of “catastrophic consequences” if global warming exceeded 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit this century.

However, CIDSE added that the lack of “solid financial commitments” and “strong mechanisms for reducing greenhouse gas emissions” in the rulebook showed governments were still failing to “reflect the urgency” and were “shying away from their responsibility to act.”

“People asked governments to put transformative actions in place at this COP. While nobody expected one conference to solve the climate crisis by itself, we did expect better than this — and we deserve better,” the organization said in a statement Dec. 16.

Shooting in Brazilian cathedral leaves five dead, four injured. A gunman opened fire Dec. 11 after a midday Mass at Our Lady of the Conception Cathedral in Campinas, near Sao Paulo. Police said officers cornered him near the altar and he killed himself. A motive had not been determined.

Australian Cardinal George Pell found guilty of sex abuse, expected to appeal.

The cardinal’s trial, related to sexual misconduct accusations involving two boys at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne in the 1990s, is covered by a court-issued “super injunction,” which forbids all media in Australia from reporting on it. Sources said Cardinal Pell pleaded not guilty to all five charges but was found guilty Dec. 11 by a jury of 12 people. He is expected to appeal.

Vatican official praises the adoption by more than 160 nations of a key, though not legally binding, agreement on global migration. The U.N. Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration “includes a comprehensive framework of best practices and policy instruments to increase international cooperation,” Cardinal Pietro Parolin, head of the Vatican delegation, told government leaders in Marrakech, Morocco, Dec. 10. The United States, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, Chile and a handful of European countries were among more than a dozen nations that did not support the pact.

Diocese of Erie to launch Survivors’ Reparation Fund in February. Survivors of sexual abuse by clergy, lay employees or lay volunteers in the diocese will be eligible to file financial claims, as an option for abuse survivors who are prevented from seeking compensation through the courts under Pennsylvania’s statute of limitations regarding sexual assault. Other recently established funds include a program for the five dioceses in New Jersey, and the dioceses of Pittsburgh, Scranton and Greensburg in Pennsylvania.

Vatican names two previously excommunicated but now reconciled bishops to head Chinese dioceses. Part of the Vatican’s efforts to reconcile China’s Catholic communities, the move came after an unprecedented Beijing meeting of Vatican officials with Chinese bishops jointly recognized by the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, run by the ruling Chinese Communist Party; and a group of Vatican-appointed bishops from the so-called underground church, which only recognizes the authority of Rome and not the Patriotic Association.

Harm to immigrants seen in green card change. A proposal by the Trump administration to deny green cards to legal immigrants using public assistance “will dramatically change the process of legal migration and make it increasingly difficult for low-income and working-class individuals to legally migrate to the United States.”It also will undermine family unity and stability and negatively impact the social safety net. That’s the view of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and Catholic Charities USA, according to comments they filed in response to proposed revisions to the “public charge” rule. They urged the Department of Homeland Security to abandon the proposed rule and return to “the current and long-standing interpretation” of the rule.

The administration is taking comments into consideration before issuing its final rule.

Faith advocates see victories in new bipartisan farm bill

By Mark Pattison Catholic News Service The farm bill that passed both houses of Congress by wide margins doesn’t include money to protect endangered species, but it does preserve one thing that had been on the threatened list: bipartisanship.

“We were so excited that the Senate acted like grownups,” said Sister Simone Campbell, executive director of Network, a Catholic social justice lobby.

“They actually did governance, and they had hearings, and Sen. (Pat) Roberts (a Republican) from Kansas: I rarely agree with him on anything, so this was an amazing project he led, focused on the needs of the people involved,” Sister Campbell said Dec. 13. “It was far beyond partisanship in actually trying to make government work.”

Jim Ennis, executive director of St. Paul-based Catholic Rural Life, was happy Congress acted relatively swiftly. This was the first time since 1990 that a farm bill passed without needing an extension of the expiring version. That was when George H.W. Bush was president.

Not all farmers will reap benefits from the farm bill.

“We’ve got lots of folks hurting in rural communities,” Ennis told CNS Dec. 14, “but you can’t put everything in one bill. You just can’t.”

Sister Campbell, a Sister of Social Service, gave Roberts, chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee,

CNS

Cattle rest in a field outside a farm in late July in Peosta, Iowa.

Congress has passed an $867 billion farm bill with strong bipartisan support. President Donald Trump is expected to sign it into law. credit for “listening to many of the agricultural workers in Kansas who use SNAP (the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) in the off-season.”

Farmers who hire the farmworkers, she said, “depend on their workers being able to eat,” and Roberts saw this “through the eyes of the farmworkers and the farmers.”

Sister Campbell also lauded Roberts’ Democratic counterpart on the committee, Sen. Debbie Stabenow of

Michigan: “She has worked hard to put together a very collaborative relationship with him, so together, they could create a bill they could be proud of.”

The Senate passed the farm bill 87-13 Dec. 11. The House passed it 369-47 Dec. 12. The bill was awaiting the signature of President Donald Trump.

One point of contention between the original House and Senate versions was a provision in the House bill that would have imposed stricter work requirements for SNAP eligibility. The House ultimately removed that from its version of the bill.

“We actually got most of the stuff that we wanted,” Sister Campbell told CNS in a telephone interview.

While she said she sees farm subsidies as “a little excessive,” the final bill “maintained pretty much the existing protections for farm runoff and the fertilizers used and that sort of thing. So I don’t have complaints on that side.”

In a Dec. 12 statement, the Rev. David Beckmann, a Lutheran minister who is president of the Christian citizen anti-hunger lobby Bread for the World, praised the bill for its inclusion of added funding for employment and training pilot projects — including funding prioritizing specific populations such as older Americans, former prison inmates, people with disabilities and families facing multigenerational poverty.

It also creates and funds a program allowing health care providers to give prescriptions for low-income people to buy fresh fruits and vegetables.

DECEMBER 20, 2018

NATION+WORLD

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 9A

U.S. bishops move to address allegations of abuse, claims of cover-up

By Carol Zimmermann Catholic News Service The year 2018 will no doubt be remembered as a dark time for the U.S. Catholic Church.

Catholics felt betrayed by Church leaders accused of sexual misconduct and cover-up that was revealed this summer, and this cloud still hung over the Church at the year’s end.

In June, allegations were made against then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington, accused of sexually abusing a minor almost 50 years ago and having sexual contact with seminarians while he was a bishop in New Jersey.

A month later, Pope Francis accepted Archbishop McCarrick’s resignation from the College of Cardinals and suspended him from public ministry, ordering him to a “life of prayer and penance” until the accusations against him are examined in a canonical trial.

The archbishop, who has denied the allegations, now lives in a Capuchin Franciscan friary in Victoria, Kansas.

Since these allegations came to light, Catholic laity and Church leaders, including bishops, have been asking who knew about the archbishop’s alleged misconduct and how was it possible for him to move up the ranks in Church leadership.

Open letters to the pope asked him to investigate what happened, and a fury of speculation was fueled by unsubstantiated allegations made by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, former papal nuncio to the United States, who accused the Vatican hierarchy and Pope Francis, in particular, of being complicit in covering up accusations against Archbishop McCarrick.

Amid the turmoil over Archbishop McCarrick, the Church was dealt another blow in mid-August with the release of a Pennsylvania grand jury report covering 70 years of abuse allegations in six of the state’s Catholic dioceses, starting in 1947. The report detailed allegations of abuse by 300 clergy and other Church workers involving 1,000 minors. It also claimed a Church cover-up of abuse in some instances.

The report particularly shined a spotlight on Washington Cardinal Donald Wuerl in reporting a mixed picture of how he handled some abuse cases when he was Pittsburgh bishop from 1988 until 2006.

Amid calls for the cardinal to resign, Cardinal Wuerl, who had submitted his resignation two years earlier after he turned 75, as required by canon law, met with the pope about stepping down. Pope Francis accepted his resignation in mid-October, while keeping the now-78-year-old prelate on as apostolic administrator for the Archdiocese of Washington until a successor archbishop is named.

Another result of the Pennsylvania grand jury report was that 13 states and the District of Columbia announced their own investigations into Church records. Several dioceses also started publicly releasing names of priests credibly accused of child sexual abuse, with most allegations decades old.

Although the Pennsylvania grand jury report fueled strong outrage, it also

raised questions about its intentions, especially since it focused on what happened decades ago rather than on the changes in Church protocols on addressing abuse that have occurred in the past two decades, said Frederick Thieman. The former U.S. attorney for western Pennsylvania has served on the Independent Review Board in the Pittsburgh Diocese for 20 years.

While a full accounting of child sexual abuse “is a story that needs to be told,” Pennsylvania’s use of grand juries that publicly disseminate accusations, but bring no indictments, can be problematic, he told the Pittsburgh Catholic, diocesan newspaper.

“Unlike a trial, there is no opportunity for cross-examination and very limited opportunity for those accused to challenge evidence or present evidence of their own,” he added.

But as this process is more closely examined, the public shaming of Catholic Church leadership has already been in full swing.

Catholics across the country, many of whom thought the Church dealt with abuse 16 years ago after the Boston Globe highlighted the issue, expressed raw frustration and anger at listening sessions throughout the summer and fall, asking Church leaders what went wrong and how the Church could move forward.

Catholics also gathered in cathedrals and parishes across the country for healing Masses said by bishops who prostrated themselves before the altar in a posture of repentance. Several bishops individually issued statements on the crisis, and many urged Catholics to pray and fast for the Church to find healing and restoration.

In mid-September, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, had a long-awaited private meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican to discuss the growing sexual abuse crisis in the United States.

Between Aug. 1 and that Sept. 13 meeting, the cardinal issued five statements responding to various aspects of the sexual abuse crisis and called for greater transparency and accountability in the Church, particularly on the part of the bishops.

In early October, while they were in Rome for the Synod of Bishops, Cardinal DiNardo and Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez, USCCB vice president, had a private meeting with the pope, again about the abuse crisis.

Abuse was a major focus of the bishops’ June meeting in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, as well as at subsequent meetings of their Executive Committee and Administrative Committee.

The issue also was front and center at the bishops’ annual fall assembly in Baltimore Nov. 12-14 where protesters, including abuse victims, gathered outside.

The meeting, which many hoped would be a decisive response to the abuse crisis in the Church, began with an announcement by Cardinal DiNardo that the Vatican wanted the bishops to delay any vote on new procedures in response to clergy abuse until after a February meeting on the issue with the pope and presidents of the bishops’

CNS

Suzanne Emerson from Silver Spring, Md., holds a sign during a Nov. 12 news conference held by Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests as the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops met in Baltimore for the annual fall general assembly. The growing abuse crisis facing the U.S. Church in 2018 topped the meeting agenda. conferences around the world.

The Congregation for Bishops, which made the request, also said the delay was needed to better evaluate the bishops’ proposals in light of canon law.

So instead, the bishops heard details about establishing standards of episcopal accountability; forming a special commission for review of complaints against bishops for

violations of the accountability standards; and establishing a protocol regarding restrictions on bishops who were removed or who resigned over claims of sexual misconduct made against them or for grave negligence in office.

At the end of the meeting, Cardinal DiNardo said he was more hopeful than he was at the meeting’s start.

“We leave this place committed to taking the strongest possible actions at the earliest possible moment,” Cardinal DiNardo said. “We will do so in communion with the universal Church.”

He said the discussion throughout the meeting provided direction and consensus and also would serve as a “springboard for action.”

Since the Baltimore gathering, more dioceses have publicized lists of priests accused of sexual abuse of minors. On Dec. 6, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles released an updated list that included two cases of alleged abuse of current minors in the archdiocese since 2008.

In remarks posted on the archdiocesan website along with the listing, Archbishop Gomez said that “every case of child sexual abuse is one too many, a crime committed against an innocent soul, a sin that cries out to heaven for justice, reparation and healing.”

He called for continued vigilance but also noted that “we have witnessed a dramatic reduction in incidences of abuse over the last two decades.”

10A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Catholics working to overcome polarization

High court won’t hear appeals over defunding Planned Parenthood

By Dennis Sadowski Catholic News Service Pope Francis’ repeated invitations to practice mercy and charity have become the focus of efforts to defuse the widespread polarization that has wracked society and has crossed into Catholic circles.

The basic message behind such efforts during the last year is simple: come to see perceived “enemies” as real people, deserving of respect and dignity.

While such efforts have not been a coordinated campaign, diverse Catholic voices have expressed concern that rampant polarization poses a threat to the common good.

“The danger in our current political climate is that the people of the United States will come to accept the current political division, nihilism, hypocrisy and anger in our culture as normal,” Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego said in delivering the Cardinal Bernardin Common Cause Lecture at Loyola University Chicago in April.

The Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life at Georgetown University has addressed polarization in the Church and society several times throughout 2018.

John Carr, director of the Georgetown initiative, recently described the current state of affairs as one guided by “fear, cynicism and anger” that leads to “alienation, loneliness and hopelessness.”

“This feeds tribal identities in politics, where we often define ourselves for who or what we are against,” he said Dec. 4 at the start of a panel discussion addressing polarization in the Church and the nation.

Carr’s observation about tribal identities taking precedence, even among Catholics who angrily have debated Church teaching when it comes to challenging public policy issues such as immigration or climate change, seems to be illustrated in a Pew Research poll. A survey released in March showed that U.S. Catholics’ regard of the pope is colored by their political leanings.

Pew said the results revealed “signs of growing discontent with Francis among Catholics on the political right, with increasing shares of Catholic Republicans saying they view Francis unfavorably, and they think he is too liberal and naive.”

The poll found that favorable support for the pope among Catholic Republicans dropped from 90 percent in 2014 to 79 percent early this year.

Catholic Democrats saw no discernible shift in favorable views of the pope over the same period, rising from 87 percent to 89 percent.

Speaking at the Georgetown forum in December, John Gehring, Catholic program director at Faith in Public Life, an advocacy group in Washington, acknowledged that the Church is experiencing infighting between Catholics on the left and the right.

“I think one of the dangers in these days right now in terms of the infighting is that the credibility of the Church in the public square is at its

Catholic News Service

CNS

Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich and Helen Alvare, a law professor at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School in Arlington, Va., participate in a June 4 public dialogue at Georgetown University in Washington about “Overcoming Polarization in a Divided Nation Through Catholic Social Thought.”

“

The saddest thing is when you encounter the person who is so convinced of their righteousness that they’ve lost all sense of charity.

Bishop Christopher Coyne

lowest point in many, many years,” he said. “My point is, if you’re a Catholic progressive or a Catholic conservative, if you think the Church has nothing important to say in politics or relative to the public square, now is not the time to hunker down. ... We have to find a way to navigate through legitimate differences in a prudent way.”

Another panelist, Elise Italiano, founding executive director of The Given Institute, which provides leadership training for young women seeking a greater role in the Church, said polarization and the Church’s loss of credibility threatens to turn away young people.

Italiano described a retreat by young people from established institutions as they search for identity, community and purpose. “The Church should be able to provide that, and yet we’ve seen the effect of polarization on their hope and commitment,” she said.

Gehring and Italiano also were among 100 Catholics representing different perspectives invited to a three-day conference in June at the Georgetown institute to share ideas on overcoming the deepening polarization in Church and society.

The gathering led to commitments

to further conversations across the perceived liberal/conservative divide to better serve the Church and begin to heal society.

Bishop Christopher Coyne of Burlington, Vermont, called on the Church, including his fellow bishops, to take steps to reverse polarization.

“We must acknowledge it’s there,” he told Catholic News Service Dec. 11.

“That’s the starting point. We see it, and I think we have to call it out.”

Bishop Coyne, who until November was chairman of the Committee on Communications of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the Church must guard against letting the small percentage of people on the left and the right “drive the bus.”

“The saddest thing is when you encounter the person who is so convinced of their righteousness that they’ve lost all sense of charity,” he said.

“Their message is ‘I’m doing what I’m doing to save these people from hell,’” the bishop continued. “It’s almost like, sadly, there’s a kind of lower level magisterium that’s developed where people are convinced they have the truth in a way the Church doesn’t, and they operate out of that.

“When they operate out of that they often leave out the most important teaching of mercy and charity.”

The Church’s tradition of respect for human dignity must be part of the discussion on the road to overcoming deep differences, Bishop Coyne added.

“Those of us in the moderate middle either way,” he said, “have to be willing to be bold and say exactly what the Church’s teaching is and not allow the extremes to say who we are.”

Pro-life leaders said they were disappointed the U.S. Supreme Court declined Dec. 10 to hear appeals from Kansas and Louisiana on lower court rulings that have stopped the states from blocking Medicaid funds going to Planned Parenthood.

“Complicated legal arguments don’t take away from the simple fact that a majority of Americans oppose taxpayer funding of abortion,” said Jeanne Mancini, president of March for Life.

“America’s largest abortion provider, Planned Parenthood, is responsible for more than 300,000 abortions each year and was recently found to be involved with the harvesting and trafficking of body parts from aborted babies,” she said in a statement issued shortly after the high court declined to hear the states’ appeals.

“Abortion is not health care; it is a human rights abuse,” Mancini added.

“Until Planned Parenthood ceases to perform abortions, they should not receive any money from taxpayers.”

The court issued the 6-3 order in the cases of Andersen v. Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri and Gee v.

Planned Parenthood of Gulf Coast.

The three who dissented were Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch. New Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh was in the majority; if the order had been 5-4, the court would have heard the appeals.

“So what explains the court’s refusal to do its job here? I suspect it has something to do with the fact that some respondents in these cases are named ‘Planned Parenthood,’” Thomas wrote in dissent. “That makes the court’s decision particularly troubling, as the question presented has nothing to do with abortion.”

Federal funds cannot be used to pay for abortion, but pro-life advocates say Planned Parenthood should not get Medicaid funding because its facilities perform abortions. Also, the organization has been accused of making a profit on providing fetal body parts to researchers.

Planned Parenthood officials and its supporters say the Medicaid funds are used only to help low-income women receive wellness services, cancer screenings, pregnancy tests and birth control.

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the national pro-life group Susan B. Anthony List, said that despite the Supreme Court declining to take the two states’ appeals, the pro-life grassroots movement “will not stop fighting until every single tax dollar is untangled from the abortion industry led by Planned Parenthood.”

She said the pro-life citizens of Kansas, Louisiana and other states “do not want Medicaid tax dollars used to prop up abortion businesses like Planned Parenthood.”

“We support their right to redirect taxpayer funds away from entities that destroy innocent lives and instead fund comprehensive community health care alternatives,” she said.

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 11A

FAITH+CULTURE

Priests at Christmas: Reflect on God’s love

By Joe Ruff The Catholic Spirit

S

pending time with Christ in front of a Nativity set and his presence in the Eucharist, reflecting on Scripture, exchanging gifts and gathering with family and friends.

Asked to reflect on the meaning and opportunities of Christmas, three priests of the archdiocese shared different aspects of the season, all of them centered on the presence, gentleness, understanding and love of Christ.

“One of the hardest things for people to believe is that God is as close to us as he is,” said Father Michael Byron, pastor of Pax Christi in Eden Prairie.

For centuries, God had been understood by many as a far-away spirit, having little to do with the flesh, Father Byron said. But the mystery of Christ’s incarnation brings God directly into the human condition, demonstrating his great love and desire to be with us, he said.

“The Incarnation broke down that barrier,” he said.

Through God’s grace, man also can take on the divine, Father Byron said, pointing out a statement on the Christmas mystery in the Catechism of the Catholic Church: “We have been made sharers in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share our humanity.”

Some question whether God would have taken on flesh if man did not have to be redeemed from sin, Father Byron said. “Others say the Incarnation is the completion of what God always intended to do to complete his creation — to unify his very being with us. That is his good will and pleasure.”

“These are legitimate questions, and good ones,” Father Byron said.

In any event, Christ did take on flesh, the promise of redemption is real, and people can reflect and experience the divine in everyday actions, most profoundly in the Eucharist, but also in activities as simple as sharing each other’s company and gifts at Christmas, he said.

“It’s something more than the experience of human love; divine love is experienced with that as well,” Father Byron said.

Father Thomas Balluff, pastor of St. John the Evangelist in Little Canada, said Jesus Christ in the world at Christmas is what God looks like as a human being.

“As we read about him in the Gospels and Scripture, we get know what he is like, full of kindness and

iSTOCK | ALEXHSTOCK

patience,” Father Balluff said. At other times Jesus is angry, such as when he cast out the money-changers in the Temple, or anxious and even in agony, such as during his Passion and death, he said.

“He comes into the world, and it is something we need to celebrate, to set aside time to focus,” Father Balluf said. He recommends 15 to 30 minutes of reflection a day, at home in front of a Nativity scene, at church before the Eucharist, or in quiet prayer in a chapel.

“We need to ponder the goodness, the beauty, the love God has for us. Especially in this season, as a little baby, Jesus,” he said.

In this world, loudly and deeply divided by politics, religious practice and other difficulties, it is important to remember God’s voice, said Father John Paul Erickson, pastor of Transfiguration in Oakdale.

“He speaks in the still, small voice of a child,”

Father Erickson said. “It’s not to say there isn’t a time and place to defeat evil and even suffer martyrdom.

But most of us are called to work in meekness every day of our lives.”

“Only through service, understanding, the whisper of love, can we come to truly experience the goodness of God,” he said. “Only in the day-to-day, only in the person in front of us, right now, can we really love. …

It’s counter-cultural, it always will be, and we Christians are called to embrace it.”

Father Byron said he will embrace that kind of love when he gathers with his family ­— three sisters, two brothers and their families — to celebrate Christmas.

“I would hazard to say, without the experience of human love, love among family and friends, I would not know who God really was,” Father Byron said.

“It’s one aspect of the Incarnation. ... This is the real warp and woof of human love.”

Pope: Don’t be afraid to ask for things from God in prayer

By Carol Glatz Catholic News Service No one should be afraid to turn to God with prayer, especially in times of great doubt, suffering and need, Pope Francis said.

Jesus does not want people to become numb to life’s problems and “extinguish” those things that make them human when they pray, the pope said Dec. 12 during his weekly general audience in the Paul VI audience hall.

“He does not want us to smother our questions and requests, learning to put up with everything. Instead, he wants every pain, every apprehension to rise up to heaven and become a dialogue” with God, the father, he said.

Continuing a new series of audience talks on the Our Father, the pope reflected on the simplicity of the prayer and the way it addresses God with intimate familiarity.

With this prayer, Jesus shows an “audacious” way to address God immediately as “our Father” without any pomp and “preambles,” the pope said.

“He doesn’t say to turn to God calling him ‘O, the All-Powerful’ or ‘O, the One on high,’ or ‘O, You who are so far from us and I am the wretched one ... .’”

“No. He doesn’t say that, but simply [uses] the word, ‘Father,’ with great simplicity, like children who turn

CNS

A woman embraces Pope Francis as he arrives to lead his general audience in Paul VI Hall Dec. 12 at the Vatican. to their daddy. This word, ‘Father,’ expresses intimacy, filial trust,” he said.

The prayer invites people to pray in a way that “lets all the barriers of subjection and fear fall away,” he added.

While the Our Father is rooted in “the concrete reality” of every human being, prayer, in essence, begins with life itself.

“Our first prayer, in a certain way, was the first wail that came with our first breath,” and it signals every human being’s destiny: “our continual hunger, our continual thirst, our constant search for happiness.”

Prayer is found wherever there is a deep hunger, longing, struggle and the question, “why?” Pope Francis said.

“Jesus does not want to extinguish [what is] human, he does not want to anesthetize” the person in prayer, he said. Jesus understands that having faith is being able to “cry out.”

“We all should be like Bartimaeus in the Gospel,” he said. This blind man in Jericho kept crying out to the Lord for help even though everyone around him told him to be quiet and not bother Jesus, who ­­­­— ­­­they felt — ought not be disturbed because he was so busy.

Bartimaeus did not listen and only cried out louder “with holy insistence,” the pope said. Jesus listened to his plea and told him his faith is what saved him.

The pope said this shows how the cry for healing is an essential part of salvation, because it shows the person has faith and hope and is “free from the desperation of those who do not believe there is a way out of so many unbearable situations.”

“We can tell him everything, even those things in our life that are distorted and beyond comprehension.

He promised us that he would always be with us,” he said.

FAITH+CULTURE

12A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Hill-Murray family grateful for outpouring of support during son’s recovery

By Matthew Davis The Catholic Spirit

F

ootball and faith connections were natural reasons for Academy of Holy Angels senior twins Mitch and Jack Hendrickson to donate their recently-won charity check to support Zach Zarembinski, a senior at HillMurray School in Maplewood who has been recovering from a brain hemorrhage suffered during an Oct. 27 football game.

“We are called to help one another, support one another,” said Jack, who played tight end for Holy Angels in Richfield. “It’s just the right thing to do.”

Mitch and Jack were two of six recipients of the 2018 Vikings Community Captains Award in early December, which included $1,000 to donate to charity. The Hendrickson brothers’ donation is one of the latest for the Zarembinski family in the past two months. Zach and his family have received droves of prayer support along the way, too.

“It’s been very overwhelming, as far as the amount of people that have reached out to us,” said Dan Zarembinski, Zach’s father. “I just tell people it was truly a miracle.”

Zach, who played nose tackle for the Hill-Murray Pioneers, took himself out of the game against Johnson Senior High School in St. Paul before collapsing on the sideline. Emergency medical personnel immediately attended to him, and they transported him to Regions Hospital in St. Paul.

Zach had surgery and was placed in a medically-induced coma for 13 days to help his brain heal.

Zach returned home Nov. 13, but a long road to recovery remains. A couple weeks ago, he went back to school and is receiving academic help. He hopes to return to classes after the Christmas break and attend college next year.

“I can’t sleep a lot. I get headaches throughout the day,” Zach said of the effects of brain trauma.

Signs of support and prayers poured

in for the Zarembinski family during Zach’s stay in the hospital and beyond.

It came from individuals, prayer groups, churches, Catholic and public school communities ­— many of whom the Zarembinski family had never met.

Visitors were frequent.

“When I woke up [from the coma], I kind of at first realized it through all the cards and the letters,” Zach said of the support. “Since I’ve gotten out of there [the hospital], I just keep realizing how many people prayed for me.”

Six Catholic high schools, including Hill-Murray, offered their respective All Saints Day Masses for Zach and his family. Other schools have remembered Zach in the petitions at Mass or in a prayer before Mass. Students at many of those schools wore green, the awareness color for traumatic brain injury, in honor of Zach. St. John the Evangelist Catholic School in Little Canada, where Zach attended middle school, also offered a Mass for Zach, and the students wore green.

“Mass is the most powerful prayer we can offer, and when we can be united in that, offering our intentions for a particular cause, ... we can’t overestimate the power that prayer has,” said Father Kevin Manthey, HillMurray chaplain who celebrated that school’s Mass.

“You could feel it, almost,” said Tracy Zarembinski, Zach’s mother, about the prayers.

Father Manthey and St. Charles Borromeo Fraternity Father Daniele Scorrano, also a chaplain at Hill-Murray, were among those who visited Zach at Regions. Benedictine Sister Linda Soler, who serves as a spiritual coach for the football team, made regular visits. The Hill-Murray community’s support for Zach was impressive, she said. Her fellow sisters at St. Paul’s Monastery in Maplewood prayed for him, too.

“Prayer was the priority here at HillMurray,” said Sister Linda, who primarily serves as the school’s student service coordinator. “I believe this incident has made the community stronger. There was a lot of love and a

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Senior Zach Zarembinski sits for a photo Dec. 11 at Hill-Murray School in Maplewood with his parents, Dan and Tracy. He hopes to return to classes in January. lot of concern.”

Sister Linda and Head Football Coach Pete Bercich held a prayer service for the players and their parents to pray for Zach. Bercich said the players also took the initiative in many additional efforts to support Zach, including a fundraiser at a nearby Chick-fil-A. Bercich’s youngest son, Ryan, plays long snapper at Holy Angels and helped to forge part of the football connection the Hendrickson twins had to Zach.

They received the Vikings award Dec. 16 at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis for their leadership on the field, performance in the classroom and involvement in the community.

Meanwhile, Zach attended an unrelated event at the Vikings’ stadium Dec. 15 as an honorary all-star for the Minnesota High School All-Star game.

“It was really amazing to me how the other teams, mainly the teams that we

played against, ... how they all reached out and asked to see what they could do to help support Zach,” Pete Bercich said.

Other support efforts included a charity volleyball event organized by the Hill-Murray student council. They raised $730 with 200 participants.

“We could not be happier to have Zach back smiling in the halls and giving everyone high fives,” said Alyson Steichen, a Hill-Murray senior and student council member, who helped organize the volleyball event.

Zach, who attends Eagle Brook Church in White Bear Lake, said the support and the journey reaffirmed his faith. He said it’s been growing since his freshman year at Hill-Murray.

“And then I go and have this injury [happen] to me, and I wake up from it and go, ‘Mom, God’s real,’” Zach said.

CARBON COOL ADJUSTABLE BEDS • 763-325-5253 Locally Owned Company • Beds Hand Delivered & Setup To your Satisfaction!

CALL !

NOW

FREE DRAWING!

Enter to Win Your Own Adjustable Bed!

Enter Your Name & Phone Number For Our November & December Drawing!

$1600 Value!

No purchase necessary. One winner per month.

Call for details. Restrictions Apply. A packet will be mailed.

35% OFF Through Through12-18-18!

1-18-19!

IMPROVES QUALITY SLEEP • REDUCE SNORING • AIDES SLEEP APNEA • PROMOTES BLOOD CIRCULATION REDUCE LEG SWELLING • EASES MUSCLE PAIN • IMPROVES DIGESTION • AIDES IN ALLERGY RELIEF PREVENTS ACID REFLUX • SLEEP COOLER FOR A NIGHT OF UNINTERRUPTED SLEEP • 12 ZONE MASSAGE OPTIONS

Call Today for Your FREE In Home Estimate! • No Obligation! • Special Senior Citizen Discounts Apply

DECEMBER 20, 2018

FAITH+CULTURE

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 13A

‘Ask the Archbishop’ showcases students’ letters to Archbishop Hebda — and his responses

By Maria Wiering The Catholic Spirit

“D

ear Archbishop Hebda, My name is Luke. I am in first grade at Nativity School. I like to write poems. My favorite thing at Nativity is learning. My question is, does God really loves us when we make mistakes?”

So reads the first letter in the newly published book “Ask the Archbishop,” a compilation of 58 letters from Catholic school students in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. Modeled on the book “Dear Pope Francis” that Loyola Press published in 2016, “Ask the Archbishop” includes the image of a letter from a student on one page, and Archbishop Hebda’s response on the facing page.

Steve Wright, a fifth-grade teacher at Visitation School in Mendota Heights, conceived of the idea in spring 2016 while his class was working on a letter-writing project. He saw a copy of “Dear Pope Francis” and envisioned a similar project on a local level. He enlisted the help of his Visitation colleagues Jeanne Doyle, a school counselor, and Michelle Schlehuber, a middle school English and social studies teacher. They contacted Archbishop Hebda. He agreed to the project and suggested they connect with the Catholic Schools Center of Excellence, which supports marketing endeavors and other initiatives in the 79 Catholic elementary schools in the archdiocese.

Edina-based CSCOE was an invaluable partner, Wright said. Without it, the project wouldn’t have moved forward like it did, he said. It helped that Gail Dorn, CSCOE’s president, championed the project, he said.

With CSCOE’s help, they solicited letters from students in kindergarten to grade five in all 79 schools, and they received letters from 51 of the schools before the deadline. Those letters amounted to more than 800, all of which they passed along to Archbishop Hebda.

However, the three Visitation teachers, along with CSCOE representatives, selected the 58 letters that were included in the book. Student artwork also appears prominently throughout the book.

The questions range from the sweet — “Do you like to dance?” and “What is your favorite ice cream?” — to the profound — “How or in what way can we love our enemies?” and “I have always had a hard time putting God above all things. Do you have any advice for me?”

Schlehuber said that even a year after initially reading the letters, she still gets choked up talking about them.

“The thoughtfulness of the students was astounding,” she said.

Archbishop Hebda answered most of the questions over the course of a single week, which gave him a chance to immerse himself in the project. He noted that Catholic schools are very important to him, and he found the letters “beautiful.” As the project unfolded, he said, he would run into the student-writers at their parishes or elsewhere in the community, and they would ask, “Archbishop, did you get my letter?”

“They were so engaged in the whole process,” he said of the students. In June 2017, CSCOE and the Visitation faculty organized an event for students whose letters were included in the book to meet the archbishop. The student-writers received a certificate and a St. Philip Neri medal, and, the archbishop said, he still encounters those students wearing the medal.

Archbishop Hebda had in mind his six nieces and nephews as he penned the responses, he said. They are written simply, but they also synthesize complex truths of the Catholic faith.

To Luke, the writer from Nativity of Our Lord Catholic School in St. Paul who asked about God’s love for people when they make mistakes, he responded: “The more that we learn about the life of Jesus, the easier it is to believe that we have a God who loves us always, even when we make mistakes. In fact, it seems that Jesus had

a special love for those who made mistakes. St. Peter, for example, made lots of mistakes and yet the Lord made him the head of the Church. As a group, the Apostles often seemed like real bumblers, and yet the Lord loved them deeply.”

He continued: “The Cross is where we see God’s love for us most clearly. Imagine that Jesus would be willing to give his last breath for those of us who sin and make lots of mistakes. One of the last things that Jesus said was, ‘Father forgive them, they know not what they do.’ That gives me, a sinner who makes mistakes, great hope.”

Archbishop Hebda said the book forged a connection between himself and all the students who participated, not only those whose letters were featured.

The book shows “the closeness between the ‘sheep’ and the ‘shepherd,’” he said, adding that it demonstrates his care for children, “who are important members in our Church.”

Archbishop Hebda noted that he’s not sure how helpful the book would be for kids — except for those to whose letters he responded — but that he’s been getting positive feedback from adults. He said he’s heard from people who are new to the faith, or who are facing health difficulties and have found levity in “small doses” in the book.

CSCOE self-published the book earlier this year, printing 15,000 copies. It retails for $24.99 and is available for purchase at each Catholic elementary school in the archdiocese and at several bookstores: Leaflet Missal, St. Patrick’s Guild and the Red Balloon in St. Paul; and Wild Rumpus in Minneapolis. The proceeds from books sold at a school benefit that particular school, and proceeds from bookstore sales benefit a CSCOE initiative to enhance schools’ work with “exceptional learners” — students whose learning needs fall on both ends of the learning spectrum, said Melissa Hamilton, CSCOE’s communications manager.

The book aimed to show beauty and community found in the local Catholic schools, she said, as well as unify the elementary schools in a single project.

Archbishop Hebda thinks it hit the mark, noting that it “highlights the great work that’s being done in our Catholic schools, [and] how beautiful it is that we have kids who are asking these questions, and how wonderful it is that they have a forum for talking about those things day-in and day-out.”

Wright said he hopes the book’s readers see that “children are our hope and future, and this is the good work of our Catholic schools.”

Doyle added: “There’s hope for the future of the Church. [Students] are still curious and want answers to the big questions and the small questions. [And they have] so much love in their hearts.”

PHOTOS BY DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

ABOVE Images from “Ask the Archbishop,” a book of letters from kindergarten-to-fifth-grade students in local Catholic schools to Archbishop Bernard Hebda, and his written responses. Edina-based Catholic Schools Center of Excellence published the book earlier this year.

14A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

FROMAGETOAGE

Papal preacher will lead U.S. bishops’ retreat

By Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service

F

or more than 38 years, Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa has preached to the pope and top officials of the Roman Curia. In early January, he will lead the weeklong retreat of the U.S. bishops.

As they continue to study and discuss ways to respond to the clerical sexual abuse crisis, the bishops will gather for the retreat Jan. 2-8 at Mundelein Seminary near Chicago.

Pope Francis suggested the bishops hold the retreat and offered the services of the 84-year-old Father Cantalamessa, who has served as preacher of the papal household since 1980.

In an email Dec. 6, the Capuchin declined to be interviewed about the retreat, saying, “At this delicate moment in the life of the U.S. Church, I don’t believe it would be opportune for me to give interviews.”

The theme of the U.S. bishops’ retreat will be “the mission of the apostles and of their successors” and will draw from Mark 3:14, which says Jesus “appointed 12 — whom he also named apostles — that they might be with him and he might send them forth to preach.”

In a follow-up email Dec. 15, Father Cantalamessa said, “I will not talk about pedophilia and will not give advice about eventual solutions; that is not my task and I would not have the competence to do so.”

“The Holy Father asked for my availability to lead a series of spiritual exercises for the episcopal conference so that the bishops, far from their daily commitments, in a climate of prayer and silence and in a personal encounter with the Lord, can receive the strength and light of the Holy Spirit to find the right solutions for the problems that afflict the U.S. Church today,” he wrote.

Greg Burke, director of the Vatican press office, told Catholic News Service, “You can see why the pope asked the bishops to make the retreat together in what he told the bishops of Chile: without faith and without prayer, fraternity is impossible.”

“At a moment like this, the bishops need to be united in prayer, and Catholics in the U.S. should see them at prayer,” Burke said Dec. 13. “A retreat is always a time for conversion, and perhaps there’s been no time in the U.S. with more need for conversion than now.”

The job of “preacher of the papal household” is not a full-time position; each year it requires the priest to give an average of eight meditations — one each on most Fridays of Advent and Lent — and the homily during the pope’s Good Friday celebration of the Lord’s Passion.

The title, and the ministry, has a very long history.

Superiors of different religious orders took turns preaching to the pontiff and his aides during Advent and Lent until the mid-1500s, when Pope Paul IV

CNS

For more than 38 years, Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa has preached to the pope and top officials of the Roman Curia.

In early January, he will lead the weeklong retreat of the U.S. bishops. He is pictured in a 2010 photo. appointed the first preacher of the papal household; his successors followed suit, always choosing a religiousorder priest for the job. Pope Benedict XIV decided in 1743 to be more specific, decreeing that the preacher of the papal household always be a Capuchin friar.

St. John Paul II asked Father Cantalamessa to take the job in 1980; since then, the Capuchin has given more than 300 spiritual talks and homilies to the popes and their closest aides in the Roman Curia.

When he is not preaching to the pope, Father Cantalamessa leads retreats around the world, writes books and articles, and works with charismatic Catholics; in late October, he was named ecclesial adviser of “Charis,” the new international coordinating body for the Catholic charismatic renewal.

In a 2015 interview with CNS, he said the first time he climbed the steps to the lectern in St. Peter’s Basilica to preach to the pope on Good Friday, “It felt like I was climbing Mount Everest.”

But, he told TV2000, the Italian bishops’ television station, “this post of preacher of the papal household says more about the pope than the preacher. He has the humility to set aside all his important tasks on the Fridays of Advent and Lent to come listen to the preaching of a simple priest.”

The three popes he has preached to have given him the freedom to choose the topics for his meditations, he

told CNS in 2015. “I try to understand, including with the help of prayer, what are the problems, needs or even graces the Church is living at the moment and to make my little contribution with a spiritual reflection.”

“Putting the word of God into practice must characterize all preaching,” he said. “Pope Francis gives us a stupendous example of that with his morning homilies.”

While focused on challenging and strengthening the faith of those he is preaching to, Father Cantalamessa’s homilies have touched on religious persecution, Christian unity, signs of hatred and prejudice in society, violence against women, war and peace, the defense of human life and the abuse crisis.

His homily in St. Peter’s Basilica on Good Friday in 2010 caused controversy. At the service, presided over

by Pope Benedict XVI, the Capuchin focused on how Jesus broke the cycle of violence and victimizing others by taking on the world’s sins and offering himself as a victim.

He had noted that in 2010 the Christian Holy Week and the Jewish Passover coincided, and he told the congregation the Jews “know from experience what it means to be victims of collective violence,” and they recognize when other groups are being attacked simply because of who they are. He then read from a letter he said he received from a Jewish friend, who wrote that he was following “with disgust” attacks against the Church and the pope because of the abuse scandal. The repetition of stereotypes and using the wrongdoings of some individuals as an excuse to paint a whole group with collective guilt reminded the Jewish author of “the most shameful aspects of anti-Semitism,” the letter said.

Father Cantalamessa later said he was sincerely sorry if he offended any members of the Jewish community or any victims of sexual abuse.

The Capuchin also has preached on the need for the Catholic Church to be honest and transparent about the abuse crisis and to repent for it.

In December 2009, just a few hours before Pope Benedict XVI met with Irish bishops to discuss the clerical sex abuse crisis, Father Cantalamessa gave one of his Advent meditations. He told the pope and other Vatican officials that, as a matter of justice, the Church must publicly admit the weakness of some of its priests.

And, in Advent 2006, leading a meditation on the passage from the beatitudes that says, “Blessed are they who mourn, for they will be comforted,” Father Cantalamessa said the Church’s tears of shame for the abuse crisis must be turned into tears of repentance.

Rather than mourning for the damage done to the Church’s reputation, he said, the Church must weep “for the offense given to the body of Christ and the scandal given to the smallest of its members.”

w a s hb ur n- m crea vy. c o m

Funeral Chapels, Cemeteries and Cremation Services

Since 1857, you can trust the McReavy family for professional advanced planning, funeral and cremation services.

612.377.2203

FROMAGETOAGE

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 15A

Pilgrimage across U.S. lets peacemaker spread light from Bethlehem

By Katie Rutter Catholic News Service Brian Duane’s maroon Subaru had already covered about 1,800 miles when he pulled into the parking lot at the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception in Lafayette, Indiana, Dec. 4.

It was Duane’s 18th stop in what would be a weeklong, cross-country journey for the resident of Pembroke, Massachusetts, and his car contained precious cargo with a radiance of goodwill.

This road trip was a mission from Bethlehem carrying a message of peace, contained in a glowing lantern.

This fire had originally been kindled at Christ’s birthplace, the Grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem, West Bank.

Duane is part of a national network of volunteers spreading this “Peace Light from Bethlehem” across the nation.

“It is symbolic of Christ’s love for us and of the Prince of Peace,” Duane told Catholic News Service. “It serves as a reminder to us.”

For more than a decade, volunteers like Duane have driven this flame from coast to coast, lighting hundreds of lanterns along the route, including some this year in Minnesota.

The effort to spread the Peace Light is spearheaded by Scouts and Scouting

advisers, most often associated with Catholic churches. The goal is to kindle peace in all hearts by remembering that Christ’s mission began in Bethlehem.

“It’s symbolic, but it’s the effort, the coming together, the dedication to peace and heading home and spreading the message, even at the family level,” said Bob McLear, who lives west of Chicago.

McLear planned to take the light from Lafayette back to his parish in Batavia, Illinois, and pass it off to another volunteer headed to Madison, Wisconsin.

The Peace Light’s journey can be traced back to a tradition in Austria. For the past 32 years, the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation ORF has sent a child to Bethlehem to kindle a flame from the oil lamps hanging above Christ’s birthplace.

The fire, stored in two explosion-proof miner’s lanterns, is then flown with a safety adviser back to Europe, where it is spread to more than 30 countries.

“The reaction of the people touched my heart,” said Wolfgang Kerndler, a security expert for Austrian Airlines, who has escorted the flame for about two decades.

“Even the crew is proud to be part of the operation,” Kerndler told CNS in an email. “It’s an honor.”

The Peace Light first arrived in the United States in the wake of the terrorist

KATIE RUTTER | CNS

Braden Mosier, a student from Lafayette, Ind., holds a candle containing the Peace Light after receiving the fire at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Lafayette Dec. 4. attacks on 9/11. The Austrian government and a national Scouting association sent the flame with a VIP delegation to comfort the grieving nation. The light has been flown by Austrian Airlines to New York every year since. Stanton helps organize the official reception at John F. Kennedy International Airport.

This year, about 150 adults and children gathered at the airport’s Our

Lady of the Skies Chapel to welcome the light of peace and kindle their own flames. Duane was at the chapel to light his lanterns and begin his journey. From New York, he drove as far west as Denver, before heading back to Massachusetts, logging more than 5,400 miles.

Along the way, Duane stopped at 26 locations to meet volunteers, participate in ceremonies and pass on the flame.

“I’ve walked into so many different places, a very liberal congregation, a very conservative congregation,” he said, “and yet we all agree on the need for peace and civility.”

Duane arrived in Indianapolis Dec. 4 where more than 60 people, mostly children, gathered at Our Lady of Lourdes parish to welcome him and spread the flame from Bethlehem.

Lanterns and candles lined the altar.

“We hear about Jesus being born in Bethlehem, but we never actually see anything from there or go there, so I thought that was really cool,” said Eliza Frank, a student at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School. The Peace Light was set to reach California by Dec. 13 and is reported to burn in more than 30 states.

A volunteer-run Facebook page maps out the spread of the Peace Light and fields requests from people wishing to take the flame to their communities.

Trojack Law Office, P.A. • Wills • Trusts • Probate

• Guardianships • Conservatorships

• Powers of Attorney • Health Care Directives

Have a Blessed Christmas!

John E. Trojack, Attorney at Law

We offer tailor-made, client-focused estate planning and related services from an authentic Catholic Perspective

Trojack Law Office, P.A. • 1549 Livingston Ave., Ste. 101 • W. St. Paul, MN 55118

Phone: 651.451.9696 • www.TrojackLaw.com

Number one regret of our residents: “Why didn’t we move here sooner?”

With age comes wisdom. And an opportunity to define your next chapter. At The Glenn Catholic Senior Living Communities, we’re focused on inspiring a more active lifestyle. We’re a welcoming Catholic community that provides daily spiritual support, a warm sense of family, and the ability to modify your living arrangement from independent, assisted, memory care, care suites or adult day to suit your needs.

!$"%

Call or visit today!

NOTICE

TheGlennHopkins.com | 952-960-2921 TheGlennMinnetonka.com | 952-373-0005

Look for The Catholic Spirit advertising insert from

CATHOLIC CHARITIES in all copies of this issue.

16A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

FOCUSONFAITH SUNDAY SCRIPTURES | FATHER NATHANIEL MEYERS

Presents will fade, but love remains

According to Forbes Magazine, American holiday spending exceeded $1 trillion in 2016, and it dropped to a little more than $700 billion in 2017. As we are now just a few days away from Christmas in 2018, no doubt Americans have started to rack up an impressive amount of spending again this year.

While it is understandable that people want to express their love and affection for one another in a material way, I nonetheless cannot help but think that this instinct could be met without accruing such exorbitant expenditures. As the old saying goes: It’s the thought that counts.

The season of Advent is drawing to a close, and hopefully we can use these final days to prepare ourselves for a truly blessed and spiritual entrance into the Christmas season. The Letter to the Hebrews calls to mind that our Lord is not interested so much in our material offerings, but in our desire to do the Father’s will. A purification of the soul and our intentions is what makes for a worthy act of worship and love of God. In the life of faith, each of us is called to offer ourselves to

FAITH FUNDAMENTALS | FATHER MICHAEL VAN SLOUN

The Eucharist, Christmas and the manger St. Luke places an extremely high value on the Eucharist, and it is a major point of emphasis woven into the fabric of his Gospel from beginning to end. He artfully inserts a curious detail into his birth account to begin to state his case: Mary “gave birth to her firstborn son … and laid him in a manger” (Lk 2:7). The manger is mentioned twice more in verses 12 and 16.

A manger is a feeding trough for animals. It is made of wood or stone, located on the ground or slightly above the ground, and contains hay or grain for cattle, horses, donkeys and other animals. It is not very sanitary, and it often is cold and damp.

What mother would place her baby in a manger? She would hold her newborn child in her arms or lay it in a crib.

This detail would have jumped off the page for Luke’s first readers, and it should stand out as peculiar to us. Luke is hoping that we will be wondering, “Why is baby Jesus in a manger?”

Animals approached the manger anytime, day or night, for food. The farmer was concerned about his animals and was careful to be sure that there would be feed in the trough at all times so the animals would be well-fed, healthy and strong.

The shepherds represent people everywhere, and as the animals approached the manger for food, the shepherds approached the manger to feast their eyes upon Jesus, and the infant in the manger would be the one to feed their souls, both with his word and the Eucharist, the great banquet feast of his Body and Blood.

God. Yet, this offering will only be pleasing to God if it truly flows from the heart.

We can say all the right words and adopt all the right gestures, but they do us no good if our hearts are empty of a sincere desire to fulfill God’s will.

In what remains of Advent, in which we are called to prepare ourselves for Christ, we can reflect upon the Blessed Mother and St. Elizabeth as a wonderful way to ready our hearts and minds for a worthy celebration of the Savior’s birth. In St. Luke’s Gospel, we are told that Mary sets out for the hill county “in haste” to visit her cousin.

Our Blessed Mother does not accumulate large expenses to see the work of God in her family — she simply is moved by faith to pursue God’s great goodness. In our forthcoming celebrations of Christmas, we can follow Mary’s example and move in haste to see God working in our families, friends and parishes.

Instead of exerting energy to make Christmas just right, dwelling on the right wrapping paper or the perfect surprise gift, we should instead focus on cultivating loving hearts that propel us forward to joyfully encounter those God puts in our path during these privileged days of Christmas.

The presents we buy and travels that we plan for the holidays will fade into history, but the love we offer to one another will be joined to our Lord’s love for us, the love we see so clearly in the Incarnation.

Let us ready our hearts now to move past material things to embrace the spiritual realities of God. Father Meyers is pastor of St. Francis Xavier in Buffalo.

The manger on Christmas anticipates the table at the Last Supper, and as the owner of the animals made sure that his animals would be well-fed to provide for their physical health, the infant Jesus would feed his sheep to provide for their spiritual health.

The manger begins a feeding or banquet theme that surfaces multiple times throughout Luke’s Gospel. Only Luke mentions that Jesus’ disciples “eat and drink” (Lk 5:33), that Jesus was accused of being “a glutton and a drunkard” (Lk 7:34), and that Jesus dined three times at the home of a Pharisee (Lk 7:36; 11:37; 14:1). Luke alone has two banquet parables, the parables of the Guests at the Banquet (Lk 14:7-14) and the Great Feast (Lk14:1524), both of which look ahead to the banquet of the Last Supper and further ahead to the eternal banquet in heaven (Lk 22:30).

Luke also reports how Levi gave a banquet for Jesus (Lk 5:29), and how Jesus miraculously fed a crowd of 5,000 (Lk 9:10-17).

Beginning with the manger, it all points to the Last Supper.

The infant in the manger would be the one who would take bread and say, “This is my body” (Lk 22:19), and a cup of wine and say, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood” (Lk 22:20).

And wanting to provide ongoing spiritual sustenance, he told his disciples to “Do this in memory of me” (Lk 22:19b). Then Jesus showed them how to re-enact the Eucharist when he broke bread with two of his disciples on Easter Sunday night at Emmaus (Lk 24:30).

The early Christian community took Jesus’ instruction to heart, and from the outset they devoted themselves “to the breaking of the bread” (Acts 2:42).

Most religious artists portray the infant Jesus in the manger on a bed of hay or straw, but those who grasp the Eucharist connection show him on a bed of wheat. (For example, note the wheat depicted in the stained glass window on page 1.) Luke would have us approach the manger and feast our eyes upon Jesus because the newborn child is food for our souls.

Father Van Sloun is pastor of St. Bartholomew in Wayzata. This column is part of an ongoing series on the Eucharist. Read more of his writing at TheCatholicSpirit.com and CatholicHotdish.com.

Prices starting at $2,499 ~ with Airfare Included in this price from anywhere in the USA

Several trips to different destinations: the Holy Land; Italy; France; Portugal; Spain; Poland; Medjugorje; Lourdes; Fatima; Ireland; Scotland; England; Austria; Germany; Switzerland; Turkey; Greece; Budapest; Prague; Our Lady of Guadalupe; Colombia; Brazil; Argentina; Domestic Destinations; etc.

We also specialize in custom trips for Bishops, Priests, and Deacons.

Call us 24/7 508-340-9370 or 855-842-8001 www.proximotravel.com anthony@proximotravel.com (Hablamos Español)

DECEMBER 20, 2018

DAILY Scriptures Sunday, Dec. 23 Fourth Sunday of Advent Mi 5:1-4a Heb 10:5-10 Lk 1:39-45 Monday, Dec. 24 2 Sm 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16 Lk 1:67-79 Tuesday, Dec. 25 Nativity of the Lord Is 52:7-10 Heb 1:1-6 Jn 1:1-18 Wednesday, Dec. 26 St. Stephen, first martyr Acts 6:8-10; 7:54-59 Mt 10:17-22 Thursday, Dec. 27 St. John, apostle and evangelist 1 Jn 1:1-4 Jn 20:1a, 2-8 Friday, Dec. 28 Holy Innocents, martyrs 1 Jn 1:5–2:2 Mt 2:13-18 Saturday, Dec. 29 1 Jn 2:3-11 Lk 2:22-35 Sunday, Dec. 30 Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph Sir 3:2-6, 12-14 Col 3:12-21 Lk 2:41-52 Monday, Dec. 31 1 Jn 2:18-21 Jn 1:1-18 Tuesday, Jan. 1 Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God Nm 6:22-27 Gal 4:4-7 Lk 2:16-21 Wednesday, Jan. 2 Sts. Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen, bishops and doctors of the Church 1 Jn 2:22-28 Jn 1:19-28 Thursday, Jan. 3 1 Jn 2:29–3:6 Jn 1:29-34 Friday, Jan. 4 St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, religious 1 Jn 3:7-10 Jn 1:35-42 Saturday, Jan. 5 St. John Neumann, bishop 1 Jn 3:11-21 Jn 1:43-51 Sunday, Jan. 6 Epiphany of the Lord Is 60:1-6 Eph 3:2-3a, 5-6 Mt 2:1-12 Monday, Jan. 7 1 Jn 3:22–4:6 Mt 4:12-17, 23-25 Tuesday, Jan. 8 1 Jn 4:7-10 Mk 6:34-44 Wednesday, Jan. 9 1 Jn 4:11-18 Mk 6:45-52 Thursday, Jan. 10 1 Jn 4:19–5:4 Lk 4:14-22 Friday, Jan. 11 1 Jn 5:5-13 Lk 5:12-16 Saturday, Jan. 12 1 Jn 5:14-21 Jn 3:22-30 Sunday, Jan. 13 Baptism of the Lord Is 42:1-4, 6-7 Acts 10:34-38 Lk 3:15-16, 21-22

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 17A

COMMENTARY FAITH IN THE PUBLIC ARENA | JASON ADKINS

The evil within

In politics today, people have fallen into the habit of condemning the evil in other persons, groups, structures or oppressor classes, while they themselves embrace the role of victim.

But the true enemy, from a Christian perspective, is never just something “out there.” Rather, as the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith reminds us in “Placuit Deo,” “the evil that is most damaging to the human person is that which comes from his or her heart.”

Who would know better about having ideological enemies than the Russian writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008)? He spent seven years in Soviet labor camps and three years in exile before being exonerated.

Though Solzhenitsyn was steadfast in denouncing the destructive ideology of the Soviet regime, he knew he could not succumb to personal hatred of individuals. He wrote: “It is impossible to expel evil from the world in its entirety, but it is possible to constrict it within each person.” Solzhenitsyn reminds us that the struggle for justice in our world is won or lost in the soul of each person.

Despite the evil inflicted upon him by others, he knew that the battle against evil for which he was most responsible was the one within his own heart. The same is true for each one of us.

Our culture views social relations increasingly through a victim/oppressor ideology, and we all have been conditioned to see ourselves as victims of some enemy class that seeks to impose its evil worldview upon us.

This trend can be seen on both sides of the political spectrum. One side blames an assortment of alleged bigots and status quo seekers — corporations, Christian nationalists, members of the patriarchy and white people — for the oppression of pretty much everyone else.

CATHOLIC WATCHMEN | DEACON GORDON BIRD

Evangelizing the ‘gift of the season’ through the year

This time of year we celebrate. Yet we’re reminded of how the Holy Family, who through persecution, joys, labors, prayers and sufferings, dealt with the ups and downs of life.

As they brought the reason for the season humbly and quietly into the world, Mary and Joseph had a difficult mission as the first evangelists. They showed believers that God always had the plan of salvation in mind. And by God’s grace, they were his holy, human vessels to help fulfill the plan he designed for us after the Fall. As soon as sin entered the world: “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil” (1 Jn 3:8).

Evangelizing — bringing to people the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ — is no easy task.

Enthusiastic, thought-provoking, charismatic witnesses, preachers and teachers have special, God-given gifts.

Collectively, these gifts are given to few. However, nothing is impossible for God, and through prayer, practical wisdom and other virtues we — the body of Christ — can learn and use the gifts we are given to better know, love and serve him. And with these gifts, we are all called to evangelize the gift of Jesus this season. Yet, our accountability to evangelize stretches across all seasons.

Meanwhile, the other side demonizes those branded as subversive elites and infiltrators: Marxists, Wall Street, multiculturalists, Hollywood, Muslims, immigrants and the media.

Each group’s hatred for its supposed enemies is palpable; even worse, one is guilty by association — all Republicans are misogynist white supremacists and all Democrats are anti-American communist enemies of the people.

There is, of course, a certain comfort in this approach, as it is certainly far easier to condemn the wicked “out there” than to recognize both our own sinfulness as a cause of social disorder and concurrent need for transformation.

But this growing hatred cannot end well. Coupled with the lack of civil debate and discourse, it will likely end in more bloodshed — some of which we’ve already begun to see in the Charlottesville violence, the mass shootings in Charleston and Pittsburgh, separate shootings that targeted congressional Republicans and the conservative Family Research Council, and in the clashes caused by the “Antifa” (anti-fascist) groups.

Plenty of ink has been spilled about how President Trump’s demagoguery has contributed to the growing divide in our country, which is undoubtedly true. But his 2016 election opponent is no better: “You cannot be civil with a political party that wants to destroy what you stand for, what you care about,” Hillary Clinton said in a CNN interview. “That’s why I believe, if we are fortunate enough to win back the House and or the Senate, that’s when civility can start again.”

Note the implications of Mrs. Clinton’s comment: Our political opponent is evil and out to destroy all good things; we, on the other hand, have chosen the path of righteousness and are oppressed by the powersthat-be because of it.

This kind of rhetoric is a recipe for more divisiveness, hatred and violence.

This does not mean we need to accept harmful, violent, and racist ideologies; in fact, we have the responsibility as Christians to confront them. But we must always see things through the lens of a broken, sinful and hurting world, recognizing that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23), especially and including ourselves.

There is no true justice where God is not worshipped.

In reviewing my notes from the Catholic Watchmen rally last month in Elko-New Market, which was hosted graciously by Father Patrick Barnes and St. Nicholas church, I noted the various questions directed to our guest and chief shepherd, Archbishop Bernard Hebda.

After his response to the first question on how he prays, some hard-hitting questions followed. The handling of priests and bishops associated with the recent sexual abuse crisis, Pope Francis’ leadership and cultural attributes, and discerning “irregular situations,” to name a few. A member of the audience also posed a question about sanctification and evangelization. He asked how, as Catholic men in this archdiocese, can we be better at evangelization?

Scripture tells us that “the Gospel must first be preached to all nations” (Mk 13:10). Jesus said this while with his inner circle of disciples, foretelling of persecutions and of a dismal outcome for Jerusalem.

“But he who endures to the end will be saved” (Mk 13:13). Subsequently, missionaries of the time spread the Good News of the saving grace of Jesus to much of the Roman Empire. Since the Church is still around thanks to those early evangelists who endured, we learn from the early Church that persistence pays.

Perhaps it is the “how?” of evangelizing that can hold one back. The response the archbishop gave was succinct, suggesting that one approach to evangelization was for the men to continue to participate in the Catholic Watchmen movement.

Pope St. Paul VI put it most powerfully: “Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses.” Witnesses build relationships of trust. And evangelists are witnesses who attract people by the way they live, building relationships and gaining friendships that invite others to take the next step. And that next step could be an offer to attend Mass, a monthly parish

Get to know your representatives As Catholics, we can begin to mend the fractures so prevalent in politics by reaching out in civic friendship to our newly elected officials, whether we voted for them or not. You can find out who your newly elected officials are by calling 651-296-2146 or visiting leg.state.mn.us.

Reaching out to your elected officials may seem daunting or even unpleasant, but it doesn’t have to be. By attending Catholics at the Capitol, the Minnesota Catholic Conference will equip you to take the first steps in building these important relationships. Join more than 2,000 Catholics on Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2019, for this day of prayer, inspiration, education and advocacy. You’ll hear from incredible witnesses who live out the faith in public, including actor Jim Caviezel. You’ll also be equipped to speak with your legislators about current issues affecting life and dignity.

Space is limited for this impactful day, so don’t delay!

Bring your friends, family and fellow parishioners. Get tickets and select your transportation option by visiting catholicsatthecapitol.org. We’ll see you in St. Paul on Feb. 19.

There is no order in the state or in society when there is no order in the soul.

To let the prophet Solzhenitsyn have the final word: “If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.”

Adkins is executive director of the Minnesota Catholic Conference, public policy voice of the Catholic Church in Minnesota.

gathering for men, the next Catholic Watchmen rally, Bible Boot Camp or the numerous activities at various venues throughout the archdiocese that provide fellowship and brotherhood.

For example, I’ve been attending a monthly First Friday men’s breakfast for 16 months. It’s created to expand the choir — so to speak — by inviting men to an opportunity to be better men by seeking Christ.

Designed as a pre-evangelization activity, it is simple and efficient — 6:15-7:15 a.m. — with no hard, cometo-Jesus meeting, which makes it curiously attractive.

Personal relationships have been the most successful way to boost attendance at the breakfast, but multimedia outreach has worked as well. And with follow-up, it can lead to a next step. Down the road, more active missionary disciples may be added to the Good Shepherd’s flock.

We certainly need to use effective resources and creative tools in missionary discipleship. But first we need to bring people to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ by using compassionate, compelling listening skills and by engaging in relationships. By offering ourselves and our God-given gifts each and every day to those with whom we interact, we bring the gift of Christ.

“Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in our serving; he who teaches, in his teaching; he who exhorts, in his exhortation; he who contributes, in liberality; he who gives aid, with zeal; he who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness” (Rom 12: 6-8).

We all have gifts to give!

Deacon Bird ministers at St. Joseph in Rosemount and assists the Catholic Watchmen movement of the archdiocese’s Office of Evangelization. Learn about Catholic Watchmen at rediscover.archspm.org/thecatholic-watchmen or at facebook.com/thecatholicwatchmen.

18A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

COMMENTARY

DECEMBER 20, 2018

YOUR HEART, HIS HOME | LIZ KELLY

A frozen world, a fiery hope

My beloved summer lake has now become a beloved winter lake, frozen into silence and stillness. The ice is thick enough to safely traverse, and my shining water world has become a sanctuary to me, a holy place to walk and pray and listen for God’s voice.

I unleash my dogs and we begin on the edges, making our way through the once marshy spots. My pups race back and forth between the muskrat mounds, big dome-shaped huts made from branches and cattails, where deep below the little creatures are lodged in hibernation. The snow crunches underneath my boots, my breath catches the air, I tighten my hood.

Gradually, the marsh gives way and we find ourselves heading out onto the deep of the lake where there is nothing ahead of us, just a vast, frozen, unpeopled expanse. It is our little winter desert, and its emptiness increases a sense of isolation in me. I feel my utter insignificance in the universe, and the hermit in me is comforted.

I am especially fond of walking the lake late in the day as the sun begins to set. Even on a cloudy day, it seems the sun still manages to penetrate the haze, announcing his presence with pink and orange hues that stretch like fiery arms along the horizon. There’s a desolate kind of peace in it, the kind that creates space for wonder.

And though the wind may whip bitter and unforgiving against my face, I marvel at the wild imagination of the Creator of heaven and earth who has seen fit that I should have a relationship with an object 94 million miles away. What a staggering thought. And though there be millions of miles of crystalline atmosphere between us, I still interact with Brother Sun, and he with me. He lights my path; I feel

“

I have to admire Brother Sun; he is not intimidated by winter nor darkness nor the vast expanse of space. Not even a little bit.

He burns on with celestial patience and a natural trust in the rhythms set forth by his Creator. iSTOCK | ESOlex

the heat of his burning heart; I must shade my eyes when he alights on the snow — he will not be ignored even in winter, even 100 million miles away.

I have to admire Brother Sun; he is not intimidated by winter nor darkness nor the vast expanse of space.

Not even a little bit. He burns on with celestial patience and a natural trust in the rhythms set forth by his Creator. Winter will come, and it will go, but Brother Sun knows what he is daily, dutifully about.

He blazes on, reminding me too that there is no expanse that Jesus cannot traverse; there is no distance big enough to keep him away from me, no barrier he cannot penetrate with his light, his healing, his glory. God Almighty would send me Brother Sun and the Infant-King to remind me of his awesome power and untamed creativity.

In an especially intentional way, this season asks us to “wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ” — and so we do. But I find myself praying that my hope is not only joyful, but fiery too, passionate, steadfast and unintimidated by even the most bitter spiritual winter.

God of the cosmos, you have appointed every star in the heavens and yet poured your glory into a child.

May we await the Savior’s coming in joyful, fiery, fearsome hope.

Kelly is the author of six books, including the awardwinning “Jesus Approaches” (Loyola Press, 2017) and a parishioner at St. Pius X in White Bear Lake. “Your Heart, His Home” is now a podcast. Listen at lizk.org.

“A silent night, a star above,

a blessed gift

of hope and love.

A blessed

Christmas to you!”

—Unknown

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 19A

CALENDAR Music

FEATURED EVENTS

Consortium Carissimi Epiphany Concert — Jan. 5 and 6: 7:30 p.m. Jan. 5; 3 p.m. Jan. 6 at the Chapel of St. Mary, St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity, 2115 Summit Ave., St. Paul. Consortium Carissimi singers will perform the Vivaldi Magnificat and motets of Giacomo Carissimi. consortiumcarissimi.org.

Archbishop’s Discernment Retreat — Dec. 28-30: 6 p.m. Dec. 28 to 1 p.m. Dec. 30 at Christ the King Retreat Center in Buffalo.

Archbishop Bernard Hebda will lead the retreat for men ages 18-50 who are discerning whether God may be calling them to the priesthood. Register at www.10000vocations.org. For more information, contact the archdiocesan Office of Vocations at 651-962-6890 or stpaulpriest@10000vocations.org.

Ongoing groups Calix Society — First and third Sunday each month: 9–10:30 a.m. at the Cathedral of St. Paul, 239 Selby Ave., St. Paul. A group of men, women, family and friends supporting the spiritual needs of recovering Catholic alcoholics. Kathy at 651-330-3387. calixsociety.com.

Messiah Christmas Concert — Dec. 21: 8 p.m. at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis. The event is co-presented by the Basilica and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and features Handel’s Messiah.

Tickets start at $78. For more information and to make reservations, contact Liz Legatt at 612-317-3428.

Order Franciscans Secular (OFS) — Third Sunday each month: 1 p.m. at Catholic Charities, 1200 Second Ave. S., Minneapolis. 952-922-5523.

Grieving with Hope — Second and fourth Tuesday each month: 2 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. at St. Ambrose, 4125 Woodbury Drive, Woodbury. LeAnn at 651-768-3009. saintambroseofwoodbury.org.

A Tudor Christmas: Reverence and Revelry at the English and Scottish Renaissance Courts — Dec. 22: 8 p.m. at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis. Music will be performed by The Rose Ensemble, featuring works by Englishmen William Byrd and Thomas Tallis, along with Scottish composers Robert Carver, Robert Johnson and “Tudor tutor” Philip van Wilder. The performance also will include compositions

by Henry VIII, including his famous “Pastime with Good Company.” Tickets are $15, $28 and $38, with children 12 and under free. For more information and to make reservations, visit roseensemble.org.

Job transitions and networking group — Tuesdays: 7–8:30 a.m. at St. Joseph the Worker, 7180 Hemlock Lane, Maple Grove. Bob at bob.sjtw@gmail.com. sjtw.net.

Dementia support group — Second Tuesday each month: 7–9 p.m. at St. Paul’s Monastery, 2675 Benet Road, Maplewood.

CARITAS cancer support group — Wednesdays: 10:30 a.m.–noon at St. Joseph’s Hospital, second floor, maternity classroom 2500, 45 W. 10th St., St. Paul.

Career Transition Group — Third Thursday each month: 7:30–8:30 a.m. at Holy Name of Jesus, 155 County Road 24, Wayzata. hnoj.org.

Dining out Knights of Columbus Lumberjack Breakfast — Jan. 6: 8:30 a.m.–noon at Mary Queen of Peace, St. Martin campus, 21304 Church Ave., Rogers.

Sponsored, cooked and served by the NW-Hennepin Knights of Columbus Council. mqpcatholic.org.

Prayer/worship Advent adoration — Dec. 22: 6–8 p.m. at St. John the Evangelist, 20088 Hub Drive, New Prague. Mass will follow at 8:15 p.m. npcatholic.org/st-john-theevangelist.

Taize prayer — Third Thursday each month: 7–9 p.m. at St. Paul’s Monastery, 2675 Benet Road, Maplewood. benedictinecenter.org.

Taize prayer — Third Friday each month: 7 p.m. at The Benedictine Center, St. Paul’s Monastery, 2675 Benet Road, Maplewood. 651-777-7251 or stpaulsmonastery.org.

Retreats Men’s Silent Weekend Retreat — Jan. 11-13 at Christ the King Retreat Center, 621 First Ave., S., Buffalo. Be Patient in Affliction, presented by the King’s House Preaching Team. kingshouse.com.

Just Write: Making Time for the Love of Words — Jan. 11-13 at St. Paul’s Monastery, 2675 Benet Road, Maplewood. Led by poet Vic Klimoski. benedictinecenter.org.

CALENDAR submissions DEADLINE: Noon Thursday, 14 days before the anticipated Thursday date of publication. We cannot guarantee a submitted event will appear in the calendar. Priority is given to events occurring before the next issue date.

LISTINGS: Accepted are brief no­tices of upcoming events hosted by Catholic parishes and organizations. If the Catholic connection is not clear, please emphasize it in your submission. Included in our listings are local events submitted by public sources that could be of interest to the larger Catholic community.

ITEMS MUST INCLUDE the following to be considered for publication: uTime and date of event uFull street address of event uDescription of event

Singles

u Contact information in case of questions

Sunday Spirits walking group for 50-plus Catholic singles — ongoing Sundays. The group usually meets in St. Paul on Sunday afternoons. Kay at 651-426-3103 or Al at 651-439-1203.

ONLINE: thecatholicspirit.com/calendarsubmissions MAIL: “Calendar,” The Catholic Spirit 777 Forest St., St. Paul, MN 55106

Singles group — ongoing second Saturday each month: 6:15 p.m. at St. Vincent de Paul, 9100 93rd Ave. N., Brooklyn Park. 763-425-0412.

for adoration. facebook.com/events/294960707893713.

Schools

Friday Night at the Friary — Third Friday of each month: 7–9 p.m. at Franciscan Brothers of Peace, 1289 Lafond Ave., St. Paul. Men ages 18-35 are invited for prayer and fellowship. facebook.com/queenofpeacefriary.

Benilde-St. Margaret’s open house — Jan. 7: 6–8:30 p.m. at 2501 Highway 100 S., St. Louis Park.

A premier Catholic, college-preparatory 7–12th-grade school. bsmschool.org.

St. Helena Catholic School PreK-8 open house — Jan. 10: 1:30–5:30 p.m. at 3200 E. 44th St., Minneapolis. sainthelenaschool.us.

Open House for prospective families — Jan. 10 and 15: 6 p.m. at Good Shepherd School, 145 Jersey Ave. S., Golden Valley. gsgvschool.wordpress.com.

Young adults Advent adoration and fellowship — Dec. 22: 10 a.m.–noon. Join Cathedral of St. Paul Young Adults

Other events Knights of Columbus bingo — Wednesdays: 6–9 p.m. at Solanus Casey Council Hall, 1910 S. Greeley St., Stillwater.

Catholic Single Adults Club’s Christmas dinner and dance — Jan. 5: 5:30 p.m.–midnight at David Fong’s Restaurant, 9329 Lyndale Ave. S., Bloomington.

For single Catholics, 21 and older. Register with Carl at 651-603-1412 by Dec. 27. caci.org/cac/tccac.html.

Marketplace • Message Center Classified Ads Email: classifiedads@archspm.org • Phone: 651-290-1631 • Fax: 651-291-4460 Next issue: 1-10-19 • Deadline: 3 p.m. 1-3-19 • Rates: $8 per line (35-40 characters per line) • Add a photo/logo for $25 ACCESSIBILITY SOLUTIONS STAIR LIFTS - ELEVATORS WHEELCHAIR LIFTS FOR HOMES, CHURCHES & SCHOOLS Arrow Lift (763) 786-2780

ANTIQUES TOP CASH PAID For Older Furniture Advertising Signs • Beer Items • Toys • Misc.

(651) 227-2469

ATTORNEYS Edward F. Gross • Wills, Trusts, Probate, Estate Planning, Real Estate. Office at 35E & Roselawn Ave., St. Paul (651) 631-0616.

CEILING TEXTURE Michaels Painting. Popcorn Removal & Knock Down Texture: TextureCeilings.com (763) 757-3187.

CEMETERY LOTS FOR SALE Gethsemane Mausoleum: Prime Interior Chapel Aisle, true companion crypt, No. 35, Tier B. Transfer to be handled by cemetery.

Value $22,580; Price $17,500 (651) 260-5869.

St. Mary’s Mausoleum, Mpls; one crypt (2 persons). Market $9930; Price $5000 or best offer: (213) 447-6336.

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES Faith-based private foundation seeks Executive Assistant to provide support to the Executive Director. The ideal candidate will have a staff accountant, legal assistant, or banking/trust officer background and will be comfortable in a supportive staff role; former executives and upper level managers will not be considered. This position is ideal for a second career and for someone who wants to make a difference in the community.

Strong written and oral communication skills are required. Seeking a candidate who will work independently and in coordination with the Executive Director in a full-time, (Cont.)

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES (Cont.) work-from-home position at a competitive salary. Applicants should have a strong understanding of the Catholic faith and the needs of the poor. Please send resume and cover letter to info.gfoffice@yahoo.com.

GREAT CATHOLIC SPEAKERS CD of the Month Club Lighthouse Catholic Media, Scott Hahn, Jeff Cavins and more! $5/month includes shipping.

Subscribe online at http://www.lighthousecatholicmedia. org/cdclub Please Enter Code: 1195

HANDYMAN WE DO 1,162 THINGS AROUND THE HOME! Catholic Owned Handyman Business: We will fix/repair and remodel almost anything around the home. Serving entire Metro. Call today.

Mention this ad and receive 10% off labor.

Handyman Matters (651) 784-3777, (952) 946-0088. www.HandymanMatters.com.

catholichotdish.com HARDWOOD FLOORS

Sweeney’s Hardwood Floors

WINTER’S HERE! Spruce up your home with new or refurbished hardwood floors: 10% off labor. Sweeney (651) 485-8187.

PAINTING For painting & all related services. View our website: PAINTINGBYJERRYWIND. COM or call (651) 699-6140.

Merriam Park Painting. Professional Int./ Ext. Painting. WP Hanging. Moderate Prices, Free Estimates. Call Ed (651) 224-3660.

Michaels Painting. Texture and Repair.

MichaelsPaintingllc.coM. (763) 757-3187.

Dennis Heigl Painting Interior/Exterior Serving Mpls. & suburbs. Free Estimates.

(612) 819-2438

The 2019 Catholic Spirit Fish Fry and Lenten Meal Guide

There’s nothing shrimpy about it.

Look for it in print and at TheCatholicSpirit.com Feb. 21.

Ask a our 3 bout t speciaime l!

PRAYERS

NOTICE: Prayers must be submitted in advance. Payment of $8 per line must be received before publication.

REAL ESTATE Sonia Kamau | (860) 797-6036 soniawkamau@kw.com Real Estate Consultant at Keller Williams Integrity Lakes Moving out? Moving in? Moving up?

Ask Sonia!

VACATION/FAMILY GETAWAY Knotty Pines Resort, Park Rapids, MN. 1, 2 & 3 bdrm cabins starting at $565/week. www.knottypinesresort.com (800) 392-2410.

Mention this ad for a discount!

WANTED TO BUY Estate & Downsizing: I buy Van Loads and Bicycles. Steve (651) 778-0571.

20A • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THELASTWORD

Spotlight on

Narnia Home-school group brings classic C.S. Lewis tale to life on the stage Story and photos by Dave Hrbacek The Catholic Spirit

T

he Christmas season began in May for Karen and Tracy Sattler of All Saints in northeast Minneapolis.

It had nothing to do with shopping or party planning. They were selecting a play for their high school drama group to perform during Advent. The couple, directors of Spotlight Family Theater, wanted to choose something related to Christmas for their annual December shows, which take place at Holy Family Academy in St. Louis Park.

They picked “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” from C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia novel series. Four performances took place through Dec. 15, featuring 20 high school actors, including three of the couple’s seven children — Leah, 17, Elijah, 12, and Levi, 10. All 20 are home-schooled and belong to a St. Louis Park-based home-school cooperative called Holy Family Home Educators.

The Sattlers look forward to the play every year, and they say it is a good bonding experience for their family. All of their children have participated since the theater group started in 2005.

“So many great family memories have come from doing shows over the years,” said Karen, 53. “It’s a great, great thing. I absolutely love it.”

The theater group did spring performances early on, then switched to December shows four years ago. At that time, a decision also was made to cast mainly high school students. Performances in recent years include “A Christmas Carol” and “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

The Sattlers have enjoyed not only being together as a family, but also spending two-and-a-half to three months rehearsing with the other children and families. Karen noted that all of the parents get involved, too, which creates a family-like atmosphere by the time the curtain closes after the final performance.

“We spend three or four nights a week together for three hours each time, and after the last performance we’re all in tears,” she said. “We see what it means to create, and then it’s gone; it’s gone forever except in our memories. And, we’ll all be able to do it again in heaven.”

Some of the high school students like it so much they come back year after year. Senior Ketura Bremseth of St. Anne in Hamel took on her most challenging role this year when she accepted the part of the White Witch. The character’s nasty demeanor doesn’t come naturally to her, but she was eager to learn how to portray evil on the stage.

“It’s taken a lot of practice,” said Bremseth, 17, the second-youngest of six children in her family, all of whom have performed in Spotlight Family Theater.

“My past roles haven’t really been this evil, so this has been a new challenge for me.”

Bremseth has been acting with Spotlight Family Theater since ninth grade but started performing when she was 4. This year, she’s joined on stage by her younger sister, Abigail, 16, who plays one of the two narrators. The play tells the story of four children who go through a wardrobe door and into Narnia, where they encounter the White Witch and Aslan, a lion who rescues the inhabitants of the land who have been experiencing perpetual winter. The story has parallels to the Christmas story, which is why the Sattlers picked it.

Until Spotlight Family Theater narrowed its casting to high school-age homeschoolers, younger children could participate. One of them was Caleb Rome, a senior who started when he was 10, and who plays Peter, the oldest of the four children who go through the wardrobe. He hopes to continue acting in college next year.

“I want to do at least a minor in theater,” said Rome, 18. “It’s just something I really enjoy. ... There’s such a unique feeling when you’re on stage performing for people. It’s unexplainable. It’s just the joy of being able to go into a different world and then entertain people at the same time. There’s really no feeling like it in the world.”

ABOVE TOP Battling for Narnia are the White Witch, played by Ketura Bremseth, and Edmund, played by Nick Fahnlander, during a dress rehearsal Dec. 6 at Holy Family Academy in St. Louis Park.

ABOVE CENTER Lucy (kneeling), played by Mary Roden, and Susan, played by Leah Sattler, mourn the death of Aslan, played by Michael Fahnlander.

LEFT From left, Edmund, played by Nick Fahnlander, and Peter, played by Caleb Rome, open the wardrobe door.

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 1B

ARCHDIOCESAN CHANCERY CORPORATION ANNUAL FINANCIAL REPORT • 2018

Seeing beyond the numbers

W

hile it’s not unusual to hear Christ characterized in our tradition as “teacher,” “shepherd,” “physician,” “advocate,” “judge” or “lawgiver,” I’m unaware of any instance in which he’s known as the “divine accountant” or the “celestial CFO.” That’s not to say that he doesn’t provide great advice in that area. His parable of the talents suggests that he has a good sense of investment, and his oftquoted statement that “to anyone to whom much has been given, much shall be required” reveals an appreciation of the necessary connection between assets and debits. Moreover, he manifests a ARCHBISHOP passion for faithful stewardship and BERNARD HEBDA rendering accounts, and he was careful not to lose any of the sheep his Father had entrusted to him.

I am delighted to present this year’s Annual Financial Report, and I hope that you will read it carefully as an accounting of what we have done over the course of the last fiscal year with the substantial resources that have been made available to us. I continue to be humbled by the generosity of the faithful of this archdiocese.

I hope that you, like me, will see beyond the mere numbers when you study this report. One of the blessings of being the archbishop is that I have had etched in my brain the faces, for example, of the young people who participated in Archdiocesan Youth Day, and of the graduates of the educational programs offered by our Office of Latino Ministry, and of our newly ordained priests as they begin their priestly ministry.

Those numbers in the report also remind me of all the efforts of the Office for the Protection of Children and Youth and the Office of Ministerial Standards and Safe Environment to make sure that we are following

“

As is reflected in this year’s Annual Financial Report, we are blessed to be part of an archdiocese in which so many lay faithful are willing to so generously offer their time and talents to the service of the local Church, responding in fidelity to Christ’s call to servant leadership. through on our promise to foster safe environments in our parishes and schools. They recall for me as well our commitment to provide fair compensation to those who have been hurt by those who minister in the name of our Church. They bring back memories of the children encountering Jesus in our Catholic Schools and of those living on the peripheries of our communities whose lives are changed by the great work of Catholic Charities. I hope that this year’s Annual Financial Report will be an occasion for you to share my pride in the work that was accomplished by our brothers and sisters around the archdiocese in very difficult times.

When it comes to financial administration, we are truly blessed to have a very competent professional staff, who have met head-on the challenges posed by our bankruptcy. They have responded well to the direction set by the Archdiocesan Finance Council (AFC) and Corporate Board, who, along with the priests serving on the College of Consultors and Presbyteral Council, have been valued collaborators in the important work of achieving stability and creating structures and procedures that will help us restore trust.

Throughout the bankruptcy process, the volunteers

serving on the AFC and Corporate Board have gone above and beyond the call of duty. I am grateful to all of them, and especially to the AFC chairman, Tom Abood, for the additional commitment of time that was required to help us arrive at the consensual plan that was essential for moving us beyond bankruptcy.

As is reflected in this year’s Annual Financial Report, we are blessed to be part of an archdiocese in which so many lay faithful are willing to so generously offer their time and talents to the service of the local Church, responding in fidelity to Christ’s call to servant leadership.

The archdiocesan website archspm.org provides annual financial reports stretching back to 2012.

Anyone comparing this year’s financials with the 2012 figures will note that we are today a much leaner operation. While the needs of God’s people have remained constant if not grown, we now have a significantly smaller archdiocesan staff to respond to them. I’m grateful to all those working at the Archdiocesan Catholic Center for finding creative ways of collaborating with our pastors and parish staffs that have enabled the Church to maintain a high level of service with significantly fewer resources. I feel privileged to work with these colleagues and know that I have benefited from their contagious Christ-centered commitment to our essential mission.

While our pledge to pay $1 million each of the next five years to the Bankruptcy Trust will necessitate that we continue to be disciplined in our expenditures, I hope that this 2018 Annual Financial Report helps you to share my confidence that our local Church is nonetheless prepared to move forward.

Please know of my gratitude for your generous financial support and expressions of growing trust.

Through the intercession of Our Lady, Undoer of Knots, may the Lord continue to bring fruit to our labors.

Financial Officer Report Author’s note: The following comments elaborate on the financial statements of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Chancery Corporation (“archdiocese”) that ended June 30, 2018. Financial statements are included in this issue of The Catholic Spirit. The Management Discussion and Analysis and Financial Statements are posted at archspm.org on the Administration and Finance page.

By Thomas Mertens, CFO

Introduction The Fiscal Year 2018 of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis began July 1, 2017, and ended June 30, 2018. For the first time since filing for Reorganization in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in January 2015, the archdiocese has some financial certainty as we approach the New Year.

The most significant financial development occurred June 28, 2018, shortly before the end of our Fiscal Year 2018, when the archdiocese and the Unsecured Creditors Committee, representing more than 400 sexual abuse claimants, filed a $210 million Joint Plan of Reorganization that provides remuneration to those harmed and allows the archdiocese to continue the mission of the Church.

In the 2017 Financial Report, I noted that the second Amended Plan of Reorganization was filed in December 2016 and proposed a settlement of $156 million. Thanks to mediation involving all parties, that number reached $210 million in late spring. The $210 million Joint Plan was approved by the judge overseeing the case Sept. 25, 2018, and we were discharged from our debts Oct. 11, 2018. We are

emerging from Bankruptcy and expect the case to be closed in December of this year.

As was our intention from the Plan’s filing in January 2015, the consensual Plan consisted primarily of insurance settlements with carriers that issued policies for coverage over the past 70 years. The other significant sources were insurance settlements from parishes in the archdiocese; proceeds from the sale of archdiocesan properties; unrestricted cash; the sale of our land to three Catholic high schools; and contributions from parishes, the General Insurance Program, Archdiocesan Medical Benefit Plan and priests.

In addition, the archdiocese signed a non-interest bearing promissory note payable to the Bankruptcy Trust that requires an annual payment of $1 million over the next five years. All proceeds have been or will be transferred to the Bankruptcy Trust, which is overseen by a trustee selected by attorneys for the survivors. Most of the funds should be distributed to claimants before the end of this calendar year.

Legal and professional expenses incurred since filing for Reorganization in 2015 totaled approximately $20 million. The archdiocese paid nearly $8 million of those expenses during the bankruptcy, and the Plan calls for the remaining amount to be paid from the Bankruptcy Trust. A significant amount of these legal and professional fees were incurred to maximize insurance proceeds from archdiocese and parish insurance policies for those harmed for events dating back as far as the 1940s. Payments from insurance carriers into the Bankruptcy Trust accounted for $175 million of the $210 million Plan.

While we provide administrative and pastoral support to parishes, Catholic schools and other

Catholic entities in the 12 counties that make up the archdiocese, this annual fiscal report does not contain their financial information. That is because, under Minnesota law, they are all independent corporations with completely separate finances, and they are required to prepare and publish their own financial reports.

In our commitment to accountability and transparency to the Catholic faithful and the public, the archdiocese has released its full audited financial reports annually since June 30, 2013. This is important to Archbishop Bernard Hebda, the Archdiocesan Finance Council and staff because approximately 70 percent of the archdiocese’s funding comes from parish assessments, which is predominately the result of plate and envelope collections from parishioners. People who give so generously to this local Church deserve a full accounting of their resources.

For the fourth year, because of the bankruptcy reorganization, the archdiocese asked our CPA firm to perform Agreed Upon Procedures on our financial statements for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2018.

These procedures do not represent an audit, and, as a result, you will not see an Independent Auditor’s Report attached to our financial statements. The Agreed Upon Procedures were developed by management and the Archdiocesan Finance Council in consultation with our CPA firm, and they will assist us in governance of the archdiocese by requiring attestation procedures on key balance sheet accounts and review of the income statement and internal controls. The Agreed Upon Procedures are

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

2018FINANCIALREPORT

2B • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Chancery Corporation Operating Expense before Special Issues Expense Fiscal Year 2018: $19.6 Million

Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Chancery Corporation Operating Revenue Fiscal Year 2018: $20.6 Million

Contributions $2.73

Other Income $0.64 Parish Assessments $14.56

Investment Income, net $0.29

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Community Services $0.08 Stewardship & Development Marriage, Family & Life $0.47 $0.86 Latino Ministries $0.48 Parish Services & Outreach $1.52

Central Services $5.11

Communications $1.88 Fees & Program Revenues $2.37 General & Administrative $2.91 Clergy Services $4.74 Evangelization $0.27 Catholic Education $1.31 FY 2018 PROGRAM EXPENSES

FY 2018 REVENUE

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE Parish Assessments

Fees & Programs Revenues

Investment than Incomean audit. When we significantly less expensive Contributionslater this calendar year, emerge from Reorganization Other Income practice of annual we will return to the standard independent audits next fiscal year and will continue our practice of releasing the information promptly after completion of our financial statements and auditor’s report.

Financial condition For the year ended June 30, 2018, we generated a surplus from operations before Special Issues Expense of nearly $1 million as compared to a surplus before Special Issues Expense of $2.3 million in Fiscal Year 2017.

Our loss from operations in Fiscal Year 2018 was $20 million because of Special Issues Expense of $21 million related to the bankruptcy settlement. Our loss from operations in Fiscal Year 2017 was $2.6 million, which included approximately $4.8 million of Special Issues Expense.

The Special Issues Expense of nearly $21 million in Fiscal Year 2018 reflects the obligations of the archdiocese agreed to in the Plan that became effective Oct. 11, 2018. Those obligations include a cash payment of $23,475,000; a promissory note of $5 million; sale of land to three Catholic high schools for $4 million in aggregate; assignment of rights to an estate and workers compensation refund; and mediator and bankruptcy filing fees. These expenses were offset by legal and professional fees previously recorded that were determined to be the obligation of the Bankruptcy Trust under the Plan. The $23,475,000 noted above was transferred to the Bankruptcy Trust in October 2018, and the sale of the high school land also took place in October 2018. Proceeds from the sales were transferred directly to the Bankruptcy Trust by the purchasers.

Revenue Total Operating Revenue in Fiscal Year 2018 was $20.6 million, down approximately $150,000 from Fiscal Year 2017. Parish Assessments, Fees and Program Revenues, and Investment Income all were

$ % $ % Central Services 5.11 26.06% lower, while Contributions and Other Income The General Insurance Program of the Archdiocese 14.56 70.73% Clergy Services 4.74 24.17% increased slightly.

The Investment Income is of St. Paul and Minneapolis provides comprehensive, 2.37 11.49% Catholic Education 1.31 6.70% generated from restricted funds and is not available uniform coverage to all of the parishes, 0.29 1.42% Evangelization & Catechesis 0.27 Catholic 1.36% for general operations. schools and certain other Catholic 2.91 entities14.82% within the 2.73 13.25% General & Administrative archdiocese, as well as the Chancery Corporation.

The Communications 1.88 9.57% 0.64 3.11% Parish Assessments, our primary source of revenue, and Outreach 1.52 7.74% 20.59 coverage provided by the General Insurance Program are generated from the 187 parishes within the Parish Services Ministries 0.48 general 2.43% includes commercial property, casualty, archdiocese, and they decreased slightly in 2018Latino from Development & Stewardship 0.47 2.39% liability and workers’ compensation.

The General 2017. Assessments are calculated and billed on a twoCommunity Services 0.08the benefit 0.38% of the Insurance Program is maintained for year lag, which means the parish financial results for Marriage, Family and Life 0.86 participants who have contributed to those4.37% funds in the years ended June 30, 2015 and 2016 formed the 19.60

basis for the Parish Assessment revenue for the years ended June 30, 2017 and 2018, respectively. Under the Plan, the archdiocese agreed not to change the assessment methodology or rates to the parishes for a two-year period.

Operating expense

Our Operating Expense Before Special Issues Expense in 2018 totaled approximately $19.6 million as compared to $18.5 million in 2017, an increase of 6.1 percent. The increase is the result of increased costs to support seminary education and graduate education for priests, and costs related to ministerial standards and safe environment initiatives. In addition, the archdiocese increased its allowance for doubtful accounts by nearly $470,000 on loans it made decades ago under a program where parish deposits provided funds for those loans. Under the Plan, those parish deposits are required to be refunded to parishes through offsets against current and future assessment billings.

Non-operating activity — Gain on sale of assets The archdiocese sold the Dayton Building, which was previously used as office space by staff, in 2017.

This sale resulted in cash received of approximately $875,000 and a book gain from the sale of $779,000.

There were no gains or losses on the sale of assets in 2018. The gain on the sale of land to the three Catholic high schools in October 2018 will be recorded during the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2019.

Non-operating activity — ­ General Insurance Program

exchange for obtaining insurance coverage.

The General Insurance Program had a surplus from operations of $2.8 million in 2018, as compared to $2.1 million in 2017, due to lower claims in the most recent year. As stated earlier, the General Insurance Program contributed $6 million to the Plan. The expense of this contribution is included in Special Issues Expense and not General Insurance Program Expenses. In addition, the archdiocese has assigned a potential refund from the workers’ compensation investment account of excess funds not required by the Minnesota Department of Commerce for self-funded plans. We estimated this refund for purposes of the bankruptcy settlement at $800,000 and have classified it as a Special Issues Expense. It is included on the Balance Sheet under Bankruptcy Settlement Liability. This refund request was submitted to the Minnesota Department of Commerce, and the archdiocese is anticipating a response in the near term.

Non-operating activity — Priest Benefits The archdiocese coordinates a self-insured health and dental benefit fund for active priests and seminarians within the archdiocese. The archdiocese invoices parishes, Catholic schools and other Catholic entities based on clergy assignments and pays benefit providers directly for any claims. Priest Benefits generated $487,000 of income in 2018 as compared to a slight profit in 2017 and a significant loss in 2016. The income was the result of lower claims per participant in the current year as compared to the prior year.

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

2018FINANCIALREPORT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT • 3B

Supporting the mission of the Church The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis serves Catholics and the greater 12-county Twin Cities community. The following narrative explains the function of each department and the funding level for Fiscal Year 2018. There also is a chart that illustrates the expenditures, as compared to other departments.

Catholic Education • $1,313,560 The Office for the Mission of Catholic Education (OMCE) provides support for Catholic schools and parish faith formation programs in the archdiocese by focusing on Catholic identity, leadership development and assistance in implementing academic programs. A particular area of emphasis is providing programmatic oversight to promote innovation and excellence in local urban Catholic Schools. The OMCE is focused on forming a new generation of Catholic students by teaming up with private partners including the Aim Higher Foundation, Catholic Schools Center of Excellence and GHR Foundation.

Central Services • $5,109,558 The Department of Central Services provides support and services to archdiocesan staff and the parishes. The department includes the offices of the chancellors of civil and canonical affairs, information technology services, the metropolitan tribunal, human resources and benefits, records and archives, the Office of Financial Standards and Parish Accounting, and facility and maintenance. Also covered in this category are assessments to the Minnesota Catholic Conference and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Clergy Services • $4,739,194 The role of this office is to provide support and formation for priests and deacons in all aspects of ministry and pastoral care. Services provided by this office include the following: Seminary Formation: There are currently 54 men in formation for the priesthood for service of our archdiocese. While the number changes throughout the discernment process, our archdiocese has one of the largest enrollments of seminarians of any diocese in the country. The archdiocese funds the medical and dental coverage of those seminarians, as well as tuition, room and board of those attending the Pontifical North American College in Rome.

Center for Clergy Formation: Institute of Ongoing Formation for Clergy and the Institute of Diaconate Formation comprise the Center for Clergy Formation.

Each entity of the center provides an integrated approach to priestly and diaconate formation, including gatherings and support for newly ordained priests, programs to assist new pastors in their role and ongoing formation opportunities for priests and deacons throughout the archdiocese.

Continuing Education: This includes continuing education opportunities, a sabbatical program, international enculturation and a biennial presbyteral assembly.

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

Financial position Net Assets of the archdiocese were nearly $27.3 million on June 30, 2017. As of June 30, 2018, the Net Assets were approximately $10.5 million. The decrease is the result of the bankruptcy settlement recorded during the year ending June 30, 2018.

Of the total cash on June 30, 2018, of $28 million, $23,475,000 represents cash restricted for the bankruptcy settlement, cash restricted by donors of $1.9 million and unrestricted cash of $2.7 million. As of June 30, 2018, there were no Board Designated funds, as all of those funds were contributed to the bankruptcy settlement in October. We believe that the remaining balance of unrestricted cash, after payment of all bankruptcy settlement obligations, will allow the archdiocese to operate and continue its mission.

The decrease in the General Insurance Program

Ministerial Standards and Safe Environment: The mission of the Office of Ministerial Standards and Safe Environment is to work with our community to prevent the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable adults through a number of initiatives, including implementing abuse prevention programs, immediately reporting allegations of abuse to law enforcement and/ or child/adult protection officials and cooperating fully with their investigations, and helping those affected by abuse in their healing journey.

Priest Support: This includes support for priests who are not in ministry due to personal health issues or a disciplinary leave of absence, as well as those who have been permanently removed from ministry.

Chaplaincies: There are 36 priests and 25 deacons in full- or part-time ministry at hospitals and correctional facilities throughout the archdiocese who are supported by the archdiocese. There are many other priests and deacons throughout the archdiocese who provide pastoral care at health care, correctional facilities or schools, either as a ministry of their parish or through their outreach work. They offer the sacraments and spiritual support during some of the most difficult times in peoples’ lives. Last year, thousands of people throughout our community were served by chaplains.

Specialized Ministries: This includes the Office of Vocations, support for international clergy and retired clergy, which includes the operation of the Leo C. Byrne Residence for retired priests in St. Paul.

Communications • $1,875,894 The Office of Communications helps convey the teachings of the Church and fosters communications between the archdiocese and the faithful, parish and school leaders and staff, and others in our community.

It does this through The Catholic Spirit, multiple websites, social media, e-newsletters, printing services and other communications. The office also conducts media consultation and training for clergy, parishes and other representatives of the archdiocese, and it works with secular TV and radio stations, as well as with print and online publications.

Community Services • $75,050 The archdiocese helps men, women and children most in need within our local community, including the poor, hungry, and homeless, primarily through cash support to Catholic Charities of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Evangelization • $267,180 The Office of Evangelization (OE) creates opportunities for people to encounter Jesus Christ and to make the truth of Christ and his Church clearly understood and accessible. Evangelization efforts are created and experienced in cooperation with parishes and Catholic schools and the many ministry groups throughout this local Church. The Office of Evangelization’s initiatives include a grandparents ministry and Catholic Watchmen.

Assets was due to the classification of cash. The $6 million contribution to the bankruptcy settlement was reflected in Cash Restricted for Bankruptcy at June 30, 2018, while in the prior year the cash was reflected in the General Insurance Program Assets. The decrease of approximately $8.3 million in Accounts Payable and Accrued Liabilities, Post-Petition, is the result of previously accrued and unpaid Special Issues Expense becoming obligations of the Bankruptcy Trust and not the archdiocese under the Plan.

Looking forward As the Bankruptcy comes to a close and I reflect on these past four years, I am comforted knowing that our primary objective prior to and during the Bankruptcy process of obtaining the most resources possible for the survivors was achieved while continuing our mission. The work of our staff, legal counsel, Archdiocesan Finance Council and Corporate

Marriage, Family and Life • $856,950 This Office of Marriage, Family and Life assists the laity and parishes through programs supporting marriage preparation, family education programming, respect life, pro-life groups, biomedical ethics and outreach for people with disabilities.

The office also sponsors the annual Archdiocesan Youth Day that brings together hundreds of local highschool-aged teens to praise God, grow in the faith and find fellowship. In addition, this office helps coordinate local representatives attending the National March for Life, World Youth Day, the National Catholic Youth Conference and other youth events.

Parish Services and Outreach • $1,517,428 The Office of Parish Services provides consultation, planning and leadership development opportunities to parishes throughout the archdiocese. The archdiocese supports outreach ministry to various groups and members of the archdiocesan community, including Indian ministry, black Catholic initiatives, the Venezuelan mission, the Archdiocesan Council of Catholic Women, deaf ministry, and other groups and coalitions.

Latino Ministries • $475,989 There are more than 24 Latino Ministry parishes throughout the archdiocese that receive support from the Office of Latino Ministry. These Latino Ministry parishes offer the sacraments, catechesis and spiritual support to tens of thousands of Spanish speaking people throughout the local Church. The Office of Latino Ministry also oversees special days of celebration of faith and family throughout the year. In addition, biblical, catechetical and pastoral leadership formation institutes are provided for members of the Latino community to assist them in growing in the faith.

Support Services General and Administrative • $2,905,425 The offices of the archbishop, retired archbishops, bishops, vicar general, accounting, finance and general administration are included in the General and Administrative category. Over half of this expense category supports salaries and benefits of staff. Also included are expenses incurred for non-bankruptcy related legal fees and bad debt expense.

Stewardship and Development • $468,100 This office works with parishes and Catholic schools to help grow a culture of stewardship in local communities and to support parish and school development efforts. The office also engages in outreach to benefactors who wish to support specific ministries or programs of the Chancery Corporation.

Board to pursue this objective was tremendous. Our staff endured continuous expense reductions and layoffs and were able to continue to provide support for our programs through creativity, hard work and perseverance.

We are fully aware of our future financial obligations to fund the Bankruptcy Trust over the next five years, and we are committed to making the difficult decisions required to provide the resources to meet our obligations.

We also know and understand that our work is never complete as it relates to the protection of children, and we vow to continue to do all we can to keep children safe in this archdiocese.

The past four years have been difficult, challenging and uncertain for all Catholics. I want to thank all of the clergy, lay leaders, staff, volunteers, parishioners and others within the archdiocese for their commitment to creating a stronger, more unified local Church.

2018FINANCIALREPORT

4B • THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Condensed Statements of Financial Position

Condensed Statements of Activities THE ARCHDIOCESE OF ST. PAUL AND MINNEAPOLIS (Debtor in Possession) Chancery Corporation Statements of Activities (Unaudited) Years ended June 30, 2018 and 2017

THE ARCHDIOCESE OF ST. PAUL AND MINNEAPOLIS (Debtor in Possession) Chancery Corporation Statements of Financial Position (Unaudited) As of June 30, 2018 and 2017

2018 2017 2018

OPERATING REVENUE ASSETS Contributions Parish Assessments Fees and Program Revenues Investment Income, Net Other Income Operating Revenue

$2,727,981 $2,644,583 14,561,156 14,596,231 2,365,234 2,556,976 291,356 400,099 641,001 540,001 20,586,728

20,737,890

1,313,560 5,109,558 4,739,194 1,875,894 75,050 267,180 856,950 1,517,428 475,989

1,231,886 5,063,918 4,124,615 1,849,891 67,569 225,157 957,191 1,580,189 379,884

16,230,803

15,480,300

Support Services: General and Administrative Stewardship and Development

2,905,425 468,100

2,490,280 501,406

Total Support Services

3,373,525

2,991,686

19,604,328

18,471,986

982,400

2,265,904

20,991,488

4,829,831

(20,009,088)

(2,563,927)

OPERATING EXPENSE Program Services: Catholic Education Central Services Clergy Services Communications Community Services Evangelization Marriage, Family and Life Parish Services and Outreach Latino Ministries Total Program Services

Total Operating Expense before Special Issues Expense Change in Net Assets from Operations before Special Issues Expense Special Issues Expense Change in Net Assets from Operations NON-OPERATING ACTIVITY Gain on Sale of Assets General Insurance Program Revenues General Insurance Program Expenses Priest Benefit Revenues Priest Benefit Expenses Change in Net Assets from Non-Operating Activities CHANGES IN NET ASSETS

Cash — Unrestricted and Board Designated Cash — Restricted for Bankruptcy Cash — Restricted by Donors Contributions Receivable, Net of Allowances Accounts Receivables, Net of Allowances Loans Receivable, Net of Allowances Investments Beneficial Interest in Perpetual Trusts General Insurance Program Assets Prepaid Expenses and Other Assets Land, Property and Equipment, Net Total Assets

$2,698,445 23,475,000 1,880,642 535,156 4,784,148 697,604 143,414 1,519,426 10,773,364 315,003 4,244,390 $52,066,592

2017

$9,109,463 8,777,117 3,057,432 573,991 4,044,160 1,105,777 1,077,007 1,488,199 14,106,969 324,092 4,540,216 $48,204,423

LIABILITIES AND NET ASSETS Liabilities

Accounts Payable and Accrued Liabilities, Pre-Petition Accounts Payable and Accrued Liabilities, Post-Petition Litigation Claims Payable, Net of Insurance Recovery Bankruptcy Settlement Liability General Insurance Program Claims Payable and Other Liabilities Amounts Held for Others Under Agency Transactions Parish Demand Deposits Deferred Revenue Lease Payable Deferred Rent Note Payable — Bankruptcy Settlement

$242,332 $242,252 1,577,658

9,880,768

— 28,694,031

4,600,000 —

4,836,053

4,928,498

175,232 495,028 144,176 65,469 351,963 5,000,000

127,892 679,304 75,357 75,090 347,554 —

41,581,942

20,956,716

Unrestricted Temporarily Restricted Permanently Restricted

6,291,163 2,436,912 1,756,575

22,290,884 2,948,733 2,008,090

Total Net Assets

10,484,650

27,247,707

$52,066,592

$48,204,423

Total Liabilities Net Assets

— 9,479,187 (6,720,347) 3,101,556 (2,614,366)

797,084 9,404,646 (7,303,322) 2,752,875 (2,618,252)

Total Liabilities and Net Assets 3,246,031

3,033,030

$(16,763,057)

$469,103