The Catholic Spirit - October 27, 2022

Pope Francis speaking to an estimated 35,000 people gathered at St. Peter’s Square Oct. 23 for the recitation of the Angelus prayer. The pope said “spiritual arrogance” — thinking one is holier or better than others — is a temptation everyone faces and is a form of self-worship. “Where there is too much ‘I,’ there is too little God,” the pope said.

notes

COURTESY CATHOLIC SCHOOLS CENTER OF EXCELLENCE

Educators carry banners bearing the names of their schools for the opening procession of an Oct. 19 Mass at the Minneapolis Convention Center for the third Catholic Schools Summit of Excellence hosted by Edina-based Catholic Schools Center of Excellence. Archbishop Bernard Hebda presided at the Mass, and the congregation included more than 2,000 faculty and staff from nearly 160 Catholic preschool through eighth-grade schools across Minnesota. CSCOE’s two-part mission is to enhance excellence and increase enrollment. This year’s summit offered breakout sessions on such topics as mental health and wellness, enhancing the middle school experience, differentiated learning and marketing and development.

BANNERS OF EXCELLENCE

Heidi Jones, a volunteer with the Center for Mission in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, is being honored in the city of Red Wing for her service to others. Jones recently received the 2022 Amos Owen Award from Red Wing’s Human Rights Commission. Owen was a tribal elder of the Prairie Island Indian Community who worked to preserve the Mdewakanton Sioux culture and language. Jones, 60, has served on Red Wing’s Library Board, Advisory Planning and Charter commissions, was elected to the city’s school board for several years and for part of that time served as a director on the Minnesota School Board Association. Since 2021, she has been a member of the school district’s equity team. Jones traveled to Kitui, Kenya, in 2017 as a delegate with the archdiocese’s partnership with the Diocese of Kitui. She now serves as secretary of the Kitui Leadership Team and chair of its communications subcommittee. Asked about her many avenues and years of service, Jones said, “It really is being called by the Holy Spirit.” Serving others, she said, “builds real community and helps strengthen our nation.”

About 150 members of Communion and Liberation in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, St. Cloud and other parts of Minnesota, North and South Dakota and Iowa will gather Nov. 18 at St. Joseph in West St. Paul to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Servant of God Father Luigi Giussani, a priest and educator from Milan, Italy, who began laying the foundations of the Catholic movement in the 1960s. A coordinator of the event, Marcie Stokman, said the group is also inviting others to encounter the charism of Communion and Liberation, which stresses a personal relationship with Jesus that is strengthened in communion with others and helps find meaning in society and culture. A 6 p.m. Mass will open the gathering, followed by refreshments and testimony from several people who met Father Giussani, who died in 2005. Pope Francis celebrated Father Giussani’s birth Oct. 15, the day of the priest’s birth in 1922, with more than 60,000 members of the movement in St. Peter’s Square, calling on them to reaffirm the movement’s “extraordinary history of charity, culture and mission.”

Opportunities to mark the feasts of All Saints Day (Nov. 1) and All Souls’ Day (Nov. 2) include a 7 p.m. Oct. 29 multimedia concert of art, poetry, organ music and theological reflections at Holy Cross in Minneapolis. Titled “Now and At the Hour of Our Death” from the Hail Mary prayer, the event will center on the intercessory role of Mary at the hour of death. The hour-long event is free, all ages are invited, and a reception will follow.

The National Council of Catholic Women will gather Nov. 3-5 at Minneapolis Marriott City Center for their annual convention. Archbishop Bernard Hebda will celebrate the opening liturgy, and Bishop Joseph Williams will celebrate the closing liturgy. About 450 women and spiritual advisers from across the United States, including one woman from the Diocese of St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands, as well as the national president of the Catholic Women’s League of Canada, will reflect on the weekend’s theme, Wide Open Hearts Abiding in Faith, Hope and Love. Patricia Voorhes of Salt Lake City, Utah, president of the NCCW, said she hopes members celebrate their contributions to the Church and return home with open hearts to try new things to brighten and enliven their councils.

PRACTICING Catholic

Oct. 21 “Practicing Catholic”

ON THE COVER: Ashly Bonin holds her son Luca while on a visit to Guiding Star Wakota in St. Paul. She came to this pregnancy resource center after Luca was born and she was struggling as a single mom. “I was very lovingly welcomed” by the staff at the center, the 39-year-old said, noting that she arrived at the center for her first visit in tears, needing diapers and other supplies for her son, plus emotional and spiritual support.

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

show, host Patrick Conley

Tierney, speaker and expert on liturgical living

owner of the Catholic All Year blog, who suggests ways families can practice liturgical living at home. The latest show also includes interviews with Ryan Hamilton, government relations associate for the Minnesota Catholic Conference, who discusses legislative priorities ahead of the elections and how to practice faithful citizenship; and Father Tom Margevicius, director of worship for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, who in his latest Mass Class describes the Communion rite. Listen to interviews after they have aired at PracticingcatholicShow com or anchor fm/Practicing catholic Show with links to podcasting platforms.

CNS | JAVIER DIAZ, CATHOLIC STANDARD

ROSARY WALK AND GARDEN Washington Cardinal Wilton Gregory blesses a statue of Our Lady of Fatima at the Rosary Walk and Garden outside the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception Oct. 23. The new statue replaces one that was vandalized in December 2021.

Indeed, in humility we become capable of bringing what we really are to God, without pretense: the wounds, the sins and the miseries that weigh on our hearts, and to invoke his mercy so that he may heal us, restore us and raise us up.

THECURIA

The recipe

I’m still unpacking boxes from a move over a year ago. Recently

I came across a couple of recipe cards written in my mother’s excellent penmanship.

My mother, God rest her soul, passed away almost 50 years ago and the sight of her handwriting caused a moment of grief sweetened by time.

Today, recipes are more likely to be on a screen and in an electronic file than on a recipe card in a wooden or metal box. But the structure and layout haven’t changed all that much.

The list of ingredients, abbreviations for amounts and the closing instructions for cooking are simply typed versions of my mother’s cursive. My mother could have never imagined a gazillion recipes from all over the world available at her fingertips with a few typed words on an electronic keyboard.

Recipes are ancient and the time-tested ones were handed down for generations. Traditional foods are one of the characteristics that identify cultures and religions. The consistency of taste over time is because of the recipe.

The early Church had a recipe for discipleship. The struggles of a world with ever-present sin and inescapable death were like a millstone. Conversion to Jesus Christ was the harvest of the ripened seeds of essential grains. The millstone may grind them up but

La receta

Todavía estoy desempacando cajas de una mudanza hace más de un año. Recientemente me encontré con un par de tarjetas de recetas escritas con la excelente caligrafía de mi madre.

Mi madre, Dios la tenga en su gloria, falleció hace casi 50 años y ver su letra provocó un momento de dolor endulzado por el tiempo.

Hoy en día, es más probable que las recetas estén en una pantalla y en un archivo electrónico que en una tarjeta de recetas en una caja de madera o metal. Pero la estructura y el diseño no han cambiado tanto.

La lista de ingredientes, las abreviaturas de las cantidades y las instrucciones finales para cocinar son simplemente versiones mecanografiadas de la letra cursiva de mi madre. Mi madre nunca podría haber imaginado miles de millones de recetas de todo el mundo disponibles al alcance de su mano con unas pocas palabras escritas en un teclado electrónico.

Las recetas son antiguas y las probadas en el tiempo se transmitieron de generación en generación. Los alimentos tradicionales son una de las características que identifican a las culturas y religiones. La consistencia del sabor a lo largo del tiempo se debe a la receta.

The early Church had a recipe for discipleship. The struggles of a world with ever-present sin and inescapable death were like a millstone. Conversion to Jesus Christ was the harvest of the ripened seeds of essential grains. The millstone may grind them up but by the grace of God, they became a fine flour.

by the grace of God, they became a fine flour.

This flour was mixed with the waters of baptism and the oil of gladness in sacramental anointings. A dash of salt as a preservative from evil and the leaven of the Gospel. The dough is kneaded by the loving hands of the Creator and let to rest to rise ready.

The fire of the Holy Spirit transformed the dough into a loaf of bread. The bread of life come down from heaven. While the bread of the Last Supper was unleavened and is still today, the recipe for discipleship needs the leaven of the Gospel.

Wine is made from stomped grapes and oil from crushed olives. These sacramental elements testify to the

La Iglesia primitiva tenía una receta para el discipulado. Las luchas de un mundo con el pecado siempre presente y la muerte ineludible fueron como una piedra de molino. La conversión a Jesucristo fue la cosecha de las semillas maduras de los granos esenciales. La piedra de molino los puede moler, pero por la gracia de Dios, se convirtieron en harina fina.

Esta harina se mezclaba con las aguas del bautismo y el aceite de alegría en las unciones sacramentales. Una pizca de sal como preservativo del mal y levadura del Evangelio. La masa es amasada por las amorosas manos del Creador y se deja reposar para que suba lista.

El fuego del Espíritu Santo transformó la masa en una hogaza de pan. El pan de vida bajado del cielo. Mientras que el pan de la Última Cena no tenía levadura y todavía lo es hoy, la receta del discipulado necesita la levadura del Evangelio.

El vino se elabora con uvas pisadas y el aceite con aceitunas trituradas. Estos elementos sacramentales dan testimonio de la misericordia de Dios que escucha los gritos de los necesitados. Nuestro encuentro con la persona y presencia real de Jesucristo reconstruye lo que el pecado ha derribado y alimenta el alma. Aunque seamos quebrantados, pisoteados y aplastados, somos partícipes del misterio del cuerpo y la sangre de Jesucristo y ungidos por el Espíritu Santo con el óleo de

Pope urges French politicians to reject euthanasia

Catholic News Service

As France begins a national debate on euthanasia, Pope Francis urged politicians from the country’s northern region to reject the “throwaway culture” and instead focus on providing care and relief to those nearing the end of their lives.

“I dare to hope that on such essential issues the debate can be conducted in truth to accompany life to its natural end and not to get caught up in this throwaway culture that is everywhere,” the pope said Oct. 21 as he met with mayors and other elected local, regional and national officials making a pilgrimage sponsored by the Archdiocese

of Cambrai.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who was scheduled to meet with Pope Francis Oct. 24, announced in early September the beginning of a nationwide discussion about allowing euthanasia in some cases; he called for local debates, country-wide consultations with health care workers and discussions with political parties to reach a decision in 2023.

Pope Francis began his talk to the pilgrims by noting how much the region and people of Cambrai had suffered with shuttering of coal mines, steel mills and textile factories, and he urged the officials to pay particular attention to the region’s poor and needy.

mercy of God who hears the cries of those in need. Our encounter with the person and real presence of Jesus Christ rebuilds what sin has torn down and feeds the soul. Though we may be broken, stomped and crushed, we are partakers in the mystery of the body and blood of Jesus Christ and anointed by the Holy Spirit with the oil of gladness.

Bread is such a simple recipe for such a profound mystery of faith. The effects of Original Sin, so prevalent in our imperfect lives in an imperfect world, do have a way of grinding us down.

Yet as a fine flour, the waters of baptism and the oil of anointing prepare us to receive the Gospel. Prayer seasons us like salt and preserves us from evil. We rest and rise ready for the fire of love in the Holy Spirit. As members of the Mystical Body of Christ, the Church, we become transformed to be bread for the world.

St. Augustine knew the recipe for discipleship and put it this way:

“Listen to the Apostle Paul speaking to the faithful: ‘You are the body of Christ, member for member.’

If you, therefore, are Christ’s body and members, it is your own mystery that is placed on the Lord’s table! It is your own mystery that you are receiving!

You are saying ‘amen’ to what you are: your response is a personal signature affirming your faith. When you hear ‘The Body of Christ’, you reply ‘amen.’ Be a member of Christ’s body, then, so that your ‘amen’ may ring true.”

la alegría.

El pan es una receta tan sencilla para un misterio de fe tan profundo. Los efectos del Pecado Original, tan frecuentes en nuestras vidas imperfectas en un mundo imperfecto, tienen una forma de aplastarnos.

Sin embargo, como la flor de harina, las aguas del bautismo y el aceite de la unción nos preparan para recibir el Evangelio. La oración nos sazona como la sal y nos preserva del mal. Descansamos y nos levantamos listos para el fuego del amor en el Espíritu Santo. Como miembros del Cuerpo Místico de Cristo, la Iglesia, somos transformados para ser pan para el mundo.

San Agustín conocía la receta del discipulado y lo expresó de esta manera:

“Escuchen al Apóstol Pablo hablando a los fieles: ‘Vosotros sois el cuerpo de Cristo, miembro por miembro’.

Si vosotros, pues, sois el cuerpo y los miembros de Cristo, ¡es vuestro propio misterio el que se pone sobre la mesa del Señor! ¡Es tu propio misterio lo que estás recibiendo!

Estás diciendo “amén” a lo que eres: tu respuesta es una firma personal que afirma tu fe. Cuando escuchas ‘El Cuerpo de Cristo’, respondes ‘amén’. Sé miembro del cuerpo de Cristo, entonces, para que tu ‘amén’ suene verdadero”.

“Welcome and care” must be the guiding principles of their public policies, the pope told them.

With northern France hosting thousands of immigrants, Pope Francis urged them to be welcoming of “the most disadvantaged people, primarily migrants — and you know how crucial this issue is and how close to my heart.” But he said he also was thinking of people with disabilities. “They need more structures to facilitate their lives and the lives of their loved ones and, above all, to demonstrate the respect that is due to them.”

But the heart of the pope’s remarks were about the care of the sick and elderly, especially at the very end of their lives.

The elderly in nursing homes and those who are dying, he said, must be accompanied and given palliative care.

“Caregivers, by their nature, have a vocation to provide care and relief,” the pope said. While it is not always possible to heal a patient, “we cannot ask caregivers to kill their patients, which is kind of the program of the throwaway culture.”

Pope Francis repeated what he had told a French journalist on the flight back from his trip to Kazakhstan in mid-September: The more people find a justification to kill someone, the more they kill.

“This is a mathematical progression,” he said.

LOCAL

Dance party

From left, third-graders Madison Hoang and Ceasarlyn Teai of St. Alphonsus Catholic School in Brooklyn Center twirl in the hallway of the school Oct. 14. On Fridays, St. Alphonsus has an informal “dance party” at 7:10 a.m. to start the school day, allowing students to get some exercise and socialize with their classmates. Teachers say the idea is a hit with the children, who display some impressive dance moves that sometimes draw attention and cheers from other students.

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Eucharistic Revival events poised to stir ‘amazement’

By Dave Hrbacek

The Catholic Spirit

The Eucharistic Revival is not merely an event or program, rather it’s a way to draw people into what the Church teaches is the source and summit of the faith. This is the message that speakers will deliver at several Eucharistic Revival gatherings in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis next month. Father Tim Tran, parochial vicar of St. Stephen in Anoka and the archdiocesan point person for the revival, said he is excited that Catholics locally will be able to take time to focus on the Eucharist and have its meaning and significance penetrate more deeply into their hearts.

“We are the body of Christ, ... baptized members of Christ’s body,” Father Tran said. “This revival, ultimately, is meant to revive us as members of that body. And, when we receive Communion, we become one with him. We become that bread. And when we’re one with Christ in our belief of his true presence among us and within us, we can spread his fragrance to those around us.”

Father Tran will attend several of the gatherings in November, including a Cor Jesu event at the Cathedral of St. Paul in St. Paul Nov. 4 led by Archbishop Bernard Hebda. Cor Jesu normally takes place on first Fridays of every month during the academic year at The St. Paul Seminary. But it was moved to the Cathedral for this occasion. Father Tran said the music team from the seminary will lead music at the Cathedral event, which begins at 7:30 p.m., and at least 15 priests will attend, including Father Joseph Taphorn, rector of the seminary, and Father David Blume, director of vocations for the archdiocese.

The event coincides with a National Eucharistic Revival Relics Tour featuring relics of St. Manuel Gonzalez Garcia and Blessed Carlo Acutis, the two patrons of the national revival chosen by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. The relics currently are in Minnesota, and they will be in the Twin Cities for

three days, Nov. 3-5.

The first revival event featuring the relics will be Nov. 3 at Immaculate Conception in Columbia Heights, beginning at 5:30 p.m., and it will bring athletics into talks about the Eucharist. It was organized by Kelly Scott of St. Charles Borromeo in St. Anthony, who played basketball at the University of Minnesota and created an organization called Spirit and Sport that helps youth grow in their basketball skills and faith. The evening will feature Father Craig Vasek of the Diocese of Crookston, who is serving full-time on the Eucharistic Revival at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Father Vasek and Scott will give talks connecting the Eucharist to sports.

“There should be blood, sweat and tears so that we can become saints,” Father Vasek said. “If we look at athletics, our life in Christ should be like (that), but unto the Lord.”

Central for Catholics

But the goal of the spiritual life is not a championship trophy. Rather, it is the Eucharist, something that should be central for Catholics, Father Vasek said.

“If the Eucharist is the source and summit of our lives, which the Second Vatican Council says, then the eucharistic life needs to touch upon everything that I do,” he said. “So, we want the Eucharistic Revival to take root absolutely in every domain of human life.”

Renowned speaker and Catholic apologist Scott Hahn will give a pair of talks at Epiphany in Coon Rapids Nov. 12 during an all-day event from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. called “The Eucharist: Our Source and Summit.” He said he wants to help Catholics continue what should be “an ever-deepening conversion” of the importance of the Eucharist in their lives.

“(Pope) John Paul (II), in his last encyclical, ‘The Church of the Eucharist (‘Ecclesia De Eucharistia,’ 2003),’ said we want to renew eucharistic faith, we want to revive eucharistic devotion, but we ought to cultivate eucharistic

Revival patrons’ relics in Twin Cities tour

By Barb Umberger

The Catholic Spirit

A first-class relic of each of the two patrons of the National Eucharistic Revival will be available for viewing during the revival’s tour in the Twin Cities Nov. 3-5. As of Oct. 21, Father Tim Tran, parochial vicar of St. Stephen in Anoka, did not know details about which specific relic of Blessed Carlo Acutis and of St. Manuel Gonzalez Garcia will be displayed.

Relics are a reminder that “the saints are among us,” said Father Tran, the point person for the revival in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. “That they’re real people like you and I; they all have a story. And that story definitely is one that includes Jesus Christ, who has written that story.”

Blessed Carlo and St. Manuel are examples for the faithful through their daily example, Father Tran said, including their struggles, “because they’re human.”

“Carlo had his own flaws, but it’s through that surrender to Jesus Christ that we, too, can become saints,” he said.

Blessed Carlo, patron of year one of the National Eucharistic Revival, was born in England to Italian parents, and grew up in Italy from the age of 3 months. Father Tran believes Blessed Carlo was chosen as a revival patron because of his eucharistic devotion and for his youth. He died of leukemia at age 15 in 2006.

“He’s probably the first millennial Blessed, and so he serves as such a great example for us to live out his eucharistic devotion and faith,” he said. Blessed Carlo is a model for all Catholics but also to

young people, Father Tran said, “to help them realize that it’s never too early to live out the faith and be a saint.”

Blessed Carlo also used his computer skills to develop a website that catalogued eucharistic miracles around the world.

Father Tran said Blessed Carlo’s parents were “nominal Catholics” and it was their son’s “eucharistic faith,” which he developed at an early age, that drew his parents back to the faith, “especially his mother.”

“He was the one who encouraged them to go to daily Mass,” Father Tran said.

St. Manuel was born in Seville, Spain, in 1877, accepted to the seminary at age 12 and entered at 24. He was ordained a priest in 1901 and became a bishop in 1920, serving as bishop of Palencia from 1935 until his death in 1940.

Father Manuel’s first assignment was at a parish where, reportedly, most had left the faith. Facilities were in disrepair and the abandoned tabernacle was covered in dust and cobwebs.

In the 2018 book “The Bishop of the Abandoned Tabernacle: Saint Manuel Gonzalez Garcia,” author Victoria Schneider wrote that Father Manuel knelt in prayer before the tabernacle and later wrote, “…I would dedicate my priesthood to taking care of Jesus in the needs of his life in the tabernacle: to feed him with my love, … keep him warm with my presence, … entertain him with my conversations, … defend him against abandonment and in gratitude,” relieving his heart with sacrifices, serving him wherever he is desired, giving alms, speaking of him and consoling others in his name until people follow him.

amazement,” said Hahn, founder and president of the St. Paul Center and is also the Father Michael Scanlon Professor of Biblical Theology and the New Evangelization at Franciscan University of Steubenville (Ohio). “It’s amazing how unamazed we are” by this sacrament, the body and blood of Jesus, he said.

He said he hopes to help Catholics develop a practice of receiving Communion each week “as though it’s the first time.”

Father Tran will be involved in two other revival events, one at St. Stephen Nov. 4 from 9 a.m. to noon, and one later that day at the parish where he grew up, St. Anne-St. Joseph Hien in Minneapolis from 2-4 p.m. At the latter event, he will talk about the Vietnamese Eucharistic Movement in Minnesota and developing a eucharistic spirituality. The relics will be present at both events, and then at the NET Center in West St. Paul for a Lifeline youth event that evening from 6-9:30 p.m.

Since being appointed in the summer as the point person for the revival in the archdiocese, Father Tran said he already has noticed an enthusiastic response, with several parishes promoting it and holding gatherings in recent months. One parish incorporated a eucharistic display into its parish festival, which was “really awesome to see,” Father Tran said.

“That’s what the Eucharistic Revival is all about, these grassroots movements,” Father Tran said. “I think it’s a wonderful, wonderful opportunity, a great gift.”

As he tries to help others deepen their love and devotion to the Eucharist, Father Tran expects the revival to impact him as well.

“I see it as a moment for my own eucharistic faith to be revived,” he said. “So, not only am I guiding this or leading this... but I honestly see it as God’s invitation for me as a priest to have my own eucharistic hunger revealed to me so that I can live out my priesthood in such a way that I can spread Christ’s fragrance to others and attract them to the one thing necessary, which is the body and blood of Jesus Christ.”

MCC starts campaign to build Civilization of Love by putting Families First

By Joe Ruff

The Catholic Spirit

Encouraging Catholics to lead the way and inspire others to join the effort, the Minnesota Catholic Conference, the public policy arm of Minnesota’s Catholic bishops, embarked this month on a multi-year campaign to build up the family while strengthening charity and justice in society.

“We’re trying to bring people out of their silos, to make connections, to encourage this work and to give it real momentum,” said Jason Adkins, MCC executive director and general counsel.

Two websites will be focal points for the effort: familiesfirstproject com and civilizationoflove.net.

The sites are independent of the conference’s website mncatholic.org to help draw people to the campaign who are not members of the Catholic Church but could adopt Church teachings and policy initiatives that help the broader society, said Ryan Hamilton, MCC government relations associate.

“We hope that the Catholic community will lead the effort, but by no means should the Catholic community be the only folks participating,” Hamilton said.

The conference will continue its yearly advocacy agendas with state lawmakers and others to help alleviate poverty, meet social concerns, lobby for criminal justice and fight for the right to life, Hamilton said. It also wants to help eliminate the primary causes of social challenges, which often can be traced to struggles faced by families, he said.

“The time has come to go upstream, to address the root causes of those problems,” he said. “And we feel that’s family fragmentation and family economic insecurity and a decline in family formation.”

Policy initiatives under the Families First Project include lobbying for a state tax credit for families that would have a

real impact — such as $1,800 per child, Hamilton said. With rising inflation, it’s been estimated that households will spend an extra $5,200 this year compared with last year for the same basket of consumer goods, he said. For a family with three children, such a tax credit would offset those increasing costs, he said. To help growing families, Minnesota could set up a $5,000 minivan grant to families with three or more children who buy a vehicle that seats at least six people, Hamilton said.

Individuals and families might suggest other ways to foster a society that supports the stable base on which societies thrive — the family — and share their ideas on the Families First website, he said.

The goal is to “transform Minnesota into a state where the economic well-being of the family has been elevated to the top priority for elected officials and a focal point of public policy discussions,” Hamilton said.

The conference’s Civilization of Love website cites Pope St. John Paul II: “The future is in your hearts and in your

hands. God is entrusting to you the task, at once difficult and uplifting, of working with Him in the building of the civilization of love.”

The site encourages people to share their stories of helping create a civilization of love and offers monthly challenges, such as October’s: supporting pregnancy resource centers, which also strengthens the U.S. bishops’ Walking with Mom’s pro-life initiative, Adkins said. The November challenge will be burying the dead, a work of corporal mercy, he said.

“That might seem like a stretch, but we must honor and respect human life, especially at the end of life, and provide a dignified and honorable burial, especially in a society where now we’re talking about composting human remains and alkaline hydrolysis, and other, really troubling ways of disposing of human bodies,” Adkins said.

December’s challenge is likely to be increasing shelter space for the homeless, Adkins said.

“All these things build up the common good,” he said. “We find that many

people are allergic to politics these days, but there is a great need to encourage people to live their discipleship in social life. We build a healthy society, the civilization of love, with the two hands of charity and justice.”

Weaving a network of people placing family first and acting in charity and justice will strengthen efforts to create policies and laws that support those priorities, Adkins said.

“We hope as we engage people deeper in the social apostolate, that they’ll begin to make the connections — that it’s not just charity that builds the civilization of love, but it’s also the work of justice that can provide that framework,” he said.

“And that’s what political life is about.”

Getting to know lawmakers, expressing concerns and hopes with them, is within everyone’s reach, Adkins said. And it might lead to political activity among the faithful that includes running for public office, he said.

MCC staff is exploring the possibility of an initiative to encourage Catholics to run for public office, particularly at the local level, such as city councils, boards of county commissioners, school boards and library boards, Adkins said. There are concerns to weigh, such as the risk of the Church appearing to be partisan in its advocacy of public office, he said.

But “we’re meeting with people on both sides of the aisle, who have worked as elected officials, who have served in politics, and we’re exploring what that would look like,” he said.

Key points to make in promoting public life include helping people understand that it’s an important vocation and equipping them with principles and tools to hold office effectively, he said.

Each of the initiatives support the other — Families First, Civilization of Love and promoting public life, Adkins said, as MCC strives to transcend partisan divides and unite people in promoting the common good.

Sister Mary Madonna Ashton remembered for strong leadership, faith

By Joe Ruff

The Catholic Spirit

Minnesota’s first woman and non-physician commissioner of health, president and CEO of a major hospital, and delegate for religious in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis — Sister Mary Madonna Ashton was all those things and more, colleagues, fellow religious and a family member recall.

Sister of St. Joseph of Carondelet Mary Madonna died Oct. 16. She was 99. “She ran a good ship. She stood tall,” said fellow Sister Carolyn Puccio, who succeeded Sister Mary Madonna as delegate for religious in 2014. Trained as a medical social worker, Sister Mary Madonna told Sister Carolyn she learned to be an administrator even while accepting those positions. “It wasn’t easy, but she did it,” Sister Carolyn said.

Michael Osterholm, regents professor, McKnight Presidential Endowed Chair in Public Health and director of the Center for Infectious Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said Sister Mary Madonna “could be a very, very strong leader. But at the same time, caring and compassionate.” Highly respected in her field, she also “was the type of person

who is hard not to love,” said Osterholm, who as state epidemiologist served under Sister Mary Madonna during her term as commissioner of health, from 1983 to 1991. Sister Mary Madonna served as commissioner of health for Gov. Rudy Perpich.

She began her career as a social worker in 1946, the year she joined her religious order, at then-St.

was also at the forefront of meeting the challenge of the emerging HIV/AIDS epidemic and was a strong advocate for the health needs of the gay community, Osterholm said.

She led detailed surveillance of the epidemic in Minnesota in a system that led the nation and helped discover that HIV/AIDS also spread through the use of infected, intravenous needles in the illegal drug trade, Osterholm said.

health care agent, there to make care decisions if the religious sister no longer could. “It was a privilege to be with her” in her last days, Sister Meg said.

Sister Mary Madonna’s closest living relative, Ruth Cocker of Rock Hill, South Carolina, a niece, recalled Oct. 17 growing up in the Methodist faith in North Carolina and enjoying Sister Mary Madonna’s visits.

SISTER MARY MADONNA ASHTON

Joseph’s Hospital in St. Paul. She later moved to then-St. Mary’s Hospital in Minneapolis, where she served for two decades, ultimately serving as president and CEO. After her term as health commissioner, Sister Mary Madonna was CEO of Carondelet LifeCare Corp., which in 1992 led to her founding St. Mary’s Health Clinics to serve the uninsured and those ineligible for government programs. Today, SMHC includes seven Twin Cities clinics with 150 volunteer doctors, nurses and support personnel.

As health commissioner, she took on the tobacco industry, which led to banning smoking in public spaces. She

“Under her leadership, we emerged as the premiere health department in the country for infectious disease,” Osterholm said. “Our health department is one of the most respected in the country, and its roots go back to Sister Mary Madonna Ashton.”

A native of St. Paul and a convert to Catholicism from the Episcopal faith, Sister Mary Madonna in a 2014 interview with The Catholic Spirit recalled telling her family at Easter dinner she was ready to enter the religious life.

“Everybody left the table except my young sister who sat there,” Sister Mary Madonna said. “They were just so upset. It was a real crisis. Anyway, be that as it may, I entered the convent.”

Sister of St. Joseph of Carondelet Meg Gillespie was Sister Mary Madonna’s

“She was a nun. She wore a big habit. We were fascinated,” Cocker said. Her aunt was kind and business-like, said Cocker, who about 10 years ago began visiting her aunt annually and most recently visited Oct. 1 at Carondelet Village in St. Paul, where the religious sister was living and passed away.

“There was a religious side to her, but I knew she was a businesswoman,” said Cocker, who went on to a career at IBM and later was finance manager of a financial planning group. “She was always such a role model for me.”

Funeral arrangements for Sister Mary Madonna include 10:30 a.m. viewing and 11 a.m. funeral Mass Nov. 18 at the religious order’s Our Lady of the Presentation Chapel in St. Paul. Interment will be at Resurrection Cemetery in Mendota Heights.

COURTESY KATHERINE SZEPIENIEC, MINNESOTA CATHOLIC CONFERENCE

Jason Adkins, executive director and general counsel of Minnesota Catholic Conference, left, at the State Capitol in St. Paul with MCC’s Ryan Hamilton, government relations associate, Maggee Hangge, policy and public relations associate, and Lynn Varco, policy and engagement associate.

Ukraine top of mind for those with family ties

By Barb Umberger

The Catholic Spirit

Not long after visiting his ailing mother in Ukraine and returning to Minnesota last spring, Yuri Ivan, music director at St. Constantine Ukrainian Catholic Church in Minneapolis, received “minor orders” from the bishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Eparchy of Chicago.

He told his mother that day about being installed as a reader and cantor, and a friend told him how proud she was of her son, even asking for a little cognac to celebrate. The next day, he learned his mother died sometime after his friend’s visit.

Ivan said he is happy that his visit with his mother seemed to “give her steam to go for another two months.” When he arrived, she couldn’t sit by herself. Within a week of his being there, she began walking again, he said.

“That boosted her life,” he said. “So, I was not afraid to leave her.”

Ivan said a priest reminded him of the story of St. Simeon, who saw baby Jesus at the temple with Mary and Joseph. “And St. Simeon saw the boy and said, ‘OK, now God, you can let me go.’”

Ivan has other relatives in western Ukraine as well, and friends and colleagues across that war-torn country. Some are in the trenches fighting the Russian invasion that began in February, he said. “We are constantly praying for them … ,” he said.

Those not fighting still hear air raid

sirens daily, Ivan said. He fears that Ukrainians will have difficult months ahead, especially as Russia targets power plants, electrical substations and high voltage lines. Rocket and drone strikes left more than 1,000 towns without power Oct. 18. Neighborhoods in Kyiv lost power and water. The BBC reported Oct. 18 that one Ukrainian official in the president’s office said, “The entire population needs to prepare for a tough winter.”

Prices are rising and Ukraine’s economy is destroyed, Ivan said.

Increased rocket attacks prompted many to flee to western Ukraine, Ivan said. Trains arrive daily with wounded Ukrainian refugees, he said.

Many cross into Europe, but others who don’t have language skills or feel more comfortable staying in Ukraine do not leave. “They just stop before the

border,” he said.

Other local Ukrainian Catholics feel the stress of having family members living in Ukraine. Inna Collier Paske, principal of St. Pascal Regional Catholic School in St. Paul, has been in continual contact with her parents, who live in a region of the country not yet devastated by the war but close enough to feel nervous. They visited Collier Paske this summer as she prepared for the upcoming school year.

One of Ivan’s relatives is a child psychiatrist in Ukraine. “She says PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) is going to be the number one issue in the foreseeable future,” he said. “More and more children have seen the atrocities of the war and gone through things we don’t want to think about.”

Ivan and others at St. Constantine have been keeping in touch with

SUPPORTING UKRAINE

Fundraisers at St. Constantine Ukrainian Catholic Church in Minneapolis have supported Ukraine. Following a liturgy Aug. 21, traditional Ukrainian food was available in the church fellowship hall. Parishioners and guests could make freewill donations, which were directed to Prosthetics for Ukrainians, a project of the Minneapolis-based Protez Foundation, which provides free prosthetics for Ukrainian soldiers and civilians who lost limbs during the war. The parish did not disclose the exact amount raised. A fundraising lunch was served Oct. 23, with proceeds directed to humanitarian aid in Ukraine, said Yuri Ivan, music director.

The parish’s humanitarian refugee committee helps families resettling in Minnesota, supplementing aid from the Ukrainian American Community Center in Minneapolis to help with settlement, transportation, food and some living expenses. And Ivan helped St. Constantine host the 13th annual Byzantine Choral Festival Concert Oct. 16. Five choirs from the Twin Cities metro area performed, including St. Constantine’s. Freewill offerings were accepted for humanitarian aid in Ukraine.

relatives, raising money to help Ukraine, mourning their country’s losses, finding hope in its gains and praying for an end to the eight-month war.

St. Constantine parishioner Joe Kryschyshen said he monitors multiple news outlets to gain an accurate sense of the situation in Ukraine. He also receives

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Inna Collier Paske, center, stands Aug. 24 with her parents, Olga, left, and Mykola Zhuravel, who came from Ukraine for a visit to the Twin Cities.

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Study shows priests feel distrustful of bishops

By Rhina Guidos Catholic News Service

A study of U.S. priests released Oct. 19 details clerics’ “crisis of trust” toward their bishops as well as fear that if they were falsely accused of abuse, prelates would immediately throw them “under the bus” and not help them clear their name.

The study “Well-being, Trust and Policy in a Time of Crisis” by The Catholic Project, written by Brandon Vaidyanathan, Christopher Jacobi and Chelsea Rae Kelly, of The Catholic University of America, paints a portrait of a majority of priests who feel abandoned by the men they are supposed to trust at the helm of their dioceses.

And while the study says priests overwhelmingly support measures to combat sex abuse and enhance child safety, the majority, 82%, also said they regularly fear being falsely accused. Were that to happen, they feel they would face a “de facto policy” of guilty until proven innocent.

The study, unveiled at The Catholic University of America in Washington, documents the environment between priests and their bishops in light of the “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People” instituted in 2002 by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Commonly referred to as the Dallas Charter, it sets in place policy about how to proceed when allegations of sexual abuse of children by clergy or church personnel come to light.

“Indeed, many priests feel that the policies introduced since the Dallas Charter have depersonalized their relationship with their bishops; they see bishops more as CEOs, bureaucrats, and legalistic guardians of diocesan finances than as fathers and brothers,” the study points out, and quotes a diocesan priest saying: “Our archbishop is a remote figure. Not at all personable. Not approachable. He appears to be a busy CEO and religious functionary.”

The document reveals that 40% of the priests who responded said they see the zero-tolerance policy as “too harsh” or “harsher than necessary,” adding that it’s too easy to lodge false claims of abuse against them. They feel bishops would not support a priest in the period necessary to prove his innocence.

“There’s this sense ... that the bishops are against a priest who’s been accused, rather than doing what the bishop must do but still supporting the priest,” said one of the 100 priests that researchers interviewed.

“Most priests agree with the Church’s response to the abuse crisis, but also fear that their bishops wouldn’t have their backs if they were falsely accused,” Vaidyanathan said.

Of the 10,000 diocesan and religious priests surveyed, just 24% said they had confidence in U.S. bishops in general. Instead, priests in the study said they predominantly see the prelates as social climbers,

FROM PAGE 7

updates from a cousin in Chicago who is in regular contact with aunts, uncles and cousins in Ukraine.

Kryschyshen said he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin is reticent to use nuclear weapons because it would change the world order. And he is facing “dissension at home,” he said, with young men, many educated, “who don’t want to die for a war that has no meaning for them.”

“Ukraine is fighting with their heart and Russia’s fighting because they have to,” Kryschyshen said.

Ivan said he believes it’s a miracle that Ukraine is “slowly taking back territories.” “I pray that, somehow, we

Seminarians listen as Brandon Vaidyanathan, associate professor and chair in the department of sociology at The Catholic University of America in Washington, speaks at the university during an Oct. 19 presentation on the findings of a national study of Catholic priests titled “Well-being, Trust and Policy in a Time of Crisis.”

careerists and administrators who barely know priests in their diocese by name.

“I don’t really trust most of the bishops, to be honest with you. I’ll show them all a great amount of respect. And if I was in their diocese, I would really serve them and try,” a priest told researchers. “But just looking across the United States and looking across a lot of bishops ... I would say I have an overall negative opinion of bishops in the United States.

“They’re really not leaders or they’re just kind of chameleons ... looking to climb up the ladder.”

The study says 131 bishops also participated in the study, which analyzed attitudes about priests’ wellbeing, trust and the policy related to the sex abuse crisis.

In response to the study, the USCCB’s Public Affairs Office released a statement by Bishop James Checchio of Metuchen, New Jersey, chairman of the organization’s Committee on Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations.

“I am grateful for the insight provided by this study which will assist the bishops in our ministry to our priests. While not surprised, I am heartened that the results report priests have such a high level of vocational fulfilment and that they remain positive about their priestly ministry,” Bishop Checchio said in the Oct. 19 statement.

“Our priests are generous and committed,” Bishop Checchio continued. “While acknowledging that circumstances will vary from diocese to diocese, the findings of this study are overall valuable in that they remind us of the importance of being always attentive to the care of our priests with the ever-growing stressors they experience in ministry, while we strive to address any issues that have damaged the unique relationship we enjoy.”

have a major breakthrough … that it’s not inch by inch taking back territories, … and that the situation resolves soon.”

Nadia Doroschak, 80, also a member of St. Constantine, said she was captured by the Nazis in World War II, taken with her family to a prisoner-of-war camp until 1945, then moved at age 4 to a displaced persons camp in Germany. She knows about war and immigration, she said.

Her husband has family in western Ukraine. They tell the Doroschaks, “We’re not living in the Middle Ages anymore,” she said. “We don’t have to be enemies toward others. There are ways to negotiate. But when you start killing people for no reason at all, there’s no desire to negotiate because then you have to stand up for your rights.”

Academy for Life president defends appointment of economist

By Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service

Convinced that poverty, inequality and economic systems are killing millions of people each year and threatening the dignity of many more people, Pope Francis appointed an economist to the Pontifical Academy for Life.

But the nomination of Mariana Mazzucato, a professor of the economics of innovation and public value at University College London, raised concern because of her retweets or positive comments on tweets in June criticizing the U.S. Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and affirm that there is no constitutional right to abortion in the United States.

Mazzucato’s nomination and the nomination of six others were announced by the Vatican Oct. 15.

In the wake of the criticism, Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the academy, told Catholic News Service Oct. 20 that all the members, including Mazzucato, “have at heart the value of human life in their area of expertise.”

“They are not all Catholics and do not profess all the tenets of the Catholic faith,” the archbishop said. “And we know there are differences on the level of ethics, but they defend life in its entirety.”

A statement from the academy Oct. 19 said, “The Pontifical Academy for Life is a body of study and research. So, debate and dialogue take place among people from different backgrounds.” However, it added, when a document is prepared for publication by the academy, it is first reviewed by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

In addition, the statement noted, after academicians recommend new members, and before they are appointed by the pope, they are vetted through consultation with the apostolic nuncio and the bishops’ conference of the countries where they live and work.

“This happened in this case as well and there were no problems,” the statement said.

The statutes of the academy say members are appointed “on the basis of their academic qualifications, proven professional integrity, professional expertise and faithful service in the defense and promotion of the right to life of every human person.”

“The academy is definitely against abortion. Absolutely,” Archbishop Paglia told CNS.

He and the academy also are “against euthanasia, against assisted suicide, against social inequalities, against the death penalty, ... against violence, against every coercive power and against all forms of totalitarianism.”

“The choice of Mazzucato came from the recommendations of several academicians to address attacks on life that come from inequality,” the archbishop said.

Relatives in Ukraine are preparing for winter, “trying to make sure they survive and trying to keep their spirits up,” Doroschak said. Relatives also described seminars in Ukraine that help people separate truth from propaganda, she said.

Collier Paske’s parents, Olga Zhuravel, 70, and her husband, Mykola, 74, traveled from Ukraine in June to help their daughter and family as they prepared for the school year. Collier Paske also wanted to give her parents a break from living in a country torn by war and take them on a long-planned trip to Hawaii.

While their hometown in central Ukraine has largely been sheltered from damage experienced by people living in larger cities, the family does hear warning sirens daily. On Ukrainian

Independence Day, Aug. 24, when they spoke with The Catholic Spirit at Collier Paske’s home, they were told by people in Ukraine that sirens blared “nonstop.”

“The only hope that we have is in God,” said Olga Zhuravel, through her daughter’s translation. “And we strongly believe he’s going to help us. All our hope is in God.”

Father Ivan Shkumbatyuk, a Ukrainian rite Catholic priest and pastor of St. Constantine, said he knows people around the world support Ukraine. He hopes that continues.

“It’s not only about saving Ukraine’s land, but to make sure to help everybody in the world, to not make slaves of other people, to continue democracy,” he said through a translator.

CNS | BOB ROLLER

uCries for peace can’t be ignored, pope says at interreligious meeting. Standing in front of an ancient symbol of violent battles, Pope Francis and religious leaders from around the world echoed “the cry for peace” of people suffering the impact of conflicts around the world, but especially in Ukraine. At various spots inside and around Rome’s Colosseum Oct. 25, members of different religions prayed separately for peace before coming together with Pope Francis to issue their appeal to all their followers and, especially, to the modern-day emperors who send their gladiators to fight to the death. But even as the location reminded people of the first-century battles, the specter of nuclear war lurked nearby. Sixty years ago, the Cuban Missile Crisis had the world teetering on the brink. Pope Francis, addressing the religious leaders, noted the anniversary of that “grave international crisis, when military confrontation and nuclear holocaust seemed imminent.” The event at the Colosseum concluded the annual interreligious meeting the Community of Sant’Egidio sponsors to continue relationships begun by St. John Paul II in 1986, when he invited religious leaders to join him in Assisi to pray for peace.

uVatican, China renew agreement on appointing bishops. Saying it is committed to “respectful dialogue” with China’s communist government and to “fostering the mission of the Catholic Church and the good of the Chinese people,” the Vatican announced it has renewed its agreement with China on the appointment of bishops. The “provisional agreement,” forged in 2018 and renewed in 2020, has been extended for another two years, the Vatican announced Oct. 22. The text of the agreement has never been made public, but Vatican officials said it outlines procedures for ensuring Catholic bishops are elected by the Catholic community in China and approved by the pope before their ordinations and installations. In the past four years only six bishops have been named and installed under the terms of the agreement.

uChicago’s Father Pfleger is removed from ministry over abuse allegation. Father Michael Pfleger, a popular Chicago priest and outspoken advocate against gun violence, gangs, poverty and racism, has stepped aside from his ministry after the Chicago archdiocese said it received an allegation that the priest had sexually abused a minor more than 30 years ago. Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich announced the decision in an Oct. 15 letter to Father Pfleger’s parishioners at the Faith Community of St. Sabina in Chicago. The 73-year-old priest has led the historically African American parish since 1981 and is currently its senior pastor. The priest strongly denied the accusation, which comes on the heels of a similar accusation against him in January 2021 where he also temporarily stepped aside from his ministry until an archdiocesan review found “insufficient reason” to suspect the priest was guilty of abuse allegations said to have taken place 40 years ago.

uVatican Museums repatriates mummies to Peru. Completing a project to repatriate human remains held in the Vatican Museums’ ethnological collection, the Vatican and the government of Peru signed an agreement Oct. 17 to return to Peru three mummies sent to the Vatican in 1925. The three human remains are thought to be Incan and several centuries old, but their exact age will not be known until after thorough studies are conducted in Peru. They were found at an altitude of more than 9,800 feet in the Peruvian Andes along the Ucayali River. The first remains returned from the Vatican collection, a mummy from Ecuador, were returned in 2014.

Bishops wrestled with possibility of nuclear annihilation in pastoral letter

By Mark Pattison Catholic News Service

Over the course of three years, the U.S. bishops not only wrestled with the specter of nuclear Armageddon in writing a pastoral letter, but how to convey that teaching effectively.

The result was the pastoral letter “The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response,” which was approved overwhelmingly by the bishops in May 1983. Fewer than 10 bishops voted against it, according to retired Auxiliary Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of Detroit, who had served on the five-bishop drafting committee.

“As Americans, citizens of the nation which was first to produce atomic weapons, which has been the only one to use them and which today is one of the handful of nations capable of decisively influencing the course of the nuclear age, we have grave human, moral and political responsibilities to see that a ‘conscious choice’ is made to save humanity,” the document, colloquially known as the “peace pastoral,” said in its introduction.

The pastoral letter acknowledged

how tenuous peace was with nuclear weapons ready to be fired.

“We live today, therefore, in the midst of a cosmic drama; we possess a power which should never be used, but which might be used if we do not reverse our direction,” it said. “We live with nuclear weapons knowing we cannot afford to make one serious mistake. This fact dramatizes the precariousness of our position, politically, morally and spiritually.”

Still, it was unambiguous in its treatment of nuclear weapon usage.

“Under no circumstances may nuclear weapons or other instruments of mass slaughter be used for the purpose of destroying population centers or other predominantly civilian targets,” “The Challenge of Peace” said. “No Christian can rightfully carry out orders or policies deliberately aimed at killing noncombatants,” it added.

Later, it proclaimed, “We do not perceive any situation in which the deliberate initiation of nuclear warfare, on however restricted a scale, can be morally justified. Non-nuclear attacks by another state must be resisted by other than nuclear means.”

Despite this, the pastoral letter said, “we recognize the responsibility the United States has had and continues to have in assisting allied nations in their defense against either a conventional or a nuclear attack. Especially in the European theater, the deterrence of a nuclear attack may require nuclear weapons for a time, even though their possession and deployment must be subject to rigid restrictions.”

“The Challenge of Peace” dwelt further on the concept of nuclear deterrence: “One of the criteria of the just-war tradition is a reasonable hope of success in bringing about justice and peace. We must ask whether such a reasonable hope can exist once nuclear weapons have been exchanged.”

The bishops added, “Without making a specific moral judgment on deterrence, the (Second Vatican) Council clearly designated the elements of the arms race: the tension between ‘peace of a sort’ preserved by deterrence and ‘genuine peace’ required for a stable international life; the contradiction between what is spent for destructive capacity and what is needed for constructive development.”

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‘MIRACLE FOR ME’

Risa Cobb, a young mother from St. Paul, said seeing her baby via ultrasound was nothing short of miraculous.

“They showed me my baby on the ultrasound, which was a miracle for me to see that with my own eyes. I knew it was the right thing to do to keep my baby, and I had enough time to think about adoption,” Cobb said.

Cobb visited the Women’s Life Care Center in Little Canada in 2019 after searching for ultrasounds on the internet. She was terrified to tell her parents and boyfriend about her unexpected pregnancy.

“It’s not shoving any information down your throat,” said Cobb. “They are not pushing you to believe what they believe; they are simply guiding you as you share with them what is going on. They will ask you questions and help you figure out what you really want.”

Through information offered and questions asked, Cobb decided she really did want her baby.

“It has been a huge, huge blessing to have (the center). I don’t know what I would have done without them,” said Cobb, in a telephone interview. “The more courses I took, the more confident I felt as a mother.”

Life coaching offered at the center paved the way for Cobb to finish her degree in communication studies and mass media. She plans soon to transition to a job in which she can use her degree, while she participates in multiple Bible studies.

Her son, Johnny Rocket — named in honor of his remarkable progress as a premature baby — is doing well.

Itwas a routine Wednesday morning at the Women’s Life Care Center, a pregnancy resource center in Little Canada.

A certified nurse sat in the ultrasound room, awaiting the day’s appointments or walk-ins.

The executive director prepared to install a child seat in a woman’s car. A volunteer answered a phone call from a Spanish-speaking woman as another opened the clinic’s front door to a Somali woman. Upstairs, donations of diapers, baby clothes and baby toys were sorted to give to women in need.

Pregnancy resource centers such as Women’s Life encounter women on the front line of unexpected pregnancies. Many offer free services and goods such as parenting classes, certified life coaching, job resources, diapers and maternity clothes, with the mission of empowering women to make informed decisions about their pregnancy — and backing them in choosing life.

Some centers offer medical services such as ultrasounds performed by a licensed sonographer or trained registered nurse, and testing for sexually transmitted diseases and infections.

Catholic parishes, schools and other ministries assist many of the centers with fundraising, volunteers and donations.

At least 86 pregnancy resource centers dot the rural and urban Minnesota landscape, according to Minneapolis-based Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life.

Recent criticism leveled by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison in an Aug. 23 consumer alert claims that pregnancy resource centers “pose as

reproductive healthcare clinics despite not providing comprehensive reproductive healthcare to consumers,” and some don’t provide any health care services at all. The alert also claims that the centers “attempt to prevent or dissuade pregnant people from accessing their constitutionally protected right under the Minnesota Constitution to a safe and legal abortion.”

The alert — and similar alerts in states including Massachusetts and California — use the kind of wording found in, or refer directly to, a recent study of crisis pregnancy centers by a group called The Alliance: State Advocates for Women’s Rights and Gender Equality.

Publishing data from centers in nine states, including Minnesota, the Alliance claims that crisis pregnancy centers “are generally failing at their purported mission to reach and dissuade ‘abortion-minded’ people,” since most of the women who come to pregnancy resource centers are not abortion-determined. On its website, alliancestateadvocates org, the Alliance also claims CPCs are “a Surveillance Tool of the Post-Roe state.”

But clients, executives and staff at pregnancy resource centers — sometimes called crisis pregnancy centers — say women are not coerced in any way to keep their child. The centers simply aim to meet the needs of pregnant women and mothers at sites such as Birthright and Abria Pregnancy Resources, both in St. Paul, Women’s Life Care Center in Little Canada and Guiding Star Wakota in West St. Paul.

Karen McCann, a 55-year-old mother of two and director of Birthright, said the staff cares equally about the women who visit the center and the child they carry. Birthright recognizes that abortion ends a life and harms women emotionally, spiritually and sometimes physically, McCann said. While most of Birthright’s services center on supplying free diapers, formula and baby clothes to women in need, they also refer women to prenatal care if they don’t already have a doctor. The center does not claim to be a clinic and it doesn’t advertise any medical services.

“They say ‘fake clinic,’ but we never have called ourselves a clinic, so they’re putting that on us. We are a help center,” McCann said. “We’re not medical but we are very much practical. We’re just trying to help them with emotional and practical things and just being a friend for them.”

Joyce Thomas, a mother from north Minneapolis who serves as a life coach and advocate at Abria Pregnancy Resources, said she helps women whether they are considering abortion or need extra support.

“They’re scared,” Thomas said, noting that some clients are pregnant with their first child. “When we offer the services and the program, they can take the lead where they want to go.” Women helped by Abria can participate in pregnancy and parenting classes, life coaching, learning about healthy relationships and other offerings. Licensed professionals at Abria offer pregnancy testing, limited testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections, and ultrasounds that can confirm pregnancy, find the location of a fetus and verify gestational age, but are not used diagnostically.

Jacinta Lagasse, 35, the executive director of Women’s Life Care Center, said most of the mothers coming to the center are unwed, in their 20s, and from minority populations. Out of every 1,000 clients, about one-third are Caucasian. About two-thirds of the women are abortion-minded or are vulnerable to obtaining an abortion if support falls away, and one-third are not considering ending their pregnancy, she said.

“We want to see (women) fly on their own, give them

A BRIEF HISTORY

The first pregnancy resource center in Minnesota was founded on the north end of St. Paul, followed by another on the University of Minnesota campus, shortly after the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision, which legalized abortion in the country. (That decision was overturned in June, returning the question of abortion to the states.)

Those two centers were founded by Sister Jeanne Therese Condon, a sister of St. Joseph of Medaille, one of seven orders that joined in 2007 to establish the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph.

Sister Jeanne Therese, who died in 1992, was an undaunted supporter of the pro-life cause, among other social justice

movements, said Mary Sand, a certified life coach at Women’s Life Care Center in Little Canada who has researched the religious sister’s life.

Galvanized by Sister Jeanne Therese, those two centers multiplied into 17 centers at the time of her death, and eventually evolved into Eagan-based umbrella organization Elevate Life, with 37 locations in Minnesota and Wisconsin, including Women’s Life Care Center, Guiding Star Wakota in West St. Paul and Abria Pregnancy Resources in Minneapolis and St. Paul, said Vaunae Hansel, president of Elevate Life, which provides training for staff and volunteers, liability insurance, and policies and procedures for medical services offered at the centers.

Families and

Clients say pregnancy change lives by

Story and sidebars by Anna Wilgenbusch

TOP Registered Nurse Karen Dosh, who performs limited obstetric sonography, does an ultrasound on Anh Wilcox Oct. 11 at Guiding Star Wakota in West St. Paul. Wilcox learned from the ultrasound that she is pregnant with twins.

ABOVE LEFT Client Advocate Kenyatta Hardaway, left, hands Breanna Brown a bag with supplies at Guiding Star Wakota.

the skills so that they can go out and move forward in life, and be in a good place, and send other moms to us who are in more vulnerable or tenuous situations,” Lagasse said. Women pursuing college degrees, a job or other goals find support and resources at the center, she said.

Expanding services

“In my experience, when women come here and they are abortion minded, it is because they feel they have no other choice,” said Anne Swanson, 42, director of client services at Guiding Star Wakota, which offers an array of resources to help women in that situation, including rent assistance, job information, entrepreneurship classes and fertility awareness training.

The center offers a program that supports men in their role as fathers, and it plans to expand into a clinic

and miracles

pregnancy resource centers by supporting life

her Christian faith into their sessions.

“I love it,” said Hardaway. “This is a ministry, not a job.”

As of Oct. 12, Wakota had served 917 women this year alone. Hispanics make up the greatest percentage of their clientele, followed by African Americans and then Caucasians. Most of the women are single and in their 20s. Of those, 59% of women intend to carry, while the rest are unknown, undecided or plan to abort, Wakota executives said.

Pivotal influence

Many women report that pregnancy resource centers have had a pivotal influence on their lives, including Ashly Bonin, 39, who said she heard about Guiding Star Wakota from staff at a food shelf when she needed diapers. She and her three children had left an abusive husband and had next to nothing. She arrived at the center in tears.

“I was very lovingly welcomed,” said Bonin, who at age 18 had conceived her first child and kept the baby despite threats from her boyfriend. She spent the duration of her first pregnancy in a homeless shelter, while working full time until the day she gave birth. Nearly 20 years later, she found Guiding Star Wakota after her third child was born. She said she can only imagine the difference it would have made if she had found the center sooner. It changed her life, she said.

“I’ve done everything in my life so alone, and suddenly I didn’t feel alone,” Bonin said as she, and a social worker with her, Betty Lamb, began to cry. “It’s not like these people were just doing their job. I could feel they truly cared about me.”

Bonin said she was raised Catholic but fell away from her faith as she struggled with abandonment, drugs and alcohol. She credits the center for her return to a life of faith.

“They never pushed religion on me,” Bonin said. But once the center helped stabilize her situation, she found herself seeking God. She now attends a Lutheran church and feels that she has a personal relationship with God.

“This place made me feel great about myself again and acknowledged the gifts in me and have those pointed out to me,” she said. The center encouraged her to teach an art class, which brought her a great sense of worth and purpose.

Now Bonin plans to lead a group under the National Alliance for Mental Illness as she continues her own healing. She hopes to inspire parents who struggle with mental health, past trauma or abuse.

Aimee Keenan, a 39-year-old from St. Paul, said she received help from Women’s Life Care Center when she became unexpectedly pregnant two years ago, while fleeing from domestic abuse. The father of her four other children had cut her off financially when she obtained a protection order.

“I just didn’t know what to do,” Keenan said in a telephone interview. When she arrived at Women’s Life, which was the pregnancy resource center nearest to her home, she wondered if she could carry her child to term and care for her other children.

The center provided her with a life coach, car seat, baby clothes and maternity clothes, and connected her with a food shelf and a program in finances that allowed her to earn a minivan. At Christmas time, when Keenan could not work because she had a high-risk pregnancy, the center supplied gifts for the children.

‘LIKE FAMILY’

Samantha Dinsey, a native of Ghana in West Africa now living in St. Paul, said that Women’s Life Care Center “was a life-saving place” that helped her “feel like living again” after the child in her womb was diagnosed with a fatal condition and died two and a half months after she gave birth.

Dinsey was referred to the center after she sought opinions from multiple doctors, some of whom encouraged her to get an abortion.

“No woman should have to go through what I went through, but Women’s Life Care Center made me feel like I was not alone,” Dinsey said. After her baby, Martha, was born, the center continued to support her and take her to appointments as she spent her days with Martha in the intensive care unit.

Despite predictions of the doctors, Martha grew and lived for two and a half months before she died. The center provided Dinsey with a life coach and helped her apply for jobs after Martha’s death.

“They did not leave me there. They helped me, I went to school, they helped me with my job application, everything, my resume, this center helped me with all that,” Dinsey said.

She gave birth to a healthy daughter, Emma, in 2021, and plans to take her into the clinic to show her to the staff.

“Everybody in my family knows the center, they were like family,” Dinsey said.

that. Those words were never spoken to me.”

Some women otherwise happy to carry their baby can change their minds if their child is diagnosed with trisomy 21 or another developmental condition, Lagasse said. Women’s Life tries to establish a relationship with the women before they become vulnerable to an abortion.

“Happy-to-carry moms experience road bumps, too,” Lagasse said. “You know, we’ve seen moms where everything was going well and then there’s an adverse diagnosis with the baby and all of a sudden, everything changes. We’re really, really grateful when those women call us to get help and advice and resources because, depending on their doctor, they might be offered an abortion at the 20-week stage,” she said.

Sometimes, women carrying their pregnancies to term refer other women to the clinic, Lagasse said. One happy-to-carry woman who had been helped with material needs by the center referred her niece to the center when her niece became pregnant and was considering an abortion, she said.

Patty Bradway, a registered nurse trained to administer ultrasounds at Women’s Life, said women often cry when they see their babies’ heartbeats on the screen — expressing a range of emotions from elation to fear.

“We can’t push, we can’t judge,” Bradway said.

Executives and staff at pregnancy resource centers also emphasized the importance of prayer in helping people struggling with unexpected pregnancies.

offering gynecological services and an on-site therapist for mental health needs.

“We know that the mother is not going to choose life for her child unless her needs are met first, so we do everything possible to meet her needs, so that she can have the option to carry,” said Kelly Huber, 34, the center’s director of operations.

That is precisely what happened for Kenyatta Hardaway, 46, who now works as a certified life coach at Guiding Star Wakota. When she was pregnant with her first child, Hardaway considered an abortion because of the sickness associated with her pregnancy and her needs at the time. With help from a pregnancy resource center, Hardaway kept her baby.

After teaching for 21 years, Hardaway now helps other women develop their life skills and work toward their goals. If her clients are open to it, she incorporates

“I don’t have one iota of regret in my decision to choose life,” Keenan said. Asked if her experience with a pregnancy resource center made her feel coerced into keeping her baby, she said, “absolutely not. I never felt

“We see those prayers really, really make a difference,” said Lagasse at Women’s Life, which sends text messages to a thread of 80 supporters asking for prayers when a woman comes in who is considering an abortion.

“We see women open up,” Lagasse said. When people are praying, “they warm up to the idea of keeping their baby.”

ADDITIONAL ASSISTANCE

Pregnancy resource center offerings have changed dramatically over the past few decades, said Ann Dickenson, a member of St. Joseph in West St. Paul and an early leader in the state’s pro-life movement.

“I’m pretty amazed at how they’ve changed,” Dickenson said. “They were just like holes-in-the-wall. You wouldn’t even want to go in there.”

In 1973, the year that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled abortion was a constitutional right in Roe v. Wade, a decison overturned in June,

Dickenson founded Cradle of Hope, a nonprofit that provides financial aid to women in crisis pregnancies. Pregnancy resource centers such as Birthright, Women’s Life Care Center and Guiding Star Wakota serve as liaisons for the organization.

Rather than simply referring women to welfare — as when Dickenson was first involved in the movement — PRCs now can provide financial assistance through Cradle of Hope. Since 2019, Guiding Star Wakota alone has received $25,093 for rent assistance and 291 cribs from Cradle of Hope to distribute to women.

Wilgenbusch • For The Catholic

ABOVE Catherine Kracht, a child watch assistant, cares for Luca Bonin while his mom, Ashly, visits Guiding Star Wakota. Child care is one of many services provided at the center, all of which are free.

PHOTOS BY DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

MOMS group fights against Ramsey County abortion ruling

By Barb Umberger The Catholic Spirit

It’s a busy time of year for St. Paul residents Susan and John Neuville, parents of five children, including two teenage girls. As the school year began, they faced a growing stack of permission slips and release forms for their children’s sports clubs and activities.

“I’m required to supply the name of another adult to contact in case of emergency to advise on treatment if I’m unreachable,” Susan said. Without adult permission, her children cannot go on a field trip, have their photo taken, receive basic dental care, be vaccinated or be served ice cream.

“What I would like to understand is how it would make any sense to have that same child decide whether or not to have an abortion,” she said during a news conference at the Minnesota Capitol Sept. 13. “Wouldn’t this be the most critical time to ensure that she has the best support available, most likely her own parents?”

On July 11, a Ramsey County District Court judge struck six protections regarding abortion — longstanding laws passed through the legislative process with bipartisan support, said Maggee Hangge, policy and public relations associate at Minnesota Catholic Conference. The law requiring that both parents be notified at least 48 hours before an abortion is performed on a minor, for example, had been in place for 41 years. The 2003 woman’s right to know law, also struck down, required that women know the gestational age of their unborn child, the risks of carrying the child to term and of the abortion procedure, and that they be offered information on the baby’s development and alternatives to abortion.

Other protections struck down include a 24hour waiting period before a woman can have an abortion; a requirement that only physicians perform

abortions; an abortion data reporting law requiring annual reporting of information such as reasons for a given abortion, the abortion method used and the stage of fetal development; and a law requiring that abortions performed after the first trimester be done in a hospital. In his 140-page ruling, Judge Thomas Gilligan Jr. wrote that “These abortion laws violate the right to privacy because they infringe upon the fundamental right under the Minnesota Constitution to access abortion care and do not withstand strict scrutiny.”

A pro-life group called MOMS — Mothers Offering Maternal Support, a group of about 50 mothers of at least one minor daughter — held the news conference decrying the judge’s decision. Susan Neuville is a member of the group.

Teresa Collett, a law professor and director of the Prolife Center at the University of St. Thomas in

St. Paul, is serving in a private capacity as lead counsel for MOMS. She filed a motion to intervene as a party to the lawsuit on behalf of the MOMS group Sept. 12 because only those who are party to a lawsuit can appeal a court ruling, Collett said.

The motion to intervene covered the four protections that specifically pertained to MOMS’ interest in protecting the health and safety of their daughters: parental notification, informed consent, physicians only and the waiting period.

Two other members of MOMS spoke at the news conference, along with Collett. Renee Carlson, general counsel for Minneapolis-based True North Legal, emceed the conference.

During an interview for the “Practicing Catholic” radio show that aired Sept. 30, Collett said members of MOMS came together out of their concern to protect not only their daughters, but all Minnesota women, from overreaching by the abortion industry. “We have now … asked that the trial court allow us to come in and defend these laws in a way that the attorney general of the state did not,” she said. “And that’s really the crux of the complaint.”

On Oct. 19, both the plaintiffs — which include an obstetrician-gynecologist who performs abortions and a Minnesota nonprofit, Our Justice, that provides financial and logistical help to people seeking an abortion — and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, who has declined to appeal the ruling, objected to the MOMS’ attempt to intervene. The MOMS’ legal team will respond to the objections, Carlson said.

While the MOMS arguments to intervene were expected to face an uphill battle, Hangge said, “these MOMS have stepped in where public officials have failed to lead. That is a witness that should inspire all of us.”

Faithfully Preparing for End of Life

It’s been said that angels have appeared in the halls of the Our Lady of Peace residential hospice home on the corner of Cleveland and St. Anthony Avenues in St. Paul. We’ve witnessed faith excelling for hospice patients as they approach their final days on earth and prepare their souls for ascension. Our job is to give them the physical, emotional, and spiritual support they need during that time

From a calming spa bath upon arrival to the ministration of last rites by a parish priest, we meet the needs of our patients with kindness, dignity, and respect, rooted in Catholic principles. We have pride in our Catholic identity and sponsorship by the Archdiocese, and work to ensure we uphold Catholic values.

Parish priests are welcome here, and work alongside our chaplains to provide on-going spiritual care. Chaplain Judith Oberhauser describes the final days of a patient’s life as their “grand finale” or “swan song.” “We want it to be beautiful, so we focus on resolving all the minor and dissonant cords of their lives, so they can go in peace.”

We provide the highest quality of life for our patients, so they can live well….always.

Read about us at ourladyofpeacemn.org Call us at 651-789-5031

We are in the process of renovating our on-site chapel and hospice residence that features 21- private suites for families to gather in privacy. Care is provided at no cost, beyond what is covered by Medicare.

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Susan Neuville, left, gives remarks during a news conference Sept. 13 at the Minnesota State Capitol by a pro-life group called MOMS — Mothers Offering Maternal Support.

Minneapolis Institute of Art features major Italian Renaissance works

By Debbie Musser For The Catholic Spirit

Admirers of Renaissance art can view works from the renowned Uffizi Galleries without making a trip to Florence, Italy.

The Minneapolis Institute of Art is presenting “Botticelli and Renaissance Florence: Masterworks from the Uffizi,” featuring more than 45 loans from the Italian museum, including works by Sandro Botticelli, a Catholic well-known for painting a wide range of religious subjects throughout his career, including many Madonnas.

“The term ‘Renaissance’ derives from the French word that translates to ‘rebirth,’” said Lois Eliason, adjunct professor at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul who has taught a variety of art history classes at UST over the last 20 years.

“In this case, contemporary Florentine painters, sculptors and architects studied and emulated the works and style of ancient Greece and Rome, rivaling the magnificent achievements of these civilizations,” Eliason said.

Botticelli (1445-1510) lived most of his life in Florence and was a leading artist of the Italian Renaissance. He painted three major frescoes in the Sistine Chapel in Rome, commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV, as well as his most famous work, The Birth of Venus.

His career began as an apprentice of Fra Filippo Lippi, a leading Florentine painter who was a favorite of the Medici, a powerful Catholic family who gained success in commerce and banking. The Medicis’ devotion to the arts and humanities helped make Florence the center of the Renaissance, a time characterized by a new awakening of art, culture and learning. The Medici family went on to produce four popes: Leo X (15131521), Clement VII (1523-1534), Pius IV (1559-1565) and Leo XI (1605).

“I think everyone, Catholic or not, should see this exhibit,” said Eliason. “We can understand a little bit more about the painter and his contemporaries, learn about what life was like in 15th century Florence, and experience a selection of gorgeous paintings, which are some of the Uffizi’s most prized works. Minneapolis is very lucky to be the only stop for many of these paintings, which I believe rarely leave Italy,” said Eliason.

“Together, these paintings present an overview of the Christian spirit that was persuasive throughout 15th century Florence through the lens of one of its most popular and prolific painters,” she said.

Madonna and Child in Glory with Angels, one of Botticelli’s best-known sacred pieces, features a supernatural, celestial character contrasting with a very human depiction of Mary and Jesus.

“Botticelli created tender scenes with his sacred subjects, and this one is really special, with the gold highlights and such detail,” said Rachel McGarry, Elizabeth MacMillan chair of European art and curator of European paintings and works on paper at MIA

Another of Botticelli’s depictions of Jesus and his mother, Mary, is a brilliantly colored work with detailed symbolism

Sandro Botticelli, Madonna and Child in Glory with Angels, c. 1467-69, tempera on panel.

— Adoration of the Child with Angels (Madonna of the Roses).

“Here, Botticelli and his assistants paint a scene of the Virgin Mary and angels adoring the Christ child in an outdoor garden,” Eliason said.

“I love this painting for its colorful and detailed renderings of costumes, plants and flowers; take note of the strawberries and violets in the foreground meadow as well as the roses that fill up the sky in the background,” she said.

Eliason noted the small-scale painting, Saint Augustine in His Study, in which Botticelli gives the viewer an intimate glimpse into the private study of St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430), whose writings helped shape Western Christianity.

“Here, a heavy green curtain is pulled back to show the saint writing at his desk,” Eliason said. “We can see books on the shelves at our left, and a low-relief roundel depicting the Virgin Mary and Christ child on the back wall.”

“Pieces of torn paper and quills scattered on the ground suggest that St. Augustine is fully immersed in his work; Botticelli portrays the saint with a sense of calm reserve,” she said.

Another Botticelli religious painting, Adoration of the Magi, is displayed in the last gallery of the exhibition.

“This is a remarkable painting, filled with grace and beauty as the three kings honor the infant Christ on Jan. 6, a very important day in Florence,” McGarry said. “The more you look at the painting, the more you see.”

“Botticelli’s scene in this painting adds another layer to our understanding of the story by making it an homage to the most powerful figures from 15th century Florence,” said Eliason.

“Portraits of Medici family members appear on the figures of the kings, and the clan’s patriarch, Cosimo the Elder, is shown cradling the feet of the infant Christ,” Eliason said.

Of note — the only known self portrait of Botticelli is at the far-right side of

TOP Botticelli and workshop, Adoration of the Child with Angels (Madonna of the Roses), 1490-1500, probably tempera and oil on panel.

ABOVE Botticelli, Adoration of the Magi, 1470-75, probably tempera and oil on panel.

Adoration of the Magi. “The artist wears a heavy camel-colored robe and turns his head to acknowledge our presence,” said Eliason

Other notable Botticelli works in the Mia exhibition include The Trial of Moses, The Flagellation and Pallas and Centaur, a large painting Eliason said is “not to be missed, as it fully embraces contemporary human thinking regarding beauty and virtue.”

BOTTICELLI AND THE MIA

Botticelli and Renaissance Florence: Masterworks from the Uffizi Oct. 16 through Jan. 8

Minneapolis Institute of Art 2400 3rd Ave. S., Minneapolis $16 to $20; free age 17 and under newartsmia org

PHOTOS COURTESY UFFIZI GALLERIES

Botticelli, St. Augustine in His Study, c. 1494, probably tempera and oil on panel.

After 30 years at Our Lady of Peace hospice, Joe Stanislav to say goodbye

By Christina Capecchi For The Catholic Spirit

After 30 years as president and CEO of Our Lady of Peace — the free Catholic hospice in St. Paul with a home health care staff — Joe Stanislav is preparing to step down. His final day is Dec. 30. The 65-year-old — a member of St. Ambrose in Woodbury — is planning to spend more time with his wife, Pam, their three daughters and their 12 grandkids.

Q Tell me about your childhood memories growing up in Rochester.

A During those days we were free. We could go anywhere as long as we were home for supper. Then we’d go out again till bed. Kids aren’t as free anymore. We were lucky. We played pick-up ball; we played pick-up hockey in the winter. We just found ways to entertain ourselves. There were large Catholic families all around us — the next-door neighbors had 10 kids, across from us had eight, down the street had eight. There were always games on the street.

Q The Franciscans who taught you as a boy entered your life again in 2009, when the hospice — founded by the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne and formerly known as Our Lady of Good Counsel — merged with the Franciscan Health Community and was renamed Our Lady of Peace.

A It’s a melding of those two religious orders and their missions. I always tell my wife, “It’s the Franciscans’ revenge at me for having to teach me in grade school and put up with us in high school.” My whole life has been paying them back. They were joyous people, and they definitely lived out their mission.

Q What kept you in this job so long?

A I never found anything I’d like to do more. I like the challenges, what changes throw at you and how you respond. It helps you grow in faith.

Challenges can look huge sometimes. You let your mind go wild, and, “Oh my gosh, this is Armageddon!”

That’s the advantage to being at a place a long time: You learn to be patient and persevere. You see those cycles, and instead of running from the problems, you go through them and face them and realize you’ve got a really great support group — excellent staff, volunteers, donors, all these folks. It isn’t just you,

it’s everybody. That’s what’s kept me going for this long.

Q What has working with death taught you about life?

A People fear death because we fear life. We’re afraid of the future, of not being adequate. I’m always inspired by patients who express that they are content with their lives, they’re not afraid of dying, they look forward to heaven. A lot of people are ready to go. They’re not anxious about it. They don’t think they were inadequate. And they believe that Christ died for us, and that’s all that matters. If you have faith, you’re not afraid of what comes next.

Q Do you hope to have that same contentment when your time comes?

A Definitely. They’re kind of role models, and when you see people like that, you realize they’re not really any different than you. They’ve just learned to live in the moment. They’re not anxious about the future, they’re not ruminating about the past — they’ve come to grips with it. That’s what you have to do. Hopefully we all have time to do that and the mental capacity.

Q Do you hear stories from staff about patients who encounter a loved one in heaven as they near death?

A Yes. That’s what I look forward to, too — seeing them again and realizing that they’re in heaven. What could be better?

A priest once said, “It’s great to have people who are in serious suffering or pain pray for you.” I thought, “Well, we should be praying for them.” But when you think about it: people who are facing those things, they’re coming to holiness, and who better to pray for you?

Q Our Lady of Peace is known for the way it welcomes new patients — giving them a bath, a shave or shampoo, clipping their nails, putting them in clean clothes. It’s a corporal work of mercy.

A If we do anything well, we get people to a point of being symptom free. That’s our goal. One way you do that is psychological, the things that just make you feel better. The (Dominican) sisters set that example. They’re about the little things. And our long-term staff have passed that along. It’s their legacy: to look at the little things that can bring joy and to help make those end days much happier.

It’s good to see how a family that arrives in turmoil — very demanding or upset about everything — by the end of the day, they’re calm and complimentary. We see that change in them. Their anxiety turns to acceptance and gratitude.

Q Your retirement times out with the completion — or near completion — of a successful capital campaign and a construction project that will give each patient a private room.

A It’s gratifying to know that we give great care and now we’re going to be able to do it in the best setting — and still do it at no cost to the patient — all three of those things. Sometimes two would be great. That feels good.

Q Are people blown away by the fact that Our Lady of Peace is free?

A More people are aware of that now. The sisters, to their credit, didn’t blow their own horn. They were on this quiet mission here. But with our goals to expand and do more for underserved communities, we’ve had to be more public. So yeah, you do hear from folks who didn’t know we existed. “You do what?” Then we show them what the rooms look like.

Q You have a close-up view of generosity in action.

A It inspires you. It makes you want to be more generous. It doesn’t matter whether they’re giving six figures or $100, it’s the attitude that they give it with. They really want to be part of this. Donating is their way of being part of this. It’s not grudging. It’s freely given, with such joy. That’s why I know I’ll always support this place.

Q What are your retirement plans?

A I don’t know. When I have more time to concentrate on it, I’m sure that’ll take care of itself. I hope to travel more, to dodge winter and to be more involved in our church. I’m looking forward to having more time to reflect, more quiet time.

Q Do you have a favorite prayer?

A My wife and I together daily pray the rosary before bed. When we started doing that, it always seemed more like a chore. Now it’s something we look forward to.

Q One of your daughters has a farm near Littlefork. It sounds like you enjoy your adventures up there.

A Pam and I keep a trailer on their property. They’re right along the Little Fork River. We fish, we golf, we take walks. They’ve got four-wheelers and snowmobiles. When I go up there, I turn into a kid. I often tell my grandchildren, “Don’t tell Nana about the stuff I do.”

Q What do you know for sure?

A The only thing I know for sure is that I’m loved. That’s enough.

Pope announces a second session for Synod of Bishops assembly

By Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service

Saying he did not want to rush the process of discerning how the Holy Spirit is calling the Church to grow in “synodality,” Pope Francis announced that the next assembly of the Synod of Bishops would take place in two sessions.

The synod assembly, with mostly bishops as voting members, will meet Oct. 4-29, 2023, as previously announced, the pope said, but the assembly will have a second session in October 2024 as well.

Pope Francis made the announcement Oct. 16 at the end of his Angelus address. He had met Oct. 14 with the synod leadership.

The pope and local bishops kicked off the listening and discernment process for the “synod

on synodality” in October 2021, and by November the synod secretariat is expected to release a working document for continental assemblies.

With 112 of the 114 bishops’ conferences in the world having sent in a synthesis of what emerged in the listening sessions in their countries, Pope Francis said that “the fruits of the synodal process underway are many, but so that they might come to full maturity, it is necessary not to be in a rush.”

“To have a more relaxed period of discernment,” the pope announced, “I have established that this synodal assembly will take place in two sessions” rather than the one originally planned.

“I trust that this decision will promote the understanding of synodality as a constitutive dimension of the Church and help everyone to live

it as the journey of brothers and sisters who proclaim the joy of the Gospel,” Pope Francis told thousands of people gathered in St. Peter’s Square for the Sunday Angelus prayer.

The website of the synod secretariat describes synodality as a style seen in the Church’s life and mission that reflects its nature as “the people of God journeying together and gathering in assembly, summoned by the Lord Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit to proclaim the Gospel.”

While it does not imply everyone has a vote on issues facing the Church, it does mean that all the members of the Church — ordained or lay — have a responsibility to contribute to the Church’s mission and to pray, offer suggestions and join in discerning the voice of the Holy Spirit.

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Searching for

What brings people into the Church? What drives a person who is not Catholic to convert to Catholicism? I doubt it’s the result of a convincing argument. What brings someone who is Catholic but has stopped practicing the faith back to the Church? This last question, I can answer partially from my own experience.

As many people know, I did not practice the faith in my early adult life. It was not because I did not believe in God and Jesus Christ as my savior. There were a few reasons I did not go. I was too lazy. I did not care to associate myself with people who in my eyes at the time seemed to be too sanctimonious. But most of all, I stopped going to church because I felt I did not need it. I still can hear my mom scolding me, “You should go back to church.” “Yeah right, ma, I will definitely think about it.”

What brought me back to church was a situation that I felt God had a hand in helping me through. After that, I felt that I needed to make some room in my life for God, and that compelled me to come back to the Church. I needed the Church to help me make room for God. My brother asked me at the time, “Why the Catholic Church; why not some other Christian denomination?” My answer simply was that it was all I knew. There was no theological reason. I found a parish that felt right, where I felt accepted despite my foibles, and started going. And then things started to make sense.

Drawing from my own experience, the reason someone comes back to the Church after being away for a while, or converts to Catholicism, more times than not, isn’t theological. Other elements need to be in place for someone to make the conversion, to follow the way of Christ.

I think today’s Gospel gives us a little insight into how this might happen. Zacchaeus is an interesting character; one many might identify with. He lived in Jericho, a wealthy town, a place where a lot of taxes could be collected. And Zacchaeus

was a tax collector, a man who was at the top of his profession, and probably the most hated man in his district. While his profession made him wealthy, he probably was not happy and he probably was lonely because the same profession that made him wealthy made him an outcast. He had heard of this Jesus, who welcomed tax collectors and sinners, and he wanted to see him, to see if Jesus could provide him with any solace in the way he had led his life. Despised and hated by all, Zacchaeus was searching for the love of God.

Zacchaeus was now determined to see Jesus, and nothing would stop him, not even a large crowd. Jesus noticed Zacchaeus high in a tree and called to him, saying he needed to stay with him. With the crowd observing with a jaundiced eye, Zacchaeus shows the community his conversion, that he was a changed man, pledging to be a good steward of his wealth by giving to the poor and ensuring he deals with people justly. Jesus assures him of salvation; that Jesus came to seek and to save what was lost.

When we think of the word “lost” in religious terms, we might think of the words “damned” and “doomed.” But the word “lost” simply means “in the wrong place.” When we find ourselves away from God, we are lost, in the wrong place, and we look to get to the right place. Jesus Christ finds us and puts us in the right place with God.

What brings people to the Church? I think many of us are like Zacchaeus, lost and looking to Jesus to put us in the right place. Some of us at one time might have been lethargic in practicing our faith or even somehow alienated from it. Then something happened that prompted us to stand up and take notice, such as a profound experience of God working in our lives. Or having brought a child into the world and wanting this child to learn about God. It might be reaching a point in life that brings us to search for answers that can be found only by having a relationship with God, or searching for a place that accepts us for who we are. For many of us, Zacchaeus represents the lonely in us, the outcast in us, the one in us who searches to be with God.

Father Beeson is pastor of St. Pius V in Cannon Falls and St. Joseph in Miesville.

there was no shortage of times when we had to be escorted from our spot by one of my parents for one reason or another, but overall, it was probably a good plan.

DAILY Scriptures

Sunday, Oct. 30

Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time

Wis 11:22–12:2

2 Thes 1:11–2:2

Lk 19:1-10

Monday, Oct. 31

Phil 2:1-4

Lk 14:12-14

Tuesday, Nov. 1

Solemnity of All Saints

Rv 7:2-4, 9-14

1 Jn 3:1-3 Mt 5:1-12a

Wednesday, Nov. 2 Commemoration of All Souls Wis 3:1-9 Rom 6:3-9 Jn 6:37-40

Thursday, Nov. 3 Phil 3:3-8a Lk 15:1-10

Friday, Nov. 4 St. Charles Borromeo, bishop

Phil 3:17–4:1 Lk 16:1-8

Saturday, Nov. 5 Phil 4:10-19 Lk 16:9-15

Sunday, Nov. 6 Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time

2 Mc 7:1-2, 9-14

2 Thes 2:16–0 3:5 Lk 20:27-38

Monday, Nov. 7 Ti 1:1-9

Lk 17:1-6

Tuesday, Nov. 8 Ti 2:1-8, 11-14 Lk 17:7-10

Q I don’t like going to Mass. I had to go when I was a kid, and I never got the point. But I also realize that it could just be me; I could be the one missing something. What can I do to get more out of Mass?

A I’m glad that you have written, and I’m grateful that you have asked this question. I must tell you: We were one of those “front pew” families when I was growing up. According to my mom, it wasn’t because we “got it” better than other families or because we were holier than anyone else. Far from it. In fact, I think that one of the primary reasons we sat in the front is because we were always late to Mass. (I don’t mean “sometimes.” When I say “always,” I mean that the priest could tell that he was late for Mass if the Schmitz family was already there when he got to the front of the church.)

We sat in the front because Catholics are always so hospitable that we leave the front pews for visitors — and for the late families, I guess.

My mom says that, when she and my dad were new parents, some more experienced moms and dads had told them that if you want your kids to pay attention, then bring them to the front so that: a) they can see what’s going on, and b) they will be on their best behavior. I think that it kind of worked. I mean,

Even though I hated going to Mass as a kid, there still were a couple of things that my parents instilled in me (and in all of us) growing up. The first is that Sunday Mass is not optional. This was huge. We were all in sports, and as we got older, we were all relatively good at sports. Yet, no matter what, if we were traveling with our team or traveling on vacation or had any number of other things going on over the weekend, Mass was absolutely and without question going to be a part of our plans.

I know that I did not appreciate that at the time. At the time, it was annoying. And I have known many people who have said exactly what you said about how this affects your willingness to go to Mass as an adult. They claim that their unwillingness to go to Mass as adults comes from the fact that they had to go to Mass as children.

I see that, but what if we applied that same logic to any other thing we “had to do” while growing up: Someone might say, “I no longer eat vegetables because I had to as a kid.” Or, “I no longer brush my teeth because my parents made me brush my teeth when I was little.” Or, “I don’t wash my hands after using the bathroom because my parents would always make me do that when I was younger.” If we were to say any of those things now, it would be more than a little immature and foolish. So, let’s not say that about the Sunday Mass requirement. It would be better to say that you just don’t like clean teeth, or you just don’t see the point in brushing them regularly.

Maybe you don’t see the point in going to Mass. I understand that. That would make sense to me. I think about those years while I was growing up in the front pew. And what was I taught? “Be quiet. Watch.”

PLEASE TURN TO ASK FATHER MIKE

Wednesday, Nov. 9 Dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome Ez 47:1-2, 8-9, 12

1 Cor 3:9c-11, 16-17 Jn 2:13-22

Thursday, Nov. 10 St. Leo the Great, pope and doctor of the Church Phmn 7-20 Lk 17:20-25

Friday, Nov. 11 St. Martin of Tours, bishop

2 Jn 4-9 Lk 17:26-37

Saturday, Nov. 12 St. Josaphat, bishop and martyr 3 Jn 5-8 Lk 18:1-8

Sunday, Nov. 13

Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time Mal 3:19-20a

2 Thes 3:7-12 Lk 21:5-19

This month, my parents celebrated their 64th wedding anniversary. I’ve always found their October anniversary significant — as though in a special way, in this month we celebrate the Blessed Mother and her rosary, Mary has kept an especially watchful eye over my parents and our family.

My mother, 89, and father, 94, still manage to keep two holy hours every day, in addition to praying any number of novenas, especially rosary novenas, for various intentions. A while ago, my mother gave me a box that contained the notes she took on these novenas throughout the years, her catalog of when they were saying them, for whom, their specific intentions, and so on. It was filled to the brim.

A few years ago, my parents recorded the rosary, praying all 20 mysteries with light background music, and they gave a copy to all of us — children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. I treasure this gift, though I have barely broken it out. My parents are still here, and thankfully I can still pray with them. One day too soon, I will have to settle for hearing their recorded voices at prayer, but what a gift, what a legacy.

They were not always as prayerful as they are now. Raising seven children was as full and busy a life as

any. Like many of us, they grew into a more mature prayer life as they grew older and wiser. But there was one thing about their prayer that I always found very convincing: whether prayers were answered or not, they kept praying, returning to the rosary over and over and over.

Pope Benedict XVI makes an interesting observation about the Blessed Mother in “Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives” that is related to this. He writes:

“I consider it important to focus also on the final sentence of Luke’s annunciation narrative: ‘And the angel departed from her’ (Lk 1:38). The great hour of Mary’s encounter with God’s messenger — in which her whole life is changed — comes to an end, and she remains there alone, with the task that truly surpasses all human capacity. There are no angels standing round her. She must continue along the path that leads through many dark moments ... right

up to the night of the Cross.

“How often in these situations must Mary have returned inwardly to the hour when an angel had spoken to her, pondering afresh the greeting: ‘Rejoice, full of grace!’ and the consoling words: ‘Do not be afraid!’ The angel departs; her mission remains, and with it matures her inner closeness to God.”

I’m certain my parents have had some outstanding moments of consolation from the Lord. They wouldn’t have managed 64 years without them. But the fact their many novenas may not have been answered in the way they wished, in the timing they wished, did not keep them from filling that box to overflowing. Very much like Mary, after consolation, their mission remained, and they tended to it with extraordinary, unpretentious, unselfish faithfulness. They returned, again and again, to that moment when the Incarnation broke in upon our world and a little girl from Nazareth had the courage to say “yes.”

My parents are not perfect, but I’m pretty sure that when the time comes to face their judgment, any remaining sin-stain they might bear will be instantaneously blotted out by a lifetime of hailing Mary.

Mother Mary, I thank you for watching over this world, for your faithful intercession, and for your faithfulness to your mission. Pray for my parents, and for all parents, who are guarding and guiding the faith at home. Strengthen all families, encourage them in fidelity to their mission even in moments of darkness, and pray for us now, right now, and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Kelly Stanchina is the award-winning author of 11 books, including “Love Like A Saint: Cultivating Virtue with Holy Women” and “A Place Called Golgotha: Meditations on the Last Words of Christ” (forthcoming). Visit her website at lizk org

Wishing for a real debate on abortion

So many falsehoods and confusions fill the media lately on abortion that I find myself pining for an actual argument.

For an example, I do not want to pick on our president. But he started it, by picking on Catholic teaching.

In a recent speech to supporters, President Biden is reported as saying:

“You have Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and others talking about how they’re gonna you know, make sure that Roe is forever gone and Dobbs becomes a national law. ... Talk about, what, no exceptions. Rape, incest, no exceptions. ... Now, I’m gonna deal with my generic point. I happen to be a practicing Roman Catholic, my Church doesn’t even make that argument.” He also promised that if his party wins two more seats in the Senate, “we’re going to codify Roe and once again make Roe the law of the land.”

In how many ways is this misleading?

First, it makes no sense to talk of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision becoming the law of the land, because it makes no law one way or the other. It says the Constitution leaves the people and their elected representatives free to make the abortion laws they support.

Second, the law Sen. Graham has introduced bans most abortions after 15 weeks of gestation. That leaves about 94% of abortions untouched. It also has exceptions for danger to the mother’s life and cases of rape or incest.

Third, the law the president wants to sign, the Women’s Health Protection Act, would not codify Roe. Besides legalizing abortion throughout pregnancy, it attacks hundreds of modest state laws that have remained in effect under Roe, dealing with informed consent, parental rights when minors seek abortions, safety protections for women at abortion clinics

and even the requirement that abortions be done by licensed physicians.

That law has passed the House. The president refers to two Senate seats because he supports ending the Senate filibuster, allowing this most extreme abortion law in U.S. history to be approved by simple majority.

Then there is, most seriously, that business about the Church.

In his great encyclical on “The Gospel of Life,” St. John Paul II reviewed how Catholic teaching has rejected abortion since the Church’s first centuries. Reaffirming that constant tradition, he declared that “direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being” (No. 62).

After citing Scripture on our need to obey God’s commands when faced with injustice, he added, “In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to ‘take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or vote for it’” (No. 73).

In this same paragraph, Pope John Paul II discussed a common problem for pro-life legislators: When a current or pending law allows abortion and full protection for the unborn is not practically possible, may one support “a more restrictive law, aimed at limiting the number of authorized abortions”?

His answer was yes.

Since 1975, the U.S. bishops have said much the same thing in their Pastoral Plan for Pro-Life Activities, calling for laws protecting the unborn child “to the maximum degree possible.” Both words, “maximum” and “possible,” are important.

So Catholic teaching allows for supporting a bill like Graham’s when broader protection is not possible, but rejects the bill the president supports. As Jonathan Swift once wrote, “Falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it.” So much limping is needed to get past the falsehoods these days that there is little genuine debate on how to best serve pregnant women and their children.

Doerflinger worked for 36 years in the Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. He writes from Washington state.

DEACON GORDON BIRD

We go to the saints like we do our friends and family, so we do not have to be loners when it comes to living the faith as God calls us — to teach, provide, protect and lead. Those holy men and women whom we celebrate come the first of November — the solemnity of All Saints — compel us to emulate their example, giving us ways and means to answer the call to serve others diligently and prayerfully. The saints we celebrate reflect our monthly petition and prayer: to transform people to offer their lives in service to others — as the saints did as living sacrifices filled with the abundance of Christ’s love. We do this for justice, with mercy, in forgiveness and for peace.

We are called to live sacramental lives of prayer, mercy, forgiveness, service and love, as the saints so justly lived with their time, talent and treasure. Like the saints, we are called to protect the helpless, care for the sick, feed the hungry, support the homeless and lead those who have fallen astray back to the faith. So many times, within the sphere of influence in which God placed them, the saints needed remarkable physical,

LETTERS

Culture of Life

I was completely appalled when I read Ms. Rosenwinkel’s recent letter (“Roe overturned, now what?” July 28) bashing “pro-lifers” with wild accusations that they don’t care about a whole slew of issues. I care about a host of social issues and work hard on changing them. However, I absolutely must put a priority on the issue of abortion. What I have seen and heard from women throughout my 32 years as a nurse at a pregnancy resource center breaks my heart. Abortion doesn’t liberate women or promote the common good. It ends the life of a baby that I clearly see while doing ultrasounds. It wounds ever so deeply both the mother and father in countless ways. The staggering number of abortions with their life altering consequences should make it a priority for all Christians. We can help create a Culture of Life by understanding and promoting God’s beautiful plan for our sexuality to our young people.

Mary Stolz St. Peter, Forest Lake

Defending Pope Francis

I was attending Mass with friends at a different church. They had a substitute priest presiding. His homily centered on St. Paul telling St. Peter he had changed and that this was not right. This priest then went on to tell us our job is to do the same. Well, my thought is to let some of the U.S. bishops know that their job is to treat Pope Francis with more respect and reverence. Pope Francis hasn’t changed. He has always loved the poor and tried to help them. He was criticized for saying that laws should be established to allow same sex unions so these people could benefit from government programs. Nope, he won’t bless their civil marriage as it is not a sacramental marriage. This has been and still is his opinion. He feels God is the judge of everyone. I still like the Gospel where he says whoever is free of sin should cast the first stone upon the woman caught committing adultery. So, I guess my job according to this priest is to comment on priests and bishops who are in the news for speaking against Pope Francis. We all know he chose the name Francis as he feels called to rebuild God’s Church. Personally, I feel he is trying very hard and the bumps in the road are people under him who promised to obey and follow him.

Esther Lenartz St. John Neumann, Eagan

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Please limit your letter to the editor to 150 words and include your parish and phone number. The Commentary pages do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Catholic Spirit.

intellectual and spiritual abilities. They responded by sacrificially living out their lives with unending acts of corporal and spiritual mercy.

Christians must love and serve one another. As Catholics, we do not choose to go it alone in acts of service because we value being in relationship — which entails both communication and presence. As in the presence of the holy Eucharist, surrounded by the saints and angels and in communion with our brothers and sisters in Christ. As an invocation of the penitential act tells us: “Lord Jesus, you come to us in word and sacrament to strengthen us in holiness.”

And, he provides us with the Church Triumphant — the communion of saints in heaven above — for that reason as well. Because they are friends and family. Their prayers and actions are immensely powerful.

With so much spiritual and physical combat going on throughout the world today, we certainly need to learn and receive help from the saints. The saints who are alive and well hear our prayers — “He is not God of the dead, but of the living.” (Mk 12:27). As Catholic Watchmen, we serve as a witness to family and community — a weekly discipline — and we understand that includes calling on the intercession of our favorite saints. We call on Apostles, martyrs, pastors, preachers, doctors of the Church — all holy men and women who teach us best by how they lived and fought in their evangelization efforts, disciple-making apostolates and loving service to others, even as they struggled and triumphed through trials and tribulations.

Call on your favorite saints to help you love and serve God better. Strive to offer your life to others as

self-gift — starting with your family. With the Blessed Mother and St. Joseph at the domestic helm, I have many “go to” saints, depending on the situation, to strengthen me in holiness: Padre Pio (“pray, hope and don’t worry”); Thomas Aquinas (“study well”); Francis de Sales (“write/evangelize courageously”); Anthony (“lost things”); Isidore (“success for farmers”); Agnes (“purity of body, soul, heart”); John Vianney (“good confession”); John Paul II (“vibrant, joyful soul and intellect”); Mother Teresa (“love and charity”) — to name just a few.

I’ve heard that a saint was simply “a sinner who loves God more than his or her sin.” Perhaps. For sure the saints knew that spiritual and physical warfare are concurrent in the world, yet Christ actively taught and healed through them as they served others. Jesus was their perfect model of sacrifice. Surviving and thriving in the world to serve others, to experience the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, required their relentless daily conviction to an active prayer life.

St. Teresa of Kolkata knew all about prayer, and how it supplies the wherewithal to give hope and love unceasingly while serving others. The great saint who founded the Missionaries of Charity — serving the poorest of the poor — once commented on the impact that a prayer life can have on charitable works, saying “I used to believe prayer changes things, but now I know that prayer changes us, and we change things.”

Deacon Bird ministers at St. Joseph in Rosemount and All Saints in Lakeville and assists with the archdiocese’s Catholic Watchmen movement.

Why I am Catholic

By Sam Galvin

am Catholic because of the witness of joy and peace that I have seen in my Catholic brothers and sisters.

Throughout my life I have been surrounded by Catholics. I was well formed in the apologetics of my faith. I knew the faith, but I didn’t know what it was to live a Catholic life.

When I was 18 years old, I decided I didn’t care about my faith. I grew up in a very Catholic home. I went to a Catholic school that gave me a classical education and taught me apologetics. I understood what the Church was and why it taught what it did. But after graduating high school, I longed for freedom and a lack of rules placed on me by my parents. While I appreciated Catholicism, I would rather not have a bunch of rules over my head making me feel guilty.

Yet even with my “guilt-free” life, I was still deeply unhappy and felt severe shame when I sinned. After about six months, I decided to reflect on how I was living. I knew that this emptiness was not what life should be and that there must be more. While reflecting, I thought about all those in my life who were the happiest. It was in this time that a common theme appeared: All the happiest people in my life were Catholic.

Growing up, I knew many priests, as my father worked for the local diocese. Priests would often frequent our house for dinner or just to play board games. I experienced their joy firsthand. I also saw joy in the families around me. Parents living Catholic lives to the best of their ability with real joy. These priests and families weren’t perfect, far from it, but they were joyful and had an air of peace. This was deeply attractive to me, as it was what I was craving in my life.

It was at this time that I decided to give my faith a real try and actively pursue a relationship with the Lord. During that time, I found that my relationship with the Lord, strengthened by the sacraments, was pivotal in my peace and joy. This joy made life more enjoyable, but more important, it strengthened me in my times of fear and doubt. When the Lord sent me away from my hometown and the community that had formed me, my immediate reaction was fear and confusion. But through my faith and time in prayer, I was able to receive peace from the Lord, knowing that he had plans greater than mine.

As I have progressed in my faith, I continue to be thankful for being a part of the Catholic Church. The joy that I experienced in others drew me into my faith, but that was only the beginning. Truly, my strengths lie only in the Lord, and through the sacraments of Communion and reconciliation, I can stand firmly in him.

Praised be Jesus Christ.

Galvin, 22, is a senior at the University of Minnesota studying strategic communications with an emphasis on public relations. He enjoys rock climbing, watching soccer and football, playing guitar and singing. A native of Madison, Wisconsin, his current parish is St. Lawrence Catholic Church and Newman Center in Minneapolis.

DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Sean M. Schniederjan

PARISH EVENTS

Fair and Ethical Trade Sale — Oct. 29: 10 a.m.–3 p.m. at St. John Neumann, 4030 Pilot Knob Road, Eagan. Household items, jewelry, gifts, children’s items, coffee, tea, chocolate, spices and more. Benefits farmers and artisans in developing countries and disadvantaged regions. Lunch for purchase. Kristen at kristenmarie1530@gmail com sjn org

Oktoberfest! — Oct. 29 at St. Katharine Drexel, 7101 143rd Ave. NW, Ramsey. 4:30 p.m. polka Mass; 6 p.m. food and beer; 7 p.m. live music and dancing. Adults $10; Kids $5. Questions? Troy at 763-323-7012 or Amanda at 763-338-0206. stkdcc org

Craft and Bake Sale — Oct. 29-30 at St. Peter, 2600 Margaret St. N., North St. Paul. Fall and Christmas crafts and homemade baked goods. 2–6 p.m. Oct 29; 9 a.m.–1 p.m. Oct 30. Hosted by St. Peter’s Council of Catholic Women. churchofstpeternsp org

Holiday Bazaar — Nov. 5: 9 a.m.–3 p.m. at Assumption, 305 E. 77th St., Richfield. Featuring craft items, baked goods, jewelry, recycled Christmas

decorations, lunch and the famous Assumption caramel rolls. assumptionrichfield org

Craft Fair — Nov. 5-6 at St. Thomas Aquinas, 920 Holley Ave., St. Paul Park. 49th annual craft fair. 9 a.m.–3 p.m. Nov. 5; 9 a.m.-noon Nov. 6. Activities Building. The men’s club will serve a pancake breakfast Nov. 6. st thomas aquinas com

St. Catherine Turkey Bingo — Nov. 6: 2–4 p.m. at St. Patrick, 24425 Old Highway 13 Blvd., Jordan. The St. Catherine CCW is hosting its annual turkey bingo. $10/card for 20 games with two $50 coverall games for $1/card. Light meal provided. Social hall. stpandc mn org

Habits of Freedom — Nov. 8: 7 p.m. at St. Thomas More, 1079 Summit Ave., St. Paul. Presentation by Fr. Chris Collins, SJ — author of “Habits of Freedom: 5 Ignatian Tools for Clearing Your Mind and Resting Daily in the Lord.” morecommunity org/ habitsoffreedom

Craft and Bake Sale — Nov. 19: 9 a.m.–6 p.m. at Our Lady of Victory, 5146 Emerson Ave. N., Minneapolis. Crafts. Baked Goods. Raffles.

RETREATS+WORSHIP

School of Discernment — Nov. 11-13 at St. Paul’s Monastery, 2675 Benet Road, St. Paul. Discern the voice of the Holy Spirit under guidance of skilled teachers and listeners and with the benefit of wisdom from the monastic tradition. Now offered in-person and online simultaneously. benedictinecenter org/schoolofdiscernment

The Eucharist: Our Source & Summit — Nov. 12: 8 a.m.–4 p.m. at Epiphany, 1900 111th Ave. NW, Coon Rapids. Scott Hahn and John Bergsma. Learn about the faith, receive the sacraments and enjoy fellowship. $35. stpaulcenter com/coonrapids2022

Being with Father Luigi Giussani Yesterday and Today — Nov. 18: 6–9 p.m. at St. Joseph, 1154 Seminole Ave., West St. Paul. Celebrate the 100th birthday of Servant of God Father Luigi Giussani and encounter the charism of Communion and Liberation. 6 p.m. Mass. 7:15–8:30 p.m. a sharing from those who knew Father Giussani personally. Light refreshments served. churchofstjoseph org

SCHOOLS

St. Thomas Academy Woodbury Information Night — Nov. 2: 6–7:30 p.m. at The Wick Pub & Grille, 9555 Wedgewood Dr., Woodbury. Talk with students and parents from Woodbury. Food and beverages. Free. RSVPs requested. tinyurl com/yc79y2ba

St. Thomas Academy Lakeville Information Night — Nov. 9: 6–7:30 p.m. at The Barn at Spirit of Brandtjen Farm, 16972 Brandtjen Farm Drive., Lakeville. Talk with students and parents from Lakeville, Apple Valley and Rosemount. Food and beverages. Free. RSVPs requested. tinyurl com/5fynjyzb

Open House: Welcome to Benilde-St. Margaret — Nov. 10. 6–8 p.m. at Benilde-St. Margaret, 2501 Highway 100 S., St. Louis Park. Explore campus, meet teachers and administrators, speak with current parents and students. For 2023: Jan. 5, April 6, May 18: bsmschool org/openhouse

is one thing that we need to make absolutely clear: There is a massive difference between “watching” and “worshipping.”

When you were baptized, you were anointed a priest, prophet and king or queen. You were anointed a “kingdom priest,” and a priest is one who offers the sacrifice. All of the faithful exercise their kingdom priesthood when they unite their prayers with the ministerial priest who is uniting all of their prayers with Jesus, the One, Great, High Priest. When we go to Mass, we are there to offer the sacrifice to the Father with the priest at the altar and Jesus the High Priest. You have a job to do!

And this job accomplishes something. At every Mass we pray, “May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands for the praise and glory of his name, for our good and the good of all his holy Church.” And that is what happens: The Father is glorified, and the world is sanctified! When you pray, when you offer the sacrifice with the ministerial priest, those two things are accomplished in reality.

I like to think of it this way: When you exercise your kingdom priesthood, the Father is just that much more glorified, and the world is just that much more sanctified. Something happens that wouldn’t happen if you weren’t there. Your priesthood is needed, because this world needs your presence and your prayers.

Father Schmitz is director of youth and young adult ministry for the Diocese of Duluth and chaplain of the Newman Center at the University of Minnesota Duluth.

jlian@mid-america.com

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES

Sharing & Caring Hands/Mary’s Place is located in Minneapolis and is a compassionate response to the needs of the poor. They provide an array of services to the homeless and poor and stand as a beacon of hope to those that are alone, afraid, and in need. They are hiring for multiple job positions as well as seeking volunteers. For job descriptions/how to apply, please email kklement@sharingandcaringhands .org. To learn more about volunteering as a tutor to the children living at Mary’s Place (must be age 16+), please email kklement@ sharingandcaringhands.org. To learn more about

in the dental or medical clinic (must be a dentist, doctor, or nurse), please email mcozart@sharingandcaringhands.org

HARDWOOD

By Carol Glatz Catholic News Service

Every year for 30-plus years, the Vatican tribunal dealing with matters of conscience has offered a course to help priests in their “ministry of mercy” as confessors. The laity also need to better understand confession, according to the Apostolic Penitentiary, which offered a special seminar specifically for laypeople Oct. 13-14.

Of the talks covering the usual biblical, theological and spiritual aspects of the sacrament, the most practical presentation was given by Msgr. Krzysztof Nykiel, regent of the Apostolic Penitentiary.

Highlights from the monsignor’s list of “I don’t go to confession because ...” are summarized here:

1. “... I speak directly to God.” Speaking with God is “excellent,” he said, and it should be done throughout the day with prayer to know God’s will. While “it is not impossible to obtain forgiveness” from God this way, “we would never be sure.”

Only God can forgive sins, he said. So, before the birth of Christ and a life lived without him, humanity could only “hope” to have their sins forgiven. “With Christ, this mercy has descended onto earth and is

3. “... The priest may be a worse sinner than me.” It is true that priests are not God, and it is “certainly easier and more uplifting to confess to a holy priest, like St. John Vianney and St. Padre Pio,” he said.

But “the moral condition of the priest at the moment

sins “is already the first healthy sign” of a conscience that has not grown numb or blind to evil, he said. It also should be seen as part of contrition and a form of penance that can strengthen the desire for conversion.

6. “... I always say the same things.” While it may be good there are no new sins to add to the list, confession is exactly what is needed, he said, to humbly plead with God for his mercy to fight and win the daily battle against one’s vices.

7. “... I’m not committing serious sins.” One may not be guilty of committing theft or murder, but there are still eight other commandments to keep, Msgr. Nykiel said. Believing only serious crimes count as sin can also be a kind of “self-justification” and DIY redemption.

The unworthiness one feels before God “is always directly proportional to one’s closeness to him,” which is why the greatest saints always felt like the greatest sinners. “If we don’t feel like we are sinners, then we still are not saints.”

8. “... I didn’t like it the last time I went.”

Confessors might be distracted, unprepared, too “rigorous because he wanted to send me straight to hell” or too lax because “he wanted to almost canonize me

CNS | GREGORY A. SHEMITZ

Father Jiha Lim listens to a penitent’s confession March 7, 2021, at St. Aloysius Church in Great Neck, N.Y.