The Catholic Spirit - September 8, 2016

Grandparent conference 7 • Egypt churches 8 • Buying babies 12 September 8, 2016 Newspaper of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis

Missionary, mother, saint

St. Teresa of Kolkata will always be ‘Mother’ Teresa, pope says

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By Junno Arocho Esteves and Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service ith a large tapestry bearing the portrait of the woman known as the “Saint of the Gutters” suspended above him, Pope Francis proclaimed the sainthood of Mother Teresa of Kolkata, hailing her courage and love for the poor.

Despite the formality of the occasion though, “her sanctity is so close to us, so tender and fruitful, that spontaneously we will continue to call her ‘Mother Teresa,’” Pope Francis said to applause at the canonization Mass Sept. 4.

“Mother Teresa, in all aspects of her life, was a generous dispenser of divine mercy, making herself available for everyone through her welcome and defense of human life, those unborn and those abandoned and discarded,” the pope said in his homily during the Mass in St. Peter’s Square with an estimated 120,000 people.

Upon hearing Pope Francis “declare and define Blessed Teresa of Kolkata to be a saint,” the crowds could not contain their joy, breaking out in cheers and thunderous applause before he finished speaking.

The moment was especially sweet for more than 300 Albanians who live in Switzerland, but came to Rome for the canonization. “We are very proud,” said Violet Barisha, a member of the Albanian Catholic Mission in St. Gallen.

Daughter of Divine Charity Sister Valdete, a Kosovar and one of the Albanian group’s chaplains, said, “We are so happy and honored. We are a small people, but have had so many martyrs.”

Born in 1910 to an ethnic Albanian family in Skopje, in what is now part of Macedonia, Mother Teresa went to India in 1929 as a Sister of Loreto and became an Indian citizen in 1947. She founded the Missionaries of Charity in 1950.

Mother Teresa, Sister Valdete said, is a shining example of how “Albanian women are strong and our people are hardworking.”

Mother Teresa in Minnesota Local clergy, religious sisters and laity share memories of encounters with St. Teresa of Kolkata, who visited the state on several occasions.

— Page 6 In his homily, Pope Francis said God’s will is explained in the words of the prophets: “I want mercy, not sacrifice.”

“God is pleased by every act of mercy because in the brother or sister that we assist, we recognize the face of God, which no one can see,” he said. “Each time we bend down to the needs of our brothers and sisters, we give Jesus something to eat and drink; we clothe, we help and we visit the son of God.” Like Mother Teresa, he said, Christians are called not simply to perform acts of charity, but to live charity as a vocation and “to grow each day in love.”

“Wherever someone is reaching out, asking for a helping hand in order to get up, this is where our presence — and the presence of the Church, which

sustains and offers hope — must be,” the pope said.

Mother Teresa, he said, lived out this vocation to charity through her commitment to defending the unborn and bowing down “before those who were spent, left to die on the side of the road.”

She also “made her voice heard before the powers of this world so that they might recognize their guilt for the crime of poverty they created,” Pope Francis said. “For Mother Teresa, mercy was the ‘salt,’ which gave flavor to her work, it was the ‘light,’ which shone in the darkness of the many who no longer had tears to shed for their poverty and suffering.”

For all Christians, especially volunteers engaged in works of mercy, the life of the saintly nun remains an example and witness to God’s closeness to the poorest of the poor, he said.

“Today, I pass on this emblematic figure of holiness,” Pope Francis said. “May this tireless worker of mercy help us to increasingly understand that our only criterion for action is gratuitous love, free from every ideology and all obligations, offered freely to everyone without distinction of language, culture, race or religion.”

Mother Teresa’s simplicity did not keep the powerful away from the Mass, though. Some 20 nations sent official delegations to the Vatican for the canonization. Queen Sofia of Spain led a delegation. The president and prime minister of Albania attended, as did the presidents of Macedonia and Kosovo and the foreign minister of India.

President Barack Obama sent a delegation led by Lisa Monaco, his assistant for homeland security and counter-terrorism. The U.S. delegation also included Ken Hackett, ambassador to the Holy See; Carolyn Woo, president and CEO of Catholic Relief Services; and Dominican Sister Donna Markham, president and CEO of Catholic Charities USA. After the Mass, 250 Missionaries of Charity sisters and 50 Missionaries of Charity brothers served pizza to about 1,500 poor people who had come to the Mass from shelters, dormitories and soup kitchens the order runs throughout Italy.

Pope Francis, through the office of the papal almoner, funded the lunch, which was prepared by a team of 20 pizza makers, who brought three ovens with them from Naples and cooked behind the Vatican audience hall.

ALSO inside

Church historian

Burying the dead

Catholic mom blogs

Father Marvin O’Connell, professor emeritus at the University of Notre Dame, remembered as a prolific writer.

— Page 5

With prayers for those he buries, Delano deacon spends career performing work of mercy.

— Pages 10-11

Local stay-at-home moms among writers who share faith and inspiration online.

— Page 13

2 • The Catholic Spirit

PAGE TWO

September 8, 2016 NEWS notes • The Catholic Spirit

in PICTURES

Bishops set Sept. 9 as Day of Prayer for Peace The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has designated Sept. 9, the feast of St. Peter Claver, a national Day of Prayer for Peace in Our Communities. In a July news release, the bishops conference said the day of prayer is a “response to the racially-related shootings in Baton Rouge, Minneapolis and Dallas.” In the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, Archbishop Bernard Hebda will lead a public prayer service 7 p.m. Sept. 8 at St. Peter Claver, 375 Oxford St. N., St. Paul. On Sept. 11, St. Bridget in Minneapolis is hosting an ecumenical prayer and worship service with Minneapolis’ New Creation Church. “Come Together: Seeking God’s Peace” will take place from 4 to 5:30 p.m. at St. Bridget’s campus, 3811 Emerson Ave. N., Minneapolis. Father Paul Jarvis, associate pastor, said the services will be ongoing at different locations, and participants will commit to pray for a particular section of the neighborhood.

UST Law School to host dialogue on racial justice The University of St. Thomas School of Law will host an event 4-6 p.m.

Sept. 14 titled “Finding Common Ground Between Public Safety and Racial Justice – All for the Common Good.” The event, free and open to the public, will take place in the law school’s Schulze Grand Atrium. To register and for more information, visit www.stthomas.edu/law/events.

Mass for Persons with Disabilities coming Sept. 18 SCHOOL MURAL From left, artist Mike Klein, Paul Henry and his grandson, Isaac Henry, work on a mural in the cafeteria of St. Mark School in St. Paul Aug. 29. Klein, a faculty member at the University of St. Thomas, started the mural in June and got help from students, parents, grandparents and school staff to complete the 3,000-square-foot mural, which was painted on all four of the walls of the cafeteria. Nine scenes tell the story of the school. Dave Hrbacek/The Catholic Spirit

The annual Mass for Persons with Disabilities will take place at the St. Paul Seminary St. Mary’s Chapel 3 p.m. Sept. 18. Archbishop Bernard Hebda will celebrate the Mass, in which he also will confirm several people with disabilities. The event begins with a singalong at 2:30 p.m.

For more information, visit www.archspm.org/archspm_events.

Outdoor all-school Mass set for Sept. 22 An all-school Mass, the Mass of the Holy Spirit, will take place at CHS Field in St. Paul Sept. 22. Sponsored by the Catholic Schools Center of Excellence, it will include an estimated 12,000 students in fourth through eighth grades from 79 Catholic schools in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. Also attending will be Archbishop Bernard Hebda, Bishop Andrew Cozzens and 60 priests. The local Christian rock band Sonar will kick off the event at 10:30 a.m., with Mass at 11 a.m.

New reporter comes aboard for The Catholic Spirit Matthew Davis began work as a reporter for The Catholic Spirit Aug. 29 after spending the past couple years with the Sun Post Newspapers in the northwest suburbs of Minneapolis. Davis also taught a journalism class at Providence Academy in Plymouth for the 2015-2016 school year. He has a degree in mass communications from North Dakota State Matthew DAVIS University in Fargo and a certificate from the Archbishop Harry J. Flynn Catechetical Institute in St. Paul. He lives with his wife and two children in suburban Minneapolis, and the family attends the Cathedral of St. Paul in St. Paul.

MOBILE HOME MASS Bishop Andrew Cozzens celebrates Mass Aug. 20 at Lowry Grove mobile home park in St. Anthony for residents who are concerned about their future after the park was sold to developers, who plan to close the park and use the property for other purposes. Developers have expressed their intent to offer some compensation. Residents, including a number of Latino families, are protesting the closure in court. Dave Hrbacek/The Catholic Spirit

WHAT’S NEW on social media From a comic book to letters to coins, an archivist at The Catholic University of America in Washington discusses the importance of St. Teresa of Kolkata’s artifacts from donors: www.facebook.com/thecatholicspirit Read the latest news about the local and universal Church by following The Catholic Spirit on Twitter @CatholicSpirit.

The Catholic Spirit is published bi-weekly for The Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis Vol. 21 — No. 18 MOST REVEREND BERNARD A. HEBDA, Publisher TOM HALDEN, Associate Publisher MARIA C. WIERING, Editor

in REMEMBRANCE Father John Pilaczynski of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a longtime priest and educator at St. Thomas Academy in Mendota Heights, died Aug. 27 in San Antonio, Texas, at age 84.

Ordained in 1958, in Pine Hills, Mississippi, Father Pilaczynski served as a priest of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate for 58 years. He began teaching theology at STA in 1973 and also served as the audio-visual director and temporary music instructor. STA recognized Father Pilaczynski in 2015 with an award renamed in his honor, the Father John Pilaczynski Christian Service Award.

Father Pilaczynski often offered Mass at Sts. Cyril and Methodius in Minneapolis. He served in Minnesota for more than 30 years and also taught at the College of St. Thomas (now university) in St. Paul.

A funeral Mass was Sept. 2 at the Oblate Madonna Residence Chapel in San Antonio.

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September 8, 2016

FROM THE BISHOP

The Catholic Spirit • 3

Do you know that Jesus is thirsting for your love?

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n Sept. 4, Pope Francis gave the Church an incredible gift of a new saint: St. Teresa of Kolkata — arguably one of the world’s most famous people when she died. Besides receiving the Nobel Peace Prize and honorary degrees from places like Harvard, she also opened houses to serve the poor on every continent and founded a new religious community that today numbers more than 5,000 and is still growing.

How is it that this small, Albanian missionary, who started by walking alone through the streets of Kolkata picking up dying people to show them love in the last minutes of their lives, ended up becoming an icon for God’s merciful love and captured the attention of the world? What made her different from so many other famous people?

Most people say it was the fire of love that burned in her heart. That fire came in prayer when she was in her 30s. While she was already a religious sister deeply in love with Jesus, she experienced Jesus’ thirst on the cross. Following more prayer and discernment, she founded the Missionaries of Charity “to satiate the infinite thirst of Jesus on the cross for love and for souls.”

Mother Teresa did not just serve the poor. She went and lived among them, becoming one of them. She heard Jesus say to her in her prayer: “My little one, come. Come carry me into the holes of the poor. Come, be my light. I cannot go alone. They don’t know me, so they don’t want me. You come, go amongst them. Carry me with you into them. How I long to enter their holes, their dark, unhappy homes.

Come, be their victim. In your immolation, in your love for me, they will see me, know me, want me. Offer more sacrifices, smile more tenderly, pray more fervently, and all the difficulties will disappear.”

The fire that drove St. Teresa of Kolkata and made her a ONLY JESUS saint was something deeper than that natural human desire we all have to do good. That desire is a reflection of a deeper Bishop truth that Jesus shows us. We were made to give our lives Andrew Cozzens away for love, and only when we truly make a gift of our

She used to say that we weren’t really giving unless we give until it hurts, because love must cost us something. Her life invites us to the same experience — to encounter the same love. lives will we be happy. Mother Teresa did what she did because of a profound encounter with the love of Jesus, an encounter that changed her, an encounter that she sought to renew every day through daily Mass and adoration. She came to know how deeply Jesus thirsted for her love, and she desired to satiate his thirst with her life. She used to say that we weren’t really giving unless we give until it hurts, because love must cost us something. Her life invites us to the same experience — to encounter the same love.

Do you know that Jesus is thirsting for you? Have you experienced his thirst in prayer? St. Teresa of Kolkata once wrote to her sisters, “Until you can hear Jesus in the silence of your own heart, you will not be able to hear him saying, ‘I Thirst’ in the hearts of the poor.”

¿Sabes que Jesús tiene sed de ti?

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l 4 de septiembre, el Papa Francisco dio a la Iglesia un increíble regalo de un nueva santa: Santa Teresa de Kolkata — posiblemente una de las personas más famosas del mundo cuando murió.

Además de recibir el Premio Nobel de la Paz y títulos honorarios de lugares como la Universidad de Harvard, ella también abrió casas para servir a los pobres en todos los continentes y fundó una nueva comunidad religiosa que cuenta hoy con más de 5,000 religiosas y sigue creciendo. ¿Cómo es que esta pequeña misionera albanesa, que comenzó caminando sola por las calles de Kolkata recogiendo moribundos para mostrarles amor en los últimos minutos de su vida, terminó por convertirse en un ícono para el amor misericordioso de Dios y capturó la atención del mundo? ¿Qué es lo que la hizo diferente de tantas otras personas famosas?

La mayoría de la gente dice que era el fuego del amor que ardía en su corazón. Ese fuego surgió de la oración cuando ella tenía unos 30 años. Mientras que

ella ya era una religiosa profundamente enamorada de Jesús, experimentó la sed de Jesús en la cruz. Después de más oración y discernimiento, fundó las Misioneras de la Caridad “para saciar la sed infinita de Jesús en la cruz por amor y por las almas.”

La Madre Teresa no se limitó a servir a los pobres.

Ella fue y vivió entre ellos, convirtiéndose en uno de ellos. Oyó a Jesús que le decía en su oración: “Pequeña mía, ven. Ven y llévame a los agujeros de los pobres.

Ven, sé mi luz. No puedo ir solo no me conocen, por eso no me quieren. Tú ven, ve hacia ellos., llévame hasta ellos. Cuánto anhelo entrar en sus agujeros, en sus obscuros e infelices hogares. Ven, se su víctima. En su inmolación, en tu amor por mí, ellos me verán, me conocerán, me querrán. Ofrece más sacrificios, sonríe más tiernamente, reza más fervientemente y desaparecerán todas las dificultades. “ El fuego que condujo a Santa Teresa de Kolkata y la hizo una santa era algo más profundo que el deseo humano natural que todos tenemos de hacer el bien.

Ese deseo es el reflejo de una verdad más profunda que Jesús nos muestra. Nos hicieron entregar nuestras vidas por amor, y sólo cuando realmente hacemos el regalo de nuestras vidas vamos a ser felices. Madre Teresa hizo lo que hizo debido a un encuentro profundo con el amor de Jesús, un encuentro que la cambió, un encuentro que buscó renovar todos los días a través de la misa diaria y la adoración. Ella llegó a saber hasta qué punto Jesús tenía sed de su amor, y ella deseo saciar esa sed con su vida. Ella solía decir que realmente no nos damos a menos que demos hasta que duela, porque el amor nos debe costar algo.

Su vida nos invita a la misma experiencia: al encuentro con el mismo amor. ¿Sabes que Jesús tiene sed de ti? ¿Has experimentado su sed en la oración? Santa Teresa de Kolkata, una vez escribió a sus hermanas, “Mientras no puedas oír a Jesús en el silencio de tu corazón, no serás capaz de oírle decir “tengo sed” en el corazón del pobre”.

Author finds One World Trade Center a witness to nation’s spirit

By Beth Griffin Catholic News Service Fifteen years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks decimated the twin towers in lower Manhattan, the 1,776-foot One World Trade Center rises out of the ground, a palpable symbol of triumph and optimism.

The tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere is the soaring, storied, centerpiece of a 16-acre complex that includes eight other major structures.

“It’s a secular site encoded with multiple symbols of faith, hope and love,” said Judith Dupre, author of the recently published “One World Trade Center: Biography of the Building.” The volume is a detailed, illustrated exploration of the political, structural and aesthetic forces that clashed, combined and coalesced before the building opened in October 2014.

Dupre, a Catholic raised in Rhode Island and an architectural historian and best-selling author of lushly illustrated works of narrative non-fiction, spoke to Catholic News Service Aug. 30 at her home in Mamaroneck, a suburb north of New York. She said she was the only writer given unfettered access by the Port Authority of New

York and New Jersey to its site and archives. The Port Authority is principal owner of One World Trade Center.

The nine-building complex is primarily a commercial site, but includes the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, Liberty Park and the not-yet-completed St. Nicholas National Shrine of the Orthodox Church.

“It’s impossible to be on those 16 acres and not remember what transpired there,” Dupre said. “We all hold the falling towers in vivid imagination. The new structures are part of a continuum that began on 9/11 and embody a message of faith in the future.”

While researching the book, Dupre interviewed some of the 26,000 people who worked on One World Trade Center.

“Without being asked, each person first shared their personal story of 9/11 and described what compelled them to rebuild. It was a deeply moving ritual and gave me the sense that they were doing the work for something greater than themselves,” she said.

“I understand that rebuilding is a way to heal. One World Trade Center will never bring back loved ones and what was lost, but it stands as a symbol of hope, resilience and faith in the future.”

OFFICIAL Archbishop Bernard Hebda has announced the following appointment in the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis: Effective September 1, 2016 Reverend Thomas Rayar, appointed pastor of the Church of Saint Margaret Mary in Minneapolis. Father Rayar is returning to ministry after a leave of absence.

4 • The Catholic Spirit

LOCAL

SLICEof LIFE

September 8, 2016

Parish rib feast Briley Velzke, left, and her sister, Alix, of Holy Trinity in Waterville, help their grandmother, Nancy Velzke, get barbecued ribs ready for parishioners and guests to eat at Holy Trinity’s annual Fall Festival and BBQ Competition Aug. 20. Last year, the parish decided to include a rib competition as part of the parish festival. It went so well that it was approved again for this year, with a field of eight contestants.

Nancy, her husband, Keith, and their two granddaughters placed third, and also won the People’s Choice Award. “The aroma is what gets you,” said Father Michael Ince, pastor of Holy Trinity, who easily approved the idea to have a rib competition.

“If you stand there for five minutes, you’re hungry.”

Dave Hrbacek/ The Catholic Spirit

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LOCAL

Sexual abuse victims seek $80M from archdiocese in Reorganization plan

By Jessica Trygstad The Catholic Spirit Three months after the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis filed a plan for Reorganization in its bankruptcy proceedings, the committee representing sexual abuse claimants filed its own plan Aug. 22 that seeks approximately $80 million in compensation from the archdiocese.

The plan calls for the archdiocese to contribute assets totaling $80 million, including a requirement that the archdiocese obtain a loan of approximately $38 million for deposit into a trust for sexual abuse claimants. St. Paul attorney Jeff Anderson, who represents some of the victims/survivors, claimed the archdiocese should be able to borrow $38 million secured by mortgage against the Cathedral of St. Paul and three Catholic high schools — Benilde-St. Margaret’s in St. Louis Park, DeLaSalle in Minneapolis and Totino-Grace in Fridley.

In the archdiocese’s plan for Reorganization — which it filed May 26 — it identified more than $65 million in assets to be available to compensate victims of clergy sexual abuse, with the potential for that amount to grow.

In a statement released Aug. 23, Archbishop Bernard Hebda said the archdiocese’s goal of a “fair and just resolution for all” remains the same.

“The judge has asked all parties to negotiate in good faith, and that is what we are endeavoring to do,” Archbishop Hebda said.

In July, a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge ruled that the estates of parishes and other Catholic entities should not be consolidated with those of the archdiocese as it seeks to compensate clergy sexual abuse victims as part of its bankruptcy resolution.

The ruling responded to a motion filed in May by attorney Robert Kugler, who represents the unsecured creditors committee. Kugler asked the judge to substantively consolidate the archdiocese’s assets with those of other Catholic institutions with ties to the archdiocese, such as Catholic Cemeteries, the Catholic Community Foundation and several Catholic high schools. The committee has appealed the decision.

The archdiocese’s plan for Reorganization outlines specific sources for funds available for victim remuneration, including at least $8.7 million from the sale of archdiocesan properties, including three chancery buildings on Cathedral Hill, as well as more than $33 million from insurance settlements.

It establishes a trust for sexual abuse claimants, with a court-approved allocation protocol.

The plan also includes settlements from parish insurers of approximately $13.7 million with the potential for future settlements from archdiocesan insurers that have not yet entered into agreements with the archdiocese. The archdiocese is seeking to transfer the rights of recovery for those policies to the trust for the benefit of sexual abuse claimants.

Upon filing its plan, Archbishop Hebda said the archdiocese did so with victims/survivors in mind.

“The longer the process lasts, more money is spent on attorneys’ fees and bankruptcy expenses, and, in turn, less money is available for victims/survivors,” he said May 26.

“We are submitting our plan now in the hope of compensating victims/survivors and promoting healing sooner rather than later.”

The bankruptcy court allowed the archdiocese to be the sole party to file a plan for Reorganization until May. Other parties, including creditors, were able to file a plan after the exclusivity period ended.

The court is slated to hear both plans Dec. 15.

The archdiocese filed its plan a day after the deadline for filing decades-old sexual abuse claims under the Minnesota Child Victims Act, which the State Legislature passed in 2013. The law lifted for three years the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse civil suits.

The lifting of the statute ushered in a wave of claims against clergy who had been or were serving in the archdiocese, leading the archdiocese to enter bankruptcy in January 2015 as a means to distribute assets equitably and fairly among victims. By a court-established claim deadline in August 2015, more than 400 claims of clergy sexual abuse had been filed against the archdiocese.

The Catholic Spirit • 5 in BRIEF SUFFERN, NEW YORK

Local woman professes first vows to Sisters of Life A woman who grew up in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and attended Divine Mercy in Faribault professed her first vows to the Sisters of Life Aug. 22 in Suffern. Sister Magnificat Rose, 27, served with NET Ministries for two years after high school and later earned a degree in Catholic Studies from the Sister University of St. Thomas in Magnificat St. Paul. She is the daughter of Timothy and Trena Wayland.

ROSE Bishop Andrew Cozzens celebrated the Mass of profession at Sacred Heart in Suffern.

MINNEAPOLIS

Archbishop Hebda blesses new center at DeLaSalle High School Archbishop Bernard Hebda of St. Paul and Minneapolis celebrated the opening Mass at DeLaSalle High School Aug. 31. After the Mass, he blessed the new Center for Innovative Learning and completion of the new “D Building” on campus.

The school’s CIL, which contains state-of-the-art technology and educational resources, will help enable students and teachers to differentiate their instruction, research, learning and interactive discovery across multiple departments and multiple technologies. The project, which began 15 months ago, created six different learning spaces, plus allowed for the construction of new corridors; replacement of heating, cooling and electrical systems; and relocation of athletic lockers, storage and theater staging areas. It is funded by the “Gateway to the Future” campaign, launched in 2014, which calls for the school to raise $17 million over five years, with $8.8 million earmarked for the building project and $8.2 million for tuition assistance and endowment programs. So far, the campaign has raised $12.3 million.

Father Marvin O’Connell, Church historian, was prolific writer

By Jessica Trygstad The Catholic Spirit Father Marvin O’Connell, 86, a priest of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and professor emeritus of history at the University of Notre Dame, died Aug. 19 at Holy Cross Village in Notre Dame, Indiana.

Born July 9, 1930, Father O’Connell grew up in the Twin Cities, the only child of Richard and Anna Mae (Kelly) O’Connell. He studied at Nazareth Hall and the St. Paul Seminary, both in St. Paul, and was ordained at the Cathedral of St. Paul on June 2, 1956, by Bishop James Byrne.

He served as assistant pastor of St. Mathias in Wanda (now in the Diocese of New Ulm) until September 1956, when he was sent to the University of Notre Dame for graduate studies. He earned a doctorate degree in history from Notre Dame in 1959, at which time he served in the University (then-College) of St. Thomas’ history department until 1972.

During his time in the archdiocese, Father O’Connell was a columnist for The Catholic Spirit’s predecessor, the Catholic Bulletin, from 1966 to 1972. In a 2006 interview with The Catholic Spirit, Father O’Connell said the era provided great commentary opportunities for “Tracts for the Times,” which was syndicated in 30 other Catholic newspapers across the country.

“It was the ’60s, after all,” Father O’Connell had said.

From 1972 until 1995, Father O’Connell was a history department faculty member at the University of Notre Dame, chairing the department from 1974 to 1980 and directing the school’s undergraduate program in

Father Marvin O’Connell, a priest of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and a historian, holds his book “Pilgrims to the Northland: The Archdiocese of St. Paul, 1840-1962” in this 2009 file photo. Dave Hrbacek/The Catholic Spirit London from 1993 to 1995.

Father O’Connell wrote several books detailing American Church history, including “Pilgrims to the Northland: The Archdiocese of St. Paul, 1840-1962” (University of Notre Dame Press, 2009) and “John Ireland and the American Catholic Church” (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1988). In 1995, he won the John Gilmary Shea Prize for his book “Critics on Trial: An Introduction to the Catholic Modernist Crisis” (Catholic University of America Press, 1994). He retired from Notre Dame’s faculty that same year. Father O’Connell also wrote a biography of Notre Dame’s founder, Father Edward Sorin of the Congregation of

Holy Cross. He became a retired priest of the archdiocese in 2000.

Retired priest Father James Reidy was ordained with Father O’Connell and described him as “a good and faithful priest, and a great historian.”

“We used to say he had become the premier Catholic Church historian here in the United States. . . . His books were just superb,” Father Reidy said.

Although he never served as a pastor, Father O’Connell felt connected to students and families through his teaching, said Sharon Wilson, whose father was a cousin of Father O’Connell’s.

Wilson, who attended the funeral Mass Aug. 24 at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Notre Dame, said she heard many stories of how her father’s cousin was integral in people’s faith journeys, including her own.

“He was very steadfast in reminding me to go back to prayer,” said Wilson, a parishioner of Divine Mercy in Faribault. “He probably wouldn’t consider himself an evangelizer or spiritual director, but by example and counsel, he brought me back into what my faith really means.”

Ultimately, though, Wilson said people will remember Father O’Connell as a gifted writer. She said his writing left readers with a sense of not just history, but that they were part of history.

“And it was always about moving on toward the future and how we had gotten here,” Wilson said.

“To me, he was much more than an academic; he was much like a beloved uncle,” she added.

Archbishop Bernard Hebda presided at the funeral Mass. Burial was in the Holy Cross Community Cemetery at Notre Dame.

6 • The Catholic Spirit

LOCAL

September 8, 2016

Before sainthood, Mother Teresa lit up the hearts of Minnesotans

By Matthew Davis The Catholic Spirit

in 1979. She had to decline because of family obligations.

Father Joseph Johnson made a surprising connection in Rome with Mother Teresa in the 1990s before his ordination.

Mother Teresa inquired about his studies and where he would serve as a priest. Father Johnson, now pastor at Holy Family in St. Louis Park, shared it with her not expecting her to know about Minnesota.

“Her eyes lit up, and she repeated the word ‘Minnesota’ with such love,” Father Johnson said. “I never heard anyone say the name of our state with such love. You could tell that there is a real connection that, in her mind, she was remembering all the times that she had been here visiting the Kumps.”

The late Dr. Warren and Patti Kump of Golden Valley hosted Mother Teresa 10 times from 1965 to 1986. Father Johnson later ministered to the Kumps during his time as associate pastor at St. Olaf in Minneapolis.

Mother Teresa left a lasting impact on the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis in many different ways.

That includes the presence of the order she founded, the Missionaries of Charity, as promised to Archbishop Harry Flynn at the time.

“Mother Teresa promised four sisters for Minneapolis and died before she could fulfill that promise, and so her successor reverenced the promise and sent four sisters,” Archbishop Emeritus Flynn said.

The Kump family contributed much for aiding Mother Teresa’s mission. Patti helped found the Co-Workers of Mother Teresa in the U.S., who participate in the Missionaries of Charity’s work through lay outreach to the poor.

Sisters in Minneapolis formed by newest saint During their formation with the Missionaries of Charity, Sisters Mary Davis and Mary Tessillina (all Missionaries of Charity Sisters use Mary as their first name) didn’t need to look far to see how to live out the religious order’s life, since they learned firsthand from the foundress.

“Whatever she taught us, she practiced it first,” Sister Davis said.

Sister Davis recalled a visit of Mother Teresa’s to the U.S. that involved giving a talk at a large stadium. The sisters had breakfast with Mother Teresa that morning, and Sister Davis returned to the refectory only to find Mother Teresa

“It wasn’t a fundraising group, it was more of sharing of the work and a showing of the love of Christ with others through their work,” Leghorn said.

Both Warren and Patti attended Mother Teresa’s beatification in 2003, to which they contributed information for the cause.

“They were so thrilled to be able to be there and be part of it,” Leghorn said.

From left, Missionaries of Charity Sisters Mary Lilia Rose, Mary Dominique, Mary Tessilina and Mary Davis laugh in their convent in south Minneapolis. Dave Hrbacek/The Catholic Spirit wiping down a table.

“She did ordinary things for the sisters,” Sister Davis said.

Sister Tessillina said Mother Teresa’s witness enlivened her vocation. What Sister Tessillina learned of Mother Teresa both in meeting her and reading about her strengthened that desire.

“I used to tell everybody, ‘She’s a living saint, I want to join her,’” Sister Tessillina said.

Both sisters now serve in Minneapolis with two other sisters, caring for the poor and women with unexpected pregnancies. In the sisters’ convent hangs a maroon parka the Kumps gave to Mother Teresa to wear during any wintertime visits to Minnesota. In addition to the parka in the sacristy, the sisters have a picnic table from the Kumps’ home, where Mother Teresa often interacted with the family members.

Such second-class relics remind sisters and guests of the close connection Mother Teresa had to Minnesota.

Mother Teresa’s home away from home Patti Kump learned about Mother Teresa late one night while reading a missionary magazine and taking care of

one of her infant children at the time.

Kump decided to write a letter to Mother Teresa, who had yet to become known worldwide. A lifelong friendship developed. The Kumps soon witnessed Mother Teresa in the ordinariness of daily American life during her visits.

“She really lived the life of our household,” said Theresa (Kump) Leghorn, a daughter of Warren and Patti’s.

Mother Teresa did so while using that time as a spiritual retreat from her apostolate of serving the poorest of the poor. Leghorn recalled her parents asking the children to let Mother Teresa have space and quiet, which didn’t always work as the couple had planned.

Once, Patti heard noise in one of her children’s rooms during Mother Teresa’s prayer time. She went to see what was going on and found both her son and Mother Teresa there playing with Match Box cars. Patti quickly apologized.

“And she [Mother Teresa] said, ‘No, no, that’s alright. I was mediating on the Christ child, and he came to visit me,’” Leghorn said.

Mother Teresa last visited the Kumps in 1986, but Patti visited Mother Teresa, too, and remained in regular contact.

Mother Teresa even invited Patti to join her for receiving the Nobel Peace Prize

Witness to holiness Mother Teresa also stayed with the Visitation Sisters in Mendota Heights, a connection that came about through the Kumps.

Patti and Warren had a daughter who served with the sisters at that time. The Visitation sisters remember well Mother Teresa’s visits.

“She was very, very gentle,” Sister Mary Denise Villaume said.

Mother Teresa normally went there during her more public visits during the 1970s and 1980s. She again participated in their community life fully and even visited a dying sister.

“Mother Teresa whispered in her ear, please remember my poor when you are in heaven,” Sister Mary Frances Reis said.

Sister Mary Paula McCarthy wrote a book about Mother Teresa, which included documentation of the saint’s visits to the community. Sister Mary Paula found the difference in how Mother Teresa lived religious life moving.

“She helped me deepen my vocation, though lived out in a different way,” Sister Mary Paula said.

Visitation School seniors to this day get to see the room where Mother Teresa stayed in at the retreat wing.

Please turn to SAINT on page 19

St. Paul street named after Mother Teresa in 2004

By Dave Hrbacek The Catholic Spirit

Mother Teresa of Calcutta Boulevard in St. Paul lies between two archdiocesan buildings: the Msgr. Ambrose Hayden Center at 328 W. Kellogg Blvd. and the chancery on Summit Avenue. Dave Hrbacek/The Catholic Spirit

Mother Teresa of Kolkata is memorialized on a street just one block away from the Cathedral of St. Paul in St. Paul.

A two-block stretch was named Mother Teresa of Calcutta Boulevard on St. Patrick’s Day (March 17) 2004. Archbishop Emeritus Harry Flynn celebrated Mass at the Cathedral that day, then led a blessing and dedication of the newly-named street, which also keeps its original name, Old Kellogg Boulevard.

The renamed St. Paul street lies between two archdiocesan buildings: the Msgr. Ambrose Hayden Center at 328 W. Kellogg Blvd. and the chancery on Summit Avenue. The street carries little traffic, and no homes or businesses use it as an address.

The Ancient Order of Hibernians, which sponsors the annual St. Patrick’s Day Mass at the Cathedral, asked the St. Paul City Council in 2003 to rename a

two-block section of Old Kellogg Boulevard in honor of then-Blessed Teresa, according to a story that appeared in The Catholic Spirit March 11, 2004, which quoted Leo Cullen, a former Hibernians state president who chaired the group’s street-naming project committee.

The proposal was then put on the council’s consent agenda and passed at its Nov. 5 meeting. Former Councilman Chris Coleman, who later became mayor of St. Paul, was instrumental in getting the proposal in front of the council.

After the 9 a.m. St. Patrick’s Day Mass, a procession including Archbishop Flynn went from the Cathedral to Old Kellogg Boulevard. In front of a crowd that included Hibernians, members of the Knights of Columbus and members of the Missionaries of Charity, the order founded by Mother Teresa in India, Archbishop Flynn blessed the street. There are two signs on the street bearing Mother Teresa’s name.

LOCAL

September 8, 2016

The Catholic Spirit • 7

New ministry equips grandparents to pass along the faith

By Susan Klemond For The Catholic Spirit Carl and Susan Keeney began teaching their granddaughter about the Catholic faith while she lived with them during the first years of her life. The girl is now 10 and the couple, parishioners at St. Vincent de Paul in Brooklyn Park, has continued to teach her. They helped prepare her for baptism this spring, but to their disappointment, the girl’s mother (their former daughter-in-law) wouldn’t allow her to be baptized.

“It’s been very, very tough for us to see that,” said Carl, 68.

The Keeneys attended an Aug. 27 conference for grandparents called “The Gift of Being Grand” at Mary, Mother of the Church in Burnsville to find resources to help them continue pursuing their hope for their grandchildren to become Catholic and their three sons to return to the faith.

Speakers told 350 grandparents, parish leaders and priests at the conference that God has given all grandparents the mission of passing the faith on to their grandchildren, who often aren’t receiving it from their parents. The conference was also the launch of a new archdiocesan Catholic Grandparent Ministry. Through their prayer, personal sharing and example, grandparents can offer a vibrant witness of the Catholic faith to their adult children and grandchildren.

“If we allow a generation to be broken from the faith, then it makes it that much more difficult to bring them back to the Church,” said Crystal Crocker, interim director of the archdiocesan Office of Evangelization and Catechesis, which co-sponsored the conference with the Office of Marriage, Family and Life. “I think God’s calling us now not only to pray, but also to pass on the faith through our actions wherever we can.”

The conference included presentations on the importance of intergenerational faith, God’s message to grandparents from Scripture, how to strengthen the faith within the family and Pope Francis’ message about the role of grandparents. The day also included breakout sessions on topics relating to prayer, and resources for passing on the faith and healing relationships.

Grandparents’ role Beyond the conference, the Catholic Grandparent Ministry, developed through the Office of Evangelization and Catechesis, encourages grandparents and parish leaders to start parish prayer and study groups, along with attending

regional meetings.

Auxiliary Bishop Andrew Cozzens, who shared some of Pope Francis’ teachings on grandparents, said in a society where many are focused on themselves, grandparents can show how to focus on others.

“Pope Francis says you have a special gift to give,” Bishop Cozzens said. “One is the gift of prayer and how important it is to be able to pray, both for yourself and others. Second, by reaching out to young people and sharing with them the wisdom they don’t have.”

Grandparents’ role in society today is undefined, and they can be more intentional in passing on the faith, said Katherine Kersten, a writer, attorney and senior policy fellow at the Center of the American Experiment in Golden Valley.

Helping form disciples But grandparents need a plan to bring their children and grandchildren back to the faith, said Judy Cozzens, a volunteer with the grandparent ministry and presenter who is the mother of Bishop Cozzens.

She shared seven practices for passing on the faith, including prayer, telling stories, reading the Bible and sharing.

When praying for grandchildren, our prayer life becomes more about giving spiritual life to others and allowing suffering to bear fruit in others, said Father Jonathan Kelly, formator and spiritual director at St. John Vianney College Seminary in St. Paul. He suggested praying a daily rosary and offering Mass for family members.

One way of helping grandchildren become disciples is taking them to Mass, after first preparing them, said Father Joseph Bambenek, pastor of St. Pius X in White Bear Lake and Catholic Grandparent Ministry chaplain. Grandparents should tell them why they attend and afterward share the experience.

Kim Doyle, 59, has started a parish grandparents discussion, prayer and service group at St. Joseph in Rosemount, one of the first parish groups to form as part of the Catholic Grandparent Ministry. The parish plans to start a study program called the Grand Adventure.

Doyle’s husband, Shawn, 58, said the effort “is all about educating grandparents, giving them some tools to help with their grandchildren and helping them understand the impact they have on their family.”

At the conference, Carlyle Sweeney said he found useful tips and encouragement that will help his relationships with his children and grandchildren.

“It’s just encouraged me and strengthened me that we have to keep working together, and it’s educating and learning the best ways to communicate and to get the word to our kids and grandchildren,” he said.

“And the old ways are not always the right ways.”

Citing Pope Francis, Bishop Cozzens said grandparents shouldn’t underestimate their role: “How beautiful is the encouragement that an elderly person manages to pass off to a young person who is seeking the meaning of faith and of life.”

“If we allow a generation to be broken from the faith, then it makes it that much more difficult to bring them back to the Church.”

Crystal Crocker, interim director of the archdiocesan Office of Evangelization and Catechesis “Grandparents can provide a rich context of meaning that helps children make moral sense of the world and assists them in answering . . . questions such as why am I here, how should I live, [and] what will happen when I die?” she said.

Catholic speaker Jeff Cavins told attendees that the Bible speaks about grandparents’ role in influencing their grandchildren.

“The Scriptures show that we have a duty as grandparents to leave an inheritance and a legacy to our children,” said Cavins, developer of “The Great Adventure” Catholic Bible study program. “You are part of passing on that inheritance.”

St. Jerome Church Fall Festival, Booya & Car Show Sunday, September 18 • stjerome-church.org Outdoor Mass begins at 10:30 a.m.

Featuring our Fall Festival Choir Activities begin at approximately 11:30 a.m. th

Silent Auction • Talent Tent • Kids Games • Car Show • Pull Tabs Bingo • Booya by the Bowl • Cold Stone Creamery • Hamburgers, Brats and Cheese Curds • $2,000 SWEEPSTAKES *200 gallons of our famous Booya will be available for take-out at 6:00 a.m. until gone. Bring your own non-glass container.

The remaining 300 gallons will again be served by the bowl at 11:30 a.m.

St. Jerome is located at 380 E. Roselawn Ave. (at 35E) www.archspm.org

Cavins also noted that grandparents with regrets about raising their children may gain a second chance as they reach out to their grandchildren.

For information about resources and events for grandparents, and about forming a parish grandparents group, visit www.catholicgrandparenting.org or call 651-291-4411.

Transfiguration Church 6133 15th St. N., Oakdale

Saturday, September 10 Rain or Shine 8 a.m. – 5k Run/Walk (same-day registration available) 2 – 9:30 p.m. • FAMILY FUN! • Inflatables Vendor Market • Games • Book Barn Bingo • Food/Beer Garden & More!

5:30 p.m. - Spaghetti Dinner 5:30-9:30 p.m. - LIVE MUSIC

www.TheCatholicSpirit.com

8 • The Catholic Spirit

U.S. & WORLD

Georgetown announces beginning of reconciliation for slaveholding past

By Rhina Guidos Catholic News Service Georgetown University last year stripped from a building the name of one of its past presidents, a priest who authorized the sale of 272 women, children and men — slaves sold to save the university from financial ruin in 1838.

In a historic change of fortune, current university president John DeGioia announced Sept. 1 that the building will be renamed after one of the men the university sold as a result of the priest’s decision.

It was one of several steps DeGioia detailed as part of a plan to begin to deal with what he called “Georgetown’s participation in that disgrace,” meaning slavery.

With descendants of the slaves sold watching nearby, DeGioia formally apologized for the university’s past actions.

“There were two evils that took place,” he said. “The sale of slaves and the breakup of families.”

In 1838, Jesuit Father Thomas Mulledy, who was then the head of the Maryland province of the Society of Jesus as well as Georgetown’s president, authorized the sale of the southern Maryland slaves, which the university said was “controversial even by the standards of the day.” It violated conditions set by the Vatican, including that no families be separated.

Mulledy Hall, first named after Father Mulledy, will be renamed Isaac Hall, taking the first name of the slave first listed in the sale documents. Another building, originally named after Jesuit Father William McSherry, who was also involved in the 1838 sale and in other slave sales, will be renamed Anne Marie Becraft Hall. It will honor a free woman of color who founded a school for black girls in Georgetown in 1827 and later joined the Oblate Sisters of Providence.

Georgetown also will create a memorial describing the sale and the significance of the event. The university will celebrate a Mass of reconciliation to seek forgiveness for the university’s involvement in slavery.

Coptic Catholic spokesman welcomes new Egyptian law on building churches

By Jonathan Luxmoore Catholic News Service The Coptic Catholic Church has welcomed a new Egyptian law to facilitate the building of Christian places of worship.

On Aug. 30, Egypt passed a law codifying the rights of Christians to build and renovate churches in the mostly Muslim country. Under the new 10-article law, regional governors must rule within four months on Christian church-building and renovation applications and provide a “justified decision,” subject to appeal, if refusing authorization.

“There’ve been some criticisms, but the government has tried to resolve any problems, and we now have a law which meets modern needs,” said Father Rafic Greiche, spokesman for the Coptic Catholic Church.

“No law can be like the Bible — it has to be interpreted, and it can be changed. But having had the

same law since the Ottoman Empire, we’re satisfied we now have one which seeks to avoid sectarian enmities.”

Father Greiche told Catholic News Service Sept. 2 that Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant churches had been represented by legal experts on the commission drafting the law, which had been actively promoted by Egypt’s president, Gen. Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, and Prime Minister Sherif Ismail.

Priests who ministered in Egypt under the old law said any permit that had to do with a church building had to be signed by the president. One priest said he waited 21 years for a permit.

The 200,000-member Catholic Church has 14 dioceses in Egypt, including pastoral services for Latin, Melkite, Armenian, Chaldean, Maronite and Syriac Catholics. The much larger Coptic Orthodox Church makes up at least 10 percent of Egypt’s population of 82.5 million.

September 8, 2016

Vatican newspaper: ‘Amoris Laetitia’ is authoritative Church teaching

By Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation on the family is an example of the “ordinary magisterium” — papal teaching — to which Catholics are obliged to give “religious submission of will and intellect,” said an article in the Vatican newspaper.

Father Salvador Pie-Ninot, a well-known professor of ecclesiology, said that while Pope Francis did not invoke his teaching authority in a “definitive way” in the document, it meets all the criteria for being an example of the “ordinary magisterium” to which all members of the Church should respond with “the basic attitude of sincere acceptance and practical implementation.”

The Spanish priest’s article in L’Osservatore Romano Aug. 23 came in response to questions raised about the formal weight of the pope’s document, “Amoris Laetitia” (“The Joy of Love”). For instance, U.S. Cardinal Raymond Burke has said on several occasions that the document is “a mixture of opinion and doctrine.”

Father Pie-Ninot said he examined the document in light of the 1990 instruction from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on the vocation of the theologian.

The instruction — issued by then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now-retired Pope Benedict XVI — explained three levels of Church teaching with the corresponding levels of assent they require. The top levels are: “Infallible pronouncements,” which require an assent of faith as being divinely revealed; and teaching proposed “in a definitive way,” which is “strictly and intimately connected with revelation” and “must be firmly accepted and held.”

A teaching is an example of “ordinary magisterium,” according to the instruction, “when the magisterium, not intending to act ‘definitively,’ teaches a doctrine to aid a better understanding of revelation and make explicit its contents, or to recall how some teaching is in conformity with the truths of faith, or finally to guard against ideas that are incompatible with these truths, the response called for is that of the religious submission of will and intellect.”

U.S. & WORLD

September 8, 2016

The Catholic Spirit • 9

Murdered nuns recalled for generosity, service in Mississippi

By Maureen Smith Catholic News Service The deaths of Sister Margaret Held and Sister Paula Merrill demand justice, but not revenge, Franciscan Father Greg Plata said during a memorial Mass for the women religious in the Cathedral of St. Peter the Apostle in Jackson, Mississippi.

“I truly believe with all my heart that Margaret and Paula would tell us that we need to keep loving,” the priest said during the Aug. 29 Mass.

Father Plata is sacramental administrator of St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Lexington, Mississippi, the parish in which the sisters were active.

Sister Margaret, a member of the School Sisters of St. Francis in Milwaukee, and Sister Paula, a member of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth in Kentucky, were recalled by family and friends in prayer services and Masses in the days after they were found dead Aug. 25 in the Durant, Mississippi, home they shared.

Rodney Earl Sanders, 46, of Kosciusko, Mississippi, has been charged with two counts of capital murder, larceny and burglary in connection with the incident.

The day before the Mass, representatives of the sisters’ religious communities and families issued a statement opposing the death penalty for the suspect charged in their deaths.

“Many people will be dismayed, even angered at the joint statement the School Sisters of St. Francis and the Sisters of Charity made stating that they are opposed to

the death penalty that could be imposed on the person who committed this terrible crime,” Father Plata said at the Mass. “But think of the powerful statement that makes. At the heart of Christianity is forgiveness. ‘Father forgive them for they know not what they do.’

“Forgiveness isn’t something we Sister do on our own. It is something we Paula choose to do with God’s grace,” MERRILL the Franciscan said.

During a brief vigil at the sisters’ home Aug. 27, representatives of the religious orders called for a period of reflection and remembrance.

Sister Susan Gatz, president of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth, and Sister Rosemarie Rombalski, of the School Sisters of St. Francis, went into the women’s home prior to the ceremony for prayer, closure and reflection. In the kitchen, they discovered a loaf of bread in a bread maker. The simple act — typical of the sisters who were known for being generous with their good food — turned into a life-giving symbol for the communities.

“Marge and Paula really had that sense of offering bread to each other — the bread of life, the bread of energy, the bread of hope,” Sister Rosemarie said.

The Sisters broke the loaf in half to share with their respective communities in Milwaukee and Nazareth,

Congratulations

Kentucky.

About 300 people gathered at St. Thomas Church the evening of Aug. 27 for another vigil. In addition to the more than 100 people packed inside the tiny sanctuary, another 200 watched a video feed from a tent on the lawn.

Bishop Joseph Kopacz of Jackson presided over the service, but Sister Father Plata offered a homily.

Margaret He remembered the sisters as great HELD cooks, gardeners, generous souls and hopeful women of the Gospel.

“As Christians, we only have one choice, to move on in hope,” he said.

As the families cope with the loss of their loved ones, they also worry about the people of Durant and Lexington.

“A big hole in the universe and in our hearts,” is how Annette Held described losing her older sister. “Sister Margaret was a wonderful and gracious person, always a concerned about others and certainly the spiritual leader of the family,” she said. “This tragedy is leaving a big hole for us. We are also worried because there is no one to carry their ministry now and that has been very important for so long for the community they lived in and for our family, too. We keep wishing we knew what will happen next at the clinic.”

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MOVING? Before you move, please let us know.

To be sure you don’t miss a single copy of your Catholic Spirit, please notify us at least four weeks before you move. Call (651) 291-4444.

10 • The Catholic Spirit

Acts o

A man

of the earth Delano deacon devotes decades to digging graves as he prays for those laid to rest

Part 11 in a 14-part series highlighting local Catholics who live out the corporal and spiritual works of mercy.

By Dave Hrbacek The Catholic Spirit

D

eacon Joe Kittok digs holes for a living. He spends an hour and a half several times a week removing about 4 cubic yards of dirt, which he takes to his 35-acre property in Delano and spills onto the ground. He gets $400 per hole, which adds up to a decent living.

But, what makes his job special is not the hole itself, but what goes into it. Or, rather, whom.

The 69-year-old member of St. Maximilian Kolbe in Delano, who is married with three adult sons, is a professional grave digger. He has been doing it for 44 years, and he now digs around 300 graves per year in 30 cemeteries in Delano and surrounding communities.

An important part of the process for him comes at the end, when he stands over the hole after the casket has been placed there and says a prayer for the deceased. It’s his way of carrying out one of the corporal works of mercy: burying the dead. It’s also the fulfillment of a promise he made several decades ago to a parish priest, now-deceased Father Michael Tegeder, at Our Lady of the Lake in Mound.

“We sat down and had a little talk,” Deacon Kittok recalled, not sure exactly when the conversation took place. “I think we were waiting for a funeral. And he said, ‘You know, you’re in a perfect spot to make this your ministry and pray for these people at just the right moment when they might need it.’ I thought about that for all of about 20 minutes, and I decided that I would [follow Father Tegeder’s suggestion]. . . . Every night now, I pray for every person I’ve ever buried.”

The total is somewhere in the thousands, though he has never tallied the number of burials. Yet, he remembers the very first grave he dug, and the person who was buried there — Emily Brown of Delano.

“I can find it in that cemetery to this day,” he said. “It’s a Delano public cemetery, and it was down by the river. It’s a beautiful setting.”

Details of his first digging job, which took place in January 1972, are still vivid in his mind. Freshly returned from two U.S. Army tours in Vietnam, he got off of work in the afternoon at a local plastics manufacturing company near the farm where he grew up a few miles from Delano, then headed to the cemetery in his orange, 1969 Ford Pinto. He brought a lantern, which he lit at dusk. He worked well into the night with the crudest of tools, finishing about six hours later.

“I bought three pieces of plywood and a wheelbarrow and a tarp,” he said. “I think I went and borrowed a shovel and a spade, and

later bought those. I put a piece of old sofa cushion on top of the Pinto and put the plywood up there and tied it down, hauled it all out there.”

A special role Perhaps a job that could seem creepy, Deacon Kittok finds deep spiritual meaning in the task, and sheds tears when asked what it means to bury members of his community, many of whom he knows.

“I bury about 300 people [a year], more or less,” he said. “I try to do the best I can on every single one.”

His livelihood sprouted when a neighbor of his family came over to seek help digging graves.

“He was in charge of a Delano public cemetery, and he was looking for somebody else to dig graves because he had a falling out with the fellow who did it at the time,” Deacon Kittok recalled. “And, my brother Dave and I were there, and we decided that between the two of us we could handle something like that.

We both had jobs. He was a farmer and I worked in the plastics factory. . . . So, he took the first couple. Then, his girlfriend at the time told him that she didn’t like that idea. Plus, they [jobs] come at inconvenient times. So, he gave it up, turned it over to me, and I’ve been doing it ever since.”

The job begins with taking great care to excavate the dirt so as to provide the least amount of disturbance to the landscape at the

Deacon Kittok stands outside of his Ford F-450 pickup truck as he unloads dirt excavated f Dave Hrbacek/The Catholic Spirit cemetery. It ends with saying a prayer while he covers the vault containing the casket with the same dirt he removed.

This final act is an important part, even though family members might not notice him while he is standing at the grave waiting for them to leave at the conclusion of the burial rite. Nonetheless, they benefit from his service, as he puts earth back into the hole and prays

their loved one into eterni “The burial is really the challenging rite of all of th final,” said Sister Fran Don LifeTransition Ministries a Cemeteries, who taught D his formation at the St. Pa his ordination to the diaco I think people don’t realiz

The Catholic Spirit’s Acts of Mercy series is made possible in part through a gran National Catholic Society of Foresters. Learn about the organization at www.ncsf.c

of

Mercy

from a nearby cemetery.

ity. hardest, most hem because it’s so nnelly, director of at The Catholic Deacon Kittok during aul Seminary before onate in 2000. “And, ze until they are

nt from the com.

September 8, 2016 • 11 was living. We reverently place it in the ground, and we do that because we believe as a community, this person still belongs to the community, but with the dead.”

Mercy in the midst of grief

Deacon Joe Kittok digs a grave at Calvary Cemetery in Delano. He estimates he digs about 300 graves a year in 30 cemeteries in Delano and surrounding communities.

Dave Hrbacek/ The Catholic Spirit standing there, and then they turn around and walk away [from the grave at the conclusion of the burial prayer service]. How reassuring for these people to know that there’s somebody like Joe there to care for that hole in the ground — to fill it again and make it safe, to make it secure and then to be praying for the person besides.”

When asked to describe his ministry, Deacon Kittok simply says he’s glad to have “found my niche in life.”

“God wants us to be useful, and I enjoy doing this and I think I serve people justly,” he said.

For people like John Cherek, longtime director of The Catholic Cemeteries, what Deacon Kittok does has far deeper meaning than just making him feel useful.

“I would see it as a connection to mercy,” Cherek said. “That is as fine an expression of mercy as I can think of, in terms of this particular corporal work.”

To understand what Deacon Kittok’s service means, it’s important to understand what is happening during the act of burial, Cherek said.

“When we dig the hole . . . we’re opening up a space for this person who was created in the image of God,” he said. “We consider the body to be holy and sacred in life as well as in death.

And we are going to reverently and respectfully care for that body, just as we cared for the body with the other six corporal works of mercy, or we cared for the body during the time when it

In the last decade or so, Deacon Kittok has also presided at funerals and burial rites at cemeteries. He even got called to a home right after a person died.

On March 15, his longtime friend in Delano, Tom Redmond, died unexpectedly. Redmond’s daughter, Pauline Thaemert, arrived at the home after calling to check on him. She then decided to call Deacon Kittok after the paramedics had arrived, even though she herself is Lutheran.

“Joe came over right away,” she said. “He sat in the living room while they were working on Dad. He said, ‘Well, I don’t do this a lot, but I’ll do what I can.’ He did really well.

“My dad was a very down-to-earth man, and I knew he’d want Joe there.”

Deacon Kittok, who had plowed Redmond’s driveway many times over the years, went on to dig his friend’s grave at St. Peter’s Cemetery and perform the funeral at the St. Peter campus of St. Maximilian Kolbe. Just four months later, he did the same for Redmond’s wife, Susie, who died July 12. Her funeral and burial also were at St. Peter.

In Thaemert’s mind, there was no other choice than Deacon Kittok to dig the graves and conduct the funerals, even though she realized it was tough for him to do this for his friends in the midst of his own grief.

“We appreciate him so much,” Thaemert said. “[Having him there] made it easier to deal with the grief.”

On July 30, just two weeks after her mom’s funeral, Thaemert’s daughter, Jacqueline, got married, with her wedding to Colin Lesner also taking place at St. Peter. Naturally, Pauline invited Deacon Kittok to the wedding. He came without hesitation, with Pauline sitting in the same spot as she did for her parents’ funerals.

Now that he is approaching 100 funerals performed, in addition to all of the graves he has dug, he can offer a wealth of experience and compassion to those who are mourning, with the grief often in an intense and raw state.

Yet, it isn’t necessarily nuggets of profound wisdom that people find comforting, he said.

“They just need somebody to listen,” he said.

“Let them talk and you listen. . . . That’s about all you can do.

“There’s no magic words that you can say that would comfort somebody who’s lost somebody who’s very dear to them.”

Deacon Kittok has no plans to retire. That firm commitment is aided by machinery he has accumulated over the years that makes the job easier than when he started. He now owns a hydraulic excavator, which eliminates the need to dig by hand, a task he did for the first 19 years. He also owns a 2015 Ford F-450 pickup truck that has a lift to elevate the bed so that the dirt he excavates spills off easily. The process is so slick that he has been known to sometimes dig two graves in one day. He did so just last month.

Someday, of course, his time will come and he will have to be on the receiving end of services he has performed for more than four decades.

What then?

“I tell people the story that I’m going to dig my own grave,” he said. “It’s right next to the road, so it’ll be really convenient at St. Joseph’s [Cemetery in Delano]. It’s close to my parents and grandparents.”

Bury the dead

By Father Michael Van Sloun The seventh corporal work of mercy is to bury the dead. It is different from the other six because it is not given by Jesus with his set of judgment criteria (Mt 25:35-36), but was added later to round out the list to the biblical number of seven. Also, it isn’t directed to the bodily needs of someone who is living, but rather to the body of someone who has died.

A corpse deserves to be treated with the utmost respect. While a person is alive, the body serves as a temple of God (1 Cor 3:16,17), a temple of the Father Michael Holy Spirit (1 Cor 6:19) and a tent (2 Cor 5:1-9) VAN SLOUN — the place where God and the Spirit dwell within a person, as well as the home for a person’s soul. This makes the physical body sacred. After death, once the soul has departed and God’s special abiding presence has come to an end, the remains should be accorded great reverence in honor of all that was holy that took place in that body over a lifetime.

The body of Jesus is most holy, and after his death on the cross, his remains deserved proper burial. It was an act of mercy for Joseph of Arimathea to request the body of Jesus, take it down, wash it, wrap it in a clean linen cloth and lay it in a tomb; for Nicodemus to provide a mixture of myrrh and aloes; and for Mary Magdalene and the other women to prepare spices and perfumed oils to anoint his body.

There are several other notable burials in the New Testament. After John the Baptist was beheaded, “his disciples came and took away the corpse and buried him” (Mt 14:12). When Lazarus died, his body was wrapped in burial bands, his face wrapped in a cloth, and laid in a tomb. After Stephen was stoned, “Devout men buried Stephen” (Acts 8:2).

It is an act of mercy to provide a dignified burial for someone who has died. It begins at the moment of death with prayer and subdued, well-mannered behavior. It continues with making funeral arrangements: the call to the funeral home, the removal of the body, the selection of the casket or urn and the burial vault, planning the visitation and funeral liturgy, the obituary, memorial cards, flowers, luncheon, the graveside service and the grave marker. Everything done to care for the body of the deceased is an act of love and mercy.

Another aspect of this work of mercy is to pray for the dead, to attend the wake or the vigil, the funeral Mass or memorial service or the committal rite at the cemetery. Other prayers include Mass intentions, the rosary or cemetery visits at a later date with graveside prayer.

This act of mercy is performed professionally by funeral directors under the patronage of St. Joseph of Arimathea, undertakers under the patronage of St. Dismas and grave diggers under the patronage of St. Anthony the Abbot. Others who care for the dead body include the coroner and the medical examiner.

Many others play important roles in the burial of the dead, particularly at funerals. To bury the dead is a good work pleasing to God. Father Van Sloun is pastor of St. Bartholomew in Wayzata. Read more of his reflections at www.catholichotdish.com.

12 • The Catholic Spirit

FAITH & CULTURE

granting parental privileges, but the final decision lies in the hands of a judge. This is usually done by a pre-birth order sought in the third trimester. California’s family court refused to admit Cook’s claim against the surrogacy contract.

“The court said on the record, what happens to those children is not of the court’s business . . . ,” Cassidy said in Minnesota.

According to its own testimony, though, surrogacy agencies and lawyers consider the best interests of children to be the court’s concern. Gary Debele, a Minneapolis lawyer who writes surrogacy contracts, affirmed that those contracts don’t include any provisions for the interests of the children.

Editor’s note: This is the second story in a series on surrogacy, which a Minnesota State Legislature commission is studying as it prepares to make public policy recommendations on the practice. Follow the series at www.TheCatholicSpirit.com.

W

hen California surrogate mother Melissa Cook reached Harold Cassidy on Thanksgiving morning in 2015, he was the first attorney she found ready to defend her constitutional right to carry to term the three babies in her womb. Cook’s story has been widely publicized, and on Aug. 16, Cassidy, a Catholic lawyer from New Jersey, brought it before a Minnesota state legislative commission studying surrogacy. The 15-member commission’s final report — due in December — could guide future legislation on surrogacy.

Cassidy highlighted Cook’s story as how legalized commercial surrogacy operates as a profit-driven industry that sacrifices the rights of women and children to protect the interests of its customer, the intended parent.

“In California, you have an incestuous relationship like this: You have an agency that will put together an agreement for a man in Georgia with a woman who will be 48 when she gives birth, a doctor who does a triple embryo transplant without knowing who is going to raise the child, and you have lawyers and hospitals [involved, too],” Cassidy explained to the commission.

“It wasn’t like that 20 years ago. It grew to this industry.

It started there like it’s starting here in Minnesota, fueled by the money from intended parents, and everyone is going to do what is necessary to satisfy the intended parent.”

Contractual conflict Cassidy has worked with surrogacy cases for 30 years.

He represented surrogate mother Mary Beth Whitehead in the country’s landmark surrogacy case in 1986, the Baby M Case. As a result of that case and a subsequent ethics commission study, commercial surrogacy is illegal in New Jersey and considered baby selling and exploitation of women. In the last 30 years, three more states have prohibited commercial surrogacy, most have left it unaddressed by the law, and a few have legalized it to one degree or another.

According to Cassidy, in places like California where there is an enabling statute, virtually anyone with enough money can have a child through surrogacy. For example, in Cook’s case, surrogacy enabled a 50-yearold, single, deaf man who lives in the basement of his elderly parent’s home to contract for triplets over the Internet. The only screening required was a criminal background check. No one from the surrogacy agency visited his home in Georgia to verify whether or not CM — as the intended father is called in court documents — was suited to raise children. Also, according to Cassidy, by contracting with a 47-year-old woman as a surrogate and complying with CM’s request for a triple embryo transplant, the fertility clinic and surrogacy agency violated standard medical practice.

The problems of this parenthood-by-contract arrangement soon became apparent.

One month into the pregnancy, CM realized he couldn’t afford to pay for Cook’s frequent visits to the fertility clinic, and he wasn’t sure he could afford to raise even one child.

After consulting his lawyer, Robert Walmsley — part owner of Surrogacy International, which had made the surrogacy arrangement — CM told Cook he wanted her to abort one of the babies.

Cook informed him she would not abort.

The back and forth continued for the next two months, with CM and the surrogacy lawyers first calling for an abortion on the grounds of CM’s deafness and financial situation and then claiming that abortion was CM’s decision to make by rights of the surrogacy contract.

Cook had also been seeking legal advice. Under surrogacy contracts, the surrogate mother has her own lawyer, but the attorney is paid by the intended parents.

Cook had contracted Lesa Slaughter of The Fertility Law Firm, a lawyer who also works for intended parents, Cassidy said during testimony in Minnesota.

“That lawyer was conflicted and could not argue for taking the selective reduction provisions out of contract, and she didn’t,” Cassidy told the commission.

September 8, 2016

Hospital concedes to intended parents

The nitty-gritty of surrogacy arrangements

On Feb. 22, 2016, Cook gave birth to the triplets by emergency cesarean section. Cook remained conscious during the operation and could hear the babies cry, but the hospital staff wouldn’t let her see them. Afterward, three security guards were posted outside of the nursery, and hospital staff wouldn’t tell Cook if the babies were alive. Everyone who visited Cook had to show photo ID and was also banned from seeing the babies. According to Cassidy, there is no legal basis for such actions.

To explain the hospital staff’s conduct, Cassidy cited a study that a hospital makes 120 times more profit from a surrogacy birth than it does from a single birth to a married couple.

When plans change, parties become at odds with financial responsibilities, Fixing the system If Minnesota is interested in protecting women and well-being of children children from exploitation, Cassidy proposed an easy first

By Bridget Ryder • For The Catholic Spirit When Cook turned to Slaughter again during the conflict over the abortion, Slaughter initially said she couldn’t represent Cook because she has only been paid to represent her during the writing of the contract. To represent Cook, she would have to be paid $400 an hour, which Cook couldn’t afford.

“That lawyer nonetheless communicated with the lawyer for the intended parent about the selective reduction,” Cassidy said during his testimony in Minnesota.

Cook stated in a court declaration that Walmsley wrote to Slaughter in an email, “Triplets for a married couple is hard enough. Triplets for a single parent would be excruciating; triplets for a single parent who is deaf — well, beyond contemplation.” Slaughter replied, “Agreed.” After that exchange, she told Cook she could represent her because CM was now paying her.

“Then, she proceeds to tell my client why she had to have a selective reduction and why she was going to be liable for money damages if she didn’t. That’s incorrect advice; there’s no way she could be sued for exercising her constitutional rights to carry the child,” Cassidy said to the commission.

In November 2015, Walmsley sent a letter to Cook through Slaughter threatening her with monetary liabilities for breaching her contract with CM by not having the abortion and causing him emotional distress. The threats and misinformation nearly brought Cook to the breaking point. The day before she reached Cassidy by phone, she had scheduled an abortion, he told The Catholic Spirit. Cassidy takes exception to the repeated claims of surrogacy proponents that women can’t be forced into abortions.

“Women are forced to have abortions all the time,” he said. “This woman, left alone, would have had an abortion that she didn’t want to have.”

In testimony Aug. 30 about the coercive nature of surrogacy, University of St. Thomas law professor, and member of the Pontifical Council for the Family, Teresa Collett, also analyzed surrogacy contracts as favoring the interests of intended parents.

Best interest of the children In January 2016, before giving birth, Cook filed a lawsuit in California’s family court against CM’s claims on the children through the surrogacy contract and asked for custody, citing the children’s best interests.

Legal parentage is granted to intended parents by a court order. The surrogacy contract forms the basis for

step — take the money out. If surrogacy is as altruistic as the industry paints it, why not pass legislation that prohibits paying women, Cassidy challenges.

Throughout the commission hearings, surrogacy proponents have pleaded the case of infertile couples and portrayed surrogates as motivated only by a desire to help them. Most of the surrogates who have testified to the commission have borne children for friends, not for strangers. Yet, at the Aug. 16 hearing, Dr. Lisa Erickson from the Center for Reproductive Medicine in Minneapolis testified that most couples who come to the center for surrogacy don’t have anyone in mind to act as their surrogate. Krystal Lemcke, a representative of the surrogacy agency, My Donor Connection, based in Anoka, also testified that they make surrogacy arrangements for intended parents who come to them from outside of the United States. According to Matthew Eppinette, executive director of Californiabased Center for Bioethics and Culture, having a supply of women ready to be surrogates is essential to the industry. Opponents also fear that as countries such as India restrict international surrogacy, the United States will become an increasingly appealing international hub for the practice. But in Cassidy’s experience, altruism won’t motivate many surrogates.

“Every surrogate that I’ve ever represented told me publicly that they did it for altruistic reasons and then privately told me they did it for money and, ‘without the money, I wouldn’t have done it, couldn’t have done it,’” Cassidy told the commission.

According to Kathryn Mollen, the policy and outreach coordinator at the Minnesota Catholic Conference, Resolve: The National Infertility Association that supports artificial reproductive technology and third party reproduction, opposed legislation to establish the commission now studying surrogacy.

However, it had supported a surrogacy-enabling bill that was passed by the legislature in 2008, but vetoed by then-Governor Tim Pawlenty because it didn’t include enough protections for women and children.

In her testimony, Collett, the University of St. Thomas law professor, presented an analysis of the number of births through a surrogate that have occurred in Minnesota since 2011. They represent less than 1 percent of births in Minnesota in any given year.

So far, those testifying for surrogacy have not been individuals seeking the service, but those who stand to profit from it. One of the greatest proponents of surrogacy to the current commission has been Steven Snyder, a Minnesota surrogacy lawyer who, like Walmsley in California, also opened a surrogacy agency.

“Surrogacy is not widespread,” Cassidy told The Catholic Spirit. “This can be stopped.”

FAITH & CULTURE

September 8, 2016

The Catholic Spirit • 13

Motherhood in the digital age Amid diapers and dinner, Catholic moms turn to blogging for camaraderie and creative outlet

By Beth Blair For The Catholic Spirit For some stay-at-home mothers, there can be a loneliness factor — days spent caring for young children with no interactions with other adults.

“Motherhood can be very isolating in today’s world,” said Anna Coyne, 30, a mother of two who with her husband, Alex, and their children attends St. Mark in St. Paul. “I am the only stay-at-home mom on my block, and I get lonely. But I can go online and read about all the other woman out there in the trenches of motherhood, just like me.”

Coyne taps into a world of mothers in a similar stage of life by reading their stories and sharing experiences on their blogs. In particular, she goes to blogs written by Catholic moms to find faith, connection and support. Coyne also authors her own blog called The Hearts Overflow, www.theheartsoverflow.com.

“I started blogging almost three years ago, after our

Parishioners of St. Agnes in St. Paul, Jacqui Skemp and her husband, Ian, pose for a family photo with their two sons. In addition to her blog, she writes for the Catholic online ministry Blessed Is She. Courtesy Jacqui Skemp son was born,” Coyne said. “When I became a mother all of a sudden I had no time to pursue any of my creative passions, and I found myself getting frustrated with how little I was able to get done each day. Blogging was a creative hobby that I could easily do while I held a sleeping or nursing baby.”

If you or someone you know has been sexually abused, your first call should be to law enforcement.

The archdiocese’s Victim Assistance Program is also available to offer help and assist with healing. For confidential, compassionate assistance from an independent and professional local care provider, please call (651) 291-4497.

Another local blogger, Susanna Spencer, met her husband, Mark, in college at Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio where she earned a bachelor’s degree in theology and philosophy and a master’s degree in theology. They have four children and are members of St. Agnes in St. Paul.

“I home school the older ones, keep the home, and do writing in my spare time,” said Spencer, 30. She explained that her blog, Living with Lady Philosophy (www.livingwithladyphilosophy. blogspot.com) is based on the personified “Lady Philosophy” in “The Consolation of Philosophy” by sixth-century philosopher Boethius, who describes how Lady Philosophy appeared to him and consoled him.

“Writing has always been an outlet for me. Before I chose to study theology and philosophy, I Anna wanted to be a writer,” Spencer COYNE said. “However, it took until I got used to being a mother that I really discovered that writing was an essential part of my happiness.”

Blogger Jacqui Skemp of Mexican Domestic Goddess (www.mexicandomesticgoddess.com) and her husband, Ian, are parishioners of St. Agnes in St. Paul and are expecting their third child. On her blog, Skemp has revealed the challenges they have faced in their marriage.

Please turn to BLOGS on page 19

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14 • The Catholic Spirit

FOCUS ON FAITH

SUNDAY SCRIPTURES

Jeff Hedglen

Mistakes and mercy One of the greatest fears of my childhood was getting caught doing something bad and having to face my dad. It’s not that he was mean or abusive, it’s just that I did not want to disappoint him, and this caused a kneejerk reaction of fear whenever such situations would arise.

Probably the worst and stupidest thing I remember doing happened when I was a senior in high school hanging out with

friends. We were roller-skating in the street and then decided to go to another friend’s house. I’d borrowed my dad’s car that night and jumped in and started driving with my skates still on.

As you might expect, there was an accident. Thankfully, it was just a fender bender. It could have been a lot worse, but knowing that the next day I’d have to tell my dad what I had done caused me a terrible, sleepless night full of fear

September 8, 2016

and trembling.

After I showed my dad his dented bumper, I was expecting to never leave my room unless I was doing all my siblings’ chores forever. But instead of getting the worst punishment of my life, I got something wholly unexpected: mercy. Sure, my dad gave me a talking to about how our lives are defined by our choices, and this was not a good choice on my part. But all he asked of me was to think about the kind of person I was going to be.

This story came to mind as I reviewed this week’s readings. Each passage tells of God’s mercy, whether it is God relenting on his plan to smite the Israelites, St. Paul reminding us that Jesus came into the world to bring God’s mercy or, most expressive of all, the loving father full of mercy and forgiveness welcoming the prodigal son home.

Sunday, Sept. 11 Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time Readings • Ex 32:7-11, 13-14 • 1 Tm 1:12-17 • Lk 15:1-32 Benny Hester has a song about the prodigal son with a line that perfectly illustrates God and his mercy: “The only time I ever saw (God) run was when he ran to me, took me in his arms, held my head to his chest and said, ‘My son’s come home again.’”

This Catholic News Service column is offered in cooperation with the North Texas Catholic of Fort Worth, Texas.

DAILY Scriptures Sunday, Sept. 11 Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time Ex 32:7-11, 13-14 1 Tm 1:12-17 Lk 15:1-32

Wednesday, Sept. 14 Exaltation of the Holy Cross Nm 21:4b-9 Phil 2:6-11 Jn 3:13-17

Monday, Sept. 12 1 Cor 11:17-26, 33 Lk 7:1-10

Thursday, Sept. 15 Our Lady of Sorrows 1 Cor 15:1-11 Jn 19:25-27

Tuesday, Sept. 13 St. John Chrysostom, bishop and doctor of the Church 1 Cor 12:12-14, 27-31a Lk 7:11-17

Friday, Sept. 16 Sts. Cornelius, pope, and Cyprian, bishop, Martyrs 1 Cor 15:12-20 Lk 8:1-3

Saturday, Sept. 17 1 Cor 15:35-37, 42-49 Lk 8:4-15 Sunday, Sept. 18 Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time Am 8:4-7 1 Tm 2:1-8 Lk 16:1-13 Monday, Sept. 19 Prv 3:27-34 Lk 8:16-18

SEEKING ANSWERS

Father Michael Schmitz

What can I do to help my children stay Catholic?

Q. I try to do all I can to help our

children know of God’s love for them.

I want them to be truly Catholic, not merely in name, but as their deepest identity. In the face of a seemingly hostile culture, what can I do?

A. While there are no fool-proof strategies for passing along the faith to your children, there are some very powerful things you can choose to do that will make a difference in your children’s lives (and their eternities). I will name four here.

First, teach your children how to pray.

I have a friend who lamented the fact that, as Catholics, we “have been taught how to repeat, not how to pray.” A recent study indicated that 47 percent of Catholics in America are not absolutely certain that a personal relationship with God is ever possible.

Reflect on that for a moment. The entire basis of Catholicism is centered around the fact that God broke into this world in Jesus Christ, and that he continues to animate and engage us through the Holy Spirit on a moment-by-

moment basis. As Catholics, we have unprecedented access to the Father. And it has even been revealed that God is not some distant power but that he has become our father when we were made his children through baptism. Teach your children how to pray. Teach them that God is their father and show them how you talk to him.

Second, speaking of fathers, there is something that is often entirely missed in our culture: the power of a father’s blessing. Did you know that, in God’s original plan for the people of Israel, every father of a family was the priest of the family? In the new covenant, the father of the family is the priest of the “domestic Church” (aka “the family”). This means there is power in a father’s blessing.

This was brought home to me when I was having a conversation with a priest who is an exorcist in another diocese. He described the case of a young woman who had been cursed by her father.

While the exorcism was freeing her through the power of Jesus Christ, there was a bunch of “push back” because her father continued to curse his own

Tuesday, Sept. 20 Sts. Andrew Kim Tae-gon, priest, and Paul Chong Ha-sang, and companions, martyrs Prv 21:1-6, 10-13 Lk 8:19-21 Wednesday, Sept. 21 St. Matthew, apostle and evangelist Eph 4:1-7, 11-13 Mt 9:9-13 Thursday, Sept. 22 Eccl 1:2-11 Lk 9:7-9

daughter. He noted how powerful that curse was because it was her father doing it. After staring at him in shock that a dad would do that, a thought came to my mind. I said, “If that is the case with a father’s curse, what does that mean if a dad blesses his child in the name of Jesus?” He looked at me and said, “You can’t imagine the power of grace that a dad’s blessing has over his children.”

Fathers, pronounce the blessing of God over your children. It can be a simple sign of the Cross traced on their foreheads, or if they are far away from you, raising your hand in their direction and praying, “Bless you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” It might not be “sacramental” in the way a priest’s blessing is, but it is part of the “primordial sacrament.”

Third, little can compete with an authentic witness to Jesus Christ and his Church. When moms and dads give witness that they truly strive to live what we profess on Sundays, there is power.

This does not mean being overly strict or demanding with one’s own children. In fact, St. John Paul II testifies to the authentic witness of his own father. He wrote, “The mere fact of seeing [my father] on his knees had a decisive influence on my early years. He was so hard on himself that he had no need to be hard on his son; his example alone was sufficient to inculcate discipline and a sense of duty. He was an exceptional person.” He went on to state, “. . . his example was in a way my first seminary.”

St. John of the Cross cited his mother and her willingness to raise him and his brother in the faith despite the great

Friday, Sept. 23 St. Pius of Pietrelcina, priest Eccl 3:1-11 Lk 9:18-22 Saturday, Sept. 24 Eccl 11:9—12:8 Lk 9:43b-45 Sunday, Sept. 25 Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time Am 6:1a, 4-7 1 Tm 6:11-16 Lk 16:19-31

sacrifices she had to make in order to be Catholic. It was her example that inspired him and his brother. Many mothers have had that sanctifying effect on their children.

Fourth, we must not underestimate the power of prayer. As many know, St. Augustine was absolutely opposed to the Catholic faith of his mom in his early years. An incredibly bright young person, he seemed to delight in throwing his mom’s faith in her face. But she remained steadfast in prayer.

Here is something we often overlook: She did not merely “throw up a few prayers.” She begged God on behalf of both of her sons. She prayed. She fasted.

If you desire this conversion, be gentle with your child, but be strict with yourself. The spirit of this age is alive and well. It can often only be driven out of your children with prayer and fasting.

Fast for your children, whether from food or through any mortification. Offer up your grief and your sufferings for your children. You can even ask God to accept whatever suffering you experience as you age and approach death for the salvation and sanctification of your children.

You might not see the fruit of these four powerful tools in your life. But you are a person who knows that there is more to this life. Never lose heart. God desires the salvation of your children even more than you do. Trust in him.

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.

Reach him at fathermikeschmitz@gmail.com.

September 8, 2016

BACKGROUNDER

The Catholic Spirit • 15

Poverty solutions almost absent as a presidential campaign issue

By Dennis Sadowski Catholic News Service America has 46.7 million people living in poverty, but there’s been little talk on the presidential campaign trail about the needs of poor people.

No doubt, poverty is a tough sell in a campaign where middle class votes — both blue collar and white collar — are important to success come Election Day Nov. 8.

But economic difficulties are fueling much of the voter angst, and Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump are attempting to tap into that uncertainty by portraying their economic policies as good for what ails the country and good for creating massive numbers of well-paying jobs.

“Poverty is an issue in the campaign, it’s just not being talked about,” said Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami, chairman of the U.S. bishop’s Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development.

“It’s certainly driving a lot of the things in the campaign. It’s certainly driving a lot of the anger. But we don’t see on either side really any substantive policy proposal,” Archbishop Wenski told Catholic News Service.

Archbishop Wenski and other election observers doubt that poverty will suddenly become an election year concern this time around.

“It’s hard to engage in a discussion about poverty or about anything else in this particularly very strange campaign,” he said. “This is atypical in many ways and therefore, some of these issues are not being engaged because it almost seems like an exercise in futility.”

So while poverty is not on the lips of the candidates, it would seem that some of their proposals are directed toward improving economic opportunity for the working classes and perhaps helping poor people, too.

CNS Trump’s proposals focus on reducing income taxes across the board and making it easier for companies to hire, invest in infrastructure and boost production. He has complained that businesses operate under too many restrictive regulations and promised that his administration would undertake a systematic review of those regulations and eliminate any that hinder business activity.

The Republican’s plan is light on particulars when it comes to social policy, education and support for lowincome families, particularly the extreme poor.

Clinton, meanwhile, has stressed that she would implement a job creation plan focused on much-needed nationwide infrastructure improvements. She has pledged to address underlying causes of poverty, boost early childhood education and ensure a strong safety net, especially for those stuck in intergenerational poverty.

The Democrat also said it is important to continue improving the State Children’s Health Insurance

Program and the Affordable Care Act to keep people on the path to the middle class.

Yet poverty has been a largely avoided topic in the campaign.

“It’s incredibly foolish to ignore poverty,” said Kathryn Edin, Bloomberg distinguished professor of sociology at Johns Hopkins University and co-author of “$2 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America.”

“What people aren’t doing and they should be doing is to link what’s happening in our cities to the unbelievable disparities we’re seeing across the country.

“Why did Baltimore burn? What’s going on in Milwaukee, Ferguson? It’s not frustration with the police, while that’s important. It’s anger and dissatisfaction with the lack of opportunity and living in poverty,” Edin said.

Rather than spending a lot of time trying to engage the presidential candidates, Catholic Charities USA has focused its advocacy efforts on Congress in a longstanding effort to build support for legislation that funds programs that would ease the burden of poverty in the country.

Dominican Sister Donna Markham, Catholic Charities’ president, said the agency feels it will be more successful advocating for poor people through individual members of Congress.

“We will talk with anyone on either side of the aisle to promote the alleviation, reduction of poverty,” she told CNS. She added that showing House and Senate members how programs work in local communities does a lot more to affect the country’s social policies.

“We have made over 200 visits to Congress folks this past year, always dealing with the question [of] how are their proposals going to affect the poor, especially the most vulnerable,” Sister Donna said.

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St. John’s Campus – Friday & Saturday, Sept. 9 & 10 6 Interlachen Road • 55343

Live Music • Hamburgers • Brats • Beer • Hispanic Food GIANT Inflatable • Family & Children’s Games Friday Events: 5-10 p.m.

Saturday begins 8 a.m. with Interlachen Park Garage Sale Mass at 4:30 p.m. • Live Music 5:30-8 p.m.

St. Joseph’s Campus – Sunday, Sept. 11 1310 Mainstreet • 55343

Mass – 10:30 a.m. (Bilingual)

Chicken Dinner 11 a.m. — 4 p.m.

0 $4,00 fle f a in R es Priz

BINGO • Games • Silent Auction • Bake Shop • Country Store Wine & Beer Garden and Concessions • Vikings vs. Titans on Big Screen at Noon

There is so much more online!

Full calendar of events • Catholic Hotdish blog Photos and videos • Search the archives

16 • The Catholic Spirit

THIS CATHOLIC LIFE • COMMENTARY

September 8, 2016

EVERYDAY MERCIES

Alyssa Bormes

My time with ‘Mother,’ now St. Teresa of Kolkata It was 2004, and I was volunteering.

Sister Edward would assign me tasks, and I never knew what to expect. There were days of washing dishes and days of cleaning bedrooms. There was one wonderful thing; my friend, Ellie, was the best at laundry. Since we were volunteering with the Missionaries of Charity, there were no washing machines. Ellie did it all by hand, and I never begrudged her this.

We were in Rome, and Mother Teresa had been beatified in 2003. One of Sister Edward’s jobs was to care for some of the relics of Mother, and from time to time, I was able to help her.

Now, when I imagine someone working with the relics of a saint, I picture a room with all sorts of ornate woodwork, monks prayerfully bending over beautiful desks with the glow of library lamps illuminating their work, and perhaps some other monks chanting in the background. Sister Edward chuckled when she said, “That’s what you would think, but it is nothing like that.”

Instead, we were in an office that would more appropriately be called a closet. There were a few white plastic folding tables and two or three sisters working at them.

On the first day I was to help with the relics, Sister Edward was giving me instructions rather quickly. Then she saw the look on my face, and

everything slowed. She sat down, picked up a white piece of cloth, held it to her lips for just a moment, and then told me that it was the collar of the dress that Mother wore under her sari, her habit. She then pressed the collar into my hands and said, “Here, sit with Mother for a while.”

My breath was gone, time stood still.

I’m just a girl from South Dakota who led a rather terrible life before coming home to the Church, and Mother Teresa was very different from that.

Yet, here we were together through this simple relic, and the power of Christ.

In addition, there were little pieces of Mother’s hair and swabs of cotton with Mother’s blood that were saved near the end of her life as she received medical care. Handling them was absolutely humbling each time.

Now and then, there would be an item that didn’t have a clear provenance, in which case it would be buried or burnt. First class relics would be reserved for reliquaries. Second class relics, like small pieces of cloth, would be put into special holy cards with little windows. But from time to time, there would be a relic that didn’t exactly fit into a category. Stumped, Sister Edward would wonder aloud, “What are we going to do with this?”

With a twinkle in my eye, I would reply with a sense of authority, “Well,

TWENTY SOMETHING

Christina Capecchi

Dreaming of the Caribbean: adventures and homecomings The phone call came when I was boiling sweet corn — suppertime on a hum-drum Sunday whose excitement peaked with a trip to the grocery store.

It had been months since I’d spoken with my college friend, Wendy, but she skipped right over the small talk: She’s moving to St. Croix.

When I heard St. Croix, I thought Wisconsin and the river I’ve fished with my brother. But Wendy had been thinking much bigger. She clarified: the U.S. Virgin Islands.

The life she had planned for herself — a comfortable one in a quiet Iowa suburb lined with sidewalks, strollers and swing sets — no longer fit.

Motherhood, she had come to discern, is not her vocation. This was a startling realization, one she had arrived at with

frequent prayer and utter honesty.

A series of events that seemed divinely orchestrated led her to this juncture, beginning Memorial Day weekend when she was laid up with a broken arm. Restlessness made her heart throb and her fingers tingle, sending them to the keyboard and a Google search for job openings in — of all places — St. Croix, some 2,500 miles from her current residence.

I Googled it, too, to brush up on my geography. The map showed a tiny island surrounded by blue. Puerto Rico.

Images of scuba diving, horseback riding and white beaches. An hour’s flight from Caracas, Venezuela.

It was time to take a leap of faith, Wendy told me. Time for an adventure.

Sunday night rolled around —

There are plenty of places that need joy and mercy, and it will take all of us to help her. St. Teresa of Kolkata, pray for us!

CNS

in all my time working with relics. . . .”

Each time, this would make us laugh out loud. But better yet, it made the little French nun sitting behind us quietly giggle.

The closet-turned-office didn’t have any marvelous woodwork, shimmering lamps or chanting in the background.

However, what it did have was the beautiful and bold Sister Edward, the gentle, quiet sister from France, one exuberant, funny woman from the Midwest, and laughter. In short, there

was joy.

dishwasher loading, Netflix, Etsy — and I couldn’t stop thinking of St. Croix. I felt a jolt of inspiration, and somewhere folded in Wendy’s news, should I acknowledge it, a challenge.

Couldn’t we all use the push to finally do the thing we’ve always wanted to do? Couldn’t we all use the audacity — that place in the heart where blood pumps in equal measures of courage and impatience — to go ahead and do it?

My early 20s brought me across the globe with friends, with family and for journalism — from Kilkenny, Ireland, to Ketchikan, Alaska. Praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. Strolling through Venice on a wet, ethereal night. Embracing the pope in St. Peter’s Basilica.

But part of young adulthood is letting the slow tilt of maturity carry your feet to the ground, like a teeter totter nearing the grass. It’s figuring out where to put roots. Holding onto your adventurer’s heart while making room for responsibility.

I’ve been thinking about new beginnings, which you can almost smell in September, with all the backto-school possibilities — sharp-tipped crayons, blank notebooks and mighty resolutions.

New beginnings can come in

surprising forms — and sometimes they lead you back home, allowing you to recognize the beauty that was always in your midst. The late Eleanor Boyer, a New Jersey Catholic who never married, was given a new shot in 1997, when, at 72, she won the lottery.

Immediately she knew how to spend her $11.8 million winnings: She gave it away — half to her parish, half to her hometown.

“No new car, no vacation,” Eleanor told The New York Times. “My life is no different. I’ve given it up to God. I live in his presence and do his will, and I did that from the start.”

My commitments mean I won’t be adding a stamp to the passport this year, so I’m contemplating adventure in the broadest sense — from the life of the mind to the spiritual life, exploring new corners of my God-given talents and embracing glimpses of grace.

I’m pushing myself to find compelling ways to tell other people’s stories, all while writing my own story.

One day I will appreciate how God brought each chapter together, marked by a generosity that knows no bounds.

She is St. Teresa of Kolkata, a member of the communion of saints. The opportunities to volunteer with her have not ended; they have only just begun, and there are plenty of places that need joy and mercy, and it will take all of us to help her.

St. Teresa of Kolkata, pray for us!

Bormes, a member of Holy Family in St. Louis Park, is the author of the book “The Catechism of Hockey.”

Capecchi is a freelance writer from Inver Grove Heights and the editor of www.sisterstory.org.

THIS CATHOLIC LIFE • COMMENTARY

September 8, 2016

THE LOCAL CHURCH

Deborah Savage

Complementarity: a timeless truth St. John Paul II’s teaching on the theology of the body has been the subject of countless publications and widely discussed in Catholic media. Institutes have been formed to train and certify those interested in disseminating the teaching further. It is a beautiful teaching, a gift to the world at a time when human sexuality and human relationships have undergone a truly dramatic upheaval, leaving many of us confused and uncertain about what to think.

St. John Paul II’s primary intention in offering this teaching was to help us understand the sacred meaning of our own bodies. But it was also intended to lead to a deeper appreciation of the natural “complementarity” that characterizes the relationship of men and women — an old, if mostly undeclared truth, but clearly one in need of renewal

and an unambiguous affirmation.

For we all know that since Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden of Eden, both men and women have often struggled to understand and respect each other — even as they have worked tirelessly together throughout history to create human families and culture. It hasn’t been easy, but the Holy Father shows that, by returning to the creation accounts found in the first chapters of Genesis, we can uncover the beauty of God’s purpose in creating us male and female.

It may be relatively easy to see the complementarity that exists at the heart of the marital union, though, as St. John Paul II states repeatedly, the love that binds women and men together is expressed not only through their bodies.

This complementarity, something that

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has served as the bedrock of romantic love and characterized marriage for centuries, is not merely biological or physical. It is a feature of our very being, something reflected in the two distinct ways men and women have of being in the world. He teaches that man and woman are equally human and at the same time different: complementary creatures meant to make of themselves a total gift to each other. And though it remains a mystery that defies any attempt to reduce it to rigid roles or functions, the relationship of husband and wife is truly a manifestation of complementarity that, when given room to breathe, will find universal expression in every home and family.

However, and equally important, the Holy Father also argues that the complementarity expressed in the relationship of woman and man is found not only in the marital act or in the sustaining of families, but it is also a feature of that relationship in every context — whether social, political or economic.

Both man and woman were given dominion over the earth and both are called to share generously of their gifts and charisms in the tasks of human

The Catholic Spirit • 17

Event Woman & Man: Complementarity as Mission: What do both science and Scripture have to say about the battle of the sexes?

Sponsored by the Siena Symposium for Women, Family and Culture, and the archdiocesan Office of Evangelization and Catechesis

7-9 p.m. Oct. 5 at Woulfe Auditorium on the University of St. Thomas campus in St. Paul For more information, visit www.stthomas.edu/sienasymposium living. And it seems clear that only by a mutual collaboration, intentionally and intelligently directed toward that task, will our mission — to return all things to Christ — be fulfilled.

Savage is the director of the Siena Symposium for Women, Family and Culture at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, and a faculty member at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity in St. Paul.

She is a member of St. Mark in St. Paul.

18 • The Catholic Spirit

Music Disability Awareness Concert: Billy McLaughlin — Sept. 17: 7:30 p.m. at the Basilica of St. Mary, 1600 Hennepin Ave., Minneapolis.

Parish events Cathedral Young Adults Sport Night — Fridays through September: 6:30–9 p.m. at Rahn Athletic Park, 4440 Nichols Road, Eagan. www.cathedralsaintpaul.org/cya.

St. Gabriel fall festival – St. John campus — Sept. 9-10 at 6 Interlachen Road, Hopkins. www.stgabrielhopkins.org.

St. Timothy carnival — Sept. 9-11: 5 p.m. at 707 89th Ave. NE, Blaine. www.churchofsttimothy.com.

Holy Family Maronite Lebanese Festival — Sept. 9-11 at 1960 Lexington Ave. S., Mendota Heights. www.holyfamilyevents.org.

Holy Cross Septemberfest — Sept. 9-11 at 1630 Fourth St. NE, Minneapolis. www.ourholycross.org.

The Incredible Festival — Sept. 9-11: 4 p.m. at 2385 Commerce Blvd., Mound. www.incrediblefestival.com.

St. Jude of the Lake Cornfest — Sept. 10: 3–10 p.m. at 700 Mahtomedi Ave., Mahtomedi. www.stjudeofthelake.org.

St. Ignatius parish festival — Sept. 10: 4–9 p.m. at 35 Birch St. E., Annandale. www.stignatiusmn.com.

Spirit Fest at Holy Spirit — Sept. 10: 4:30 p.m. at 515 Albert St. S., St. Paul. www.holy-spirit.org.

CALENDAR St. Patrick CountryFest — Sept. 10-11 at 19921 Nightingale St. NW, Oak Grove. 763-753-2011 or www.st-patricks.org/countryfest.

Sacred Heart garage sale — Sept. 10-11: 10 a.m.–4 p.m. Sept. 10 and 10 a.m.–1 p.m. Sept. 11 at 840 Sixth St. E., St. Paul.

St. Joseph the Worker 40th anniversary celebration — Sept. 11: 10 a.m. at 7180 Hemlock Lane N., Maple Grove. www.sjtw.net.

St. John the Baptist fall festival — Sept. 17-18 at 215 Broadway St. N., Jordan. www.sjbjordan.org.

Divine Mercy Catholic Church and School Spirit Fest — Sept. 17-18: 10 a.m.–4:30 p.m. at 139 Mercy Drive, Faribault. www.divinemercy.cc.

Holy Trinity salad luncheon — Sept. 22: 11 a.m.– 1 p.m. at 749 Sixth Ave. S., St. Paul.

Retreats

St. Boniface Countryfest/Hog Roast — Sept. 11: 11 a.m.–4 p.m. at 8801 Wildwood Ave., St. Bonifacius. www.stboniface-stmary.org.

Women’s mid-week retreat — Sept. 13-15 at Franciscan Retreats and Spirituality Center, 16385 St. Francis Lane, Prior Lake. www.franciscanretreats.net.

St. Stanislaus fall festival — Sept. 11: 11 a.m.– 5 p.m. at 398 Superior St., St. Paul. www.ststans.org.

Grieving Retreat — Sept. 16-19 at Franciscan Retreats and Spirituality Center, 16385 St. Francis Lane, Prior Lake. www.franciscanretreats.net.

Sacred Heart fall festival — Sept. 11: 10 a.m.– 4 p.m. at 840 Sixth St. E., St. Paul.

St. Gabriel the Archangel fall festival – St. Joseph campus — Sept. 11: 10:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m. at 1310 Mainstreet, Hopkins. www.stgabrielhopkins.org.

St. Paul Divine Mercy mission — Sept. 11-13: 7 p.m. at 1740 Bunker Lake Blvd. NE, Ham Lake.

Father Angelo Casimiro presents three talks on mercy. www.churchofsaintpaul.com.

St. Patrick garage sale — Sept. 14-17: at 6820 St. Patrick’s Lane, Edina. www.stpatrick-edina.org.

St. Bartholomew – The Gathering Carnival — Sept. 16: 5–11 p.m. at 630 E. Wayzata Blvd., Wayzata. www.st-bartsschool.org/thegathering.

Lumen Christi’s Highland Catholic Block Party — Sept. 16: 5:30–10:30 p.m. at 2017 Bohland Ave., St. Paul. www.lumenchristicc.org.

Guardian Angels fall festival — Sept. 16-18: 11 a.m.–5:30 p.m. at 8260 Fourth St. N., Oakdale.

Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary 70th anniversary — Sept. 17-18 at 1725 Kennard St., Maplewood. www.presentationofmary.org.

Sacred Heart Family Fun Fest — Sept. 17-18 at 4087 W. Broadway, Robbinsdale. www.shrmn.org.

St. Joseph Harvest Festival — Sept. 17-18 at 13900 Biscayne Ave. W., Rosemount. www.stjosephcommunity. org/harvestfestival.aspx.

The Power of Faith – Curatio Weekend Retreat for health care workers — Sept. 23-25: 5:30 p.m. at Christ the King Retreat Center, 621 First Ave. S., Buffalo. www.curatioapostolate.com.

Schools Hill High School class of 1966 reunion — Sept. 17: 5–9 p.m. at Duke’s, 1285 Geneva Ave. N., Oakdale. www.hill-murray.org/hhs1966reunion.

Conferences/seminars/workshops Panel discussion – Factory Farming in Minnesota: Time for a change? — Sept. 20: 7–8:30 p.m. at Rauenhorst Ballroom, St. Catherine University, 2004 Randolph Ave., St. Paul. www.facebook.com/ events/1115868455172560.

Speakers Faith Sullivan at St. Pascal Baylon — Sept. 12: 7–8 p.m. at 1757 Conway St., St. Paul. 651-774-1585.

Other events 11th Day Prayer for Peace and Racial Justice — Sept. 11: 6:30 p.m. at Our Lady of the Presentation Chapel, 1890 Randolph Ave., St. Paul.

Catholic Watchmen Rally — Sept. 15: 6–9 p.m. at Epiphany Church, 1900 111th Ave. NW, Coon Rapids.

September 8, 2016 rediscover.archspm.org/the-catholic-watchmen.

Women with Spirit Bible Study — Sept. 20-April 4, 2017: Tuesdays, 9:30–11:30 a.m. at Pax Christi, 12100 Pioneer Trail, Eden Prairie. www.paxchristi.com/wws.

Project Life Fundraising Banquet — Sept. 22: 6–9 p.m. at Envision Event Center, 484 Inwood Ave., Oakdale. www.stillwaterprojectlife.org.

WomenSource Light of Life Gala — Sept. 23: 6–9:30 p.m. at Marriott Northwest, 7025 Northland Drive N., Minneapolis. www.womensource.org/news-events.

TLC Options for Women banquet — Sept. 24: 6–9:30 p.m. at 3800 American Blvd. E., Bloomington.

651-291-9473 or www.tlcoptions.org/events/banquet.

CALENDAR submissions DEADLINE: Noon Thursday, 14 days before the anticipated Thursday date of publication.

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

LISTINGS: Accepted are brief no­tices of upcoming events hosted by Catholic parishes and institutions. If the Catholic connection is not clear, please emphasize it in your press release.

ITEMS MUST INCLUDE the following to be considered for publication in the calendar: • Time and date of event • Full street address of event • Description of event • Contact information in case of questions.

(No attachments, please.)

FAX: 651-291-4460 MAIL: “Calendar,” The Catholic Spirit 244 Dayton Ave., St. Paul, MN 55102 A note to readers As of Jan. 1, 2016, The Catholic Spirit no longer accepts calendar submissions via email.

Please submit events using the form at www.thecatholicspirit.com/calendarsubmissions.

September 8, 2016 The Catholic Spirit • 19 SAINT continued from page 6

Her mission began on her knees

BLOGS continued from page 13

A visit to St. Olaf

Archbishop Emeritus Flynn first met Mother Teresa in the 1970s when he invited her to speak with his seminarians at Mount St. Mary’s Seminary in Emmitsburg, Maryland. Archbishop Flynn, the rector at the time, hoped she could talk to his 192 seminarians about the poor during her visit to Washington, D.C. “Her message was very, very simple,” Archbishop Flynn said. “She said the more you see Christ in the Eucharist, the more you will see Christ in the poor.”

He and a fellow bishop rode together to the event with Mother Teresa. She recounted to them many stories of God’s providence in her work.

Though Archbishop Bernard Hebda met Mother Teresa only once, he said he learned more about her from stories of the Missionaries of Charity he worked with from 1997 to 2009.

“Especially in my last years in Rome, I had the great opportunity to work with two sisters who had spent many decades with her, were very close to her; Sister Joseph Michael and Sister Gertrude,” Archbishop Hebda said. “Listening to their stories was really a wonderful way of gaining greater insight into Mother.”

Sister Mary Gertrude became one of Mother Teresa’s first sisters and provided medical care for her late in her life. Sister Joseph Michael served as a secretary to Mother Teresa.

“They really gave me great insight into how deeply, how much she would pray, but also that she was a great [spiritual] reader,” Archbishop Hebda said.

“I felt called to share about my heartbreaking experience with not being able to breastfeed my first child,” said Skemp, 32. “That was three years ago, and I still have women reach out to me asking for advice, or simply wanting to share their own Susanna similar SPENCER heartbreak.”

Coyne, too, has shared her personal sorrows.

“My husband and I have struggled with miscarriage and infertility, and that is something I share about on my blog,” she said.

“Sometimes you get the sense that you need to put something out there, not knowing if it will actually do any good in the world, and it’s so beautiful when it does,” Skemp said.

“I have been blessed by other women who have been vulnerable and shared their own struggles as mothers, and it’s just nice to know that I’m not alone. I think that’s why most of us blog. It’s community. Just like sharing your heart with a friend over a cup of coffee at their dining room table, blogging has given us another opportunity to reach out to other women and say, ‘Yes, I understand you. You are not alone in this.’”

In addition to blogging, all three

Mother Teresa could draw a crowd before her fame went worldwide.

She spoke at St. Olaf on June 22, 1974, to a crowd first anticipated to be a small group in a side chapel. The attendance ballooned so much that the talk moved to the church’s sanctuary.

Parish secretary Mary Beth Liekhus, who attended the talk, recalled how Mother Teresa reached out to a woman with cerebral palsy who asked how she could help the saint’s mission.

“Mother Teresa responded gently, ‘My dear, you are doing more for me than anyone else could ever do,’” Liekhus read from St. Olaf’s 50th anniversary book.

Find Kolkata nearby Dominican Father Joe Gillespie of St. Albert the Great in Minneapolis received a simple message from his meeting with Mother Teresa in 1994.

“She said, ‘Wherever you go, you must find your own Kolkata,’” Father Gillespie said.

Since his visit to Kolkata that year, Father Gillespie says he actively looks for those opportunities.

Father Anthony Andrade of St. Thomas Aquinas in St. Paul Park volunteered with Mother Teresa during his seminary days.

“She’s in the midst of the people all the time, not sitting in a big office or anything,” Father Andrade said.

women also write devotionals on daily Scripture readings for Blessed Is She (www.blessedisshe.net), a Catholic ministry that delivers the daily Mass readings and a devotion to the email inboxes of women around the world.

Skemp said the digital ministry fosters communities of prayer and sisterhood.

“I have benefited enormously from getting to know other Catholic bloggers online and in real life,” Coyne said. “It is a beautiful network of women I can go to for blogging advice and feedback, as well as encouragement and support in my personal and spiritual life.”

Spencer said blogging has given her the freedom to express herself while enabling her to live her vocation as wife and mother more fully.

“Whenever I hear the parable of the talents (Mt 25:14-30), I am convinced that my writing is something that was given to me to use and cultivate for the Church,” Spencer said. “When we use the gifts we are given and use them well, we are who God created us to be. As a stay-at-home mom, I have not felt that my gifts were being wasted on raising my children in the faith. But through sharing my knowledge of theology and my experience as a mother through my writing, I feel that I am using my gifts more fully.

Being able to study theology when I did, where I did, was such a great privilege that I am really happy that I can share it through writing.”

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20 • The Catholic Spirit

THE LAST WORD

September 8, 2016

Mass appeal New leadership sparks unprecedented student involvement in U of M campus ministry

By Jessica Weinberger For The Catholic Spirit

O

n an average weekend at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus, 1,200 students gather together — not to attend a Gopher sporting event or house party — but to attend one of three Sunday Masses at St. Lawrence Church and Newman Center on the northwestern edge of Minneapolis’ Dinkytown neighborhood.

Thanks to Campus Ministry Director Brother Ken Apuzzo, a strong partnership with St. Paul’s Outreach and a group of passionate student leaders, a vibrant Catholic culture has emerged at the mega public university where nearly 47,000 students study each year.

Since Brother Ken’s appointment two years ago through the Brothers of Hope religious community University of Minnesota senior Dani Shupe, front, listens during a leadership training day Aug. 21 at St. Lawrence Catholic Church and Newman headquartered in Boston, daily Mass Center in Minneapolis near the University of Minnesota campus. Shupe and other student leaders came to help organize events and programs attendance has increased from less than 10 students to nearly 70. Priests for the upcoming school year. Shupe will be directing the fall retreat. Dave Hrbacek/The Catholic Spirit previously heard 30 minutes of affect them for the rest of their lives. spends time ministering to the homeless at the confessions each week — now it’s 30 minutes per “Here [at a public university], you’re Dorothy Day Center in St. Paul. day. Fifteen students attended encountering the frontline of the world, and there’s “It’s really opened my eyes to the power of campus ministry’s 2014 fall no secret in that,” he said.

“You know where the serving others,” said Miller, a biology and public retreat, while last year’s retreat battle lines are and where the issues are.” health major from Rochester. topped more than 100 participants. More than 20 students came into the Church A faith family away from home Faith has a place on campus on Easter in 2015, and there’s a Kaly Kohns, 21, serves as president of Catholic Auxiliary Bishop Andrew Cozzens, who lives in greater interest in religious Students United, the official student group at the the rectory at St. Lawrence, has seen the growth vocations.

Newman Center. The Plymouth native who within campus ministry firsthand and describes the To spark this dramatic attended Holy Name of Jesus in Medina helps energy around the parish and the Newman Center Brother Ken resurgence, Brother Ken leaned oversee the various campus ministry committees, as “palpable.” He’s pleased to see the increase in on his experiences at other APUZZO Gopher Catholic Night and events like the recent confessions and daily Mass attendance and hopes to large public universities like Labor Day barbecue outreach event in the freshman see a continued up-tick in religious vocations.

Florida State University in Tallahassee and Rutgers superblock of dorms.

“That time in college is so important for people to University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, to form a Kohns said that CSU has helped her feel part of a choose their vocation, and that’s why it’s so trained student leadership team and develop a solid faith family away from her home parish and important that we invest in campus ministry,” vision for reaching out to the masses on campus, equipped her with the tools needed to live and Bishop Cozzens said. “That’s the time when young many being millennials who didn’t grow up in the study alongside people of different faiths.

Church.

“Because of CSU, I’ve been able to have very open people encounter Christ and then can pursue their vocation.”

“You have to be very proactive and find ways to and honest conversations with my friends,” she Now in the first week of fall semester, Brother Ken enter into their world on campus and make the first said. “They can meet me where I’m at, and they hopes this will be a breakout year in terms of step toward the Church — toward Jesus — an easy, respect the different ways I see things or how I reaching new students and strengthening the faith natural and organic one,” he said. explain my faith.” community. He asks for prayers from local Catholics That process often begins at the student-led Kohns, a senior majoring in industrial and for the incoming freshman class, which they hope Gopher Catholic Night. Each Tuesday, more than systems engineering, also noted her expanded to reach early on before temptation may draw 100 students head to the student center to listen to prayer life, which now includes lectio divina, people away from the faith. presentations, hear testimonies, participate in small Liturgy of the Hours and a greater understanding of groups and praise and worship as they focus on To support their efforts to evangelize to such a how to pray the rosary. During this Year of Mercy, deepening their faith, enriching their prayer life large university community, Brother Ken is grateful she looks forward to participating with the other and ultimately, building relationships. to have the designation as a recognized student student leaders who have taken an oath to be organization on a secular university campus.

“The goal is for them to be in relationship with “missionaries of mercy” and look for opportunities one another and us to support that because they to evangelize throughout the school year.

“We believe that faith has a place in the midst of can go out and reach each other in places we can’t,” Junior Ali Miller, 20, said her involvement with the university,” Brother Ken said. “It’s not just St. Lawrence pastor Father Jon Vander Ploeg said.

CSU has showed her the power of faith in action. supposed to be across the street outside of the life of She served with fellow campus ministry members at the university. By being an actual recognized A strong Catholic presence in a public university a homeless shelter and women’s shelter on a spring setting is crucial, said Father Vander Ploeg, as student group on the campus, it puts spirituality break mission trip to Anchorage, Alaska, and now students are making decisions each day that can and faith right there in the heart of the campus.”