A football, a little boy and a big dose of reality (Tue, 10 Sep 2024)
I was at the pool, heading to the snack bar, when I heard something that stopped me in my tracks.
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Pro-life work continues following abortion clinic closure  (Mon, 09 Sep 2024)
Leaders in the movement against abortion in the Archdiocese of Atlanta have guarded optimism that the Atlanta Women’s Center, one of the large abortion providers in the area, has closed its doors.  
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The treasure of grandparents and the elderly (Fri, 06 Sep 2024)
This year, we celebrate the Fourth World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly, instituted by Pope Francis to remind the church of the beauty of growing old and the obligation of Catholics to honor the elderly and their inherent dignity.
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Queen of Angels School receives $100,000 donation (Fri, 06 Sep 2024)
Queen of Angels School was named the beneficiary of a $100,000 donation from a local parishioner. The gift will enhance Catholic education for students.
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St. Matthew Church comforting community following school shooting  (Fri, 06 Sep 2024)
St. Matthew Church in Barrow County is comforting the grief-stricken following a tragic shooting Sept. 4 at Apalachee High School in Winder.
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Now is time to build new world without inequality, injustice, pope says (Sun, 19 Apr 2020)
By Carol Glatz Catholic News Service ROME (CNS) — As the world slowly recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic, there is a risk it will be struck by an even worse virus — that of selfish indifference, Pope Francis said. This … Continue reading →
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Puerto Rico: ‘An unprecedented level of need’ (Mon, 06 Nov 2017)
Catholic News Service was the first major Catholic news organization to send a photographer and a reporter to tour the island and document the efforts of the church and other organizations to help many of the people far from the capital of San Juan. Continue reading →
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Historic Tomb of Michelangelo and altarpiece in dire need of repairs (Wed, 11 Oct 2017)
By Matthew Fowler ROME (CNS) — The historic tomb of Michelangelo and the Buonarroti family altarpiece in the Church of Santa Croce in Florence are in dire need of cleaning and restoration due to sustained damage over the past 50 … Continue reading →
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A look back at the Legion of Decency (Thu, 17 Aug 2017)
By Mark Pattison and Julie Asher WASHINGTON (CNS) — It’s summertime and the movies are plentiful. As everyone knows the summer movie season is a big one for Hollywood, and when it comes to a close, it is followed closely … Continue reading →
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Jamboree called ‘life-changing event’ for youths, adults (Fri, 28 Jul 2017)
Here’s a dispatch from Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve in West Virginia sent earlier this week by Msgr. John B. Brady from the national Scout jamboree, which closed today. A retired priest of the Archdiocese of Washington, he became … Continue reading →
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Word to Life — Sunday Scripture readings, July 23, 2017 (Fri, 21 Jul 2017)
July 23, Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time       Cycle A. Readings:      1) Wisdom 12:13, 16-19      Psalm 86:5-6, 9-10, 15-16      2) Romans 8:26-27      Gospel: Matthew 13:24-33   By Sharon K. Perkins Catholic News … Continue reading →
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John C. Quinn tended to the ‘least of these’ in U.S. newsrooms (Fri, 14 Jul 2017)
WASHINGTON (CNS) – I’m convinced that around the country, and perhaps the world, there are many letters similar to the one I received in the mail some 18 years ago. It was written by hand and it ended with a … Continue reading →
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Some cheese with your ‘whine’: Pope ‘establishes’ complaint-free zone (Fri, 14 Jul 2017)
By Junno Arocho Esteves Catholic News Service VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis left a not-so-subtle message outside his office in the Domus Sanctae Marthae residence: anyone who is thinking of making a fuss, leave your whining at the door. … Continue reading →
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Word to Life — Sunday Scripture readings, July 16, 2017 (Thu, 13 Jul 2017)
  July 16, Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time       Cycle A. Readings:       1) Isaiah 55:10-11       Psalm 65:10-14       2) Romans 8:18-23       Gospel: Matthew 13:1-23   By Jeff Hedglen Catholic News Service It seems as though every time … Continue reading →
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Word to Life — Sunday Scripture readings, July 9, 2017 (Fri, 07 Jul 2017)
The Scriptures this weekend contain a familiar, but difficult text. “Take my yoke upon you,” Jesus says. “For my yoke is easy and my burden light.” Continue reading →
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Mother Teresa’s ‘spiritual darkness’ was not depression or loss of faith, scholar explains (Tue, 10 Sep 2024)
St. Teresa of Calcutta. / Credit: © 1986 Túrelio (via Wikimedia-Commons), 1986 / Lizenz: Creative Commons CC-BY-SA-2.0 de Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 10, 2024 / 17:38 pm (CNA). The “spiritual darkness” that Mother Teresa describes in her writings can be difficult to comprehend, but this feeling of emptiness was not caused by either depression or a loss of faith, according to a lecturer at an academic conference organized by the Mother Teresa Institute. St. Teresa of Calcutta’s “dark night of the soul” was a distinct charism that helped her build her faith and serve others rather than a mere chemical imbalance that induces depression or an abandonment of the Catholic faith, said Loyola University Maryland philosophy professor Derek McAllister at a Sept. 6 symposium held at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., one day after the saint’s feast day.  “If it’s a mental emotional problem, they do not of themselves promote virtue or increase depth of relationship with God,” McAllister said. “Whereas we know with the dark night, the nights do of themselves greatly increase love, humility, patience, and the like. And they decidedly prepare one for deeper prayer.” The lecture focused on some of Mother Teresa’s letters, which describe an emptiness and a spiritual darkness — essentially an inability to feel the presence of God. St. Teresa, who founded the Missionaries of Charity, was an Albanian sister who spent most of her life serving the poor in Calcutta, India. She was canonized in 2016. “The darkness is so dark, and I am alone,” St. Teresa wrote. “Unwanted, forsaken. The loneliness of the heart that wants love is unbearable. Where is my faith? Even deep down, there is nothing but emptiness and darkness. My God, how painful is this unknown pain? It pains without ceasing.” St. Teresa wrote that “the place of God in my soul is blank, there is no God in me” and “I just long and long for God and then it is that I feel he does not want me — he is not there.” McAllister noted that other saints have had such feelings and referenced St. John of the Cross’ 16th-century poem “Dark Night of the Soul” and his subsequent commentaries on that poem. It describes the Spanish mystic’s crisis of faith and an inability to feel the presence of God even though God was truly present and guiding the experience. “In darkness and secure, by the secret ladder, disguised — oh, happy chance! — in darkness and in concealment, my house being now at rest,” St. John’s poem reads. McAllister cited St. John’s descriptions of his experience, noting that “he identifies, by name, melancholy and says that’s not what I’m talking about.” McAllister argued that an “affective condition that overwhelms people” does not accurately describe those experiences, but rather that the experience actively pushed St. John to grow closer to God. “While you may experience desolation of God’s felt presence of the senses, you’re being purgated and drawn closer to God, but you don’t feel that you are while you’re experiencing that,” McAllister explained. In the case of Mother Teresa, McAllister compared and contrasted the symptoms described in her writing with the criteria used to diagnose major depressive disorder. According to McAllister, depression often includes an unhealthy introspection and a lack of realism, which he said “advice does little to remedy.” Further, someone who has clinical depression, he noted, will often experience chronic fatigue, insomnia, and a depressive affect. He also argued that depression does not promote virtue in and of itself: “That’s why it’s called a disorder.” He cited her writing to show that she was seeking answers to her spiritual darkness, as when she said to her confessor: “Each time your yes or no [to a question] has satisfied me as the will of God.” He also said that she did not experience the other symptoms that commonly accompany depression or depressive affect in everyday activities. The fruits of her experience, he noted, also do not point to a disorder such as depression.  “What’s this [spiritual darkness] for in and of itself?” McAllister asked rhetorically. “Does it bring about humility, charity, kindness, and growth in Christ? And just look at what happened. Yes, absolutely [it did].” The conference was attended by numerous sisters in the Missionaries of Charity along with lay members of the order, some priests, and a few professors and graduate students. It was held a short walk from the St. John Paul II National Shrine, which is displaying a Mother Teresa exhibit until Nov. 11. The exhibit contains a first-class relic of St. Teresa and many of her personal items.  Father Brian Kolodiejchuk, the president of the Mother Teresa Institute, told CNA that the organization functions as “the academic arm of the Mother Teresa Center” that focuses on her writings and her words. He said there is “a lot more depth to Mother Teresa’s holiness” than many realize.  “I think she has a message for the Church,” Kolodiejchuk said. “She was one of the great figures of the last century.”
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Missouri Supreme Court keeps pro-abortion amendment on November ballot (Tue, 10 Sep 2024)
Pro-life protestors hold signs outside the Missouri Supreme Court on Sept. 10, 2024 advocating against Amendment 3, which would dramatically expand abortion access in Missouri if passed in November. / Credit: Courtesy of Thomas More Society St. Louis, Mo., Sep 10, 2024 / 16:20 pm (CNA). The Missouri Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that a proposed constitutional amendment to dramatically expand abortion in the state will remain on the Nov. 5 ballot after a circuit judge blocked the measure earlier this week.   The ruling dealt a blow to pro-life activists in the state, who had argued that the final proposed language not only violates state law by failing to list which laws it would repeal but also misleads voters about the scope and gravity of what they will be voting for. A Catholic law firm led the legal effort to get the proposed amendment struck from the ballot.  Missouri’s proposed Amendment 3, which originally qualified for the November ballot in August after garnering thousands of signatures, would mandate that the government “shall not deny or infringe upon a person’s fundamental right to reproductive freedom,” including “prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion care, miscarriage care, and respectful birthing conditions.” Missouri law currently protects unborn babies throughout all of pregnancy with the only exception being cases of “medical emergency.” With the Tuesday ruling, Missouri remains one of 10 states that will vote on abortion-related measures in November.  In a brief order issued in the early afternoon Sept. 10 — just hours before the state deadline for finalizing the November ballot — the Missouri Supreme Court overruled a lower court’s opinion that held that the proposed amendment violates state law by failing to mention the specific laws to be repealed if voters approve the measure. The court, under Chief Justice Mary Russell, said opinions would follow.  The Thomas More Society, a Catholic public interest law firm based in Chicago, had filed the lawsuit challenging the pro-abortion amendment language in August on behalf of Missouri state Sen. Mary Elizabeth Coleman, pro-life advocate Kathy Forck, state Rep. Hannah Kelly, and Peggy Forrest, president and CEO of Our Lady’s Inn, a St. Louis pro-life pregnancy center.  The Missouri Catholic Conference (MCC) had urged Catholics to pray and fast for the amendment’s removal from the ballot.  Mary, Mother of the World, please pray with us... https://t.co/DnUGPD43Yr — Archbishop Mitchell T. Rozanski (@abp_rozanski) September 10, 2024 In a statement to CNA, MCC executive director Jamie Morris expressed disappointment with the court’s ruling. “Missourians should have the right to know what laws will be overturned when they are asked to sign an initiative petition. The Missouri Catholic Conference will continue to educate the public on the dangers this amendment poses to women’s health by removing even basic safeguards currently in law,“ Morris said. “We encourage the faithful to continue to pray for a conversion of hearts and minds so that the pro-abortion Amendment 3 is defeated.“ In his Sept. 6 ruling, Cole County Circuit Judge Christopher Limbaugh wrote that the defendants’ failure to “include any statute or provision that will be repealed, especially when many of these statutes are apparent, is in blatant violation of” state law.  Ahead of the Supreme Court’s Tuesday ruling, Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft had on Monday decertified Amendment 3 from the November ballot, citing the lower court’s ruling. Following the Supreme Court’s opinion, Ashcroft will be required to recertify the proposed amendment.  A hearing before the Missouri Supreme Court took place this morning at 8:30 a.m. During the oral arguments before the Missouri Supreme Court, Charles Hatfield of Stinson LLP in Jefferson City, arguing for the pro-amendment side, said Article 3, Section 49 of the Missouri Constitution reserves to the people the right to propose amendments through an initiative process — a right that he said ought to be upheld. Mary Catherine Martin of the Thomas More Society countered by arguing that voters need to be fully informed to exercise their rights properly and argued that the amendment’s failure to disclose significant impacts misleads voters. Martin said in a statement following the ruling that the decision “is a failure to protect voters by not upholding state laws that ensure voters are fully informed going into the ballot box.“ “Missouri’s Amendment 3 will have far-reaching implications on the state’s abortion laws and well beyond, repealing dozens of laws that protect the unborn, pregnant women, parents, and children — a reality that the initiative campaign intentionally hid from voters. We implore Missourians to research and study the text and effects of Amendment 3 before going to the voting booth,“ Martin said. This is a developing story. 
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Franciscan University launches new hub in Washington, DC, after multimillion-dollar gift (Tue, 10 Sep 2024)
Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, chapel and statue. / Credit: Joseph Antoniello, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons CNA Staff, Sep 10, 2024 / 14:05 pm (CNA). Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio is set to launch a Washington, D.C., program for its students, including residential and learning facilities, the university announced last week.   The Ward and Kathy Fitzgerald Franciscan University Homeland Mission (FUHM) is part of the university’s new “Encounter” initiative, designed to extend Franciscan University’s mission and impact beyond its campus in Steubenville, Ohio. It is designed to equip students for “advancing the great global missionary cause of positively impacting the principles and policies guiding the United States government.” The university has purchased a $3 million property on Massachusetts Avenue in the District of Columbia for the program thanks to a $10 million gift from Ward and Kathy Fitzgerald. Their donation helps fund the Outreach and Evangelization component of the university’s ongoing $110 million Rebuild My Church Capital Campaign.  “The Franciscan charism of ongoing conversion, which invites everyone to continually and humbly draw closer to Christ, will be key to carrying out this mission,” said university president Father Dave Pivonka, TOR, in a Sept. 3 press release.  “The Franciscan University Homeland Mission will invite others to deeper conversion through three pillars grounded in the university’s mission: Evangelization and Joyful Presence, Intellectual and Personal Formation, and Support for Human Dignity,” Pivonka said. FUHM’s operation will be headed by Stephen Catanzarite, executive director of Encounter, along with the political science department and other Franciscan departments and partners.  The program is intended to bring Gospel values as well as Catholic social teaching “to bear on the political and social atmosphere of Washington, D.C.,” the press release said. “This engagement will not only bring the Church’s witness to the legislative and political process, but it will also serve to draw more people to Christ and his Church.” “Programs and events at the FUHM will challenge students to work and witness ongoing, systematic change in federal government, placing the sacred human dignity of all people at the center of the work.” Ward Fitzgerald is the CEO of international real estate private equity firm fund investment group EQT Exeter. The Fitzgeralds are members of the Trustees to the Papal Foundation. “We have been provided great Providence to be able to be vessels of the Holy Spirit by participating with such a worthy university and its students, faculty, and administration,” Kathy Fitzgerald said in a statement. “We are too well mindful that nothing we have created or hold is our own but graces and gifts from Our Lord to do his work.” Student rotations at the new center in Washington, D.C., are set to begin this fall on a limited basis and expand in spring 2025. 
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Cardinal Schönborn: ‘We must accept the decline of Europe’ (Tue, 10 Sep 2024)
Cardinal Christoph Schönborn speaks at the launch of Amoris Laetitia at the Vatican on April 8, 2016. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA CNA Staff, Sep 10, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA). Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, OP, archbishop of Vienna, said in a recent interview with a French Catholic magazine that in the face of rising secularization and the growth of Islam in many historically Christian nations, Catholics should “trust in the work of grace” and remember that the Church is “an expert in humanity.” “The Church is alive and will always be, albeit under different circumstances. We must accept the decline of Europe. We tend to gaze at our ecclesiastical navel, but it is an undeniable continental movement,” Schönborn said, speaking to Famille Chrétienne.  “In 20 years, the European population will not be the same as it is today, and it is already not the same as it was 50 years ago. This is inevitable, above all due to the decline in the birth rate in Europe but also due to immigration and the increasing presence of Islam. This poses new challenges for us Christians. We must also not forget that the Lord is at work in his Church! Just think of the 12,000 baptisms of adults and young people in France this year.” The Austrian cardinal, who helped to produce the Catechism of the Catholic Church, said that despite the decline of the Church’s influence in Europe, he is convinced that the Church “has not yet breathed its last.” “Despite secularization, the great questions of men and women remain the same as before: birth, growth, education, illness, economic worries. And then there is the family, marriage, and death,” Schönborn noted. “There is a lot of talk about change, but too little attention is paid to the constants of society. The Church must remember that it is an expert in humanity, as Paul VI said.”  The cardinal called the idea that France and Europe are “no longer Christian” because of Islam’s influence “absurd,” but he firmly stressed that “Catholics should return to the Church.”  “If Catholics have left the Church, we should not be surprised that they are in the minority,” he continued, calling for a “fraternal rapprochement” with Islam, echoing the words of Pope Francis, noting that Christians “do not take up arms but trust in the work of grace.”  “Both our religions have an absolute appeal. For Muslims, God has demanded that the whole world be subjected to him and the Koran. As for Christ, he has entrusted us with a universal mission: ‘Make disciples of all nations.’ Neither of them can therefore renounce their mission. But the Christians’ way of acting is not that of the Koran but the following of Christ in all dimensions of our lives,” he said.  Addressing the ongoing Synod on Synodality — the final session of which will take place in October in Rome and is expected to produce a final report for the pope’s approval — Schönborn said “synodality is central to Francis’ pontificate, but there is continuity with previous synods, which have been about communion, participation, and mission.” “You may be disappointed that the specific topics are a little up in the air, but this is first and foremost a synod about the ‘modus operandi’ within the Church,” Schönborn said.  “In my diocese, I have experienced this synodality with the priests in small groups and tried to live it through spiritual conversation. Everyone agreed that the exchange had never been so deep.” Asked about Fiducia Supplicans, a document published by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith in December 2023 that authorized nonliturgical blessings for same-sex couples and others in “irregular situations,” Schönborn said he believes the document shows “confusion” on the part of the Church. The cardinal had previously, in 2021, criticized the Vatican’s rejection of blessings for same-sex couples, saying the document was marked by a “clear communication error.” “I experienced it as I experience things — concretely,” the cardinal said. “If friends say to me: ‘Our son has just announced to us that he is homosexual and that he has found a partner,’ I then ask them: ‘Is he still your son?’ Most often, the answer comes naturally. I believe that with the two successive documents from Rome [the 2021 Responsum ad Dubium and Fiducia Supplicans], the Church has shown its own dismay in the face of this question. These texts, in my eyes, are shaky. We are faced with a question for which there can be no right answer.” “The path that Pope Francis proposes to us is that of discernment, trying to see what the Lord is showing us,” he continued. “Incidentally, the misfortune of the German [Synodal Way] is that they want sharp, unambiguous answers. And unambiguity does not work in concrete life.” Asked about Pope Francis’ restrictions on the Traditional Latin Mass by way of the 2021 document Traditionis Custodes, Schönborn expressed the hope that the “new generation” might “easily” move from the TLM to modern movements and “prayer groups” such as the Emmanuel Community.  The Austrian prelate added: “Let us accept that Francis has his reasons for closing the doors again, at least partially, just as we have accepted that Benedict XVI had his reasons for opening them. Let us trust that the Lord is leading the Church.” Schönborn was finally asked what “profile” the next pope after Francis, who turns 88 in December, should have. “On that day, the Holy Spirit will lead the Church. We should not worry. If it is an African, it will be an African. Maybe it will be an Asian or a man from old Europe. But the most important thing is that he believes that he is a servant of Christ and that he loves the Church. This is how the Church will move forward,” Schönborn said. 
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James Earl Jones, legendary actor and Catholic convert, dies at 93 (Mon, 09 Sep 2024)
James Earl Jones attends the "The Gin Game" Broadway opening night after party at Sardi's on Oct. 14, 2015, in New York City. / Credit: Jemal Countess/Getty Images CNA Staff, Sep 9, 2024 / 18:15 pm (CNA). James Earl Jones, a distinguished actor of stage and screen who was a convert to the Catholic faith, died Monday at age 93.  Known for lending his booming voice to such characters as Darth Vader in the “Star Wars” saga and Mufasa in “The Lion King,” Jones’ career spanned nearly seven decades.  He was one of the few entertainers, male or female, to have earned the coveted “EGOT” slate of acting awards: an Emmy (for TV), Grammy (for music), Oscar (for movies), and Tony (for the stage). Born in poverty in Mississippi, Jones overcame a stutter early in life in part by discovering a gift for poetry. He joined the military after graduating from college, moving to New York after serving to pursue acting full time.  A prolific stage actor who became well known as a Shakespearean, Jones also entertained generations of moviegoers with dozens of roles. These included perhaps his most famous voice performances — the unimpeachable lion monarch Mufasa and the inimitable Sith menace Darth Vader — as well as memorable live-action appearances in “The Sandlot” and “Field of Dreams.” Jones did not talk much about his Catholic faith but said in a 1987 interview that he converted to the faith during his time serving in the military. He said that while discerning whether to stay in the military or pursue his true passion — acting — the only things that he had in his life that were “not geared toward the art of killing” were his Catholic faith “and the complete works of Shakespeare.'' In 1985, he voiced Pharaoh in the first episode of Hanna-Barbera’s “The Greatest Adventure: Stories from the Bible.” He also recorded an audio edition of the King James version of the New Testament. Jones died Monday morning at his home in Dutchess County, New York, according to his agent.
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