Transitions and change:
Often lead to surprising results

		Notes from  Msgr. Swain  Msgr. Paul J. Swain

This is a time of transition and change. High school and college graduates are leaving familiar school settings for new ventures in education or the workplace.

Many others are undergoing transitions as a result of marriage, birth of children, job changes, housing moves, loss of loved ones, or dealing with health restrictions.

This month 28 priests will be making adjustments in their assignments, including me. They include the newly ordained who begin their ministry; parochial vicars who are becoming pastors; pastors who are changing parishes; and pastors who have added responsibility with the linking of another parish to their current assignment. Sixteen parishes begin new relationships as linked parishes, sharing a pastor. Some will be without a resident pastor for the first time.

In addition, Bishop William Bullock, the Third Bishop of Madison, now serves as Diocesan Administrator, while we await the installation of Bishop Robert Morlino as the Fourth Bishop of Madison on Aug. 1. Transitions and change are never easy. Yet with trust in God's providence they can be life giving.

How can we, especially in the Church, cope with the transitions and changes of our day?

With prayer. When the Apostles, Mary, and others had to adjust, first to the death of Jesus, and then having rejoiced in the resurrection adjust again to his departure at the Ascension, they gathered together in prayer. Prayer, especially at Mass, is both a source of community support and a means by which our sights are lifted beyond the difficult moment to the higher vision God asks of us.

With patience and trust. The old adage "patience is a virtue" is true. In times of change we can no longer rest in what was, and yet what is to be is uncertain. Trusting in God's will and the presence of the Holy Spirit moving in our lives, we can be open to the future with hope. Last year I became pastor at St. Bernard Parish in Middleton. Most parishioners did not know me, and what to expect. Neither did I. Now, a year later, we have touched each other's lives in ways not expected.

With communication. When disagreements or differing interpretations arose in the early Church, such as St. Paul's ministry outside the Jewish community, Christians came together in prayer and discussion. We will never all agree on everything, but it is easier to get along when we know the basis from which we come. Spiritual reading and study of Church teachings, and then discussing them, can open us to a better understanding of what it means to be the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.

With openness to the new, while rooted in Church Tradition. One of the beautiful aspects of the Catholic Church is the variety of spiritualities, sacred music, and prayer forms. Each parish, like each family, has its traditions that are a part of the tapestry of faith expressed over the years.

We need to be respectful of the past, without consecrating what is simply personal preferred practice. Especially helpful are the approved rites of the Church. They create a framework under which transitions can take place with ease, and allow us to celebrate as a universal Church. They assure that whims of the day, often influenced by secular sources, are evaluated and kept in perspective.

We need to be open to the signs of the times and the needs of people in this day and age, while also being secure in our time-tested traditions and teachings.

As each of us responds to the call of Christ in our lives, may we do so open to the Spirit. Transitions and change often lead to surprising and uplifting results.

Educating needy children:
Even a tight budget can do more

		Eye on the  Capitol  Barbara Sella

As the governor and Republican leaders now face the task of fighting for their respective budgets, it seems an opportune time to suggest that both sides learn from the other when it comes to educating our children, especially our state's poorest and most vulnerable ones.

Early childhood plans

Republicans should reconsider the Joint Finance Committee's decision to reduce by 50 percent the per-pupil aid to K-4 students in the school aid formula, an amount estimated to be about $46 million.

Early childhood education is important for all children, but especially for those from low-income families, where it offers the possibility of a head start for children and a badly needed form of childcare for working parents.

Choice Program

For his part, the governor should reconsider his reservations about modifying the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP).

Republican legislators included several provisions in their budget that would make the program more accessible to needy children:

Income eligibility. The Milwaukee Parental Choice Program currently enrolls close to 12,000 students from Milwaukee families whose income is at or below 175 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL) - approximately $30,000 for a family of four. If that income rises to 176 percent or more, the student is obligated to leave his or her MPCP school.

In this way, low-income families are faced either with a disincentive when trying to increase their income or with the obligation to move their children back to a public school that had previously not served them well.

Assembly Bill 259 provides that once eligible for the Choice program, a student may continue to receive a voucher even if family income rises somewhat above the 175 percent FPL level.

Waiting period. Students now wishing to attend a MPCP school must wait at least a year - a waste of precious time during which they may fall even further behind. AB 259 permits an eligible child to attend a participating Choice school without first enrolling in the Milwaukee public schools.

Enrollment cap. Currently, enrollment in MPCP is capped at no more than 15 percent of Milwaukee Public School enrollment, or about 15,000 students. Based on enrollment trends, the 15 percent cap will likely be reached in 2005-6. The result will be rationing, as the Department of Public Instruction decides who can and cannot attend MPCP schools. Assembly Bill 259 lifts the 15 percent cap.

School locations. At present, MPCP does not allow students from low-income families in the city of Milwaukee to attend private schools outside the city. This is especially a problem for high school students because there are only 11 MPCP schools that serve this population - not enough to meet demand. Assembly Bill 260 allows eligible students to attend any religious or independent school in Milwaukee County.

Solid education

Milwaukee's Catholic schools have played a central role in MPCP, educating close to 40 percent of the Choice students. They teach and demonstrate that a solid, basic education is a fundamental human right for everyone, not just for those who can financially afford it.

That education is essential if the right and responsibility of all to participate in society and contribute to the common good is to be preserved. The ultimate moral test for individuals and societies is how they treat the poor and vulnerable. On the issue of education, members of both parties should reflect on how the budget could do more in this regard.

Barbara Sella is associate director of education for the Wisconsin Catholic Conference.

Cultural gap: Between U.S. and Europe

		The Catholic  Difference  George Weigel

Nothing more graphically illustrates the cultural gap between the United States and western Europe than the recent flap over President Bush's public references to God, to good and evil in the world, and to the workings of Providence in history.

German President Johannes Rau complained that "Nowhere does the Bible call for crusades." French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, whose government is leading the charge against any acknowledgment of Europe's Christian heritage in a new pan-European constitution, sniffed that "In no way can God be called on for a vote of confidence."

Cardinal Karl Lehmann chided the President for his "careless way of using religious language"; the cardinal also suggested that invoking God in public was "not acceptable anymore in today's world." Italian monk Enzo Bianchi went completely over the top and equated Bush's comments with the notorious "God with us" of Hitler's Deutschechristen (German Christians).

Cause of uproar

What were the presidential texts that got these worthies into such an uproar?

"Freedom and fear, justice and cruelty have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them." (Address to the nation, Sept. 20, 2001)

"We are in a conflict between good and evil, and America will call evil by its name." (Commencement address at West Point, June 1, 2002)

This is incipient religious fascism? Please.

President's faith

In a late April interview with NBC's Tom Brokaw, President Bush explained that he certainly didn't imagine God as a political partner. Rather, he prayed for wisdom, and for the strength to see the truth and act on it.

Yes, George Bush frankly admits that his conversion to serious Christian faith was the turning point of his life; yes, he freely concedes that he thinks about his presidency in vocational, not simply careerist, terms; yes, he insists it's possible to distinguish between good and evil in world politics; yes, he believes that, confronted by certain kinds of evil, the first responsibility of public officials is to stop it.

If, in some European eyes, those convictions make him a dangerous religious fanatic, then perhaps those eyes should be examined and their myopia corrected.

Political rhetoric and media commentary are always to be taken with a grain of salt; but what do you take when the rhetoric and the commentary lose all tether to reality and raw emotion reigns? That was "Old Europe" in the first quarter of 2003.

Damaged spirit

Western Europe is in cultural crisis, and likely has been since the "Great War" of 1914-1918 - a war which increasingly looks like an act of civilizational suicide. Europe's extraordinarily bloody twentieth century (from which it had to be rescued by American lives and American treasure on three separate occasions) deeply damaged something in the European spirit.

Take, for example, Europe's appalling birth rates, the lowest in recorded human history. When, at a time of great prosperity, entire nations fail to provide for the future in the most elemental sense - that is, by providing next generations -something is seriously awry.

That very same something, perhaps best described as cultural exhaustion, explains at least part of the Euro-bashing of George Bush as a religious fanatic. Much of western Europe seems incapable of gathering itself for large tasks: the defense of the West against Islamist terrorism, for example, or the reconstruction of Europe's own faltering economies.

Amidst that spiritual malaise, it is understandable that President Bush's convictions can be perceived as simplistic certitudes in a world of dangerous ambiguities.

To understand is not to agree, however. We know what Europe's ambiguists did in Flanders' fields in 1914-1918, and at Munich in 1938. These are not examples to be emulated.

George Weigel is a senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.