• Articles on St. Raphael Cathedral
	News Briefs: Catholic Charities adoption programs MADISON -- Those interested in adopting are invited to learn about Catholic Charities' domestic and international adoption program on Monday, June 2, from 5 to 6:30 p.m. at Catholic Charities, 426 S. Yellowstone Dr., Suite 100, in Madison. Registration is required. Call 608-833-4800 to register. For more information, contact Jerilyn Robinson at 608-833-4800, ext. 104, or jrobinson2@tds.net Professional training on infant adoption MADISON -- "Understanding Infant Adoption Training" will be held Tuesday, June 10, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Bishop O'Connor Center, 702 S. High Point Rd. This professional development opportunity is designed to help health care professionals serving pregnant women and teens discuss adoption as an option with patients and clients who are not sure they can parent their child. Continuing Education Units are available. The event is free. For information, contact Trish Grant at trish.grant@tds.net or 608-833-4800, ext. 109. To register, visit www.iaatp.com CRS representative from Ghana to speak VERONA -- The Catholic Relief Services (CRS) country representative from Ghana will make a special visit to St. Andrew Parish in Verona on Wednesday, June 4, at 7 p.m. Both drought and floods pummeled Ghana last year. The speaker will give an overview of the country, plus an update on how efforts of the Diocese of Madison, such as the Donkey Project to increase agricultural production, are creating positive change. The program will be held in the Fireplace Room of the parish office, 300 N. Main St. Nominate someone for a profile Do you know a person to nominate for a profile? This could be someone in a paid or volunteer position in the Catholic Church. It could be someone working outside the Church who lives his or her faith in ordinary or extraordinary ways in daily life. Send nominations with information about the nominee to: Catholic Herald, 702 S. High Point Rd., Madison, WI 53719, or e-mail info@madisoncatholicherald.org

Celebrating the spring of rural life
Diocesan ministry marks beginning
of agricultural season

KIELER -- On a sunny morning, the community of Immaculate Conception Parish celebrated the spring season with an outdoor Mass and blessing of the soil.

The event, held in partnership with the Rural Life Ministry of the Diocese of Madison, marked the beginning of the agricultural season by honoring labor and the natural world.

With the coming of summer making itself known in the agreeable weather, Fr. Bernard Rott, pastor of Immaculate Conception and rural life director for the diocese, presided over Mass outdoors for the students of Holy Ghost-Immaculate Conception School. About 25 parishioners also attended, setting up benches and lawn chairs on the church grass for the celebration.

Holiness of St. Isidore

The Mass was in honor of the feast of St. Isidore, an 11th-century Spanish farmer known for his exceptional holiness. In his homily, Father Rott told a story how St. Isidore, a hired hand on the estate of a rich nobleman, often went to Mass in the morning, and spent time afterwards in the church praying.

The other workers, thinking that St. Isidore worked less because of his time spent in prayer, complained to the owner of the estate, who decided one day to hide in the fields and watch Isidore work. What he saw was surprising: two angels accompanied St. Isidore in the field, guiding the plow and aiding Isidore to work twice as fast as his fellow farmers.

Prayer and work

"This points at an important message - we get wrapped in work," said Father Rott. "If we spend some moments praying, then God will send help and work with us."

The life of St. Isidore also points to generosity, Father Rott commented. St. Isidore shared the fruits of his labors with others, often bringing beggars off the street to eat. His care for the poor even produced a miracle at a banquet, with a single dinner plate multiplying into food for many. To act with charity, Father Rott told the children, "sometimes it's just willingness of ourselves to care, and share."

The triple lessons of labor, prayer, and charity were appropriate on a day traditionally used to honor those who live and work in rural areas. Father Rott called St. Isidore's feast a sort of "Green Mass" for farmers and other agricultural workers, akin to the Blue and Red Masses held for law enforcement workers and lawyers respectively.

"His whole focus was the Eucharist and prayer, and took the prayer with him to the fields," said Father Rott, a quality that makes St. Isidore the patron saint and protector of the rural life.

To mark the coming of spring, and the beginning of the growing season, Father Rott blessed soil gathered from the homes and farms of each person present. At the end of Mass, everyone together offered a blessing and prayer of the four cardinal directions, asking God's intercession for both the growing and the harvest.

Rural life affects all people

While the event focused on those who live in rural towns and communities, all people, including those in urban areas, should be concerned with the needs of the rural and agricultural community. Tom Nelson, Rural Life Office coordinator for the Diocese of Madison, said that each person should be involved in these issues. "If you haven't eaten in the past two weeks, then you shouldn't be concerned. Otherwise, it's important," Nelson said.

The scope of rural life has a primary responsibility in guaranteeing each person affordable, nutritious, and locally-grown food. It also ministers to those who produce the food, Nelson said. However, the range of rural life issues include many other significant concerns. For example, rural life ministry is involved with Catholic teaching and genetically-modified food, commodity distribution, and problems affecting domestic animals, such as the current shortage of honeybees available for pollination.

"The existence (in this diocese) of urban and rural areas provides us with a classroom for areas of stewardship. Rural life allows us to remind others that this is the world Christ grew up in, and that providing food is an important message of the Gospel," Nelson remarked.

Father Rott agreed, noting that as pastors, priests must be concerned with people both in cities and in the country. "We have to be aware of the differences among our communities," he said.

General Directives:
Create an Implementation Team

	Implementation Plans due MADISON -- The Implementation Commission composed of 20 priests and laypersons from around the diocese will meet June 3 and 4 to go over each of the 41 clusters' implementation plans due May 15. The commission will give feedback to each cluster on their plan, either accepting it as is, asking for minor corrections, or sending it back for rework. Once the plan is accepted, the Commission will forward the plan on to the bishop for his approval. Facilitators are standing by to assist parishes in meetings, planning, or discussions; contact them, if needed. For more information: trustinginthespirit@straphael.org; Trusting in the Spirit, 702 S. High Point Rd., Madison, WI 53719; or 608-821-3010.

Most parishes in the Diocese of Madison have been diligently working on their Trusting in the Spirit Implementation Plans in anticipation of the Implementation Commission meeting the first week of June.

These plans give a concrete methodology for how the parishes within each cluster will work together to achieve the directives that the bishop placed before them last October. These are the relationship "direction" that the bishop sees each cluster moving in, be it a partnership, linkage, or in some cases, merger.

The key point is that each cluster has directives that have been derived from and are relative to their specific cluster, not any other cluster. However, there was a set of directives, the General Directives, that applied to all clusters, thus all parishes, in the diocese (see General Directives), without exception. As there have been a number of questions with regard to these directives, we will try to address them in the next couple of articles.

First general directive

The first General Directive that we'll discuss is:

"Create a Cluster Implementation Team to engage the staffs and pastoral councils in developing an implementation plan and provide regular updates to the parishes and to the diocese."

Engage

The Cluster Implementation Team, just like the Core Team in Guided by the Spirit, needs to be the center of action, revolving, if you will, around the pastors, engaging all of the people in the parishes of the cluster.

What does it mean to "engage"? Well, it mainly means communicating, which can be explaining, listening, discussing, arguing, defending, and rejoicing. All of these will be part of a team that is really engaging the parishioners, making them a part of the investigating, planning, and decision making.

This can take the part of small group discussions, town-hall meetings, bulletin reminders, e-mail lists, and the like. It can be done by having focus groups, study partners, or information tables. The more that people are informed and asked for their input, the better the overall plan is going to be.

An important part of engaging is ensuring that there is a somewhat equal representation of the different parishes' viewpoints. A team that is overwhelmed by one parish's ideas is not one that is well-engaged.

Develop

What we are trying to accomplish, while not rocket-science, is pretty complicated and really needs people to study their particular situation, really think about the issues, and then work with others to come up with, not just any solution, but the best solution available given the information they have right now.

Divide and conquer is always the simplest way to develop a plan. Try to outline the components of each directive and then subdivide those up into smaller pieces. Those smaller pieces are usually going to be the right size for groups of one to three people to work on in a reasonable amount of time. Remember that sometimes a good plan is just stating that you're going to work on the plan!

Once you've done the hard work of thinking of a solution path, it's time to test your ideas. The best solutions are ones that are subjected to review and criticism from a wide variety of sources. A properly engaged parishioner base will be more than willing to offer constructive criticism to a developed plan that is put out there for review and your cluster will be all the better for it.

Updates

There isn't anything more frustrating than to find out that something important happened without you knowing about it. Everyone has a story about how they found out through "the grapevine" that something was decided. While sometimes that can't be avoided, for the most part, telling parishioners and the diocese what is going on is going to be the best way to keep the team informed about what is happening. Of course, this is easier said than done, but if there is a serious effort to communicate the status of your efforts, you will find that it will pay benefits over the long run.

'Hope that comes from Christ'

Getting the Team engaged, developing, and updating are the first steps, one that should have occurred some time ago. But it's never too late to see how your Cluster Implementation Team measures up after this last couple of months of planning. Hopefully, all of the plans will soon be in and they'll reflect the ideas we have discussed. Maybe they won't and you know it already. That's okay; let's begin and begin again with a hope that comes from Christ and . . . Trusting in the Spirit.

Forty Days for Life gearing up
for next vigil

MADISON -- Madison-area Christians will join communities around the country again this fall to partake in a 40-day, around-the-clock prayer vigil outside Planned Parenthood. Madison's 40 Days for Life is seeking volunteers and participants interested in helping bring an end to abortion.

	For more information For further information on 40 Days for Life-Madison, contact Amy Hying at 40DaysForLifeMadison@gmail.com or 608-698-3877. The June 2 organizational meeting will feature beingHUMAN, a documentary that explains the 40 Days for Life vigil. The video can also be viewed at www.40daysforlife.com/show.cfm

Participants sign up for shifts of one to four hours. They can sign up for a single time or on a weekly basis, fasting and peacefully praying outside Planned Parenthood. The 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week prayer vigil begins September 24 and runs through November 2.

Moving experiences

Last year's 40 Days for Life participants reported many moving experiences.

"I had two young ladies approach and say, 'I want to know where I can obtain an adoption,'" said Don, who partook in last year's vigil. "They change[d] their minds [about getting an abortion] because they had supporters. Someone who [could] help them do what was right."

Kathy, another vigil participant, said 40 Days for Life is an important way to provide a voice for the voiceless.

"What is amazing to me is to see so many people who have come forward to participate in this worthwhile cause," she said. "It is encouraging to see the dedication and love that we share for life and for the unborn babies. We are their voices and we have to say no to the culture of death. Praise be to God!"

Meeting on June 2

An organizational meeting for 40 Days for Life-Madison will take place Monday, June 2, at 6 p.m. at the House of Prayer in Madison, near the East Towne Mall. The address is 1714 Eagan Rd.

With the beginning of the vigil just four months away, volunteers are needed to fill the following positions:

Prayer Coordinator: responsible for encouraging the Body of Christ to pray and fast before and during the 40 Days for Life campaign.

Vigil Coordinator: keeps a list of all vigil volunteers, maintains schedules, and manages substitute lists to ensure a constant, peaceful presence at Planned Parenthood.

Outreach Coordinator: directs a door-to-door petition, education drive, and other community outreach activities.

Event Coordinator: helps plan and organize the Kickoff Rally, Halfway Rally, and Victory Celebration events.

Church Coordinator: responsible for inviting local churches' participation and maintaining ongoing communication with church leaders.

Communications Coordinator: communicates with participants through e-mail messages and blog updates and handles media relations.

Last year's 40 Days for Life was a monumental success, spanning 33 states, 89 cities, and featuring participation from 150,000 people.

Nationally, 40 Days for Life reports that in the past year, one abortion clinic has closed and two Planned Parenthood facilities have ceased performing abortions.

During last fall's national campaign, hundreds of mothers chose life, saving at least 500 babies' lives.