PHOTO: ‘Mary’ and ‘Joseph’ — St. Peter School, Ashton, students Stephanie Kalscheuer and Peter Volkman — smile with the student cast of ‘Miracle at Midnight,’ at the conclusion of the school’s annual Christmas program.
Year: 2014
Janesville teen finalist in cooking contest
JANESVILLE — An eighth grader at St. William School needs your help to win $30,000 for his school.
Elijah Thurner and his family are finalists in the Ben’s Beginners Cooking Contest, sponsored by Uncle Ben’s rice.
The contest was developed to encourage children to make healthier choices by getting them interested in cooking at an early age. The goal is also to empower parents to connect with their children one meal at a time and aims to make cooking an enjoyable activity that brings families together.
40 Days for Life concludes life-saving vigil in Madison
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| Bishop Robert C. Morlino of Madison leads people in prayer at the 40 Days for Life closing vigil on Sunday, Nov. 2. For the eighth straight year, the vigil was held outside the Planned Parenthood clinic in Madison’s east side. Reportedly, two babies were saved during this year’s vigil in Madison with 528 lives saved across the country. (Catholic Herald photo/Joe Ptak) |
MADISON — Bishop Robert C. Morlino was on hand to celebrate efforts to respect life as prayer warriors came out to help conclude this year’s 40 Days for Life vigil.
40 Days for Life is an internationally-coordinated 40-day peaceful pro-life campaign to end abortion.
Locally, the Madison vigil — in its eighth straight year — ran from September 24 to November 2 and consisted of prayer and fasting, peaceful vigil, and community outreach.
For 24 hours a day, volunteers prayed outside the Planned Parenthood clinic on Madison’s east side for an end to abortion.
About 50 people gathered at that site for the closing celebration on Sunday, Nov. 2.
Bishop Morlino thanked the pro-life community in Madison for its “perseverance” in praying and working toward an end to abortion.
The bishop also spoke about how everyone must continue to bring the truth on marriage to life.
Special recognition
After the closing prayer vigil, some of the group went to St. Albert Church in Sun Prairie for food and fellowship.
St. Ambrose Academy Benefit Dinner
MADISON — It’s become a tradition. Each Advent season, St. Ambrose Academy in Madison welcomes apostolates, organizations, and friends from every corner of the Diocese of Madison for a fun, festive Benefit Dinner in support of Catholic education.
This year’s Benefit Dinner is Saturday, Dec. 13, at the Alliant Energy Center Exhibition Hall in Madison. The cocktail hour begins at 5:30 p.m., and the dinner itself begins at 7 p.m.
Praying for, focusing on unity in the Church
Dear Friends,
This past Sunday we had the opportunity to celebrate a Feast Day which can often pass by unnoticed and under-appreciated by many Catholics.
November 9 is always the Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome, but for those Catholics who do not attend Mass on a daily basis, the opportunity to hear about this feast only comes about when November 9 is a Sunday.
Story of three young organists is inspiring
To the editor:
The front page story of the October 30 issue really inspired me. These three children ages 14, 17, and 13 who are organists are just amazing.
Veterans grateful to be able to visit war memorials
To the editor:
I really enjoyed the article about the VetsRoll very much. Mark and John Finnegan, with their mother Barbara present, received the Governor’s Certification of Appreciation for their great work at the November 7 annual Veterans Day Ceremony at the State Capitol in Madison.
Faith stories at Stoughton parish
STOUGHTON — You are invited and encouraged to attend a powerful witnessing of faith where John Gray and Meg Veek, parishioners at St. Ann Parish, Stoughton, will share their love for Christ and how important he is to their daily life. The event will take place on Tuesday, Nov. 18, at 6:30 p.m. in Healy Hall at St. Ann Church, Stoughton.
Revisiting spiritual welfare
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In the sixth chapter of St. Mark’s Gospel, we find the account of Jesus sending out the Twelve, two by two, on mission.
The first thing he gave them, Mark tells us, was “authority over unclean spirits.” And the first pastoral act that they performed was to “drive out many demons.”
The reality of evil spirits
When I was coming of age in the ’60s and ’70s, it was common, even in seminaries, to dismiss such talk as primitive superstition — or perhaps to modernize it and make it a literary device using symbolic language evocative of the struggle with evil in the abstract.
Tale of two dying persons
How sad it was to hear of the death of Brittany Maynard, the 29-year-old woman who ended her own life on November 1 using Oregon’s assisted suicide law.
Maynard suffered greatly from terminal brain cancer, and we can understand her wish to stop her pain and suffering.
More hopeful path
However, the story of another young person who is also facing death shows, I believe, a more hopeful way to face death.
A Catholic News Service article reported on Philip Johnson, a 30-year-old Catholic seminarian in the Diocese of Raleigh, N.C., who is facing the same disease as Maynard. He wrote a poignant essay in October responding to Maynard’s decision to end her own life.