PLAIN — Five years ago, St. Luke Parish catechists Vicki and Chuck Fenske challenged their freshmen students to watch the movie, The Passion of The Christ.
Author: Chris Lee
Remembering Pope John Paul II
Strange as it may seem, I’ve been vaguely worried about the beatification on May 1 of a man with whom I was in close conversation for over a decade and to the writing of whose biography I dedicated 15 years of my own life.
My worries don’t have to do with allegations of a “rushed” beatification process; the process has been a thorough one, and the official judgment is the same as the judgment of the people of the Church.
I’m also unconcerned about the fretting of ultra-traditionalists for whom John Paul II was a failure because he didn’t restore the French monarchy, impose the Tridentine Mass on the entire Church, and issue thundering anathemas against theologians and wayward politicians.
Treat miscarried babies with the dignity they deserve
As soon as I heard my wife burst out the bathroom door that sunny spring day, I knew she was pregnant. I hadn’t yet opened my eyes but I didn’t need to. Her footsteps told me everything.
My wife didn’t have any particular reason to believe she was pregnant. But after a couple years of praying for a second child, I’d grown accustomed to Laura taking random pregnancy tests — hoping against hope that somehow that second pink line would appear. This time it did.
Joyful days
The days ahead were as joyful as any we’d experienced in our life together. We beamed when friends who knew of our struggle with secondary infertility congratulated us and we devoured all the fetal development materials we could find, eager to mark every last milestone in our baby’s nascent life.
The Lord continues to call: ‘You shall be My witnesses’
Eritis mihi testes — You shall be My witnesses (Acts 1:8). These words addressed by our Lord Jesus Christ to His disciples on the day of His Ascension sets the stage for the apostolic mission of the Church.
This “witnessing” was fully commissioned on the day of Pentecost when the promised gift of the Holy Spirit came upon the apostles. This power given by the Lord to the apostles and confirmed by the presence of the Holy
Spirit in the foundation upon which the Catholic Church had thrived over the ages.
Invitation to witness
In every age and time, the Lord continues to invite people to be witnesses of His love in our world. This invitation to “witness” takes various shapes and forms.
St. Jude Marian Guild celebrates 100 years
BELOIT — In 1911, when St. Jude Parish was only three years old, the well-respected founding pastor, Fr. Joseph Hanz, organized the Senior Ladies Guild, one of three such organizations he formed within the parish.
One hundred years later, its name now changed to the Marian Guild Council of Catholic Women, the group continues to be a constant force offering dedicated service to the parish. It is one of the oldest continuously serving women’s groups in the diocese.
Donating plants for food pantry garden
COTTAGE GROVE — America’s Best Flowers Garden Center in Cottage Grove will host an event encouraging donation of veggie four-packs for St. Vincent de Paul’s food pantry garden.
American society has been redistributing wealth from the poor to the rich
To the editor:
The column entitled, “‘Social justice’ is a complex concept” by Fr. Robert A. Sirico published in the April 14 issue of the Catholic Herald is confusing.
United States income has been redistributed from the poor and middle class to the wealthy for 30 years. The book Winner-Take-All Politics by Pierson and Hacker shows that in 2005 dollars, income of the 20 percent of American households earning the least rose from $14,900 in 1979 to $16,500 in 2005, or 10 percent. Average income rose from $42,900 to $52,100 or 21 percent.
Redemptive suffering is part of being a Christian
It is not easy to block out the multiple cries of pain and suffering that permeate the world. It is almost deafening.
All one has to do is turn on the radio, read the newspaper, watch television, or go online. We are bombarded with news of pain and suffering, almost to the saturation point. I think of the people in Libya, Haiti, Japan, and others affected by war and natural disasters. It gives me an overwhelming feeling.
Good people suffer
A couple of years ago I attended several lectures on the martyrs of El Salvador who were killed during a civil war that took place there in the 1970’s and ’80s. Archbishop Oscar Romero, four women missionaries, and several Jesuits — only to name a few of hundreds of people — were brutally murdered because they spoke out against the intense suffering of the Salvadoran people and a system of government that perpetuated it.
El Cielo: Destino de nuestro camino
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| Esta columna está dirigida a los fieles de la Diócesis de Madison. Cualquier circulación más amplia transgrede la intención del Obispo. |
Queridos amigos:
Al entrar en esta Semana Santa, somos muy conscientes de la ausencia del Obispo Bullock, del Obispo Wirz, de Mons. Wil Schuster, y de Mons. Tom Campion, quienes recientemente han sido llamados al encuentro con Cristo. Los extraño mucho personalmente y, sin entrar en detalles, la muerte de cada uno de ellos puede ser vista como el final de una era distinta en la diócesis de Madison. Su fallecimiento nos recuerda que, como dice la Escritura, “el mundo como lo conocemos está pasando”. La verdad de ese misterio nos incluye también a nosotros.
Hay mucho por lo cual estar agradecidos por la vida de nuestros dos buenos obispos y estos dos buenos sacerdotes, quienes ahora contemplan el rostro de Cristo. Los recordamos con esperanza e incluso con alegría, en términos del maravilloso camino por que el vivieron y murieron. Ese destino, claro está, no es otro que el Cielo.
Article was an insult to gun owners who are law-abiding and qualified to carry guns
To Stephen Kent:
Your article in the April 7 issue of the Catholic Herald was an insult to every gun owner.
You generalize the population as unqualified to own a weapon. Evidently you are not a gun owner nor were you raised in a conservative hunting family.
I assure you that I, my family, and my children are just as qualified as most police officers or even more so.