In the past eight months our family has benefited from the dedicated services of hospice nurses, social workers, and chaplains.
That is in addition to the loving round-the-clock care my husband receives from a devoted staff at Countryside Home in Jefferson. Add that to the steady stream of visits from our 10 children, 19 grandchildren, and me, and you can see that Bob is one loved man.
An important but often unacknowledged angle of the abortion debate involves the serious effects that legalized abortion has on men.
A recent scandal surrounding John Edwards, former North Carolina Senator and U.S. presidential candidate, brought this issue into plain view.
Mr. Edwards publicly acknowledged an extramarital affair with Rielle Hunter in the summer of 2008, a few months after pulling out of the presidential race. Even after admitting to the affair, however, he continued to deny having fathered Ms. Hunter’s daughter, Quinn, until January of 2010, when he finally admitted that he was, in fact, her father.
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| This column is the bishop’s communication with the faithful of the Diocese of Madison. Any wider circulation reaches beyond the intention of the bishop. |
It was wonderful to witness and to hear of the strong turn-out of people at our Ash Wednesday Masses around the diocese. Such a turn-out is a hopeful sign that our people genuinely want to pursue the journey of holiness and conversion this Lent.
I share with you today three points that I made during my Mass on Ash Wednesday. The first point is regarding this, our Year for Priests, within the Church. I do think about the Year for Priests a lot, but I’m not sure that we’ve done everything that we can to help you think about it. I hope that you do think about it, though. My point is this: if it is the “Year for Priests,” and this “year” includes Lent, then this Lent is for priests.
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| This column is the bishop’s communication with the faithful of the Diocese of Madison. Any wider circulation reaches beyond the intention of the bishop. |
Dear Friends in Christ,
As was mentioned last week, you, your parishes, and your pastors are to be highly commended in general! We as a diocesan family have come together in an incredible show of our love of neighbor and our unity as a diocese by raising a remarkable $508,130.02 for our sisters and brothers in Haiti.
Very soon after the devastating earthquake, Pope Benedict XVI promised the people of Haiti of the prayers and concrete support of Catholics around the world. And even before the Holy Father made these promises, Catholic Relief Services was there in Haiti helping those injured and dying; you and your parishes were asking “what can we do?” and our diocesan offices were organizing how we could respond.
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| This column is the bishop’s communication with the faithful of the Diocese of Madison. Any wider circulation reaches beyond the intention of the bishop. |
Dear Friends,
In the first place, let me thank you most sincerely for your remembrance in prayer during the days of my vacation. They were special days for me of friendship, especially friendship with the Lord, and also some needed rest and recreation. The time was most enjoyable and life-giving, I’m sure in large part due to your prayers. And, of course, I remembered all of you every blessed day.
We believe, oh yes, we do believe. And it’s a beautiful thing, isn’t it? This incredible gift of faith, given by a God who wants nothing more than to spend eternity with us.
Despite our unworthiness, despite the many times we have turned away, we have a God who continually fills our hearts with this need. A need that begs us to live as we were created to live.
I have recently received a most precious gift in the mail. It was sent by my niece, Lisa, who had just buried her father, Pete, my brother-in-law.
The moment I opened the outer box and saw the soiled, yellow-white box inside, I knew what it was: my mother’s photo album. Pictures from the first half of the 20th century!
Back in the early 1800s, most practicing physicians refused to believe that the simple gesture of washing their hands between patients could help prevent the spread of childbed fever among the pregnant women they examined.
Even in the face of compelling scientific evidence, they remained stubbornly opposed to the practice. As a result of this intransigence on the part of the medical establishment over a period of many years, childbed fever (also known as puerpural infection) ended up unnecessarily claiming the lives of thousands of young women.
Dear Friends,
As we hear the sounds of “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas” so frequently in the background these days, our national and even global attention has been focused on matters “green” in terms of the events that have taken place in Copenhagen, Denmark, at the Climate Change Conference.
BOLGATANGA, Ghana — Bishop Lucas Abadamloora of the Diocese of Navrongo-Bolgatanga in Ghana died on December 23, a day after his 71st birthday.
