Columns – Page 156 – Madison Catholic Herald

Over 500 Catholics from across the United States and a few foreign countries gathered in Washington, D.C., from February 20 to 25. Sponsored by 19 groups, from the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities to the United States Conference of Bishops, people focused on the theme, “Christ Our Hope: Healing a Broken World.”

With the economic crisis as a backdrop, workshops, discussions, and prayer focused attention on bringing Catholic social teachings to assist the poor, wherever they live.

On March 5, 2009May 20, 2021

Fr. Tad Pacholczyk

Verbal engineering: Swaying of public conscience

Over the years, a number of unjust laws have come to be replaced by more just ones. Laws overturning the practice of slavery, for example, were a significant step forward in promoting justice and basic human rights in society.

Yet in recent times, unjust and immoral laws have, with increasing frequency, come to replace sound and reasonable ones, particularly in the area of sexual morality, bioethics, and the protection of human life.

On February 26, 2009

Sr. Margie Lavonis

Lent may be a good time for a ‘faith lift’

I always love to read the signs outside of churches. Once I saw a clever one that asked, “Do you need a faith lift?” It was a good question that made me stop and think about my own faith life and where I need some spiritual Botox.

Now that we are in the dark dreary time of the year when life is cold and monotonous, at least in the Midwest, and we probably have broken many of our new year’s resolutions, it is a good time to reflect on how we need our spiritual life lifted. Lent is a perfect season for renewal.

On February 26, 2009

Barbara L. Lyons

Abortion program politically, financially motivated

Imagine that you are a patient needing routine surgery at an outpatient facility. At the Madison Surgery Center, you receive treatment to enhance your health, while in the next room or down the hall a fully formed 19 to 22 week unborn baby is being dismembered, experiencing significant pain from the abortion procedure.

The UW Hospital and Clinics, Meriter Hospital, and the Madison Surgery Center recently approved such a venture. The second trimester abortion program was discussed for months, shrouded in secrecy. Since becoming public knowledge, information from facilities’ officials has been incredibly inconsistent and filled with public relations puffery.

On February 19, 2009May 19, 2021

Msgr. Daniel Ganshert

Helping others teaches us compassion

Lent presents us with an opportunity if we choose to take it. Just like God has given us people in our lives to help us if we take the opportunity and let them: family, parish, community, among others. However, to ask others for help can be humbling. Yet, knowing that we all need help can teach us compassion for others.

Lenten fasting, prayer, and almsgiving remind us of this. It is a special time and opportunity for us to ask for help and to ask out loud. When God hears our prayers, sees our fasting, and almsgiving, that’s one thing. But when we hear and see one another praying, fasting and giving to others in our families, parishes, and communities, it amplifies the impact. All of a sudden we can be moved by the example of those who recognize not only their need for help, but also their need to help others.

On February 19, 2009

George Weigel

‘Afflicted’ with fertility?

What’s the biggest threat to the world’s prosperity and stability over the medium haul — say, between 2020 and 2050?

The proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons of mass destruction? A continuing economic recession? Jihadism running amok? The Detroit Lions ushering in the Apocalypse by winning an NFL championship? (Just kidding on the last . . . )

On February 19, 2009May 20, 2021

Audrey Mettel Fixmer

On the road . . . still

Too old to travel? Who? Me? Don’t even suggest it. I’ll find a way to get to that grandson’s wedding or that resort in a warmer climate no matter what. Of course, we must listen to our aging bodies and adapt to new ways to get around.

We were in our mid 60s and newly retired when we first became aware of that. My husband and I were boarding a flight to Puerto Rico when the older lady in front of us asked Bob if he would hoist her bag into the overhead compartment. As he reached up to do so, his pants fell down. That’s when we realized he had to start wearing suspenders.

On February 12, 2009

John Huebscher

One day, two hearings, same story

Anyone who wants to know how much our society values vulnerable children need only take note of two hearings held in the same city, Madison, on the same day, February 4th, to get an answer: nowhere near as much as we should.

Beginning at 10 a.m., a joint hearing by the two legislative committees that address issues affecting children and families heard testimony from a variety of perspectives on “The State of Wisconsin’s Families and Children in an Economic Crisis.”

On February 5, 2009May 19, 2021

Msgr. Daniel Ganshert

Looking at abortion facts and figures

Parish signing campaigns against the proposed Freedom of Choice Act are ongoing in our diocese. These campaigns also are allowing the people of the Diocese of Madison to voice their concerns related to second-trimester abortions performed at the Madison Surgery Center.

Finding the following comments from Mr. Joseph Collison, director of the pro-life office for the Diocese of Norwich, Conn., to be helpful, I want to share them with you by means of this column because the numbers are frightening.

Mr. Collison states that every fourth baby conceived in the United States is deliberately destroyed in our nation’s busy abortion businesses. Every day 3,500 developing babies are killed. Almost 1.5 million are killed every year. Our nation has the highest abortion rate in the Western world, and half of the American mothers seeking abortions have already aborted at least one child before.

On February 5, 2009

Richard Bonomo

Morality and the military

Fr. Jim Murphy, in his letter in the December 25 edition of the Catholic Herald, argues that Catholics ought not participate in the U.S. military at this time because that participation “would likely involve immoral activity.”

He cites papal and other ecclesiastical opinions that our invasion of Iraq was not moral, conditions at the Abu Ghraib prison, and the holding of people at the Guantanamo Naval Base, the rendition program, the condition of veterans returning from the theater of combat, the existence of nuclear weapons, and the shear size of annual military spending.