News Briefs
By Catholic News Service
U.S.
New models of pastoral leadership required for a changing U.S. church
ORLANDO, Fla. (CNS) -- New models of pastoral leadership will be required for a U.S. church that has changed significantly from a generation ago and will continue to change. The changes include an increase in the number of Catholics, a more-educated laity, a decrease in the number of priests and vowed religious, an increase in permanent deacons and professional lay ecclesial ministers, and growing cultural diversity in the church. Those changes were identified in a four-year study conducted in response to ongoing shifts in the Catholic Church. The study, commissioned in 2002 by a coalition of six Catholic national organizations, received a $2 million grant from the Lilly Endowment to conduct the study and to assess its findings. Marti R. Jewell, project director of the Emerging Models of Pastoral Leadership Project, addressed the major findings of the study April 21, the first full day of a national summit in Orlando to review and build upon the findings. An attentive audience of nearly 1,200 participants representing all six groups listened, eager to hear the results.
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Film on anti-Semitism shows personal journey, but is it too personal?
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- A new documentary on the history of Christian anti-Semitism, "Constantine's Sword," shows the personal journey made by an ex-priest to embrace the fight against anti-Semitism and to rally others to the cause. It is a journey that started when he was a seminarian. "It became an issue in my life in the early 1960s when I was a student in a Catholic seminary," said James Carroll, the ex-priest, who since leaving the priesthood has done more work as a novelist and newspaper columnist than as a documentarian. The movie is based on Carroll's book, "Constantine's Sword: The Church and the Jews -- A History." Like the book, the movie "deepened in a profound way my own Catholic faith," he said. But one nun who has spent much of her academic career in the field of Christian-Jewish relations who has seen the film suggested the story told in "Constantine's Sword" is "skewed by the fact that it's so tied personally to James Carroll." Holy Names Sister Mary Boys, a professor of practical theology at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, told Catholic News Service that the film, like the 2001 book, "pays insufficient attention to the many generations of people who have worked for justice for the Jews in the church, and (for) a corrected self-understanding in our own (faith) tradition."
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North Dakota youth group crafts American Indian gifts for pope
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- A group of young people from a North Dakota parish serving the Spirit Lake Dakotah Nation brought traditional American Indian gifts to honor Pope Benedict XVI when they visited the nation's capital during the pontiff's visit. The gifts included a star quilt and a walking stick. Both were made by members of the group, most of whom are American Indians and live on the Spirit Lake Reservation. Thirteen-year-old Colby Gannon is hoping the 75-inch walking stick he crafted will be used once in a while when the pontiff takes a walk away from the public eye. Made in the shape of a star, the quilt symbolizes the creation of the universe by God, said Kelly Gannon, Colby's mother and a chaperone on the trip. The words "Happy Birthday Pope Benedict" were embroidered on the quilt. The gifts were presented to Father James Goodwin, a priest from the Diocese of Fargo, N.D., who is studying canon law at The Catholic University of America in Washington. Father Goodwin told Catholic News Service April 22 he plans to deliver the gifts to Archbishop Pietro Sambi, apostolic nuncio to the U.S., who will likely forward them to the Vatican.
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Pope urges young people to banish evils of drugs, poverty, racism
YONKERS, N.Y. (CNS) -- Addressing a crowd of 25,000 young people and seminarians, Pope Benedict XVI spoke of the "monster" that cast a shadow over his own childhood and urged the current generation to banish the darkness that exists today. Speaking April 19 at a boisterous rally on the grounds of the Archdiocese of New York's seminary in Yonkers, the pope said that while young people now enjoy democracy's freedom "the power to destroy does, however, remain." Pope Benedict offered a personal reflection on his own youth in Germany, "marred by a sinister regime that thought it had all the answers." Nazism, he said, "banished God and thus became impervious to anything true and good." The pope was forced to enroll in Hitler Youth as a boy but soon stopped going to meetings. In 2006 he said at a youth meeting in St. Peter's Square that he decided to become a priest after witnessing the Nazis' brutality. At St. Joseph's Seminary, the pope said the evils of substance abuse, homelessness and poverty, racism, violence and the degradation of girls and women result in people being treated as objects and the denial of God-given human dignity.
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'Vatican' board game helps players understand how a pope is elected
SAN DIEGO (CNS) -- The creator and the publisher of a board game called "Vatican: Unlock the Secrets of How Men Become Pope" said they hope players have fun with it but learn something along the way about how a pope gets elected. Stephen Haliczer, the game's creator, is a research professor at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Ill. The history of the Catholic Church is one of his areas of interest. The game, available on the Web at www.vaticanboardgame.com, was published by the College of DuPage Press in Glen Ellyn, Ill. "Vatican" is for two to six players, who assume the roles of prominent, fictional cardinals viewed as possible papal contenders. To win, a cardinal must earn the support of at least two-thirds of the 150 cardinals voting in the simulated papal conclave. According to the instruction booklet, "'Vatican' is a simulation of processes and events that are in reality far more complex and nuanced than in the game." Though "designed for enjoyment," the simulations are "distillations from the recent history of papal elections," which Haliczer and the publisher hope will also provide players with "some solid knowledge along the way."
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WORLD
Children give pope final U.S. send-off with colorful birthday cards
ROME (CNS) -- After all the speeches were over and the VIPs had gone home, Pope Benedict XVI had a final U.S. send-off from 36 grade-schoolers in Virginia. Homemade cards from the third- and fourth-graders of St. William of York Catholic School in Stafford, Va., were given to the pope aboard his Alitalia plane after he left New York April 20. The cards, made of colorful construction paper, offered a spiritual bouquet and birthday wishes to the pope, who turned 81 during his April 15-20 visit to Washington and New York. Adorned with drawings of birthday cakes, self-portraits, a rosary and a giant heart, the handwritten cards pledged prayers for completion of a safe trip. "Dear Pope Benedict, I am praying 2 glory bes for you every day. I am honored that you are visiting my state," said one card. "Thank you Holy Father for all you have done for the Catholic faith," said another. "We love you as God loves us."
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Group tries to stop flow of Christian emigration from Holy Land
JERUSALEM (CNS) -- Butros Abu Shanab said he may be like the tragic literary hero Don Quixote as he tries to stop the continuing tide of Christian emigration. Abu Shanab, a 54-year-old architect who quit his job to spearhead the nonprofit Holylanders Association for the Preservation of Christian Heritage, let out a wry laugh: Though he is intent on stopping the younger generation of Christians from emigrating, three of his own four children live abroad. "I have one daughter studying in Berlin, a son studying in Australia, a married daughter and two grandchildren living in Dubai (United Arab Emirates) and only one daughter is still living with us," said Abu Shanab, a Greek Orthodox. "This is very typical of Palestinian Christian families." Two years ago Abu Shanab left his job and began rallying all his energies and a large part of his finances into an ecumenical effort to curb Christian emigration and strengthen the community's identity and traditions regardless of denomination. His association just recently started its work.
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PEOPLE
Kansas priest marks 20th anniversary of heart transplant
CONCORDIA, Kan. (CNS) -- At age 51, Father Richard Lutgen suddenly faced mortality. He had collapsed during Mass at a mission parish in western Kansas and the next day found himself at a far-away hospital, where doctors said he had less than a year to live without a new heart. Twenty years later, that new heart continues to beat. He recites the April 16, 1988, transplant date as if it were his birthday. "I was near death, and I was resurrected. ... I call it a gift of life," Father Lutgen told The Register, newspaper of the Diocese of Salina. "It gave me 20 more years to serve as a priest. That's what keeps me going," he said. Father Lutgen retired in 2002, but has not stopped working. For the past four years, he has been a chaplain at a retirement complex in Concordia. He celebrates Mass six days a week and helps the local pastor with hospital visits and funerals.
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Pontifical North American College loses in Clericus Cup semifinals
ROME (CNS) -- The Pontifical North American College Martyrs lost 4-0 in the semifinals of the Clericus Cup soccer tournament to last year's champions, the Redemptoris Mater team of the Neocatechumenal Way's seminary. The Martyrs will play the UCRO team made up of Ukrainian and Croatian seminarians and priests for third place May 3. It is the first time the NAC players have had a chance to capture third place. The undefeated Redemptoris Mater team will face the Legionaries of Christ's Mater Ecclesiae for the Clericus Cup championship the same day. While losing to "Red Mat" April 19 was a disappointment for the Martyrs, trainer and co-captain Daniel O'Mullane of Paterson, N.J., said the defeat was made even more bitter by what he called the aggressive play and poor sportsmanship displayed by the opposing team. "We're still trying to digest the experience," he told Catholic News Service April 21. "We're not overly discouraged by the fact we lost a tough game," he said.
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Man who sang for the pope at synagogue calls it 'powerful' experience
NEW YORK (CNS) -- On Fridays and Saturdays, Daryl Henricksen, a Protestant, sings a cappella, in Hebrew, at the historic Park East Synagogue in New York. On Saturday evenings and Sundays, he's a member of the mixed adult choir and the cantor for four Masses at Resurrection Catholic Church in Rye, N.Y. On April 18, he sang for Pope Benedict XVI and Rabbi Arthur Schneier at a brief prayer service. "It was a powerful, heady experience and very emotional, very surreal" he said after the service at Park East Synagogue on Manhattan's Upper East Side. "The thing that is difficult for me to wrap my head around," he said, is that the pope, 81, and the rabbi, 78, are close in age and that as youngsters "they were at opposite ends of the spectrum of the Holocaust. Now they are at the peak of their religions and they are coming together on a world platform. It's such an extraordinary gift for the two of them to have this moment and for the world to experience it," he said in an interview with Catholic News Service.
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Paraguayans elect retired Bishop Lugo as president
ASUNCION, Paraguay (CNS) -- Retired Bishop Fernando Lugo was elected president of Paraguay April 20, ending the six-decade rule of the Colorado Party. Bishop Lugo took an early lead in the pre-election polls, despite official disapproval from the Vatican and, initially, from the Paraguayan bishops' conference. As support for Bishop Lugo remained strong in the largely Catholic country, the conference refrained from further comment. Bishop Lugo, 58, retired from the Diocese of San Pedro in 2005. The Vatican suspended him from exercising his priestly ministry when he decided to run for president, but rejected his request for laicization after more than 30 years as a bishop and priest. The Paraguayan bishops' conference made no official statement after the elections, but the Paraguayan newspaper ABC quoted Bishop Adalberto Martinez Flores of San Pedro, secretary of the Paraguayan bishops' conference, as saying that the conference "accepts and acknowledges the victory of (Bishop) Lugo as president-elect of Paraguay."
Copyright (c) 2008 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops