Month: October 2022

SCRANTON – As a member of Saint Ann Parish in Shohola, Frank A. Fanelli has served his community through the Knights of Columbus for several years. He has proudly helped to distribute thousands of meals over that time but is now looking to serve his community in a new way.

On Oct. 1, 2022, Fanelli was one of eight faith-filled men who took a step toward ordination as a permanent deacon in the Diocese of Scranton during a Mass at the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Scranton.

“I’ve had the calling for a while. It (Mass) was actually tear jerking. This is the first step in a long process,” he explained. “I’m just looking to help people.”

The Mass, in which the Most Rev. Joseph C. Bambera, Bishop of Scranton, served as principal celebrant and homilist, included the Rite of Candidacy.

During the Rite of Candidacy, Bishop Bambera accepted the men to formally enter the diaconate formation process as Candidates. Over the next four years, these men will receive spiritual, theological and pastoral formation, and upon completion, will be called to ordination as permanent deacons.

The Rite of Candidacy is the first official recognition of the positive signs of a man’s vocation to the permanent diaconate.

In addition to Fanelli, the seven other men who participated in the Rite of Admission to Candidacy for Holy Orders were Fernando B. Alves, Saint Luke Parish, Stroudsburg; Ernesto A. Capo, Jr., Saint Ann Parish, Shohola; Michaelangelo J. Colaneri, Cathedral of Saint Peter, Scranton; Joel Marte, Saint Matthew Parish, East Stroudsburg; Jorge A. Roca, Saint Matthew Parish, East Stroudsburg; Rafael Sánchez Velásquez, Saint Matthew Parish, East Stroudsburg; and Christian D. Saunders, Saint Paul Parish, Scranton.

Capo said one of many things that led him to consider diaconal service is the growing number of people who do not believe in God.

“I believe with the lack of faith now in this world, in this climate, I feel that I can stand in the gap of people who believe and don’t believe, or people that are on the fence, where I can push them toward the way of God,” he explained.

Capo said if he could accomplish just five percent of what the early Apostles did, his ministry will have been successful.

“It’s a lot of responsibility but moving forward, it is something you have to hold dear – and through God – that is how it happens,” he added.

During his homily, Bishop Bambera told those admitted to Candidacy that God is calling them to a moment in life that demands a radical decision of faith and trust.

“Your openness to the call to serve the Church demands a letting go of your own ego, needs, interests and control in order to trust in Jesus and the life He embraced – a life that found Him washing the feet of His friends in humble service and inviting His followers to do the same,” the bishop said. “Your openness to the call to serve the Church also demands that you know well that you cannot succeed in this way of life apart from the grace of God.”

The bishop also thanked each man on behalf of all people in the Diocese of Scranton.

“You are responding to a call to be a sign and instrument of Christ, who came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life for the sake of the many,” Bishop Bambera explained.

Colaneri reflected on the importance of the bishop’s words following the Mass.

“It’s a calling to something more than yourself. You want to be in service to those who need you,” he said.

While he already has a full-time job as a store manager for a refrigeration and heating equipment business, Colaneri is looking forward to the opportunity that lies ahead.

“A lot of time people think the pomp and circumstance of being on the altar is where the glory comes, but in being a deacon, you set that aside. You become ‘less than,’ you become one of the people bringing the spirit of Christ to the people through the Church,” he added.

A ninth man, Francisco Castelan, has also been accepted into this formation class for permanent deacons, but he already received the Rite of Candidacy in 2013 in the Diocese of Brooklyn.

ARCHBALD – For nearly 100 years, the Little Sisters of Saint Francis have spread joy, hope, happiness and a love of the Gospel wherever they have gone.

As the religious congregation prepares to celebrate the centenary of its founding in 2023, many of the Catholic sisters who minister to the poor and marginalized in the United States gathered for Mass at Christ the King Parish in Lackawanna County on Oct. 1, 2022.

“Today is a big day for us because we are launching the centennial celebration of our foundress, Mother Kevin Kearney, who founded the Little Sisters of Saint Francis in Uganda, East Africa, in 1923,” Sister Lucy Marindany, LSOSF, said.

The Most Rev. Joseph C. Bambera, Bishop of Scranton, served as principal celebrant and homilist for the Eucharistic celebration.

Two sisters, Sister Nancy Kamau, LSOSF, and Sister Julietha Mduma, LSOSF, currently live in the convent at Our Lady of Czestochowa in Eynon and serve local missions that benefit many people in the Scranton area.

Sister Nancy serves as the National Superior of the Little Sisters of Saint Francis and oversees communities in six other parts of the United States, including Binghamton, N.Y., Williamsburg, Va., Milwaukee, Wis., Los Angeles, Cali., Brooklyn, N.Y., and Springfield, Mo. She is also the Director of Development of ASEC (African Sisters Education Collaborative) at Marywood University, which raises funds to provide tuition for religious sisters in Africa to do undergraduate and graduate work to deepen their service of the Church locally and abroad.

Sister Julietha serves selflessly in pastoral ministry at Saint Joseph’s Center.

“We have Sisters working in diverse situations and we are grateful to God for the gift of our vocation that enables us to go out and do ministry following in the footsteps of Saint Francis of Assisi,” Sister Nancy explained.

Many of the Sisters who work in the other parts of the United States attended the Mass in Archbald. That includes Sister Rose Mary Nakhumicha, LSOSF, who works in colonial Williamsburg.

“I work with the disabled, both mentally challenged and physically challenged, as a medical person,” she said. “I enjoy the work in the community.”

Sister Mary Jane Athieno, LSOSF, who works in the Binghamton area, said it is a blessing to help to the poor and underprivileged.

“I do pastoral care in five different nursing homes and work with the homebound. I also do church ministry in my parish,” she explained.

In 2016, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints officially accepted the Cause for Beatification of Mother Kevin Kearney and she was declared a ‘Servant of God.’ That begins the lengthy process to sainthood.

The current Little Sisters of Saint Francis pray for Mother Kevin’s cause daily and work to follow her loving and caring example.

“When she came to Uganda, she really worked tirelessly in Uganda helping so many people. She never got tired. She was always working,” Sister Lilia Kagendo, LSOSF, explained.

During the Mass celebrating the centenary of the founding of the Little Sisters of Saint Francis, the Sisters in attendance renewed their vows and offered a brief hymn of Thanksgiving in response to their renewal.

The Sisters also presented the Gifts of the Mass in a reserved, traditional African procession accompanied by a hymn in Swahili.

“The dance was to give Glory to God for his wonders that he has done in our lives, in our ministries here and back in Africa,” Sister Mary Jane explained.

Father Brian J.T. Clarke, Pastor, Christ the King Parish, works closely with the Little Sisters of Saint Francis who work in the Diocese of Scranton. He said they wonderful partners, friends and companions.

“They pray regularly for the intentions of people who are sick or in need or have struggles in their lives and people are drawn to them because of their goodness and their clear openness to help them,” he said. “We are incredibly blessed to have them in our community and are very grateful that they respond so willingly and without any hesitation to the needs of our people.”

During his homily, Bishop Bambera also noted the gift that the Little Sisters of Saint Francis have been to people locally and around the world. He specifically mentioned their ministries of caring for the sick and suffering, helping the poor and marginalized, and teaching the young and old about life and faith rooted in the vision of Saint Francis of Assisi.

“Saint Francis often encouraged his followers, ‘Start by doing what is necessary; then do what is possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible,’” Bishop Bambera said. “Sisters, may our loving God sustain you in the work that you do – a work that to many may seem impossible – but to those with eyes of faith, a work that flows through your hands from the heart of Jesus, our life and our salvation.”

WASHINGTON (CNS) – The chairman of the U.S. bishops’ pro-life committee called for a “radical solidarity” with pregnant women to protect and support them and their unborn child.

“In the post-Roe world, we must act in radical solidarity with the pregnant woman and her child, as we work and pray for the day when abortion is unthinkable,” said Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities.

The archbishop made the remarks in a statement released late Oct. 4 to mark the 100 days since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in its Dobbs ruling.

Mothers should “be protected and supported,” he said, “and we all have a responsibility to stand with mothers in need and provide the material and emotional support necessary to allow mothers, children and families to live in dignity.”

Archbishop Lori also issued the statement to reiterate Catholic teaching on life as a response to recent public comments from people in public life “who distort the Catholic Church’s teaching,” said a USCCB news release.

“The Catholic Church recognizes that all people, born and unborn, have been created in the image and likeness of God, and therefore have inherent dignity, and the right to life,” Archbishop Lori said. “When a woman is carrying a child, both mother and child are valued and should be protected, and the life of one should not be set against the life of another.”

He added, “The goal is always to save life, never to intentionally destroy life. The church seeks the protection of all unborn children, this includes the innocent child conceived in rape or incest.”

Neither Archbishop Lori nor the news release named any specific public officials’ comments on abortion and the Catholic Church, but in remarks Sept. 22, President Joe Biden claimed that a bill sponsored by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., to ban abortion after 15 weeks nationwide is more strict than what the church says about abortion.

Speaking at a Democratic National Committee fundraiser in New York, Biden said Graham and others are “talking about how they’re gonna, you know, make sure that Roe is forever gone and Dobbs becomes a national law.”

He said the senator’s bill has “no exceptions.” “I happen to be a practicing Roman Catholic, my church doesn’t even make that argument,” Biden said.

However, the “Protecting Pain-Capable Unborn Children from Late-Term Abortions Act,” as the bill is called, does include exceptions for rape, incest or to save the life of the mother. The measure also has been introduced in the House.

“Whereas the church always seeks the protection of all unborn children, it is licit to support legislation that falls short of this goal, if it advances protections and limits harm,” said Archbishop Lori said in his statement.

He quoted Section 73 of St. John Paul II’s 1995 encyclical on the value and inviolability of human life, “Evangelium Vitae”: “This does not in fact represent an illicit cooperation with an unjust law, but rather a legitimate and proper attempt to limit its evil aspects.”

“The USCCB supports legislation that seeks to limit the harm of abortion, including some legislation that includes exceptions,” Archbishop Lori said. “We will continue to pray and work for the day when all human life is welcomed in love and protected by law.”

The Supreme Court’s June 24 decision overturning Roe v. Wade came in a challenge to a Mississippi law banning abortion after 15 weeks. The case was Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

The court affirmed the law 6-3 and also voted 5-4 to overturn the 1973 Roe ruling, which legalized abortion nationwide, and 1992’s Casey v. Planned Parenthood ruling, which affirmed Roe. The ruling returned the issue of abortion to the states.

In a Sept. 21 statement he issued for October as Respect Life Month, Archbishop Lori said the court’s reversal of Roe “is, without question, an answer to prayer,” but in a post-Roe world, “Catholics must now work together for another, even deeper paradigm shift.”

“We must move beyond a paradigm shift in the law in order to help the people of our nation better see who we can be as a nation by truly understanding what we owe to one another as members of the same human family,” he said.

“To build a world in which all are welcome,” he said, Catholics “must heed” the words of St. Teresa of Kolkata “and remember ‘that we belong to one another.'”

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – To know oneself is a gift and a grace that allows Christians to properly discern between feelings and convictions, Pope Francis said.

During his weekly general audience in St. Peter’s Square Oct. 5, the pope said that knowing oneself requires “patient soul-searching” and the awareness of one’s “way of acting, of the feelings that dwell within us.”

“It also requires that we distinguish between emotions and spiritual faculties,” he said. “‘I feel’ is not the same as ‘I am convinced.’ ‘I feel like’ is not the same as ‘I want.’ Thus, we come to recognize that the view we have of ourselves and of reality is at times somewhat distorted. To realize this is a grace!”

Continuing his series of talks about discernment, the pope reflected on the element of self-knowledge that is crucial in discovering what one truly wants or needs in his or her life.

The pope explained that at times it is difficult to discern the path for one’s life “because we do not know ourselves well enough.”

“You have heard many times: ‘But that person, why doesn’t he or she sort out their life?'” he said departing from his prepared remarks. It “happens to us too that when we do not know clearly what we want, we do not know ourselves well.”

Spiritual doubts and vocational crises, he added, are often caused by “an insufficient dialogue between our religious life and our human, cognitive and affective dimension.”

Furthermore, “forgetting God’s presence” in one’s life goes “hand-in-hand with ignorance of ourselves,” he said.

Pope Francis said that much like computer programs requiring a password to access important and personal information, the spiritual life also “has its passwords,” words that touch one’s heart in a particularly powerful way.

However, he warned, the devil also “knows these passwords well.”

“Temptation does not necessarily suggest bad things, but often haphazard things, presented with excessive importance,” the pope explained. “In this way, it hypnotizes us with the attraction that these things stir in us, things that are beautiful but illusory, that cannot deliver what they promise and therefore leave us in the end with a sense of emptiness and sadness.”

That sadness, he said, is an indication that “we have embarked on a path that was not right.”

Pope Francis said Christians need to “know the passwords of our heart” to protect themselves from external manipulations and distinguish what is truly important from “current fads or flashy, superficial slogans.”

He also encouraged Christians to make “a general examination of conscience” each day in prayer to reflect on “what happened in my heart in this day” and “learn to note in our evaluations and choices what we give most importance to, what we are looking for and why, and what we eventually find.”

“Prayer and self-knowledge enable us to grow in freedom,” the pope said. “This is (what it means) to grow in freedom! They are basic elements of Christian existence, precious elements for finding one’s place in life.”

WASHINGTON (CNS) – During their fall general assembly in Baltimore Nov. 14-17, the U.S. bishops will elect the next president and vice president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops from a slate of 10 candidates nominated by their fellow bishops.

They also will vote on chairmen-elect for six standing USCCB committees.

The president and vice president are elected to three-year terms, which begin at the conclusion of this year’s general assembly. At that time, Archbishop José H. Gomez of Los Angeles and Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron of Detroit will complete their terms as president and vice president, respectively.

The candidates for president and vice president are, in alphabetical order:

— Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio of the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services.

— Bishop Michael F. Burbidge of Arlington, Virginia.

— Bishop Frank J. Caggiano of Bridgeport, Connecticut.

— Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City.

— Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone of San Francisco.

— Archbishop Paul D. Etienne of Seattle.

— Bishop Daniel E. Flores of Brownsville, Texas.

— Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller of San Antonio.

— Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore.

— Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana.

 

According to the USCCB bylaws, the president is elected first by a simple majority vote of members present and voting. The vice president is then elected from the remaining nine candidates.

In either election, if a candidate does not receive more than half of the votes cast on the first ballot, a second vote is taken. If a third round of voting is necessary, that ballot is a runoff between the two bishops who received the most votes on the second ballot.

During the meeting, the bishops also will vote for chairmen-elect of six USCCB standing committees on: Canonical Affairs and Church Governance; Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs; Evangelization and Catechesis; International Justice and Peace; Protection of Children and Young People; and Religious Liberty.

The six bishops will each serve for one year as chairman-elect of their respective committee before beginning a three-year term as chairman at the conclusion of the bishops’ 2023 Fall General Assembly.

The nominees are, in alphabetical order:

— Committee on Canonical Affairs and Church Governance: Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois, and Bishop Alfred A. Schlert of Allentown, Pennsylvania.

— Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs: Bishop Joseph C. Bambera of Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Auxiliary Bishop Peter L. Smith of Portland, Oregon.

— Committee on Evangelization and Catechesis: Archbishop Charles C. Thompson of Indianapolis and Bishop William D. Byrne of Springfield, Massachusetts.

— Committee on International Justice and Peace: Archbishop Nelson J. Pérez of Philadelphia and Bishop Abdallah Elias Zaidan of the Maronite Eparchy of Our Lady of Lebanon.

— Committee on the Protection of Children and Young People: Bishop Barry C. Knestout of Richmond, Virginia, and Auxiliary Bishop Elias R. Lorenzo of Newark, New Jersey.

— Committee for Religious Liberty: Archbishop Cordileone and Bishop Rhoades.

 

Because the elections for USCCB president and vice president are also taking place at the general assembly, if any of the candidates for committee chairmanship are elected to fill either of those higher offices, the USCCB’s Committee on Priorities and Plans will convene to nominate a new candidate for that committee.

Last November, the bishops voted for chairmen-elect for five standing committees. At the end of this year’s fall assembly, they will take over as chairmen of their respective committees on:

— Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations: Bishop Earl A. Boyea of Lansing, Michigan.

— Divine Worship: Bishop Steven J. Lopes, who heads the Houston-based Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter.

— Domestic Justice and Human Development: Archbishop Borys Gudziak of the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Philadelphia.

— Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth: then-Auxiliary Bishop Robert E. Barron of Los Angeles, who now heads the Diocese of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota.

— Migration: Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – As thousands of people sat in the dark in St. Peter’s Square, they watched fish jump from the facade of the basilica, saw the word “no” form and dissolve three times and heard an actor reciting the part of St. Peter speak about the overwhelming love and mercy of Jesus.

They also heard tenor Andrea Bocelli sing four songs, including “The First Noel” from the soon-to-be released Christmas album he made with his children Matteo and Virginia.

The nighttime event Oct. 2 was the premiere of “Follow Me,” an eight-minute film about the life and faith of St. Peter.

Using “video mapping,” images of St. Peter from the basilica’s collection and that of the Vatican Museums were turned into 3D video clips and projected onto the facade of the basilica, which is built over the presumed tomb of the apostle.

The film was to be shown every 15 minutes between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. until Oct. 16.

Cardinal Mauro Gambetti, archpriest of the basilica, told viewers that one motivation behind the film was to help people understand that Peter was human, he worked hard as a fisherman – sometimes catching fish and sometimes catching nothing – and, although his faith wobbled when Jesus was arrested, he continued to answer Jesus’ call to follow him.

“Peter gives light to this place, gives light to the universal church and the world with his humanity, which little by little began to shine with divine light, divine love,” the cardinal said.

“He tells us, ‘Look, there is a path. I encountered the love of Jesus, who looked deep inside me, and my life was transformed,'” Cardinal Gambetti said.

Jesus had told Peter, “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church,” and despite challenges and opposition and human foibles, the cardinal said, the church stands around St. Peter embracing the world and all its peoples as brothers and sisters.