VATICAN CITY (CNS) – World Youth Day is an antidote against indifference, isolation and lethargy, Pope Francis said.
Since World Youth Days were established by St. John Paul II in 1985, “they have involved, moved, stirred and challenged generations of women and men,” he said in the preface of a new book, “A Long Journey to Lisbon,” by Aura Miguel, a Portuguese journalist for Rádio Renascença. Vatican News published the preface May 2.
The initial intuition that inspired St. John Paul “has not faded,” Pope Francis wrote, as today’s world, especially its young people, is facing enormous changes and challenges.
Pope Francis greets the crowd before celebrating Mass for World Youth Day pilgrims at St. John Paul II Field in Panama City, Panama, Jan. 27, 2019. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)
Young people, he wrote, “risk self-isolation every day, living in a virtual environment much of their life, ending up as prey to an aggressive market that creates false needs.”
“Getting out of the house, heading out with fellow travelers, having important experiences of listening and prayer combined with moments of celebration, and doing it together, makes these moments precious for everybody’s life,” he wrote.
“We really need young people who are at the ready, eager to respond to God’s dream, to care about others, young people who discover the joy and beauty of a life spent for Christ in service to others, to the poorest, to the suffering,” the pope said.
Pope Francis repeated his call to young people not to live life “standing on a balcony watching life go by,” avoiding getting involved and getting their hands dirty, putting a screen between them and the rest of the world.
“Many times I have told (young people) not to be ‘couch potatoes,'” not to be “‘anesthetized’ by people who benefit from having them ‘dumb and numb,'” he wrote.
Being young is the time for dreaming, the pope wrote, and for being open to the real world, “discovering what is really worthwhile in life, struggling to conquer it; it is opening oneself to deep and true relationships, it is engaging with others and for others.”
But, he wrote, the world is facing so many challenges: the pandemic has shown that “we can only save ourselves together”; there is “the vortex of war and rearmament”; the arms race “seems unstoppable and threatens to lead us to self-destruction”; there is the war in Ukraine; and many wars and conflicts continue to be forgotten, “so much unspeakable violence continues to be perpetrated.”
How are young people to respond, the pope asked? “What are they being called to do with their energy, their vision of the future, their enthusiasm?”
“They are called to say, ‘We care.’ We care about what is happening in the world” and about “the fate of millions of people, of so many children, who have no water, no food, no medical care, while the rulers seem to be competing to see who can spend the most on the most sophisticated armaments,” he wrote. “We care about everything,” including all of creation and the digital world, “which we are challenged to change and make more and more humane.”
“World Youth Days have been an antidote to life on a balcony, to the anesthesia that makes people prefer the couch, to disinterest,” Pope Francis said in the preface.
“WYD is an event of grace that awakens, broadens horizons, strengthens the heart’s aspirations, helps people dream, to look ahead,” he wrote. “It is a planted seed that can bear good fruit.”
World Youth Day 2023 is scheduled to take place in Lisbon, Portugal, Aug. 1-6, and the motto for this year’s event is a passage from the Luke’s Gospel: “Mary arose and went with haste.”
In his formal message for WYD 2023, published in last year, Pope Francis said that the figure of Mary shows young people “the path of closeness and encounter” at a time when “our human family, already tested by the trauma of the pandemic, is racked by the tragedy of war.”
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(OSV News) – When King Charles III is crowned May 6 in the gothic splendor of London’s ancient Westminster Abbey, it will be one of the year’s most watched events.
The coronation has attracted controversy – not least over its $125 million price tag during a cost-of-living crisis – even as opinion polls show dwindling public interest in the monarchy. But despite controversies, it will still be an opportunity to project the soft-power of British royal pageantry and reaffirm Christianity’s place in public affairs, including the presence of Britain’s small but significant Catholic minority.
King Charles III and Camilla, Queen Consort, attend a ceremony at Buckingham Palace in London on April 27, 2023. (OSV News photo/Yui Mok, Reuters)
“Being anti-Catholic has been an element of British identity for centuries,” Father Timothy Radcliffe, former master of the Dominicans and one of Britain’s best-known Catholic preachers, told OSV News. “I’d hope an event like this will help our church become yet more integrated into national life at a time when, like most countries, we face threats of disintegration, increasing inequality and a declining sense of the common good.”
King Charles inherits the duties and prerogatives of head of state in an unbroken line of monarchs dating back to the 10th century. He also assumes the role of supreme governor of the Church of England, along with the traditional title of “fidei defensor,” or “defender of the faith,” bestowed in 1521 by Pope Leo X on King Henry VIII.
And while he’s long declared his wish, in a modern multicultural society, to be defender of all faiths, not just one, King Charles III reaffirmed his Protestant identity in speeches after the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022 — and will reaffirm it again during the coronation service.
This has caused some disappointment, not least among Britain’s Catholics.
The Catholic Church will be represented at the abbey by Cardinal Vincent Nichols of Westminster, who will share a blessing with Protestant and Orthodox leaders. Catholic bishops from Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland also will join the congregation, along with the Vatican’s secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, and the newly appointed apostolic nuncio to Great Britain, Spanish Archbishop Miguel Maury Buendía.
But Catholic prelates were not included among 50 public figures assigned formal roles in the order of service, published April 28. This will include a Bible reading by Britain Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, a practicing Hindu, and the presentation of regalia by Muslim, Jewish, Sikh and Hindu leaders.
Susan Doran, an Oxford University monarchy historian, said she regretted the bulk of the ceremony will be exclusively Protestant, with Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury and other Anglican prelates playing a dominant role.
“With its plummeting membership and many problems, it’s not surprising the Church of England seeks to hold on to its link with the monarchy, and sees the coronation as an opportunity to proclaim this,” Doran told OSV News.
“But at a time when the monarchy seems to be losing meaning for many people, I think it will fuel further alienation if they go too far down a narrow Protestant route — particularly among the young and people of other faiths,” she added.
That could be the reaction of some Catholics, too, especially those conscious of how bitter past conflicts have defined modern Britain’s religious outlook.
Relations with Rome, dating from the first mission to Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the sixth century, were broken off under Henry VIII in 1536 during the Reformation conflicts. After a brief restoration under Henry’s Catholic daughter, Mary I, hostility reared again under the Protestant Elizabeth I, who was declared excommunicated and deposed as a “servant of wickedness” in 1570 by Pope Pius V.
Persecution of Catholics intensified under Elizabeth’s successor, James I, particularly after the infamous 1605 Gunpowder Plot to blow up the king and his parliament. Some historians now dispute whether such a plot really existed. But it sealed the fate of English Catholics for the next 250 years as perceived heretics and traitors.
Even in the late 19th century, the Catholic Church was treated as an alien element in national life, deprived of equal rights. Although a church hierarchy was reestablished in 1850, it took until 1871 for Catholic academics even to be admitted to Oxford and Cambridge universities, and until St. John Paul II’s historic 1982 visit for formal diplomatic ties to be established.
Since then, the Catholic Church’s profile has been rebuilt, bringing it closer to full acceptance as a British institution.
Recent statistics show that Catholics make up around 13% of the United Kingdom’s 67 million inhabitants, with Anglicans at 14%, although religious affiliations have declined sharply across the country, with only around half of citizens declaring themselves Christian in recent surveys, compared to more than 70% two decades ago.
Although King Charles’s consort, Queen Camilla, was baptized a Protestant, she was married by a Catholic priest in 1973 to her Catholic first husband, Andrew Parker-Bowles, and brought up her son and daughter as Catholics.
Technical formalities aside, Charles has shown personal openness to Catholics, postponing his own wedding to Camilla in 2005 to attend St. John Paul’s funeral.
Before his fourth Vatican visit in October 2019 for the canonization of St. John Henry Newman, Charles published an article in L’Osservatore Romano and The Times of London hailing the event as a celebration “not merely for Catholics, but for all who cherish the values by which he was inspired.”
Heading a 12-member Catholic delegation to pledge allegiance to the new king March 9, Cardinal Nichols duly paid tribute to Charles’s “commitment to religious faith” and assured him of Catholic support.
On April 19, the pope himself reciprocated, donating two splinters from the Cross of Christ, preserved among relics in the Vatican Museums, for incorporation into a new Cross of Wales, which will lead the king’s coronation procession.
The king will be crowned as he sits on a 700-year-old chair with the solid-gold St. Edward’s Crown, made for Charles II in 1661. He will be presented with the orb and scepter pictured last autumn sitting atop the late queen’s coffin.
Holy oil for anointing the monarch and Camilla was consecrated March 4 at Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher by the Greek Orthodox Patriarch Theophilos III of Jerusalem.
Cardinal Nichols and other British Catholic bishops urged Catholics to take a full part in coronation events, including special weekend Masses and a May 3-5 triduum of prayer, as well as a nationwide day of volunteering and charity work set for May 8.
“The world has immeasurably changed since 1953 (coronation of Queen Elizabeth II), with many more opportunities and challenges,” Cardinal Nichols acknowledged in a prayer card circulated to all parishes in April. The prayer asks God to help Charles III “constantly secure and preserve for the people entrusted to his care the freedom that comes from civil peace.”
Father Radcliffe, the Dominican preacher, hinted at his own disappointment, all the same, that the Catholic Church won’t be assigned a fuller part, given the “godly role” it’s always tried to play in society.
“Catholic social teaching could be a precious gift for a nation needing to renew its social bonds and rediscover a common life and purpose,” Father Radcliffe told OSV News.
Cardinal Nichols’ spokesman, Alexander DesForges, was more sanguine. Although Catholic clergy aren’t playing a significant role in the coronation, they’ll at least be present – for the first time since Henry VIII and his Reformation.
“We have to be realistic. The king has a formal role in the Anglican Church of England, and this service is taking place in Westminster Abbey,” DesForges told OSV News. “The fact that six bishops will be present, including the Vatican’s Cardinal Parolin, whereas there was no Catholic representation at all 70 years ago, clearly shows things have changed.”
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BUDAPEST, Hungary (CNS) – Praising the piety and charity of Hungarian Christians and their commitment to supporting traditional family life, Pope Francis said Christ also calls them to open their hearts — and perhaps their borders — to others in need.
When it comes to the church or to society, isolationism is not Christian, the pope said in a variety of ways during his visit to Budapest, Hungary, April 28-30.
Pope Francis accepts the offertory gifts from Hungarians dressed in traditional clothes during Mass in Budapest’s Kossuth Lajos Square April 30, 2023. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)
Because of the 86-year-old pope’s mobility issues, the trip was confined to the capital and the official schedule was lighter than usual. But, as is normal for the pope, he used part of his long midday breaks and early evenings for private meetings, including with Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Hilarion of Budapest and Hungary.
Flying back to Rome April 30, the pope confirmed that he and Metropolitan Hilarion had spoken about Russia’s war on Ukraine, and he said the Vatican has some special “mission” underway, but he declined to provide details.
The pope also spoke about the war with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who, despite being a friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has condemned the war. But within the European Union, he has consistently voted against sanctioning Russia and against sending weapons to Ukraine.
Orbán has claimed his position makes him the only European leader siding with Pope Francis, although the pope has insisted Ukraine has a right to defend itself.
In his first speech in Hungary – to government and civic leaders and diplomats serving in Budapest – the pope encouraged the leaders to foster greater European unity rather than going their own way.
The “passionate quest of a politics of community and the strengthening of multilateral relations seems a wistful memory from a distant past,” he said April 28 in his speech at the former Carmelite monastery that now houses Orbán’s office.
“More and more,” the pope said, “enthusiasm for building a peaceful and stable community of nations seems to be cooling, as zones of influence are marked out, differences accentuated, nationalism is on the rise and ever harsher judgments and language are used in confronting others.”
Ukraine is one of Hungary’s eastern neighbors and Hungarians have assisted some 2.5 million Ukrainians who have crossed the border since Russia’s war on Ukraine began in February 2022. About 35,000 of the Ukrainian refugees have remained in Hungary.
Pope Francis repeatedly praised Hungarians for opening their country and their hearts to the Ukrainians, but in several speeches and at his Mass April 30 in Budapest’s Kossuth Lajos Square, he urged them to be open to everyone in need.
“How sad and painful it is to see closed doors,” he said in his homily. He cited “the closed doors of our selfishness with regard to others; the closed doors of our individualism amid a society of growing isolation; the closed doors of our indifference toward the underprivileged and those who suffer; the doors we close toward those who are foreign or unlike us, toward migrants or the poor.”
Orbán and President Katalin Novák, who have promoted the migration restrictions, were among the estimated 50,000 people attending the Mass in the square in front of the Hungarian Parliament building.
The pope also preached openness April 28 during a meeting with Hungary’s bishops, priests, religious, seminarians and catechists.
He called Hungarian Catholics to embrace “prophetic welcome” or “prophetic receptivity,” which, he said, “is about learning how to recognize the signs of God in the world around us, including places and situations that, while not explicitly Christian, challenge us and call for a response.”
Christians grow in “prophetic receptivity,” he said, by “bringing the Lord’s consolation to situations of pain and poverty in our world, being close to persecuted Christians, to migrants seeking hospitality, to people of other ethnic groups and to anyone in need.”
Pope Francis met with more than 10,000 Hungarian young people in a sports arena April 29 and listened to four of them share how they have overcome obstacles and grown in their faith.
One of them, Tódor Levcsenkó, a 17-year-old student in Miskolc, Hungary, and the son of an Eastern Catholic priest from the Eparchy of Mukachevo in Western Ukraine, told his peers that their sense of mission and purpose can be “numbed by the fact that we live in safety and peace,” but only a few miles away, across the border, “war and suffering are the order of the day.”
“May we have the courage to defend our faith and take up our call to be peacemakers,” he said.
Pope Francis echoed his call, telling the young people, “This is the real challenge: to take control of our lives in order to help our world live in peace. Each one of us should ask the uncomfortable question: What am I doing for others, for the church, for society? Do I think only about myself?”
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WASHINGTON (OSV News) – The Biden administration announced April 27 new steps it would take in an effort to reduce migrant arrivals at the U.S.-Mexico border when Title 42 expires in May.
In remarks at the State Department, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas said the administration would set up migrant processing centers in Latin America to screen those seeking entry as to whether they have a legal pathway.
The administration also will expand legal pathways for entry, while increasing deportations of those who enter the United States unlawfully.
Blinken said the centers would “improve qualified individuals’ access” to refugee resettlement, family reunification and lawful settlement in the U.S. or other countries.
U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, pictured with President Joe Biden in a March 1, 2021, file photo. Blinken and Mayorkas made issued a statement April 27, 2023, on steps the Biden administration will take in an effort to reduce migrant arrivals at the U.S.-Mexico border when Title 42 expires May 11. (OSV News photo/Kevin Lamarque, Reuters)
“These centers will take a hugely important step to prevent people from making the dangerous journey to the border by providing a much safer, legal option to migrate that they can pursue in and from their own countries,” Blinken said.
Mayorkas said that “when people have safe and orderly pathways to come to the United States, and face consequences for failing to do so, they use those pathways.”
Title 42 is a part of federal U.S. public health law granting the federal government some authority to implement emergency action to prevent the spread of contagious diseases by barring some individuals from entry.
Then-President Donald Trump implemented the policy in 2020 at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the move was seen as part of his administration’s broader attempts to reduce migration. The use of Title 42 to expel migrants at the southern border was criticized by some public health experts, who argued it was politically motivated rather than evidence-based.
Since then, Title 42 has been invoked more than 2.7 million times to expel migrants, including those seeking asylum, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. Title 42 is set to end May 11.
In a statement issued late April 28, Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, Texas, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration, said the bishops “strongly support increased refugee resettlement from Latin America and the Caribbean as a reliable pathway to lasting safety for those who have been forcibly displaced.”
He said the bishops “look forward to its close coordination with civil society and Congress to ensure the successful integration of these newcomers.” Bishop Seitz added that resources used for this “should not undermine existing access to resettlement for other refugees or impede the proper functioning of immigration processes generally.”
The bishops “are relieved that the Administration does not plan to detain vulnerable families, given the unjustifiable and immoral harms of doing so,” Bishop Seitz continued, but they also “are greatly concerned that such families, including those with young children, and others will be subjected to rushed proceedings without meaningful due process.”
The administration’s continued “reliance on expedited removal” coupled with “severe restrictions on asylum eligibility and access” is concerning, Bishop Seitz said, adding that those “most desperately in need of relief” will “bear the brunt of these measures.”
He acknowledged the “challenge of forced migration facing our country and hemisphere” is “complex” and said that achieving “the conditions necessary to sustainably reduce irregular migration” will only happen by overhauling the U.S. immigration system and making a long-term commitment to address root causes of migration and promote “integral human development throughout the Americas.”
J. Kevin Appleby, interim executive director of the Center for Migration Studies, told OSV News April 27 that the Biden administration’s announcement seems “a positive step forward.”
“Of course, as always, it depends on how something is implemented and what resources are devoted to the implementation that will decide whether it’s successful or not,” Appleby said.
“But it gives asylum- seekers an opportunity to tell their stories and have their cases adjudicated without taking a dangerous journey north.”
Appleby, a former adviser on migration policy for the U.S. bishops, said that for the last quarter century, “Congress has not had the political courage to reform the immigration system.”
“So it’s left to the executive branch to come up with these responses, when Congress should be working with the administration to pass legislation to overhaul our immigration laws,” he said.
Republicans have made immigration a key part of their criticism of the Biden administration, accusing him of lax policies. In a statement reacting to Biden’s 2024 reelection bid, former President Donald Trump, in the midst of his third bid for the White House after Biden defeated him in 2020, said, “Under Biden, the Southern Border has been abolished — and millions of illegal aliens have been released into our communities.”
A fact sheet from the State Department about the new actions said, “The lifting of the Title 42 order does not mean the border is open.”
The fact sheet said that any individuals who unlawfully cross the U.S. southern border after Title 42 is lifted will be processed for expedited removal, barred from reentry for at least five years if they are ordered removed and would be ineligible for asylum “absent an applicable exception.”
“To avoid these consequences, individuals are encouraged to use the many lawful pathways the United States has expanded over the past two years,” the fact sheet said.
The U.S. bishops and other Catholic immigration advocates have criticized Title 42 as well as the Biden administration’s continued use of the Trump-era policy.
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BUDAPEST, Hungary (CNS) – Paying homage to Hungary’s history, culture and location in the heart of Europe, Pope Francis pushed against the notion that the country needed to insulate itself to protect its identity.
Hungarian children in traditional dress present Pope Francis with salt and bread, a customary welcome for honored guests, as he arrives at the international airport in Budapest, Hungary, April 28, 2023. The pope was beginning a three-day trip to Hungary’s capital. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)
As expected, in his first speech in Hungary — to government and civic leaders and diplomats serving in Budapest — the pope acknowledged efforts to protect traditional values, but insisted those values include supporting European unity, welcoming migrants and working to end the war in neighboring Ukraine.
The “passionate quest of a politics of community and the strengthening of multilateral relations seems a wistful memory from a distant past,” he said April 28 in his speech at the former Carmelite monastery that now houses the office of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
“More and more,” the pope said, “enthusiasm for building a peaceful and stable community of nations seems to be cooling, as zones of influence are marked out, differences accentuated, nationalism is on the rise and ever harsher judgments and language are used in confronting others.”
The 86-year-old pope, who was released from the hospital April 1 after what the Vatican said was a bout of bronchitis and who frequently has been using a wheelchair or walker because of knee problems, simply used a cane when he walked the length of the ITA Airways plane to greet journalists during the two-hour flight from Rome.
He joked about his health – “weeds never die” – and, in response to a Polish journalist who thanked him for defending St. John Paul II, the pope described as “foolishness” rumors that the Polish pope was somehow involved in the disappearance in 1983 of Emanuela Orlandi, a 15-year-old Vatican resident.
Pope Francis continued using the cane instead of a wheelchair as he walked down the red carpet at the Budapest airport and around the presidential Sándor Palace where he met privately for 25 minutes with Hungarian President Katalin Novák and then for 20 minutes with Orbán.
Novák, welcoming Pope Francis to the meeting with government and civic representatives, told him Hungarians expected to receive encouragement from him in their quest to help make Europe “more peaceful, more democratic and stronger.”
“Over the past 30 years,” she told him, Hungarian Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants have joined forces in “the ecumenism of the preservation of Christian values,” specifically regarding marriage, family life and abortion.
In his speech, Pope Francis told those gathered that around the globe politics is showing signs of an “adolescent belligerence” that seems more about stirring up emotions than resolving problems.
“Peace will never come as the result of the pursuit of individual strategic interests, but only from policies capable of looking to the bigger picture, to the development of everyone: policies that are attentive to individuals, to the poor and to the future, and not merely to power, profit and present prospects,” Pope Francis said.
That attention, he said, must allow room for the different countries of the European Union and the different communities within each nation to assert their own identities but not at the cost of denigrating or denying the rights of others.
Mentioning some areas of common ground with Orbán’s government, Pope Francis described as “ideological colonization” efforts to promote acceptance across Europe of “so-called gender theory,” which sees gender as a social construct rather than a biological fact, and “reductive concepts of freedom, for example by vaunting as progress a senseless ‘right to abortion,’ which is always a tragic defeat.”
“How much better it would be to build a Europe centered on the human person and on its peoples,” he said, pointing positively to Hungary’s pro-family policies that encourage married couples to have children.
But Pope Francis also used the words of St. Stephen, the 11th-century king of Hungary, to draw attention to the theme of migration, a major area of difference with Orbán who, since 2015, has promoted a “no migrants” policy.
The sainted king, the pope said, told his people: “I urge you to show favor not only to relations and kin, or to the powerful and wealthy, or to your neighbors and fellow countrymen, but also to foreigners and all who come to you.”
Migration, Pope Francis said, is a “heated” topic in today’s world, but “for those who are Christians, our basic attitude cannot differ from that which St. Stephen recommended,” a lesson learned from Jesus, “who identified himself with the stranger needing to be welcomed” in Matthew 25.
Pope Francis said it was “urgent” that Europe as a whole devise “safe and legal ways” for those fleeing violence, poverty and climate change to enter its borders.
Migration cannot be stemmed by a general attitude of rejecting the possibility, he said, “but must be embraced in order to prepare for a future that, unless it is shared, will not exist.”
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A relic of Blessed Carlo Acutis — author of the Eucharistic Miracle website as well as the first millennial to be beatified — will be available for veneration at several locations in the Diocese of Erie beginning May 23.
In addition, a relic of St. Manuel González García, known as the Bishop of the Abandoned Tabernacle, will be included in this event offered as part of the national Eucharistic Revival.
All are invited to take advantage of this inspirational opportunity before the relics leave the United States to continue their global tour in the coming weeks. Find dates, locations and times for public veneration at www.eriercd.org/relics.html.
Shown are Men’s Conference Committee members: Left to Right, 1st row: John Witkosky, Raphael Micca, Dr. Chris Carr, Dr. Lou Guarnieri, Tony DePaola, Bill Leandri, Kevin Burleigh, Rev. Brian Van Fossen Chaplain for the Men’s Conference, 2nd row: Dennis Shovlin, Mike Kilmer Chairman for the Men’s Conference, Henry Pospieszalski, Jim Gerichten, Ralph Marino, Joe Adcroft, Joe Alinosky, and Gerard Schmidt. Also present were Chris Calore and Ed Niewinski.
The Eighth Annual Be A Man Catholic Men’s Conference Will Be Held Saturday, October 7th, 2023, at Holy Redeemer High School, 159 S. Pennsylvania Ave., Wilkes-Barre, Pa. 18701. This Year’s Theme Is “Stand Fast In The Faith.” Registration begins at 7:00 am (coffee available). A 7:15 am Rosary will be prayed. The Conference will be between 8:00 am and 3:00 pm. Three outstanding Catholic Speakers have been scheduled. There will be Eucharistic Adoration, Confessions, and Mass Offered by Bishop Joseph Bambera.
The fee is $40 (Early Bird $30), Students $15, Priest/Deacons FREE.
Register on line at www.BeACatholicMan.com. Or mail your check (payable to “Be a Catholic Man”) to: Be a Catholic Man c/o William Leandri, Treasurer 239 Hayfield Rd. Shavertown, PA 18708 Attn: Men’s Conference, Also put Men’s Conference on the memo line of the check.
For further information contact Mike Kilmer 570-746-0100 or michaelkilmer71@gmail.com
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SCRANTON – For many young people, their birthday is cause for celebration. Due to high inflation and financial challenges, however, not every family is able to afford the ‘extras’ associated with a big bash.
Catholic school students from five elementary schools in Lackawanna County recently came together to make sure no local child will be without a proper celebration for their big day.
During different retreat days held in Lent, students at each school brought in items to create 188 “birthday bags” filled with boxed cake mix, icing, sprinkles, candles, balloons and a disposable cake pan.
“Each grade brought in something small to contribute and created the completed bags that we then donated to local food pantries,” Liz Devine, elementary school guidance counselor, explained. “The students also created personalized birthday cards to go in the bags.”
Second through eighth grade students, 811 in all, participated in the Lenten retreats and help to create the birthday bags. The schools involved in the project are Saint Mary of Mount Carmel School in Dunmore, La Salle Academy in Jessup, Our Lady of Peace School in Clarks Green, All Saints Academy in Scranton and St. Clare/St. Paul School in Scranton.
“Our retreat was based on the passage from the Bible of Jesus feeding the 5,000,” Devine said. “We read the Bible passage and reflected on it. It was pointed out to the students how the boy in the story only gave a meager little meal to Jesus and Jesus created His miracle and even had extra left over.”
The day also included small group team building activities, prayerful introspection and guided imagery reflection.
Devine says many of the students recognize there are people in their own community who do not have enough money for regular meals, never mind a special birthday celebration.
“Catholic schools in the Diocese of Scranton distinguish themselves not only by their academic excellence but by how they incorporate a faith-filled duty to serve others,” she added.
Each school selected the local food pantry in which to donate the birthday bags created.
The recipients include Catherine McAuley Center in Scranton, Saint Ann Parish food pantry in Scranton, Saint Patrick Parish food pantry in Scranton, NEPA Youth Center in Scranton, Queen of Angels Parish in Jessup, and the Montdale food pantry.
In reflecting on the project, Devine considers it a big success because it “challenged the students to give of themselves to others, even in the smallest way!”
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SCRANTON – For Sean Rodgers, scouting is much more than just spending time outdoors.
“Scouting is the best part of my life. I started way back in first grade and now I’m a junior in high school,” he explained. “I’ve learned so much more than tying knots and building fires. I’ve learned leadership skills. I’ve learned public speaking skills. I’ve learned what it means to have good character, to be a good person.”
His friend, Simon Basham, agrees.
“Scouting is an amazing program,” Basham added. “You get team building skills. You just learn so many things that you can use in life.”
Rodgers and Basham, both members of Boy Scout Troop 106 in Mountain Top, were among 33 young people from parishes around the Diocese of Scranton recognized during the Diocese of Scranton’s annual Scout Mass on April 23, 2023. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this is the first time since 2019 the Scout Mass has been celebrated in person.
The Most Reverend Joseph C. Bambera, Bishop of Scranton, served as principal celebrant and homilist for the Scout Mass. Reverend Jonathan Kuhar, Diocesan Scout Chaplain, concelebrated the 10 a.m. liturgy, which coincided with the Third Sunday of Easter.
“My brothers and sisters in scouting, never underestimate the power that you are given as baptized Christians, as you serve and as you build up the communities in which you live,” Bishop Bambera said during his homily. “You have the ability to impart the very love and mercy of God to people who are in need. What a treasure that is – thank you for embracing it!”
The goals of Catholic youth ministry align very well with the goals of scouting: character development, citizenship training, personal fitness and leadership development.
Allison Van Pelt, who has served as an altar server and sacristan at Saint Jude Parish, believes the morals and values taught in scouting help to empower young people to live as disciples of Jesus Christ in our world today.
“In scouting, I have the Scout oath and the Scout law and in the church we have all of the teachings from the bible and the scriptures and all of these give me a very good point of view to follow and they really help guide me throughout my life,” Van Pelt said.
At the end of the Mass, the Ad Altare Dei Emblem and Pope Pius XII Emblem were presented to the young adults who had fulfilled the requirements for the award. The Ad Altare Dei program centers on the Sacraments and the program for the Pope Pius XII emblem helps scouts explore vocations (single, married, religious, ordained) and ministries in the Church as calls from God. It includes youth-led discussions on current issues facing the Church and society.
“I’ve worked so hard for these over the past two or three years and just to get them, it is definitely a big accomplishment for me,” Michael Grandzol of Saint Jude Parish said.
Since this was the first time in four years that the Scout Mass has been celebrated, four individuals were also presented with the Saint George Emblem, which honors a member of the laity or clergy, scout or non-scout alike, who have made significant and outstanding contributions to the spiritual development of Catholic youths through scouting.
The 2023 emblem went to Leonard Omolecki of Saint Faustina Parish in Nanticoke. Elizabeth Redington from Gate of Heaven Parish in Dallas earned the recognition in 2022, Mark Kuloszewski of Saint Lucy Parish received it for 2021 and C.J. Hughes of Saint Gregory Parish in Clarks Green received the honor in 2020.
After all of the awards had been presented, Bishop Bambera once again thanked all of the young men and woman honored who have committed themselves to service and living as faithful disciples.
“We are very proud to have you with us and most especially to have you all engaged in the good work that you do on behalf of our church and on behalf of our society and our world. We need more young men and women life yourself. We are so blessed to have all of you,” Bishop Bambera said.
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(OSV News) – Ahead of an annual day of prayer for vocations, a newly released report shows what one researcher called greater “consistency of age,” more diverse educational backgrounds and a commitment to Eucharistic adoration among men preparing for priestly ordination.
On April 25, the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University released the 2023 “Survey of Ordinands to the Priesthood,” a report made directly to the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
New deacons from the Pontifical North American College are pictured during their ordination in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican Sept. 29, 2022. Twenty-two seminarians from 17 U.S. dioceses and one from the Archdiocese of Sydney were ordained to the transitional diaconate. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)
The report coincides with the 60th annual World Day of Prayer for Vocations, celebrated April 30, the Fourth Sunday of Easter, which is also known as Good Shepherd Sunday in the Latin Church. The Gospel passage (Jn 10:1-10) for the Mass highlights Jesus’ role as the Good Shepherd.
The online survey, which CARA has overseen since 2006, was completed by 334 of the 458 total ordinands from both diocesan and religious order seminaries who were invited to participate. The ordinands represented 116 U.S. dioceses and 24 religious institutes.
CARA’s executive director, Jesuit Father Thomas Gaunt, told OSV News the age of men set to be ordained this year has “started to level out,” with “more consistently younger men entering seminary and beginning their theological studies in their early 20s — basically after having finished college — and then being ordained four to five years or so later.”
Overall, this year’s ordinands are on average 33 years old, with ordinands from religious institutes generally four years older than their diocesan counterparts.
That trend contrasts with “a notable number of older vocations” seen some “20 to 30 years ago,” said Father Gaunt. “Now, it’s a little more unusual to see a seminarian or someone entering the novitiate for a religious community entering at age 40 or 45.”
Among 2023’s ordinands, the elementary school (32%) and high school (26%) years were the peak periods for them in first considering a vocation, followed by the college years (19%).
The data also showed what Father Gaunt called a “steady increase in Hispanic ordinands year over year,” with 16% of the 2023 class identifying as Hispanic/Latino — a trendline set to rise to about 20% by 2028.
White ordinands accounted for 64% of the 2023 class, with 10% Asian and Pacific Islander, 6% Black or African, and 3% representing other ethnic backgrounds.
A significant number of the 2023 ordinands (25%) were born abroad. After the U.S., the most common countries of birth were Mexico (5%), Vietnam (3%), Nigeria (3%) and Colombia (2%).
That statistic is “basically on par” with one showing that “fully one quarter of all Catholics in this country are foreign born,” explained Father Gaunt.
While the majority (89%) of ordinands were not homeschooled, the data indicated the 11% who were educated at home (for an average of 8 years, among the 2023 class) could rise to an estimated 13% by 2028.
Ordinands who attended Catholic elementary school represented 43% of this year’s class; 34% of the 2023 ordinands attended Catholic high schools, and 35% attended Catholic colleges. Two thirds of the class (66%) had attended parish religious education programs.
The majority of 2023 ordinands had obtained a college (42%) or graduate (16%) degree prior to entering the seminary, with 18% having had some college or trade school study.
An array of pre-seminary areas of study among the ordinands have “added a whole richness to the priesthood,” said Father Gaunt.
“They begin this study with college degrees in their fields of interest or specialty, so you have a number of men coming in with bachelor’s degrees in business, finance, chemical engineering, English, education, history,” he said.
Such diversity also was reflected in the full-time work experience of ordinands prior to entering the seminary, with 21% employed in business, 18% in education, 14% in sales or customer service, and 13% in restaurant or food services.
Most of the 2023 ordinands (74%) had no educational debt upon entering the seminary. The remaining 26% averaged just over $29,500 of debt, with the lowest amount reported at $1,500 and the highest at $126,000.
Diocesan ordinands (averaging $26,579) tended to have more than double the educational debt of their religious order counterparts (averaging $11,887). Family members (44%) provided the greatest amount of assistance in paying down ordinands’ debt, followed by the Knights of Columbus Fund for Vocations (24%) and parishes (10%).
Regular Eucharistic adoration figured heavily in the pre-seminary prayer practices of the class of 2023, cited by 73% of the survey participants. Following adoration was the rosary (66%), prayer group or Bible study (45%), high school retreats (37%) and “lectio divina” (35%).
Survey respondents listed among their pre-seminary activities parish youth groups (52%), Catholic campus ministry (27%), Boy Scouts (25%), parish young adult groups (23%) and the Knights of Columbus (23%).
A majority of the 2023 ordinands, 72%, had been altar servers; 51% had been lectors, 40% extraordinary ministers of holy Communion and 33% catechists.
Most cited parish priests (63%) as those who most encouraged their vocation, followed by parishioners (44%), friends (40%), mothers (37%) and fathers (29%).
Just under half of the ordinands (48%) reported being discouraged from pursuing their vocations, with another family member (21%) or friend (21%) usually cited.
Seminary “come and see” weekends were attended by 49% of the ordinands, particularly among those entering religious orders (75%).
Overall, the report offers “hope” regarding priestly vocations, said Father Gaunt, especially as demographers continue to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on religious practices.
“We want to get a couple of more years out from the pandemic,” he said. “We’re still not sure what’s an ordinary response, and what is more pandemic-related. … We’ll tell you in five years.”
