November 11, 2013, Volume VII, Number 45

November 11, 2013, Volume VII, Number 45

FEAST OF SAINT MARTIN OF TOURS

Monday of the Thirty-Second Week in Ordinary Time

Veterans Day in the United States

Feast of Saint Josaphat – Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Feast of Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini – November 13

Feast of Saint Albert the great – Friday, November 15, 2013

Feast of Saint Margaret of Scotland – Saturday, November 16, Feast of Saint Gertrude – Saturday, November 16, 2013

YEAR OF FAITH - Oct. 11, 2012, through Nov. 24, 2013

Question of the Week

For Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, November 17, 2013

“It will lead to your giving testimony. . . . By your perseverance you will secure your lives.” What testimony could you give to defend yourself from accusation? What words have been given to you by the Spirit that you could publicly proclaim about your faith? What wisdom do you find when you profess the “Mystery of Faith” after the consecration in the Mass? Whose lives have become a “model for you”? Whom do you wish to “imitate” as a believer and witness to the teachings of Jesus Christ? Whose perseverance in the faith provides you with a sense of security in your own beliefs?

NCCL News

Honoring our Military Chaplains: Servants of Church and Country

The annual observance of Veterans Dayin the United States on November 11thhas its roots in the armistice that ended World War I hostilities in 1918. The armistice between the Allied nations and Germany went into effect on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed thereafter that November 11 be observed as "Armistice Day." In 1954, Congress passed legislation thatrenamed the federal holiday "Veterans Day," in recognition of the service of veterans of all U.S. Wars.

We remember all those who have served our country in times of war. Among those veterans are our military chaplains.Five military chaplains, all Catholic, have received the Medal of Honor since the Civil War. Two of them are on the path to sainthood as their stories of bravery have touched people the world over. Their example inspires a new generation of men to be chaplains as well.

Leading up to Veterans Day 2013, the USCCB Media Blog will feature a series of posts about past, current and future chaplains, plus the extraordinary history of Catholics priests as Medal of Honor recipients. Links to the blog posts are below.

• Of Medal of Honor Winners and Saints
• Criteria to Award the Medal of Honor
• Called from Underwater

Philippine’s Typhoon Victims

NCCL offers its prayers and supports to the many people who were affected by Super Typhoon Haiyan,possibly the strongest storm ever to make landfall, slammed into the Philippines on November 7. We pray especially for those who lost their lives and for the comfort of the families and relatives who mourn their loss.

Thanks to extensive preparations, Catholic Relief Services is already responding. Unfortunately, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck the region just a month ago, leaving the region devastated and with a shortage of supplies. Battered with two major disasters, the Filipino people need our help to survive and recover.

Joe Curry, the CRS representative for the Philippines, spoke about people affected most. "In rural areas, anywhere from 30% to 40% of the population would be very poor, including farmers and fishermen, earning around $2 to $3 per day. The poorest are the people who are most affected by disasters like this. They live in the most fragile houses that are susceptible to damage."

As the storm continues to barrel through Asia, CRS is working with their partners in Vietnam as they brace for landfall on Sunday morning.Please give generously and help all those affected by Super Typhoon Haiyan and the recent earthquake by making a donation today.

NCCL Reaches 500 Likes on Facebook

Thanks to the many of you who invited your friends to Like Us on Facebook. We reached our first milestone of 500. Let’s aim for 1000 by Christmas. Do your part and invite your friends to Like Us at

Rural Catechesis Committee Has New Co-Chairs

NCCL President Bill Miller has announced the following appointments.

I am delighted to announce that Maria Cruz-Cordoba of the Archdiocese of Santa Fe and Mary Helen Llanezof the Diocese of Las Cruces have agreed to Co-chair the Rural Catechesis Committee. They are both current members of the committee and Maria is a member of the NCCL Representative Council. (It is an NCCL requirement that at least one of the co-chairs of a working committee be a member of the Representative Council.)

On behalf of the Board of NCCL, the Representative Council and the full membership of the organization, I thank Maria and Mary Helen for their willingness to serve in this capacity. Moreover, I thank you, the members of the Rural Catechesis Committee, for your patience during this time of transition and wish you every blessing as you continue to dedicate yourselves to this vitally important ministry of rural catechesis.

Theme for 2014 Catechetical Sunday Announced

Teaching about God’s Gift of Forgiveness is the 2014 theme for Catechetical Sunday.

Neil Parent Receives Cardinal Cushing Medal for Support for Catholic Research

The Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University awarded Neil A. Parent the Cardinal Cushing Medal for Support for Catholic Research for his leadership on the Emerging Models of Pastoral Leadership Project. A short slide show of the event can be seen at 2013 CARA Awards Ceremony.

To mark the occasion, and in celebration of Neil's involvement in the Emerging Models Project, CARA researcher Mark Gray lectured on the state of Catholic parish life in the United States. His talk, Steady Changes in U.S. Catholic Parish Life, is availablehere.

Legislative Prayer

At the US Supreme Court the town of Greece, New York, is testing the limits of public prayer and the First Amendment. "This case is about Christians aggressively imposing themselves upon their fellow citizens with the power of government," says plaintiff lawyer Douglas Laycock. Butdefense attorney Tom Hungar warned that the case could lead to "government regulating the theological content of prayers,prescribing what is orthodox and what is not in religion." Watch/read Legislative Prayer on Religion & Ethics Newsweekly.

Prayer for All Faiths

Susan Dunn, a professor of arts and humanities at Williams College, wrote the following Letter to the Editor of the New York Times in response to the inquiry of Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. for an example of a prayer that would be acceptable to people of all faiths. It is not what I have been led to expectfrom our first two presidents.

Why not follow the lead of Washington and Jefferson?

Washington concluded his First Inaugural Address by thanking “the benign Parent of the human race [who] has been pleased to favour the American people, with opportunities for deliberating in perfect tranquility ... on a form of Government, for the security of their Union, and the advancement of their happiness.”

Jefferson ended his Second Inaugural Address by asking for “the favor of that Being in whose hands we are ... and to whose goodness I ask you to join with me in supplications, that he will so enlighten the minds of your servants [and] guide their councils.”

Washington and Jefferson simply thanked the benign Parent for the gift of freedom to use our minds well.

USCCB President “Great Moral Urgency,” Pass Immigration Reform Legislation

In a November 7 letter addressed to Speaker of the House John Boehner, Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, called upon members of the House of Representatives to address immigration reform legislation “as soon as possible, ideally prior to the end of the calendar year.”
In stating the case for action, Cardinal Dolan cited the ongoing suffering of immigrants and their families caused by a broken immigration system. “As pastors, we [the bishops] witness each day the human consequences of a broken immigration system,” he wrote. “Families are separated through deportation, migrant workers are exploited in the workplace; and migrants die in the desert.”
Cardinal Dolan also wrote that keeping undocumented workers as a permanent underclass is a stain on the soul of our nation. “As a moral matter, our nation cannot continue to receive the benefits of the work and contributions of undocumented immigrants without extending them the protection of the law. Keeping these human beings as a permanent underclass of workers who are unable to assert their rights or enjoy the fruits of their labor is a stain on the soul of the nation.”
Cardinal Dolan concluded that passage of immigration reform is a matter of great moral urgency that cannot wait any longer for action. “The House has a responsibility to debate and attempt to resolve public policy issues that challenge the nation. Immigration is a challenge that has confounded our nation for years, with little action from our federally elected officials. It is a matter of great moral urgency that cannot wait any longer for action.”
The full text of the letter to the Speaker of the House of Representatives is available at Human Life and Dignity.

Women Religious Ask Pope for World Day of Prayer Against Trafficking
After Pope Francis entrusted two Vatican academies to study the problem of human trafficking, a group of women religious asked the pope to raise greater awareness in the church about the issue by establishing a worldwide day of prayer and fasting. "The pope was very interested in our suggestion and asked us what date we would like the day to be," said Consolata Sister Eugenia Bonetti.
"We told him Feb. 8 -- the feast day of St. Josephine Bakhita," a Sudanese slave who found freedom in Italy and became a nun in the late 19th century. She said the idea for a worldwide day of prayer came from "the need to do something that joins us together" to tackle the global problem; some dioceses and parishes are active on the issue while others are unaware or indifferent, she said.
Sister Eugenia, a leader among religious women in Italy working against human trafficking -- particularly women and young girls forced into prostitution -- was one of about 80 people attending a Nov. 2-3 working group on trafficking at the Vatican.
While he was archbishop of Buenos Aires, the future Pope Francis had been a strong supporter of local activists and initiatives fighting human trafficking and supporting rescued victims. Bishop Sanchez told journalists Nov. 4 that the pope wants to see the working group's findings and recommendations, and that "he will do something important" with the information. The pope told him recently that the academies' attention to the problem was very important to him and that the work that came out of it would be "valuable," the bishop said.
Worldwide, at least 21 million people are victims of forced labor, including sexual exploitation, and traffickers bring in an estimated $32 billion annually because of their illicit activities, the U.S. State Department's 2012 Trafficking in Persons report said. An estimated 100,000 to 300,000 minors are victims of sex trafficking at any given time, according to the U.S. Justice Department.
The November meeting was the first time the Vatican academies had dedicated a session to studying human trafficking, the bishop said. They will have another meeting next year in the run-up to a larger gathering in 2015, the bishop told journalists. "The pope, ever since he was an archbishop, had already intuited this serious social problem," Bishop Sanchez told Vatican Radio. "We were dumbstruck for not having figured it out beforehand." You can read the completePress Release.

The Importance of the New Evangelization

Cardinal Óscar Andrés Rodríguez Maradiaga SDB, Archbishop of Tegucigalpa, presented the following thoughts on The Importance of the New Evangelization at the University of Dallas Ministry Conference. Here are a few excerpts from his talk. If interested, you can read the entire talk, The Importance of the New Evangelization.

No ministry can be placed above this dignity common to all. Neither the clergy are “the men of God,” nor are the laity “the men of the world.” That is a false dichotomy. To speak correctly, we should not speak of clergy and laity, but instead of community and ministry. All the baptized are consecrated as a spiritual house and a holy priesthood (LG 10). Therefore, not only we clergymen are “priests,” but also, side by side with the ordained ministry, there is the common priesthood of the faithful. This change in the concept of priesthood is a fundamental one: “In Christ the priesthood is changed” (Hebrews 7: 12). Indeed, the first trait of the priesthood of Jesus is that “he had to be made like his brothers in every respect.”

With the New Evangelization we restart (start anew) from the beginning: we once more become the Church as proclaimer, servant, and Samaritan.

Vatican II does not make the foundations of the Church into a polarizing outline of two extremes, “clergy-laity,” thus robbing the Christian assembly of their own protagonism, participation and responsibility. A presbyter is, above all, a “minister of the Word,” who must communicate to all the life that emanates from Christ, and for that reason devotes himself primarily to the altar and to the celebration of the sacraments. No one can replace him in this regard. But the field of laity offers plenty of spaces, alternatives and scenarios where he still does not make his presence felt in an incisive, decisive and courageous manner. Certainly the Church is more than a democracy, since the religious experience of faith allows her to open herself to a dialogue in pluralism and to share in action the great common causes of life and of the whole being of the universe.

The council opened with enormous sympathy to the world, to science, to progress, to human values, to the collaboration between science and faith, to respecting the autonomy of the creation and the rights of reason, of science, and of liberty.

Catholic Volunteer Network Alumni 'Transformed' by Year of Service
Former participants in the Catholic Volunteer Network have remained involved in church and civil work long after their service commitment was done, according to a study released Nov. 8. The study was commissioned by Catholic Volunteer Network-- which is now celebrating its 50th anniversary -- and was conducted by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University. It was based on online surveys filled out by more than 5,000 of 18,000 former Catholic Volunteer Network volunteers from February to June 2013.

Jesuit Father Tom Gaunt, CARA's executive director, said the study highlights "the profound effect one year of service has on young adults" which he said "truly transformed" them. He also said their response reveals how the program has played and continues to play an important role in forming a "cadre of leadership" for the church. Watch a video on CARA's Report.

The priest said that a key finding of the study was that 60 percent of Catholic Volunteer Network alumni are currently engaged in church activities. He said many of those who came to the organization were already invested in their faith and then continued with this commitment while those in their peer group have shown a diminished level of involvement in the church. He also noted that the experience had a positive effect on marriage stability since the rate of divorce among respondents was 9 percent, which is significantly less than the 25 percent average among Catholics.

Vatican Outlines Plans for Urgent Synod Discussion of Family

The Vatican has unveiled the preparatory document for the extraordinary general assembly of the Synod of Bishops, which will meet in October 2014 to discuss pastoral challenges for the family.

At a November 5 press conference introducing the document, Archbishop Lorenzo Baldiserri, the secretary-general of the Synod, remarked that the world’s bishops will consider the topic at two meetings: the extraordinary assembly in 2014 and a subsequent “ordinary” general assembly, scheduled for 2015, which will also focus on the family. The preparation for the 2014 session may be somewhat unusual, he said—both because it will be an extraordinary session and because of plans by Pope Francis to revise the workings of the Synod.

The extraordinary meeting of the Synod, the archbishop said, reflects the Pope’s judgment that the question under discussion—in this case, pastoral care for the family—“requires rapid definition.” He said that the crisis of family live “creates a situation of genuine pastoral urgency.”

Cardinal Peter Erdo of Budapest, who has been chosen by Pope Francis to be relator-general for the 2014 Synod meeting, also addressed the November 5 press conference. He observed that the preparatory document for the Synod meeting sees the issue of family life as closely connected with marriage. The Church, he said, sees the family as an institution of divine origin. He said: “It is not, therefore, a mere invention of human society or, much less, of some purely human power, but rather a natural reality that has been elevated by Christ the Lord in the context of divine grace.” The preparatory document clearly sounds a note of urgency about the decline of family life. “Never before has proclaiming the Gospel on the Family in this context been more urgent and necessary,” the document states.

The document lists a large number of major concerns about contemporary family life: the rise in acceptance of divorce, the increase in cohabitation, the influence of feminist ideologies hostile to Christian marriage, the “culture of non-commitment,” the corrosive effect of migration on family ties, the spread of contraceptive practices, the use of artificial forms of reproduction, the recognition of same-sex unions. The document goes on to explain the Christian understanding of marriage, and explore how that understanding can be communicated effectively today.