The Deacon's Bench
If you haven’t seen it yet, check out the story below, from WPLG, which tells the wonderful story of how the baseball star saw a little boy with Down syndrome during a game — and decided to do something wonderful. Read more
If you haven’t seen it yet, check out the story below, from WPLG, which tells the wonderful story of how the baseball star saw a little boy with Down syndrome during a game — and decided to do something wonderful. Read more
From CNA: A British judge has authorized doctors to perform an abortion on a pregnant Catholic woman with developmental disabilities and a mood disorder, despite the objections of the woman’s mother and the woman herself. The woman is 22 weeks pregnant. “I am acutely conscious of the fact that for the State to order a woman to have a termination where it appears that she doesn’t want it is an immense intrusion,” said Justice Nathalie Lieven in her ruling in the... Read more
This sounds, to put it mildly, very suspect. Details are in the statement from the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston: Yesterday, a number of Chancery Departments, along with at least one Pastor, began receiving copies of a letter addressed to Bishop George Sheltz from an individual identifying herself as Yannah Nowak. Her letters do not have a return address or any contact information and our efforts to identify any individual by that name have been unsuccessful. In the letter, the author makes an... Read more
A few thoughts from my first Corpus Christi homily, from 2007: When I was young and first living on my own – way back before I was married – I decided to try and teach myself to cook. The “man-sized” TV dinners weren’t cutting it. So I got a couple of cookbooks, including one called “Cooking for Men,” which included recipes for things like meat loaf, chili and pot roast. But the most adventurous thing I attempted was trying to... Read more
Details: A priest in Mexico City has been arrested for murder barely a week after he celebrated a funeral Mass for the victim. Father Francisco Javier Bautista was arrested June 19 by Mexico City judicial officers and charged over the killing of 29-year-old Hugo Leonardo Avendano Chavez, the Catholic News Service (CNS) reports. Avendano Chavez recently graduated with a master’s degree from a Catholic university, worked with Father Bautista at Christ the Savior Parish and had aspirations of entering the... Read more
I am in St. Petersburg this week for the Catholic Media Conference, and heard Msgr. Kennedy give this address. It was, to say the least, sobering. Details, from CNS: In a remarkably frank and detailed speech, the Vatican official heading the department charged with reviewing clergy sexual abuse allegations told an assembly of Catholic journalists that his investigators and the press “share the same goal, which is the protection of minors, and we have the same wish to leave the... Read more
Once again, as is the custom there, Los Angeles welcomes deacons and their wives (though it seems to have moved away from the practice of introducing them as “deacon couples.”) From Angelus: On Saturday, June 8, Archbishop José H. Gomez ordained 11 new permanent deacons for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. “From the beginning of the Church, our Lord has set apart some men for a sacred ministry,” Archbishop Gomez told them in his homily. “But the ministry of the... Read more
One of them is my friend and blog neighbor Father Matthew Schneider, who is quoted here: By and large, opinions about Francis are as predictable as they are militant. Theological and political liberals take a positive view of the Holy Father; conservatives, not so much. Those on the Church’s right wing have strongly supported the 2016 dubia (a request for clarification of the apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia), and many defended the 2017 correctio filialis (filial correction) – though most stopped... Read more
My friend Msgr. Michael Hardiman from the Diocese of Brooklyn is moving to a new assignment, to pastor another parish, and he posted this message today on Facebook, from his parish bulletin. You probably don’t know Msgr. Hardiman, but you probably know priests like him. This is a lovely summation of what it means to be a parish priest. A Message from the Pastor When I was ordained a deacon and sent to St. Pius V in South Jamaica, Queens... Read more
From Catholic New York: “The Church needs you as it needed those first deacons,” Cardinal Dolan told 14 men of the archdiocese before ordaining them to the permanent diaconate at a Mass June 15 at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. “Once again, the needs of the Church are abundant,” the cardinal said in his homily. “And those of God’s people who are searching, who are hurting, who are hungry, sick, homeless, alone— they can never be ignored. “We thank God for the... Read more
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