ROME (CNS) — On the fourth ballot of the April 18-19 conclave to elect a successor to Pope John Paul II, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger went from being five votes shy of election to having seven more than the 77 needed. The count, along with a few details of the brief conclave leading to the election of Pope Benedict XVI, was published Sept. 23 in Limes, a respected Italian journal usually focused on geopolitics. On each of the four ballots, the magazine said, the prelate receiving the second-highest number of votes was Argentine Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Buenos Aires. Limes said its information came from the diary of an anonymous cardinal who, while acknowledging he was violating his oath of secrecy, felt the results of the conclave votes should be part of the historic record. The journal said it confirmed the diary’s count with other cardinals.

Benedictine order grows

ROME (CNS) — While religious orders worldwide continue to deal with declining numbers, the ranks of lay people making a commitment as Benedictines are swelling. Although speakers said lay people have had a spiritual association with Benedictine monasteries for centuries, the Sept. 19-25 World Congress of Benedictine Oblates in Rome was the first international gathering sponsored by the order. Some 300 people representing more than 25,000 oblates associated with close to 1,200 Benedictine monasteries around the world attended the meeting. Oblates live with or are associated with the Benedictines but do not make vows. The largest group of delegates came from the United States, which has at least 10,000 oblates, said Lavern Hayworth, an oblate from Oregon’s Mount Angel Abbey and the lay leader of the North American oblate association. Despite the declining number of Benedictines, she told Catholic News Service, "oblates are spreading Benedictine spirituality, and it is touching thousands of people around the world."

Enchiladas good for dialogue

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — A U.S. theologian said the best milieu for interreligious discussions with his Buddhist friends is over a hot plate of cheese enchiladas. Father James Fredericks, professor of theology at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, said people often talk of interreligious dialogue as being based on big spiritual mysteries, "like the Holy Spirit or some transcendent reality, but no, the foundations of interreligious dialogue in Los Angeles are cheese enchiladas." Sharing a meal is not only "the basis for dialogue, it’s the fruit of a dialogue" that even involves the Catholic food service workers at the university’s kitchens "who, in loving service, do the best job they can to cook these enchiladas for these monks from Sri Lanka," he told Catholic News Service Sept. 27.

Ban on convicted priests

CORNWALL, Ontario (CNS) — A Canadian bishops’ task force recommended banning priests and pastoral staffers convicted of sexual abuse from any public church ministry for the rest of their lives. The long-anticipated report on how Canada’s bishops are dealing with clergy sexual abuse called on all bishops to publicly and individually commit themselves to a strict method of dealing with the problem. It also called for public reporting on how the church is doing in its battle to eradicate abuse.

Rabbi, bishops, visit Auschwitz

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Rabbi Joseph Ehrenkranz has been involved in Catholic-Jewish dialogue for decades and believes "you must not underestimate the value of friendship." The rabbi, executive director of the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Conn., led six Catholic bishops on a prayer and study tour of Poland’s Auschwitz death camp in late September. "Traveling together, crying together — there is something here I hope never disappears. I feel I could call on any of these buddies if I ever need anything," the rabbi told Catholic News Service.

‘War against poverty’ needed

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — As international troops continue their fight against terrorism in Afghanistan, the world community should be waging war against the country’s grinding poverty, said one Catholic relief worker. "It’s the war on poverty that needs to be won, because if we don’t change this, then the people will be easier prey for the insurgents," said P.M. Jose, Afghanistan country representative for Catholic Relief Services, the U.S. bishops’ international relief and development agency. "The international community has to choose to be in solidarity with the people of Afghanistan," because decades of war, military intervention and outside control have rendered the country "in need and vulnerable," he told CNS.

IRA disarmament a ‘model’

DUBLIN, Ireland (CNS) — The methods used in decommissioning the Irish Republican Army’s paramilitary arsenal can serve as a model for peacekeepers elsewhere in the world, said the two clergymen who witnessed the destruction of thousands of guns and hundreds of pounds of explosives. Father Alex Reid, a member of the Redemptorist peace mission in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and the Rev. Harold Good, a former president of the Methodist Church in Ireland, acted as independent witnesses to the destruction of handguns, rifles, automatic weapons, machine guns, surface-to-air missiles, grenade launchers, explosives and bomb-making equipment.

Jailed priest suspended

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (CNS) — Church authorities in Haiti have officially suspended an imprisoned priest, Father Gerard Jean-Juste, for defying the hierarchy’s orders and presenting his credentials to be a presidential candidate in the November elections. "I recognize your spirit of faith and prayer," wrote Port-au-Prince Coadjutor Archbishop Joseph Miot in a Sept. 16 letter delivered to Father Jean-Juste’s parish, St. Claire Church. "But despite all my entreaties, you committed the public act of attempting presidential candidacy." The suspension was in accord with canon law, which prohibits priests from participating in political activity. It means that Father Jean-Juste no longer has a parish, nor is he allowed to celebrate the sacraments.

Pope prays for peace

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Benedict XVI, speaking at his weekly audience, prayed repeatedly for peace. "Oh Lord, let your face shine upon us today for the benefit of peace and, in these times, give us and all people on earth harmony and peace," he said Sept. 28. God’s "divine love becomes concrete and nearly observable in history with all its bitter and glorious events," he told some 30,000 people gathered in St. Peter’s Square. Today, God’s redemptive and protective power "reaches us now in Christ," he said.

Beaumont Diocese moves

HOUSTON (CNS) — The Diocese of Beaumont’s chancery has been temporarily relocated to the Cameron Retreat Center at the St. Dominic Center in Houston, at the corner of Holcombe and Almeda streets. The diocese’s chancery office in Beaumont, as well as all schools and parishes in the diocese, were still closed four days after Hurricane Rita tore its way up the Texas-Louisiana border. Diocesan properties were still plagued by the lack of electricity and water and sewer service, according to a news release. Through early Sept. 28, the diocesan Web site, www.dioceseofbmt.org, was still not functioning, although efforts were being made to re-establish the site, which the diocese asked its faithful to check.

Nun completes prison term

MARYKNOLL, N.Y. (CNS) — Maryknoll Sister Lelia "Lil" Mattingly said her now-completed six-month prison term for trespassing last November at the home of the former School of the Americas deepened her faith and strengthened her resolve to work for the closure of the training facility for Latin American military. Now called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, the school at Fort Benning, Ga. is the site of an annual protest by demonstrators who say some of the worst violators of human rights in Latin America have been trained there. The U.S. Department of Defense, which runs the school, says its curriculum teaches Latin American military personnel democratic principles and respect for human rights. Sister Lil was one of 15 protesters arrested and charged with trespassing at last year’s demonstration, which drew a record 16,000 participants. This year’s demonstration is set for Nov. 18-20.

Question sparks flap

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Of 56 questions that will serve as the framework for apostolic visitations of U.S. Catholic seminaries this academic year, one — "Is there evidence of homosexuality in the seminary?" — sparked a big media flap in mid-September. One of the main purposes of the visitations is to assess how well U.S. seminaries are preparing their students for a lifelong commitment to celibacy as priests. "The Church is trying to put out a very clear signal" that those seeking ordination "must embrace a life of celibate chastity," said Father Stephen J. Rossetti, president of St. Luke Institute, a facility in the Washington suburbs that specializes in treating priests and religious who suffer addictions or behavioral, emotional or psychological problems. He said there is a need to determine when it is appropriate and when it is not to ordain someone who is homosexually oriented.

Lack of public funding decried

WASHINGTON (CNS) — The lack of public funding for religiously sponsored schools in the United States is an injustice and an "incredible anomaly" in the world, a Vatican education official said Sept. 14. Archbishop J. Michael Miller, secretary of the Vatican Congregation for Catholic Education, said Europeans "are absolutely amazed at the situation in the United States," one of the few nations in the world that provides little or no public funding for the education of children in religiously run schools. That policy puts the United States "in the company of Mexico, North Korea, China and Cuba," he said.

Summit ignores nuke question

NEW YORK (CNS) — The Vatican nuncio at the United Nations criticized world leaders for sidestepping the issues of nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation at their mid-September summit. The final document on U.N. reform measures and efforts to alleviate world poverty was silent regarding disarmament and nonproliferation, said Archbishop Celestino Migliore. "Nuclear armament is simply devastating for peoples and the environment," he said Sept. 23 in a speech to the U.N. General Assembly. Such weapons also drain economic resources that could be better used for peaceful purposes, he added. "We must insist on complete nuclear disarmament" and a stronger system to verify it, he said. The day before, in a talk at a U.N. conference promoting compliance with the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, the archbishop, without naming them, criticized governments whose failure to sign the treaty is keeping the ban on nuclear testing from taking effect. So far, 175 countries have signed the treaty and 123 countries have ratified it. But the treaty cannot take effect until it is ratified by all 44 countries that possessed nuclear testing capabilities at the time the meeting that drafted the treaty was held in 1996. The United States is one of 11 such countries yet to take action.

WASHINGTON (CNS) — With all major faith groups represented, the Sept. 24 protest march in Washington against the war in Iraq marked a new step in the effort to bring a more unified religious voice to the anti-war movement, according to a representative of Pax Christi USA. Michael Jones, director of communications for the Catholic peace movement based in Erie, Pa., said at least 500 Pax Christi members and thousands of other Catholics participated in the demonstration, which drew an estimated 100,000 people for a march past the White House to the National Mall. Other Catholic participants included members of the Sisters of St. Joseph and the Catholic Worker movement, as well as individual Catholics such as 1976 Nobel Peace Prize-winner Mairead Corrigan Maguire and Cindy Sheehan, the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq, whose vigil outside President George W. Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, drew national attention during the summer. "We believe our presence was required," Jones said, adding that his organization’s opposition to the war in Iraq is built upon the late Pope John Paul II’s statement that war is "always a defeat for humanity."

Women thanked for contributions

ATLANTA (CNS) — More than 1,200 Catholic women and 50 priests from around the country gathered Sept. 15-18 in Atlanta for the National Council of Catholic Women’s convention celebrating 85 years of "making a difference." Celebrating Mass for the participants Sept. 17, Atlanta Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory praised the women for their steadfast work to build up God’s kingdom and his church, whether that be tucking a child into bed with prayers or contributing to Hurricane Katrina relief work. "Catholic women throughout the church in our nation and beyond have been the heart and soul of our efforts" following the devastating Hurricane Katrina, the archbishop said. "You have, as you have done on so many other occasions, rallied the church to undertake the works of charity and service. "Quite simply, the face of Christ has been made more visible in the works of charity that you have spearheaded during the past fortnight and on so many other occasions...."