The Oct. 14, 2012 Southwest Kansas Register is online:
St. Dominic Parish in Garden City celebrates the launching of the Year of Faith and the burning of the mortgage for the parish center. Also, Edie Loughmiller is leaving the diocese. She's served as a volunteer at the cathedral, lead "Faith and Light," and helped with taxes through AARP. She will be missed. Every Catholic school in the diocese earned Standard of Excellence awards!Last but far from least, the Dominican Sisters of Peace of Great Bend welcomed a new candidate, Anne Knight.
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Answering the invitation:
‘Our challenge is to help people see how much the
Church can benefit from what they have to share’
By David Myers
Southwest Kansas Register
Four questions were recently submitted to several priests of the diocese asking just how important parishioners are to the work of the parish.
The answers present a diocese brimming with gifts often taken for granted by the individual, but which can be beneficial in serving the parish, each other, and in so doing, bringing themselves closer to God.
The answers paint a picture of a people who perhaps don’t realize how gifted they truly are, and just how much the parish needs and appreciates them.
Do you think that there are gifts people have, that they don’t realize they have?
Father Warren Stecklein: “We definitely know there are many gifts and charisms within our people. Because of shyness, humility, a fear of drawing attention to themselves or criticism from other people – many of these gifts lay dormant. We also have the challenge of ‘thinking outside the box’. We have lifelong patterns, habits and routines that we are slow to change. It is more simple to place our energy in the same places we always have.”
Father Ted Stoecklein: “I know that the gifts are present. I believe that the Holy Spirit gives us all the gifts that are needed to accomplish the will of the Father. None of us has all of the gifts and everyone has some of the gifts. The key is to help people accept them, grow into them and offer them back to God in gratitude.”
Catholic women stand by faith in letter to president
Catholic women stand by faith in letter to president
By Archbishop Joseph E. Naumann
Archbishop, Kansas City, KS
Editor’s Note: The following is reprinted with permission from the Catholic Leaven, the newspaper of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas.
The killing of our ambassador and three other Americans in Libya as well as the attacks on the American embassy in Cairo on Sept. 11 have renewed anxieties regarding the threats posed to world peace by terrorists. I encourage every member of the Archdiocese, personally as well as our parishes, to intensify our prayers for peace. We need to pray for wisdom for our president and all who assist him with the foreign policy for our nation.
President Obama has shown extreme sensitivity and caution in the vocabulary used by his administration in discussing outbursts of anti-American violence in the Middle East. His administration rarely uses the word “terrorism” and he has all but banned the term “War on Terrorism.”
Unfortunately, the president and his administration have not manifested the same sensitivity and verbal restraint with those who oppose the Health and Human Services mandates coercing church institutions as well as private employers to include in so called “preventive health care” procedures (e.g., abortioninducing drugs, contraceptives and sterilizations) that contradict deeply held religious convictions. President Obama and his administration have no problem accusing those who oppose their policies as “waging a war on women.”
U.S. Catholic Bishops tell Congress
‘The time to act on immigration reform is now’
WASHINGTON—Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), called upon Congress to reform our nation’s immigration system. “The time to act is now,” said Archbishop Kurtz in a June 5 statement. He spoke in advance of the spring meeting of the U.S. bishops, which was held June 10-13, in New Orleans.
The U.S. Senate passed a version of immigration reform legislation about a year ago. The U.S. House of Representatives has yet to consider similar legislation.
Archbishop Kurtz cited the urgency of the issue for immigrants and their families.
50 years later: A bishop remembers Vatican II
By Francis X. Rocca
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- It was Oct. 11, 1962, and the bishop of Inchon, Korea, was walking in a procession of more than 2,200 other bishops into St. Peter’s Basilica on the opening day of the Second Vatican Council.
“Every light was on in the basilica because of television,” he said. “Literally, my mouth dropped as I walked in and looked up. Because I was used to little tiny chapels, small churches in Korea. This was unbelievable.
“I thought I was at the gate of heaven,” said Bishop William J. McNaughton, speaking about his first visit to Rome.
Fifty years later to the day, the U.S.-born bishop was back, one of 15 council fathers -- out of the 70 still alive -- who made it to an outdoor Mass in St. Peter’s Square marking the golden anniversary of that momentous event.
The sacred found in the soil -- even a simple garden
By Father Eugene Hemrick
Catholic News Service
When last have you experienced a profound sense of the sacred? If it hasn’t been lately, may I suggest you consider gardening as a means of reconnecting with it?
Why advocate gardening and not going off to a monastery, the hallowed environment of a church or making a retreat? It is not to suggest that gardening is superior. It is because it is often overlooked as a splendid means for increasing our spirituality. Our rushed times are partly responsible for this oversight, as is a society that is becoming increasingly urban and less agrarian.
Gardening fulfills a spiritual role in our lives. When we open the first pages of the Bible, we find ourselves in the Garden of Eden reflecting on the beauty of creation. Adam and Eve could have been portrayed floating in a spell-binding galaxy of stars or atop a magnificent mountain. God’s first choice, however, is a garden.
Dominican Sisters to host annual Mission Bazaar Nov. 10, Great Bend
The following was provided by the Heartland Center.
It won’t be long before the quiet flavors and aromas of the autumn season gradually give way to the miracle and meaning of Christmas. That can only mean one thing: it’s time for the Dominican Sisters of Peace Annual Mission Bazaar in Great Bend!
The Dominican Sisters of Peace in Great Bend host their famous Annual Mission Bazaar on Saturday, Nov. 10, from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Motherhouse, 3600 Broadway in Great Bend. The aroma and magic of this festive autumn, pre-holiday excursion includes beverage and coffee cake in the morning, soup and pie for lunch, hundreds of handcrafted and homemade items, two drawings for prizes, unique gift theme baskets, and a silent auction.
The spirit of the people on this day is a spirit of friendship and enjoyment all through the house. People are having a cup of coffee or juice and just sitting and visiting, or eagerly finding their treasures among the items for sale. Even though things are very busy this day, it seems that it is still a day to enjoy each shopper, renew acquaintances, and feel the excitement of the season.
Arriving in central Kansas in 1902 to provide education and healthcare for the early settlers, the sisters relied on their own resources to pay for their ministries and for a Motherhouse where they could live. They began to sell hand-crafted and homemade items, along with a hot meal. Today, the tradition continues. Sisters, Dominican Associates, employees, family members, and friends work on sale items throughout the year.
By the time the second Saturday in November arrives, there is such an array of goods that repeat customers line up to stream into the auditorium even before the doors open. The Sisters are always in awe of the all people who join them in the work of making the bazaar a success People donate items for sale throughout the year, and people and volunteer youth are here to help the weekend of the bazaar with the baking, serving the meal, assisting customers, and speeding up the clean-up. The Dominican community appreciates their generous participation so much.
For Catholic Rural Life, it’s a very happy birthday
By Jim Ennis
Executive Director, Catholic Rural Life
Birthdays and funerals are opportunities to reflect on our lives, to take stock of the things that truly matter, and to celebrate life. In November 2013, Catholic Rural Life celebrated its 90th anniversary, a milestone that provided the organization an opportunity for significant reflection on where we’ve come from.
CRL’s founder, Archbishop Edwin V. O’Hara was both a visionary and a penultimate organizer.
“Few people in his generation have made such a great contribution to the important social movements of his time,” claimed the Reverend John O’Grady, a leader of the National Conference of Catholic Charities, in describing O’Hara. Archbishop O’Hara was a gifted leader, and when he saw a problem he applied both himself and others to try and solve it.
That was the reason he founded Catholic Rural Life. Archbishop O’Hara was serving as a chaplain in France in World War I. He saw many young US service men from rural communities facing death and not well formed in their faith. He made a commitment to address this problem when he returned to the U.S., and immediately developed a survey to assess rural needs and sent it out to more than 1,000 priests serving rural communities throughout the country.
Care and stewardship of Creation
Catholic Rural Life
As people of faith, we are convinced that “the earth is the Lord’s and all it holds” (Ps 24:1). Our Creator has given us the gift of creation: the air we breathe, the water that sustains life, the fruits of the land that nourish us, and the entire web of life without which human life cannot flourish. All of this God created and found “very good.”
We believe our actions towards the environment and natural resources should be a sign of our respect for God’s creation. We are called to “renew the face of the earth” (Ps:104:30) and seek out those practices that sustain life for all.
In his 2010 World Day of Peace message, Pope Benedict XVI expressed the integral link between our social and natural world: “If You Want to Cultivate Peace, Protect Creation.”
Year of Faith Scout Patch/Requirements
