Church (ecclesiology) – Page 9

Legion of Christ orders changes

The Legion of Christ in recent days has been making some changes to its way of proceeding. The other day, for example, the pontifical delegate Cardinal Velasio de Paolis, CS, named the committee that will examine and re-write the congregation’s constitutions (Fathers Gianfranco Ghirlanda, SJ, Agostino Montan, CSI, and 4 LC priests –Roberto Aspe Hinojosa, Anthony Bannon, José García Sentandreu and Gabriel Sotres).

On December 6 but made public on the 11th, a decree was sent to the order’s superiors regarding the following:

a new way of referring to Father Marcial Maciae: either as “the founder of the Legion of Christ & Regnum Christi” or just “Father Maciel”;
photos of Father Maciel in public places are to be removed but given personal freedom, individuals are free to keep his image privately;
no dates concerning Father Maciel will be celebrated; the date of his death with be a day of prayer;
Father Maciel’s writings and talks will not be for sale in any of the congregation’s houses or works but a preacher may use Maciel’s works appropriately;
the place of internment of Father Maciel will be treated as a place of burial, nothing else;
retreat centers in Cotija will be places of prayer, reparation and expiation of sin.

The Associated Press is running this story today, which does add more to the news release of the congregation but it does show the news is getting around.

As always, we beg the Holy Spirit to guide the seminarians in the discernment to follow the Lord in the vocation given.

The parish community is an expression of beauty & unity, Pope says

Pope Benedict visits a parish in his diocese a few times a year as any good bishop would do. Yesterday, Gaudete Sunday, he visited the parish community of Saint Maximilian Kolbe. Here are few paragraphs of the Pope’s homily.

Together with all of you I
admire this new church and the parish buildings and with my presence I desire
to encourage you to realize in an ever better way the Church of living stones
that you yourselves are. I know the many and significant efforts at
evangelization that you are engaged in. I exhort all of the faithful to make
your own contribution to the building up of the community, in particular in the
field of catechesis, the liturgy and charity — pillars of the Christian life
— in communion with the whole Diocese of Rome. No community can live as a cell
that is isolated from the diocesan context; it must rather be a living
expression of the beauty of the Church that, under the bishop’s leadership —
and in the parish, under the pastor’s leadership — walks in communion toward
the Kingdom of Heaven.

Continue reading The parish community is an expression of beauty & unity, Pope says

Remembering the women killed in El Salvador 30 years ago

I was quite young when the 4 women were killed in El Salvador in 1980. They were killed months after the Servant of God Archbishop Oscar Romero was killed. Missionaries brutally killed for their faith Christ and service to the poor are part of the landscape of the proclamation of the Gospel. Since my high school days, I have kept these women in prayer, especially since Jean Donovan had a Connecticut connection. They were:

Sister Maura Clarke, MM

Sister Ita Ford, MM

Sister Dorothy Kazal, OSU

Miss Jean Donovan.

The Maryknoll Fathers & Brothers’ remembrance

The Maryknoll Sisters’ remembrance

The Vatican Radio story is here.

Gianfranco Ravasi on the move to Milan, next Pope?

A week ago today, Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, 68, was created a cardinal by Pope Benedict XVI. Ravasi, since 2007, is the well-equipped, critically acclaimed, lover of art and music, and a man who has a great sense of humor President of the Pontifical Council for Culture, the “Minister of Culture” (some might say he’s a “culture vulture”) and he heads the Pontifical Commission for the Cultural Heritage of the Church, and the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archeology. He’s the former head of the Ambrosian Library in Milan. He turned the Library into a cultural and intellectual destination.

Continue reading Gianfranco Ravasi on the move to Milan, next Pope?

Bishop Richard Williamson given ultimatum by SSPX

The controversial –and widely perceived to be satified with his own ignorance of reality– bishop of the Society of Saint Pius X, Bishop Richard Williamson, who one time lived in Ridgefield, CT, is under pressure to accept the indications of the Society or face expulsion. Rumor has it that he’s set himself to separate from the SSPX.

The directives of the SSPX:

The Superior General, Bishop Bernard Fellay, has
learnt by the press of Bishop Richard Williamson’s decision, just ten days
before his trial, to dismiss the lawyer charged with his defense, in favor of a
lawyer who is openly affiliated to the so-called neo-Nazi movement in Germany,
and to other such groups.

Bishop Fellay has given Bishop Williamson a formal
order to go back on this decision and to not allow himself to become an
instrument of political theses that are completely foreign to his mission as a
Catholic bishop serving the Society of Saint Pius X.

Disobedience to this order
would result in Bishop Williamson being expelled from the Society of Saint Pius
X.

November 20 of 2010

Fr. Christian Thouvenot, general Secretary

DICI

Urbano Cardinal Navarrete Cortés, SJ, RIP

Urbano Cardinal Navarrete Cortés, SJ, 90, died today. The Mass of Christian Burial is scheduled for November 24; the Dean of the College of Cardinals, Angelo Cardinal Sodano will celebrate the Sacrifice of the Mass and His Holiness will preside over the Final Commendation and give a valediction.

His Eminence was a professor of Canon Law, a former rector of the Pontifical Gregorian University, a prolific author and a consultor of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Disciple of the Sacraments.

In 2007, Pope Benedict created Father Navarrete a cardinal of the Roman Church. He was dispensed of the episcopal dignity. The Pope assigned him the Church of San Ponziano as his titular Church.

Cardinal Navarrete was a Spanish Jesuit (entering in 1937), ordained priest in 1952. And since 1958 was a professor of Canon Law at the Gregorian, specializing in marriage law, where he also served as dean of the Canon Law faculty.

Cardinals get a new sign of the fidelity to Mother Church –the ring

To go with a cassock and a new biretta (the 3 gore squarish hat) there’s a new ring, simple and symbolic of one’s fidelity to Jesus Christ and the Church.

Gianfranco Cardinal Ravasi, Pontifical Council of Culture

His Beatitude, Antonios Cardinal Naguib, Patriarch of the Copts, Egypt

The two new American Cardinals of the Roman Church

Left: His Eminence, Raymond Leo Burke

Above: His Eminence, Donald William Wuerl

New cardinals assigned a Roman titular church

The tradition is that when a cardinal is made by the pope, the cardinal becomes a priest of the Diocese of Rome. As members of the Roman clergy, he receives a church, though now in title only, (which he vicarious takes care of by finding the funding for projects), and has the responsibility of entering a conclave to elect a new pope and when asked, to provide his consultation on certain topics.

The new cardinal will take possession of his new church within the next six months.

Interesting to note: Cardinal Antonios Naguib is not assigned a titular church because he uses Saint Paul outside the Walls because the church’s close, historic connection with the See of Alexandria; Cardinal Fortunato Baldelli is assigned the Benedictine church of Sant’ Anselmo (replacing the recently deceased Cardinal Mayer, OSB); Cardinal Raymond Burke is assigned Church of Sant’ Agata de’ Gotti, the church where the Stigmatine Fathers have the generalate (replacing the recently deceased Cardinal Spidlik, SJ); the 93 year old Cardinal Domenico Bartolucci is assigned the Church of Santissimi Nomi di Gesù e Maria in via Lata (replacing Cardinal Dulles, SJ).

The complete list of the assignments of the churches is here.

NOW there’s 24 new cardinals of the Roman Church

The Pope created 24 new cardinals, 20 of them still work as pastors and heads of offices in the Church, 4 are honorary members of the College of Cardinals (they can’t vote for a new pope because they’re over 80 yrs).

The Scripture for today’s Liturgy of the Word:

1 Peter 3 – reverence for the Lord and witness to the reason for our hope

Psalm 145

Mark 10 – they were on the road to Jerusalem, Jesus was ahead of them, those who followed were afraid, and Jesus told the 12 of what was to happen to Him and to them

“… the cardinals witness to the Church and to the world … singular and precious cooperators entrusted to Peter by Christ … to love according to the Law of Christ,” Pope Benedict.