Clergymen made the sign of the cross during a gathering of Jesuits and laypeople in San Diego’s Chicano Park June 8. The group took part in a prayer and informational event in solidarity with immigrants and for immigrant rights issues. On June 9 they were among hundreds who attended an ordination ceremony in San Diego for four Jesuits. (CNS Photo by David Maung)
By Ruby Thomas, Record Staff Writer
Catholic Charities and the Archdiocese of Louisville’s Office of Faith Formation will offer “Welcome the Stranger: Catholic Social Teaching and Immigration” June 26 from 9 a.m. to noon at the Flaget Center, 1935 Lewiston Drive.
The workshop is a follow-up to the Share the Journey Immigration Legal Workshop which took place in March, said Deacon Lucio Caruso of Catholic Charities.
The latest event aims to educate the faith community in two areas — what the church and Scripture teach about immigration and the subject of immigration law, he said.
A better understanding of the realities of immigration is important now more than ever, because of the political climate surrounding the issue, said Deacon Caruso.
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A friend asked, “You mentioned once that having kids brought
you and your husband back to the Church. Can you elaborate what that was like?”
I remember the exact moment it dawned on me that, after several
years of being indifferent or even rebellious Catholics, there could now be
No More Coasting.
When Rocio showed up at our parish, she knew nothing about the Catholic Church. All she knew was that her life was filled with darkness and she hungered for something more. It was January, and our Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA) sessions had begun months before. So our catechetical team asked Rocio to come to Mass each Sunday and hang out with the community. We hoped this would keep her interested until she could join the next RCIA in the fall and we could teach her about becoming a Catholic.
Rocio came to Mass every Sunday and sat with several people we had asked to keep her company. After Mass they would go out for coffee and answer her questions, basic things such as, “Why do you put your hand in that water?” or “Where do you find all those readings in the Mass?” They introduced Rocio to their friends and other parishioners. Some of them invited her to their homes for dinner. Others told her about their Bible study group and made plans to bring her when she was available.
Some young adults close to Rocio’s age discovered they shared a love for cooking, and Rocio became a regular at their monthly cuisine nights. Rocio saw a bulletin announcement about the rosary and asked her new Catholic friends about it. They connected her with the parish rosary group and accompanied her to one of their gatherings. The group heard Rocio was coming and gave her a rosary of her own. They were so patient with her that day, teaching her how to pray this devotion they loved as she imitated their gestures and prayerful demeanor. When they saw her at Mass, they would always stop to chat with her.
That summer the parish was going to Tijuana for an annual service trip at an orphanage. Rocio’s new parish friends convinced her to go with them. She fell in love with the kids there, and her previous shyness gave way to an exuberant personality.
Meanwhile my RCIA team had been meeting every Wednesday night with that year’s catechumens, candidates, and their sponsors. We had our lessons neatly scheduled and our Powerpoints all planned. By the time Easter came we had covered all our topics, but our biggest challenge every year was keeping the newly initiated involved in the parish. No matter how much we encouraged them to be part of the community after Easter, they still lamented that they “couldn’t be part of RCIA anymore” or disappeared from the parish altogether.
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Developed in partnership with the Dioceses of Evansville and Owensboro, Saint Meinrad Seminary and School of Theology offers an intensive formation opportunity to equip you for catechetical leadership in the 21st century:
For more information click here.
Registration Fee:
General registration is $630.
Participants from the Archdiocese of Louisville are eligible for financial assistance.
Contact Art Turner for information.
Mural of characters from “Where the Wild Things Are,” at a Thundercloud Subs shop in Austin, Texas
First holy Communion is celebrated in May at our parish. We’ve structured our program around a parent-centered role, honoring them, as the church does, as “the first and best” teachers of the faith. So when I suggested a book they could read with their children to help them better understand the feast to which they are welcomed, I chose a book many parents know well, one which most of us have read aloud to a child: Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak.
Sendak was neither a theologian nor a Christian, but he wrote an enduring story that begins and ends with a meal and a table, a table that remains waiting for the child even when the child abandons the table in search of more exotic pleasures. He writes of a meal that is never hidden from us, of a table that is always full, always welcoming.
The book begins on the night “Max wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another.”
Sendak writes, “His mother called him “WILD THING!” and Max said, “I’LL EAT YOU UP!”
There is nothing sweet about a wolf. No child goes to bed cuddling his stuffed wolf. Wolves are always the villains (“I’LL EAT YOU UP!”) and never the heroes. The wolf suit stands for all the ways we disguise and disfigure our humanity with sin. It separates us from ourselves and from others, in this case the most vital other, Max’s mother. “Mischief of one kind and another” is storybook language for the real damage our disfigured humanity wreaks, upon other people and upon the created world.
Archdiocese of Louisville
Formed In Faith 