Cardinal George has reminded pastors of long-standing archdiocesan policies regarding lay ministers who publicly oppose church teaching.

A June 1 letter to pastors and parish administrators was in response to articles in the secular media concerning public statements by some lay ministers which do not reflect church teaching.

Policies adopted in 1994 under Cardinal Bernardin state that ministers should be loyal to the teachings of the church as a prerequisite for service.

The cardinal encouraged pastors to ensure that the policy be lived out in parish life. Where a person in ministry might be odds with church teaching, in accord with archdiocesan policies, the cardinal urged that the minister not continue in active ministry until being reconciled.

In response to some media comments regarding the instruction, archdiocesan spokesman Jim Dwyer said, “Why would anybody be surprised that the archbishop of Chicago expects lay ministers to adhere to church teaching?”

Peace Walk set at St. Clement

To demonstrate what they called peaceful unity against war, members of the Lincoln Park community scheduled a Walk for Peace June 27.

Meeting outside St. Clement Church, 642 West Deming, at 5 p.m., participants will gather for a short prayer and reflection before walking along the lakefront. After the walk, they will stop to pray, light candles and sing.

Organizers said the Walk for Peace is not intended to raise funds or demonstrate specific political views. For information: Mary Cele Doyle (773) 281-0371, or [email protected].

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Little Company comes to Auburn-Gresham

Adults 55 and older who live in the Auburn-Gresham and Roseland neighborhoods will have a new option for medical care this summer when Little Company of Mary Health Center opens a new facility at 95th and Halsted streets.

The facility will provide office space for doctors who treat adults, community education classes, and a laboratory facility.

Many residents of the medically underserved area are particularly happy about the lab, which means that they can have blood drawn for a variety of diagnostic and screening tests that might be ordered by their doctors without leaving the neighborhood, said Belinda Dixon, project director for the new facility.

Lake County parishes unveil new model for school, evangelization

Members of three Waukegan-area parishes have come together to develop a new plan for Catholic education and evangelization in their area of the archdiocese.

Holy Family and Immaculate Conception parishes in Waukegan and Queen of Peace Parish in North Chicago have pledged to create a new school and evangelization center, which will offer everything from religious education for children and adults to the social and human services needed by their heavily Hispanic immigrant populations.

Finding the way back home

Catholics learn to return to their faith, even after a lifetime of separation

On six consecutive Thursday nights after Easter, Frank Fink sat at a table at St. Hubert Parish in Hoffman Estates where he talked and listened to people who have stopped practicing their Catholic faith.

“If you told me a year ago that I’d be welcoming lapsed Catholics back into the church, I’d think you were crazy,” said Fink. “For the longest time, I felt the church had let me down.”

Fink and the 11 people he sat with at St. Hubert are part of an ongoing program called Catholics Returning Home. It’s a series of six sessions following the Easter, Christmas and fall seasons where non-practicing Catholics come together to discuss church issues, learn about Catholic teachings and doctrine and try to resume active participation of their faith in the Catholic church.

The program began about 15 years ago with Sally Mews, a parishioner at St. Patrick’s Parish in Wadsworth. Today, it has received national recognition. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops listed Catholics Returning Home as one of 12 model programs for evangelization.

A cuppa justice

CRS program links coffee drinkers and coffee growers

There’s something about sitting down over a hot cup of coffee.

Whether it’s colleagues gathering around a table in the faculty room at St. Gregory the Great High School, members of a suburban parish meeting to discuss social justice issues or neighbors or family members coming together to celebrate a Sunday brunch, conversation seems to flow better with cream, sugar and, usually, caffeine.

Now Catholic Relief Services wants to use that ubiquitous cup of coffee to bring someone else to the table: The person who grew it.

“The coffee has a story to tell,” said Michael Sheridan, CRS’ fair trade program officer. “It’s a story about relationships, the relationship of the people who grew it to the people that grew it.”

Cardinal helps mark D-Day anniversary with Mass

They gathered overlooking the wet sands of Normandy’s Omaha Beach—World War II veterans, politicians and world leaders—to mark the 60th anniversary of the beginning of the end of World War II.

Thomas Levergood, who accompanied Cardinal George to the early-June ceremonies, said many who were there “were surprised by the kind of reaction they felt as they walked on the site of so much sacrifice for freedom by young men.”

Pope meets Bush, expresses concern about continuing unrest in Iraq

In their first meeting since the Iraq war, Pope John Paul II told U.S. President George W. Bush he was deeply concerned about the “grave unrest” in Iraq and called for a speedy restoration of the country’s sovereignty.

During a 50-minute encounter June 4, the pope firmly reminded the president of the Vatican’s opposition to the invasion of Iraq last year.

What Iraq needs today, he said, is for the situation to be normalized as quickly as possible, under a framework of greater international cooperation.

Pope asks Swiss youths to make room for Christ in their lives

On a two-day visit to Switzerland, an aging Pope John Paul II reminisced with young people about his own youth and asked them to make room for Christ in their busy lives.

At an evening rally and an open-air Mass in Bern June 5-6, the pope emphasized that Christianity is more than an ideology or an institution. Its primary focus is the personal encounter with Jesus, he told a cheering crowd.

New score card rates Catholic senators’ votes on various issues

Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat and one of two dozen Catholics in the U.S. Senate, has released a “scorecard” analyzing how his fellow Catholic senators voted on 24 issues of interest to the Catholic Church.

However, another senator criticized the effort as “a deliberate and cynical attempt to mislead” Catholic voters.

Durbin said at a June 2 news conference that his staff prepared the score card as a way to help Catholics “fulfill their moral obligation to participate in the development of public policies addressing the full range of issues that are Catholic priorities for public life.”

A day for justice

Focus on renewing faith, community July 24

Justice, a key focus of Catholic teaching, will be the centerpiece of the first Archdiocesan Justice Day.

The July 24 event, to held at Loyola University’s Lake Shore Campus, is sponsored by the archdiocesan Office for Peace and Justice.

Agency director Bill Purcell said the Justice Day theme, “renewing faith: building just communities,” builds off Psalm118:19: “Open me to the gates of justice; I will enter them and give thanks to the Lord.”

‘Tap’ founder stresses key virtue of ‘hospitality’

Today’s parishes are missing out if they are not being hospitable.

“Hospitality is the Catholic virtue for the third millennium,” Father John Cusick told a series of adult-education gatherings recently in Idaho. Cusick is director of Young Adult Ministry for the Archdiocese of Chicago and founder of Theology on Tap sessions for young adult Catholics.

The Idaho sessions, sponsored by the Knights of Columbus, were held at churches around the state where Cusick spoke. At Holy Apostles Church in Meridian, he said that hospitality embodies the ways of Jesus—direct, personal, inviting and always making people feel welcome and accepted.

Steps of faith

For 35 years, “Pilgrim George” Walter has trudged more than 30,000 miles through 40 countries. Not for fitness. Not for transportation, either. Walter’s walk is one of simple faith.

This summer, the Glenshaw, Pa., native is walking from Pittsburgh to Chicago and back—1,350 miles in 131 days—to honor the 150th anniversary of the proclamation of the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary by Pope Pius IX in 1854.