“We started the event last year, on Sacred Heart’s 140th anniversary, to bring the school community and the parish together.”
Month: October 2019
The ‘Winners’ Of God’s Mercy
by Father Jean-Pierre Ruiz
As I write these words, Major League Baseball’s postseason is in full swing, so to speak.
The Ideological Hijacking of Pope St. John XXIII
ROME. With his liturgical memorial (October 11) falling on the fourth full day of the Special Synod for Amazonia, which sometimes seems bent on recycling every tried-and-failed nostrum from 1970s, it was inevitable that certain portside Catholic commentators would continue their effort to spin Pope St. John XXIII into a smiley-face, chubby Italian grandpa whose approach to the future of the Church was somewhat Maoist: “Let a thousand flowers bloom!”
It’s Time Priests Receive Good Press
In a standing room only crowd at the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Church in Ozone Park, more than a thousand people came together with one common goal: to say thank you to Father Paul Palmiotto. I had the honor of attending the Mass on Sept. 29 to celebrate the life and priesthood of an incredible man who was retiring from the priesthood due to an illness that has limited his ability to speak.
A Dismaying Start To Presidential Campaign
The presidential campaign hasn’t even officially begun, and yet there is already reason to be concerned about some of the ideas being recommended by some candidates.
Patriarchs and Sluggers
Like anyone reading the Book of Genesis for the first time, I was amazed when I read as a child Chapter 5, which lists the lifespans of the Old Testament patriarchs. “Methuselah lived for nine hundred and sixty-nine years; then he died.” Similar figures were given for Adam, Seth, Mahalalel, Noah …
The Power of Forgiveness
My dear brothers and sisters in the Lord,
The power of forgiveness was recently shown in a dramatic court room when former Dallas police officer Amber Guyger was convicted of murdering her neighbor Botham Jean, when she mistakenly entered his apartment thinking it was her own. She identified the victim as a burglar and shot him to death. But this is not the end of the story. The courtroom was presided over by Judge Tammy Kemp, who is a deaconess in her church. The scene began when the 18-year old brother of the victim, Brandt Jean, asked the judge if he could embrace the now-convicted murderer who received a 10-year prison sentence. Judge Kemp hesitated, but eventually allowed the two to embrace. This too is not the end of the story.
Vatican Confirms Election of Msgr. Peter Vaccari to be President of CNEWA
Monsignor Peter Vaccari, currently rector of St. Joseph’s Seminary in Dunwoodie, New York, has been elected to succeed Monsignor John E. Kozar as president of the Catholic Near East Welfare Association/Pontifical Mission for Palestine.
Local Catholic Teen a ‘Man for Others’
Since the summer, Felix Lam has been collecting school supplies from donations at church and buying at local stores to send to two Catholic schools in Haiti. It was an idea developed after his Boy Scout troop began to work with Queens-based From Here to Haiti.
Sports Round-Up Oct. 26
During Columbus Day Weekend, a number of Catholic Youth Organization parishes participated in the annual “Pink Games” basketball tournament to support Breast Cancer Awareness Month.