Taking care to keep the memory of the events of Sept. 11, 2001 alive, students from Jamaica Estates visited the memorial museum at the site of the twin towers. The Aquinas Honor Society from Immaculate Conception School was the first group to ever schedule a classroom workshop at the 9/11 Memorial Museum, for which they received an official certificate from the museum.
CHICAGO (CNS) – Pope Francis has appointed Bishop Blase J. Cupich of Spokane, Wash., as the ninth archbishop of Chicago. The appointment was announced Sept. 20 in Washington, D.C., by Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, apostolic nuncio to the U.S.
Fittingly, the announcement came inside Xavier University of Louisiana’s convocation center, the newest of many green-roofed monuments that Norman C. Francis, the longest-serving university president in the U.S., had built through charisma, prayer and personal witness.
CHACAS, Peru (CNS) – Freddy Cerna is about the same height as the statue he carves from Italian Carrara marble. His backward baseball cap and buggy protective goggles are a sharp contrast to the delicate face he perfects with his carving tools. The statue of Mary, her hands folded in prayer, stares back at him.
BATON ROUGE, La. (CNS) – The Diocese of Baton Rouge has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse a Louisiana Supreme Court decision that a priest may be compelled to testify as to what he heard in the confessional in 2008 concerning an abuse case. The legal step is the latest in a case involving Father Jeffrey Bayhi, pastor of St. John the Baptist Church in Zachary, La., and the sanctity of the seal of confession.
(CNS) – Religious liberty is under aggressive assault on many fronts in a culture increasingly insensitive to rights guaranteed by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, according to speakers at a Sept. 15 forum in Manhattan. The program, “In the Founding Tradition,” was organized by the Alliance Defending Freedom and drew 100 people to the Union League Club.
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – The “Francis effect” has spilled over into the Sistine Chapel, bringing a surge in visitors but also increasing risks to maintenance of what Antonio Paolucci, director of the Vatican Museums, calls “the world’s chapel.” Prior to a 14-year restoration, completed in 1994, visitors to the chapel numbered about 1.5 million annually. That rose to more than 5 million in 2011. Since the March, 2013 election of Pope Francis, whose weekly public audiences and readings of the Angelus have boosted turnout in St. Peter’s Square, the number of chapel visitors is up to 5.5 million, or 20,000 per day and 30,000 on the last Sunday of every month, when admission is free.
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – The World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia in September, 2015 will serve as a forum for debating issues on the agenda for the world Synod of Bishops at the Vatican the following month, said the two archbishops responsible for planning the Philadelphia event.
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Pope Francis will address the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France, Nov. 25.The Parliament’s president, Martin Schultz, made the announcement Sept. 11, and the Vatican immediately confirmed it.
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – In light of “countless requests from every part of the world,” Pope Francis has approved putting SS. John Paul II and John XXIII on the Church’s universal calendar of feast days. Called the General Roman Calendar, it is the universal schedule of holy days and feast days for the Latin rite of the Catholic Church.
