"Inside Clear Creek Monastery"

"Tulsa World" has launched a website with articles and a slideshow about the Benedictine Monks at Clear Creek Monastery in Tulsa Oklahoma. The photographs are beautiful, the slideshow is excellent and the articles (posted below) are very good. Enjoy.

Faith rules: Inside the Clear Creek Monastery

by: MICHAEL OVERALL Tulsa World
3/23/2008 12:00 AM

Editor’s note: This is part one of a two-part series about the Clear Creek Monastery. In Monday’s World, part two: “Keeping the faith.”

Some people say the world is slipping into a new Dark Age. Some might say the world has been in the Dark Ages for quite a while already.

In morality, in architecture, in craftsmanship and art and literature, the 21st century is a long way from the Renaissance, and many self-described “traditionalists” would suggest that it’s a long way down.

Less than a generation after the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s, a growing number of Catholics want to restore Latin as a regular part of worship. But for them, it’s not just about language. It’s about reversing the decline of civilization itself.

In their eyes, the loss of Latin represented a much wider crisis in the modern world — a rejection of tradition, a defiance of history, the severing of cultural roots and a loss of faith in general. In bringing back old-fashioned prayers, they hope to bring back old-fashioned values, too.

In this worldwide effort to “reform the reforms,” Tulsa has stepped to the forefront because of a place called Clear Creek.

For three days in February, the Tulsa World gained unprecedented access to the only contemplative Benedictine monastery in the United States. And it offered a glimpse of what life might be like in a world where . . .faith rules.


The bell ringer comes outside an hour before dawn.

No light escapes from the open door. No stars peek through the cloud cover. The remote landscape offers nothing but darkness for miles in every direction.

Wearing a long black robe with a hood pulled over his head, this solitary monk seems almost invisible, silhouetted like a shadow against the crypt’s bare concrete wall.

In the strict silence of the monastery — so quiet that the monks can lie awake and meditate to the sound of their own heartbeats — his footsteps seem subversively loud, crunching on the gravel path. A few steps from the door, he reaches out with both hands to pull on a rope that dangles down the side of the crypt.

The bell tears through the cold morning air, echoing for miles across the wooded hills that surround the north side of Fort Gibson Lake. Inside, the monks descend into the crypt in a long, solemn line, black robes brushing lightly across the concrete floor.

Heads bowed, hands clasped together, they can see their own breath in this chilly, underground chamber, lit only by a few dim bulbs and candles flickering from the altar.

“Gloria Patri,” the monks begin to sing, “et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto . . . .”

Outside, unseen by the monks, a pair of headlights appears on the crest of a distant hill. Then a second. Then a third.

Snaking along the dirt road and across a small, stone bridge, the outsiders pull into an unpaved parking lot, tires crunching on the gravel louder than any monk’s footsteps.

A couple climb out of the first SUV. Three kids and their mother emerge from a minivan. A second SUV unloads half a dozen passengers, men, women and children.

With the first subtle hint of dawn shading the sky, they all file through a side entrance to the crypt, the heavy door — its hinges squeaking — slamming shut behind them.

The Benedictines came to Oklahoma looking for solitude; to escape from the rest of the world, protected by muddy roads and low-water bridges and the sheer distance from any main highway.

Now the world is coming to the Monastery of Clear Creek.


‘Set a standard’


The iron comes out of the fire glowing red, sending sparks across the cluttered workshop as George Carpenter pounds it with a mallet.

Starting out as a thin strip, the metal twists and folds into the shape of a door hinge for one of the new monastery’s grand entrances.

In a more philosophical mood, Carpenter might reflect on the way religion shapes a man’s life, bending and twisting, folding and turning. A younger man, with a soul that is still red-hot and malleable, might question his faith.

Does he really believe in the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection? Or is it like believing in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny? Is he Catholic because he really embraces the church? Or just because his parents are Catholic?

“I was looking for some kind of spiritual connection,” Carpenter remembers now that he’s approaching middle age. “Something solid. Firm. Something permanent, that didn’t need reformed.”

Part of the first generation born after the Second Vatican Council, Carpenter grew up hearing Mass in English instead of Latin. Since the council in the 1960s, most Catholic services have been in a country’s common language.

Whether the changes sparked a crisis or simply coincided with it, that’s a matter of debate. But church attendance has dropped, seminaries face shortages of new priests and millions of Catholics openly dissent from church teachings.

Now a growing movement is trying to “reform the reforms,” bringing back Latin in hopes of bringing back faithfulness in general. The pope himself recently changed church rules to encourage a broader use of Latin in services.

For Carpenter, “the renewal,” as the movement calls itself, began several years ago when his father-in-law showed him a video of an old Latin service.

“I was drawn to it immediately,” he says, pausing for a moment to pound another red-hot piece of iron.

“It was mysterious. Beautiful. Timeless.”

Using an anvil and his own linebacker-size muscles, Carpenter bends the metal into an “S” shape, forming another part of the door hinge. Blacksmiths used the same techniques in the sixth century, when St. Benedict was alive.

“When the metal is hot,” Carpenter explains, “it’s not much different from shaping clay. As it cools, the shape becomes firm.”

Growing older, Carpenter left his doubts behind and took his family to a traditional Latin parish in Texas. But in shaping his children’s lives, faith had to compete with modern culture.

He worried about the endless pursuit of consumer goods and what he calls “the trivialization of promiscuity,” even in schools and on “family” television shows.

“We wanted to raise our kids in a truly Christian culture,” he says, “a place where the church is the backdrop for everyday life.”

Four years ago, they moved to a small farm just up the road from Clear Creek, where Carpenter works part time in the metal shop.

Others have come from the West Coast and the East, the Midwest and the Deep South. From all across the country, dozens of families have moved to this obscure corner of rural Oklahoma to live within reach of the monastery bell. Like the monks, they want to “be ye separate” from the world.

“The monks set a standard for us to look up to,” Carpenter says, throwing more coals on the fire. “We’re the foot soldiers of the church, so to speak, but they’re the special forces. They’re the Marines.”

In the fight to reclaim traditions, Clear Creek is the tip of the spear.


‘Our cultural home’


The daily Mass ends just after 11 a.m., with each monk pausing in front of the altar and falling to his knees, bowing with his forehead nearly touching the floor.

Two-by-two, they stand up and march out of the crypt in perfect rhythm, left-right-left. Hands clasped, heads bowed, they don’t whisper a word. They don’t even glance at the people in the pews.

Careful not to make the slightest noise, Carpenter and the other laymen wait patiently while the monks pass. The last one out the door hits a light switch, leaving everybody else in the dark.

They must remember — this Mass was not for them.

Catholics usually genuflect before leaving a sanctuary. But here, most people follow the monks’ example — bowing on both knees.

The younger girls struggle with the maneuver, awkward in skirts that reach to their ankles, lacy scarves slipping off their heads. But their mothers make it look effortless.

In the vestibule, laypeople go out the door on the right, to the parking lot. No matter how close they live, no matter how often they come here to worship, they’re still outsiders. The monks never asked anybody to come and now they have to leave.

It takes special permission to go through the door on the left, then up a flight of stairs to a loggia. An arched opening leads to the inner cloister itself, a courtyard that would be strictly off limits if the prior himself was not serving as a personal escort.

Eventually, as construction continues, the monastery buildings will form a giant square with this courtyard hidden in the middle. But for now, the church remains nothing but a crypt, a kind of basement foundation where the monks gather to pray.

Only one side of the square has been finished — a four-story residential hall big enough for 60 monks to occupy.

“It’s an ambitious undertaking,” admits Father Philip Anderson, the prior of Clear Creek and one of the original 13 monks who opened the monastery in 1999. “If I was doing it over again, I’m not sure we would be so ambitious.”

The fundraising and the construction can become a distraction from what the monks came here to do — to pray. And to pray, specifically, the old Latin liturgy.

“You can see that civilization is in a crisis,” Anderson says, his robe fluttering in the breeze as he walks in the courtyard.

“This crisis has, in some ways, infected even the church. There’s a lack of discipline, a lack of clear moral principles.”

Society keeps trying to reinvent itself — political revolutions, sexual revolutions, technological revolutions.

“But every attempt at a solution only makes the crisis grow deeper,” Anderson says, his voice staying meditatively calm. “We’ve had all kinds of solutions — except tradition. We’ve explored many different paths — except turning back, returning to our cultural home, returning to the ancient faith.”

At Clear Creek, the ancient traditions aren’t history. They’re here. Now. And the monks are determined to keep them for the future.

Keeping the faith (part II)
Editor’s note: Tulsa World Staff Writer Michael Overall was allowed unprecedented access behind the walls of the Clear Creek Monastery. Here is part two of a two-part series about the monastery.

by: MICHAEL OVERALL
Tulsa World

For monks, prayer is path to a brighter future

No one sits down. No one talks. Heads bowed, hands clasped together, the monks wait.

The prior stands just inside the door with a pitcher of water, an empty bowl and a clean white towel. In the sixth century, St. Benedict insisted that his followers wash a visitor’s feet before dinner, but traditions evolve — now the prior washes a visitor’s hands.

Guests eat in the middle of the room, separate from the monks, who surround two long, wooden tables against opposite walls.

“In nomine Patris,” they pray, as always, in Latin before finally sitting down, “et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. . . .”

The food comes with perfect etiquette, dishes served from the left, taken away from the right, and at a brisk pace.

Slurp quickly or the soup will disappear half finished to make room for fresh beets and coleslaw.

The monks resist earthly temptations — but when they eat, they flirt with extravagance.

Tonight, a hearty portion of salmon comes with a creamy tomato sauce, complemented by generous pours of cabmerlot wine.

The third course includes buttered noodles that look bland but taste decadent, with espresso for dessert.

When not needed, the servers stand at attention near the kitchen door, white aprons covering their black robes, ready to swoop down on the slightest crumb that might fall.

Benedictines don’t take a vow of silence. In fact, most Benedictines work at schools or hospitals, talking as much as anybody else.

Clear Creek is the only contemplative Benedictine monastery in the United States.

Nestled on the north end of Fort Gibson Lake near Hulbert, the monastery began operating in 1999.

Even here, a monk might clear his throat to ask for more wine, or whisper a couple of words if necessary. But living a contemplative life includes speaking as little as possible, lest you be distracted from always thinking about God.

Dinner would pass as quietly as the rest of the day if not for the cantor, sitting alone at a small table in the corner with a microphone and a book of saints.

“The sword cut deep into the martyr’s head,” he reads, describing the death of St. Boniface, a Benedictine missionary who brought Christianity to Germany in the eighth century. “And blood spurted forth.”

Every meal comes with a history lesson, and after a few days, a general theme emerges.

As Western civilization slid into the Dark Ages, monasteries became repositories of culture. Indeed, many scholars suggest that the Dark Ages weren’t dark at all, considering the art, literature and philosophy that flourished around the Benedictines, the Augustinians and the Carthusians.

The Renaissance would’ve been impossible without monks, and now some people see the need for another Renaissance.

In fashion, architecture, art and literature — and especially in public morals — hardly anything about 2008 looks like 1908, much less 1608.

And to the monks at Clear Creek, 2008 looks decidedly inferior.

Monasteries have saved civilization before, and monasteries might do it again.


‘JUST BEING FAITHFUL’


Silence has a way of amplifying noise. The drip of a faucet, the click of a light switch, the breeze tapping against the window. Everything draws attention to itself.

A guest will send footsteps echoing down the long corridors of the residential hall. But somehow, Father Mark Bachmann’s knocking on the door comes as a complete surprise.

“Being quiet,” he explains, “becomes a habit for us, like breathing.”

A guest’s private room measures less than 10 feet by 10, but the tall ceiling makes it seem reasonably spacious. A bed, not much bigger than an army cot, sits against the wall, with a small desk and chair beneath the window.

A separate room includes a sink and shower, but the toilets are down the hall. Each monk lives in a room, called a cell, just like this.

“Except for the sink and shower,” Bachmann says, taking a seat on the room’s footlocker. “We thought our guests might appreciate the privacy, but it’s a luxury we can do without.”

Ordinarily, Bachmann would study Scripture or read devotional texts during this free time between dinner and evening prayers. But the prior has given him permission to visit the guest area, divided from the monks’ quarters by a locked door at the end of the corridor.

Taking vows more than 24 years ago, he’s one of the older monks here. Several are recent college graduates, but the prior hesitates to let the younger ones talk to outsiders.

“It’s the way parents are always more protective of children the younger they are,” Bachmann says. “They need to mature in their vows, grow stronger in their discipline.”

Once or twice a year, family members can come to the monastery to ask for “parlor time” — maybe 30 or 45 minutes in a visiting room downstairs. The prior rarely grants permission for a monk to leave the monastery grounds, which stretch for a thousand acres across Cherokee County.

“The death of a parent, for example,” Bachmann says.

Then a monk might ask to go home for a couple of days.

“What if we get homesick?

Of course, that will happen occasionally,” he says.

“Then that is something we can offer up to God as a sacrifice.”

The separation is usually harder for the families — especially considering that many of the monks are converts, and just being Catholic seemed controversial enough.

“In time, most parents come to be proud of a son for taking vows,” Bachmann says. “They come to understand that we are just being faithful to what God has called us to do.”

The monks understand the high hopes that traditional Catholics are placing on them — that the use of Latin will spread from Clear Creek and reinvigorate the faith as a whole.

Already, Gregorian chant can be heard in more and more parishes across the Tulsa diocese, where ordinary church choirs have learned Gregorian chant from the monks.

And although most of the Sunday Mass is still in English at Tulsa’s Holy Family Cathedral, the congregation slips into Latin for some prayers.

“If it is God’s will for Latin to regain prominence in the church,” Bachmann says, “then it will happen.”

But that’s not what the monks are trying to do. They believe in the power of prayer to change the world — and that’s the only kind of prayer they are trying to make.

“We’ve heard the Lord calling us to this life of prayer,” Bachmann says. “Just as Peter and John and the other Apostles heard the Lord say, ‘Come, follow me.’ They were just being obedient. They didn’t set out to change the world.”

But change it they did.


‘INTO THE FUTURE’


Sunday morning, the monastery bell echoes across the countryside to announce that High Mass will begin in 10 minutes. But the parking lot already looks full.

Inside the crypt, the reverent silence gives way to a murmuring crowd. Babies cry.

Toddlers squirm. Teenagers pass secrets between themselves.

As the monks come down the aisle, sunlight streams through the windows above the altar and bright votive candles cast a warm glow across the pews.

On most Sundays, latecomers might have to stand in the back.

But the flu has been going around, leaving a few empty seats.

George Carpenter, the blacksmith, arrives with only one son, while his wife and six other children — plus one more on the way — have stayed home.

Around here, that’s not a particularly large family. Some parents count children into double digits.

“If you understand that a child is the greatest blessing that God can give you,” Carpenter says, “well, why would you do anything to keep God from blessing you?”

Last year, Carpenter took an informal census of the Clear Creek community — counting 35 families with a total of 145 people, including 96 children.

There have been several pregnancies since then.

Realistically, most of these children won’t stay in Clear Creek after they grow up.

They’ll go off to college, then find jobs and move to big cities. But their parents expect them to stay devoutly Catholic wherever they go.

“They’ll raise children of their own in the faith,” Carpenter says. “And those children will raise children, and those children. . . .”

After a couple of generations, 145 people can multiply into several hundreds, then a few thousand. In five or six generations, the descendants of Clear Creek might amount to a tribe of their own, taking conservative values and traditional morals with them.

“That’s the way the faith reaches into the future,” Carpenter says. “That’s how traditions survive.”

That’s how the world is changed.

"Boys step up to altar, en Mass"

There is most certainly a vocations connection here...

By Laura Crimaldi Sunday, March 23, 2008 http://www.bostonherald.com/
Photo by Matt Stone

A new generation of young altar servers captivated by the solemn rituals of Latin Mass is mastering the traditional rite in growing numbers in the Boston archdiocese as the liturgy makes a comeback after a four-decade hiatus.

“It’s really reverent. That’s why I like it,” said altar server Brendan MacKenzie, 12, of Marshfield, as he readied for the Tenebrae, or “Spy Wednesday,” service at Mary Immaculate of Lourdes in Newton during Holy Week. “It brings you closer to God.”

Since April, the number of young boys trained to perform Latin Mass in the Boston area has more than doubled, from eight to 18 servers, said the Rev. Charles J. Higgins, pastor at Mary Immaculate, where the old-style Mass is celebrated every Sunday at noon.

There are an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 altar servers throughout the Boston Archdiocese, a spokesman said. Keeping with the tradition, only boys serve at Latin Mass.

Higgins, 46, who is self-taught in the Latin liturgy, said the increase in boys studying the traditional Mass has more to do with his repeated appeals for volunteers than last year’s “motu propio” from Pope Benedict XVI. The Vatican order reversed 43 years of near banishment of the worship service by allowing priests to perform the liturgy without the authorization of a local bishop.

The devoted altar boys agree with this interpretation of how the pool of servers took on a more youthful look after years of just adult men on the altar.

“As Father Higgins says, he wants an army of servers,” said Stephen Farynaz, 12, of Lunenberg, who has been serving at Latin Mass since he was 7 years old.

A minimum of nine servers is needed to perform the highly choreographed rite, which can be traced to the sixth century and is referred to as the Tridentine Mass. The training takes weeks and entails memorizing Latin responses and learning the ceremony’s many rubrics, such as how to walk, genuflect, hold your hands, stand and carry objects.

Frank Doyle Jr., 43, of West Roxbury, a veteran master of ceremonies who has been serving Latin Mass for 17 years, trains new servers in the nuances of the Mass while conveying that they need not be Thomas Aquinas to get the hang of it.

“When in doubt, genuflect. That’s an old MC’s joke,” said Doyle, who studied the work of English priest Adrian Fortescue to learn the Mass.

To teach some details, Doyle conjures up some fire-and-brimstone mnemonic devices. Take how to kiss the thurible, which contains incense.

“You kiss the top of the chain where there is a disc or you will be like the Prophet Isaiah and know what it’s like to have coal purify your lips,” Doyle said.

Angelus Davulis, 13, of Dorchester was first exposed to Latin Mass at age 7 when his uncle, the Rev. Dominic Gentile, performed a High Solemn Mass. Since the 1990s, the Boston archdiocese has offered Latin Mass at Holy Trinity Church in the South End. The Mass relocated to Mary Immaculate last year.

Davulis studies from a booklet titled “How To Serve Low Mass and Benediction” to learn the difficult Latin. He said he prefers serving at Latin Mass to serving at the Novus Ordo, or modern Mass, because he feels more involved.

“I just want to learn it now before it’s too late,” said Davulis.

MacKenzie’s older brother, Cameron, 14, said he resisted when his parents urged him to serve.

“I guess the first time when I served I realized I was serving God. I guess it just took me away,” he said.

Higgins said he is heartened by his new flock of servers and is training five priests to say Latin Mass.

“They have an openness to the religious practice, which is very refreshing,” said Higgins. “I see it as a hopeful sign that when they come of age, that whatever stage of life they choose, that they will be strong Christian men whether as priests or family men.”

Hat tip to Fr. Zuhlsdorf

"Austrian monks win recording contract with YouTube clip"

Read my recent post about the Cistercian Monks from Heiligenkreuz HERE. Youtube video to go with the article below is at the bottom of this post.

Monday, March 24, 2008 12:26 PM CBC News

A group of Austrian monks have signed a major recording contract after submitting a YouTube clip of their Gregorian chanting.

Universal Music put out a call in religious publications for "monks, men of the cloth and sacred singers" in February.

Recording executives were inundated with hundreds of demos but said the monks from the Heiligenkreuz monastery stood head and shoulders above the competition.

Tom Lewis said he was "blown away" by the quality of the monks' singing.

"It was beautiful, beautiful music, and they're using the very latest in terms of communication devices available to them to get their music heard," Lewis told BBC News.

"They're lovely people, they're very passionate about their music and they're very excited about this opportunity."

Universal is hoping to re-create the success of the Benedictine monks of Santo Domingo De Silos in northern Spain, who reinvigorated interest in Gregorian chanting through a CD that sold in excess of five million worldwide in the early 1990s.

The Gregorian chant is a melodic ritual song that has its roots dating back to the sixth century.

There are 80 monks at Heiligenkreuz, a Cistercian monastery located in the Vienna woods that dates back to 1133.

An album, set for global release later this year, will be recorded next month.

The monastery's Rev. Karl Wallner said the album would include about a dozen singers.

"It's a fun experience because I didn't think they would choose us — it was just for fun that we [contacted] them. It's a good thing because Gregorian chant is part of spirituality and our life."

Wallner also said he didn't think his monks were on the level of music superstars.

"We're not Robbie Williams or Michael Jackson, we're just a group of monks who sing every day."

"Priestly Identity: Crisis and Renewal (Part 2)"

Interview With Father David Toups
Associate Director of the Committee for Clergy, Consecrated Life, and Vocations at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, D.C.

By Annamarie Adkins

WASHINGTON, D.C., MARCH 19, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Prayer and a deep spiritual life are necessary elements for priests facing the challenges of being overworked, discouraged or alone, says Father David Toups.

Father Toups, the associate director of the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations of the U.S. episcopal conference, is the author of "Reclaiming Our Priestly Character."

In this interview with ZENIT, Father Toups comments on the challenges of the priesthood, along with the six principles of priestly renewal.

Q: "Reclaiming Our Priestly Character" lays out six principles for renewing the priesthood in general, as well as the life of each priest. Can you briefly describe each principle?

Father Toups: The first principle is the permanence of the priesthood, namely the reminder that the priest has entered into a permanent relationship with Jesus Christ and the Church by virtue of ordination.

He receives, in ordination, an ontological character that cannot be removed or erased. This reality affects the way he prepares for the priesthood in the seminary, the way he understands himself as a chaste spouse of the Church and spiritual father of the faithful.

The second principle is that the priest acts "in persona Christi," assuring both himself and the faithful that the sacraments are efficacious "ex opere operato."

The flip side of this is that, although he has received the sacerdotal character, he is obliged to keep working on his own personal character development as a man striving for holiness in his daily life.

The third principle is a reminder that the priest is not his own, but rather he belongs to and represents the Church "in persona Ecclesiae." Thus, he prays the Liturgy of the Hours, as he promised at ordination, for the needs of the whole Church.

Likewise, he embraces and hands on the teachings of the Church as the steward, not the master, of her truths. He is also proud -- in the best sense -- to be visibly recognizable as a priest, knowing he is called to courageously be a sign and symbol pointing beyond himself to Christ.

The fourth principle is priestly presence, namely that everything the priest does is priestly and has immense value, as Christ desires to work through him at all times. This happens in a particular way when preaching, shepherding, and healing God’s people as their spiritual father.

The fifth principle is the caution for priests to avoid the trap of functionalism or activism. The priest can get so busy that he can forget who he is or for whom he is doing the work.

He must be supernaturally sensitive, grounding himself by being a man of prayer who encounters God through daily, silent meditation, desiring an ever more intimate relationship with him.

Finally, the sixth principle, which has already been discussed, is ongoing formation. These principles all find their basis in the priestly character and serve as a foundation for a priestly life lived joyfully, bearing abundant fruit.

Q: Do your recommendations apply equally to diocesan priests and those priests in religious orders?

Father Toups: Absolutely. In fact, the studies done by Dean Hoge of Catholic University reveal that a larger percentage of religious have greater confusion regarding the exact nature of the ontological character of the priesthood. For all priests, diocesan or religious, a proper understanding of the character of orders grounds them in an ever more fruitful life of ministry and service.

The studies mentioned above confirm that priests who have a clear understanding of this doctrine are more likely to be content in their ministry and joyful in their vocation.

The Thomistic axiom, "agere sequitur esse" -- doing follows being -- is true for all priests; the more they understand their priestly identity, the more they will be able to act and serve in the manner Christ has called them. This proper understanding does not guarantee fidelity or holiness, but it certainly is a strong foundation to build upon.

Q: What are some of the biggest difficulties priests face today?

Father Toups: The greatest challenges today lie in the amount of work required of the parish priest, as well as a sense of discouragement and, at times, loneliness. If these are the challenges, the answer rests in learning how to bring these concerns and frustrations before the Lord in deep, relational prayer.

A lack of interiority allows the burdens of the office to take hold of the heart and obscure the truth of his identity which serves to keep him grounded. The new Fifth Edition of the Program of Priestly Formation -- 115-- states that spirituality is the necessary core and governing principle of the whole priestly life. The other aspects of his life remain focused in as much as the priest is grounded in prayer.

Also, with fewer priests, it is all the more important for him to stay connected with his brother priests. Fraternal groups, such as the Jesus Caritas movement, allow him to express himself and be gently challenged to greater holiness by his brothers who truly understand what is happening in his life; the need for spiritual direction and frequent confession must also be attended to.

Further, healthy relationships with family and friends are a genuine joy for the priest; it is a grave danger to be a “lone-ranger” in the world today.

Q: What are, or have been, some of the major impediments to fostering the “doctrine of the priestly character”? How can seminaries and bishops remove these impediments and help priests foster happy and healthy lives?

Father Toups: The greatest impediment has been “bad” theology.

In the wake of the Council, there were a number of well-known theologians who taught that this doctrine was simply a medieval invention. Because of this, many priests, unwittingly, were simply not given the tools to properly understand the theology of the priesthood.

This has adversely affected a generation in the Church, both priest and laity alike. This is precisely why I go to such pains to show the foundation of this teaching from the sacred Scriptures, the Fathers of the Church, and the Magisterium.

Correcting this misperception was a priority during the pontificate of John Paul II. The priest is not a mere functionary who represents the community but a man called by Christ and consecrated in order to consecrate on behalf of the whole Church. Role clarity has proven to be crucial for the happiness of priests.

Bishops and seminary rectors can foster this by ensuring the teachings of the Church are being faithfully handed on to their men in formation. Likewise, dioceses should foster ongoing formation of the presbyterate so priests are being fed spiritually and intellectually with the mind of the Church.

Cardinal Ratzinger, now Benedict XVI, said that orthodoxy leads to orthopraxy; well-grounded men are more likely to lead happy and healthy lives.

Q: How might existing priests cope with the stresses of the priest shortage? Do you see the trend of diocesan priests living in community and sharing responsibilities as a positive development?

Father Toups: As previously mentioned, the spiritual life is of the utmost importance, as well as fostering a balanced lifestyle in which the priest gets the proper amount of sleep, healthy diet, exercise, and recreation.

Priests actually foster their own vocation as they promote vocations in general. There is nothing more life-giving than to pass on one’s own vocation to another. Every priest is called to be a “fisher of men” with regards to vocations.

Eighty percent of the newly ordained said it was a priest’s direct contact that fostered their vocation, but unfortunately only thirty percent of our priests are actively promoting vocations.

Jesus told the apostles, his first priests, “I will make you fishers of men;” the Church Fathers confirm that this apostolic gift was given to those men that stand in persona Christi in order to revitalize and regenerate the priesthood.

If every priest took a little time to foster vocations, we would be well on our way to greater numbers in the seminaries, and the priests themselves would find greater satisfaction and contentment, decreasing their stress and frustration as they see the presbyterate being renewed.

To answer your final question, let me begin by stating that whether priests live together in rectories, the presbyterate as a whole must grow in cooperation, love, and respect for one another. Again, the priesthood is attractive only if lived in communion with others.

I do believe that there are future opportunities for priests to work together in a more communal setting, where multiple parishes might need to be clustered and a number of priests could cooperate in the ministries of these communities. This kind of arrangement cannot be forced, but many priests yearn for a more fraternal life of prayer and communion with their brothers.

It will be interesting to see how this develops in the years to come. Jesus sent the disciples out in twos; there is greater support and effectiveness “when brothers live in unity.”

"Priestly Identity: Crisis and Renewal (Part 1)"

Interview With Father David Toups
Associate Director of the Committee for Clergy, Consecrated Life, and Vocations at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, D.C.

By Annamarie Adkins

WASHINGTON, D.C., MARCH 19, 2008 (Zenit.org).- A general crisis of authentic masculinity in society has also affected the priesthood as only "real men" can adequately fulfill the role of priest and pastor, says Father David Toups.

Father Toups, the associate director of the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations of the U.S. episcopal conference, is the author of "Reclaiming Our Priestly Character."

In this interview with ZENIT, Father Toups comments on the identity and character of the priesthood, and the various challenges it faces today.

Q: Your book focuses on recovering what you call the “doctrine of the priestly character.” Can you describe this “doctrine” in a nutshell?

Father Toups: The “doctrine of the priestly character” is about the permanent relationship the priest enters into with Christ the High Priest on the day of his ordination.

The priest is always a priest; he is not a simple functionary who performs ritual actions, but rather he is configured to Christ in the depths of his being by what is called an ontological change.
Christ is working through him at the altar, “This is my Body,” and in the confessional, “I absolve you of your sins,” but also in his daily actions outside the sanctuary.

The character that the priest receives is a comfort to the faithful inasmuch as they realize that their faith is not based in the personality of the priest, but rather the Person of Christ working through the priest.

On the other hand, the priest is called, like all of the faithful, to a life of holiness. The character received at ordination is actually a dynamism for priestly holiness. The more he can assimilate his life to Christ and submit to the gift he received at ordination, the more he will be a credible witness to the faithful and edify the Body of Christ.

Q: Is it your view that the nature of the priesthood is unknown or misunderstood by many priests? Is mandatory “continuing priestly education” the answer?

Father Toups: Studies show that there has been confusion regarding the exact nature of the priesthood among priests themselves depending on the timing of their seminary training.

Immediately following the Second Vatican Council, there was confusion among priests and laity alike about the difference between the priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial priesthood.

Vatican II’s intention was not to suppress one in order to highlight the other, but rather to recognize the universal call to holiness and the dignity of both.

The ministerial priesthood is a specific vocation within the Church in which a man is called by Christ in the apostolic line to offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Priests are different by virtue of ordination, as confirmed by the council itself in paragraph 10 of “Lumen Gentium,” which emphasized that the baptized and the ordained share in the one and the same priesthood of Christ, but in a way that differs “in essence and not only in degree.”

This difference certainly does not mean better or even holier -- that would be a major error -- but it does mean that there is a distinction.

Cardinal Avery Dulles points out that, if anything, the priesthood of the faithful is more exalted because the ministerial priesthood is ordered to its service. Hence, a recovery from the confusion lies in the need to understand the balance a priest is to find; he is both a servant and one who has been set aside by Christ and the Church to stand "in persona Christi" -- not as a personal honor, but as “one who has come to serve and not be served.”

The priest need not be embarrassed about this high calling, but should boldly live it out in the midst of the world. Pope John Paul the Great regularly reminded priests: “Do not be afraid to be who you are!”

This brings us to the second part of your question, namely, is mandatory “continuing priestly education” the answer?

In the book, I use the term “formation,” not education -- though learning is an important, component part.

Ongoing formation is essential for every Christian vocation. In the midst of full liturgical schedules, parish councils, leaking roofs and hospital visits, the priest must continually open his heart and mind to Christ in prayer and study, annual retreats and seminars, as well as times of recreation and vacation, if he is to thrive as an individual and as a man of faith.

Ongoing formation is about deepening one’s interiority and fostering a relationship with Jesus Christ. It is about an ongoing conversion that reminds the priest who he is as a minister of the Gospel and whose he is as a son of God.

So is ongoing formation the answer? It is certainly a part of the solution to a happier, healthier presbyterate. Pope John Paul II wrote, “Ongoing formation helps the priest to be and act as a priest in the spirit and style of Jesus the Good Shepherd” ("Pastores Dabo Vobis," 73).

Q: Some observers fear that encouraging young priests -- many of who are already attempting to recover traditional liturgical and devotional practices -- to rediscover their priestly character will only foster a new form of clericalism. Others believe giving prominence to the ministerial priesthood will diminish the common priesthood of the faithful -- a development that many see as one of the hallmarks of Vatican II. How would you respond to critics of your proposal?

Father Toups: Highlighting both the priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial priesthood should actually strengthen both; they are not mutually exclusive or in any way opposed to one another.

When our particular calls within the Church are not given their proper distinctions, the Church suffers. St. Paul rightly reminds us of this with his beautiful analogy of how the Body of Christ is made up of diverse members working together for the good of the whole.

The laity and the priest are not in competition but complement each other’s particular calling.

There is a danger of what John Paul II called the “clericalization of the laity and the laicization of the clergy” when distinctions are not made in the life of the Church -- again, different does not mean better. Clericalism is not what happens when one has a clear identity of who they are, but rather when it is lived in such a way that is not in the service of the faithful.

The priest should not be embarrassed to wear the roman collar and be called “father,” for this is not clericalism, but he is to do so in charity and humility as a true disciple of Jesus Christ.

So in response to your remark about younger clergy -- especially those who, in their youthful zeal, may come across too strong -- let us be patient with them as they mature in the priesthood. It takes a while for the ontology to catch up with the psychology.

To young priests who may fall into this category, I would simply say, be men of prayer with the love of Christ as your guiding light, and pray for your own deepening conversion. One can have all of the right answers, but if they are presented “without love, you are a noisy gong or a clanging symbol” as St. Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 13.

Thus we do not deny the ministerial priesthood; we live it inside and out. If the priest lives his calling with humility and service as the driving force, it is more a form of asceticism than of clericalism. He is a visible sign of the radical commitment of the priestly life.

Proper knowledge and integration of the sacramental character into the priestly life and ministry are fundamental for priests to be the men the Church needs them to be.

Q: Is there a crisis of authentic masculinity in the priesthood? Could this be a source of the vocation shortage, especially among Latinos?

Father Toups: Allow me to rephrase the first question to be more all embracing: Is there a crisis of authentic masculinity in the world? I would say yes.

There is a crisis of commitment, fidelity and fatherhood all rooted in men not living up to their call to be “real men” -- men who model their lives on Christ, who lay down their lives out of love, and who learn what it is to be a father from our Father in heaven.

So in the context of the priesthood, which flows out of society, there is a particular challenge to help men grow in manly virtue. The priesthood is not for the faint of heart, but for men who are up to the challenge of living as Christ in laying down their life on a daily basis.

As the priest says the words of consecration, “This is my Body,” Christ is not only speaking through him, but the priest is offering his own life as well for the people to whom he is called to serve.

If a seminarian does not have a deep desire to get married and have children, he might need to rethink his vocation, for these are the natural and healthy manly desires of the heart. He needs to recognize that; in actuality, the priest truly is a married man and a father.

As the priest stands "in persona Christi," he is called to embrace the Bride of Christ, the Church, as his own spouse. A great danger is for the priest to fall into a “bachelor mentality,” which can become a selfish, disembodied and non-relational life.

Instead, if he sees himself in a permanent commitment to the people of God, his life of sacrifice will have great meaning as he lives the nuptial imagery of Ephesians 5:25, “Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church and laid down his life for her.”

When the notions of love, sacrifice and relationship are taken out of the vocation, it becomes sterile and unattractive to young men. For this reason the DVD "Fishers of Men," developed by the USCCB office in which I work, has been so well received; it shows the priestly vocation as heroic and manly in the best sense of the word. To paraphrase the old Marine slogan: God is looking for a few good men!

Q: What role does the concept of “fatherhood” play in the priestly life? Is there a fear of this term because of political correctness?

Father Toups: Spiritual fatherhood in the priesthood flows from the understanding of being a chaste spouse of the Church.

Just as an earthly father feeds, comforts and nurtures his family, so too do our spiritual fathers feed us in the Eucharist, comfort us in reconciliation and the anointing of the sick, and nurture us throughout our lives of faith.

For me, spiritual fatherhood is one of the great joys of my vocation -- to be invited into the hearts and homes of people is such a place of privilege and great responsibility.

Think about your own life. Priests have -- hopefully -- played an important role in all of the key moments of life: birth, death, triumphs, struggles, graduations and marriage.

By living out spiritual fatherhood, the priest experiences the great fruitfulness and generative fecundity of his vocation. For the priest, this should be life-giving; just as parents will make incredible sacrifices for their children, so too priests do radical things -- renounce family and possessions -- to be available to their family of faith.

Where there is love, sacrifice is easy.

Benedict XVI, speaking of the kind of mature manhood needed to be a spiritual father, said: “In reality, we grow in affective maturity when our hearts adhere to God. Christ needs priests who are mature, virile, and capable of cultivating an authentic spiritual paternity. For this to happen, priests need to be honest with themselves, open with their spiritual director and trusting in divine mercy.”

We need to move beyond the fear of being “politically incorrect” to being more worried about embracing the truth of who we are; hence the title of my book focuses on reclaiming our priestly character.

"Benedict XVI: Essence of Priesthood Is Service"

Urges Priests to Believe, Think and Speak With Church

VATICAN CITY, MARCH 20, 2008 (Zenit.org).- The essence of priestly ministry is service, Benedict XVI says, encouraging priests to renew their "yes" to the call of God.

The Pope spoke about the essence of the priesthood today at the Holy Thursday chrism Mass held this morning at St. Peter's Basilica. The Mass brought together some 1,600 priests, and cardinals and bishops to renew the promises they made on the day of their ordination.

According to the Old Testament, the Holy Father explained, there are two tasks that define the essence of the priestly ministry: to be present before the Lord and to serve.

"To be present before the Lord should always be, in its depths, to take charge of mankind before the Lord who, for his part, takes charge of all of us before the Father," he said. In the second place, the Pontiff continued, the priest should serve.

He said that this service is manifested in a concrete way in the Eucharistic celebration. There, the Pope said, what the priest does "is serve, to complete a service to God and a service to man. […] The homage that Christ offered to the Father consisted in giving himself unto the end for man. The priest should unite himself with this homage, with this service."

The word "serve," in its many dimensions, implies "the correct celebration of the liturgy and the sacraments in general, carried out with interior participation," the Pontiff affirmed.

Learning

Benedict XVI continued, saying that an attitude of service implies that the priest should always be in a state of learning: learning to pray, "always anew and always in a deeper way," and learning to know the Lord in his word so that his preaching becomes effective.

"In this sense, 'to serve' means closeness, demands familiarity," the Pope said.

But he cautioned that this familiarity also implies a danger: that the sacred, with which priests come into constant contact, becomes a routine.

"In this way, holy fear is snuffed out," the Holy Father warned. "Conditioned by all the habits, we don't perceive the fact that is most great, new, surprising -- that he himself is present, speaks to us, gives himself to us. We should fight unrelentingly against this habitualness in the extraordinary reality, against the indifference of the heart, recognizing anew our insufficiency and the grace there is in the fact that he surrenders himself in this way into our hands."

Obeying

To serve implies obedience, the Bishop of Rome affirmed: "The servant is at the command of the Word. […] The temptation of humanity is always to want to be totally autonomous, follow one's own will alone and to think that only in that way, will we be free -- that only thanks to a limitless liberty will man be completely man. But in this way we put ourselves on the side contrary to the truth."

We are only free, he cautioned, if "we share our liberty with the rest" and "if we participate in the will of God. This fundamental obedience that forms part of the essence of man is much more concrete in the priest.

"We do not proclaim ourselves, but rather him and his word, which we cannot dream up on our own. Our obedience is to believe with the Church, think and speak with the Church, serve with her," the Pope continued. This implies, he acknowledged, what Christ predicted for Peter, "They will lead you where you do not want to go."

"This allowing ourselves to be led where we do not want is an essential dimension of our service, and it is precisely in this way that we become free," Benedict XVI asserted. "If we allow ourselves to be led, even though it could be against our ideas and our projects, we experience again the richness of the love of God."

The Pope concluded with an allusion to the washing of the feet, with which Christ, "the true High Priest of the world" wants "to be the servant of all. [… ] With the gesture of love to the end, he washes our soiled feet; with the humility of his service, he purifies us of the illness of our pride."

"Cardinal Rodé Calls for Renewal of Religious Life"

Says Young Monks and Priests Give Wordless Testimony

ROME, MARCH 19, 2008 (Zenit.org).- A return to the authenticity of religious life is being encouraged by Cardinal Franc Rodé, prefect of the Vatican congregation that oversees consecrated life in the Church.

Cardinal Rodé, prefect of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, spoke Tuesday with Vatican Radio about the situation of religious life in France.

"France certainly forms part of the reality of Western Europe and there, secularization has been very strong over the last 40 years, after the Council," he said. "It could be said that certain traditional congregations suffer because of this secularized mentality that has seeped into them."
The cardinal recalled that Benedict XVI "continuously warns against the danger of so-called internal secularization."

"To flee from this worldly spirit, therefore, and to put the emphasis on life in community, on fraternal life, on prayer, on poverty, on obedience, on chastity lived in the joy of the heart and in interior liberty, it is this that we should recover, that we should live intensely," he proposed.

"Living the charism intensely and returning to the authenticity of religious life," is what Cardinal Rodé suggested as the "only way to get out of this crisis situation in which religious life finds itself."

Despite the difficulties, the cardinal also noted "surprising reactions." He pointed to the experience of "great admiration and joy when you encounter young monks, young Carmelite or Dominican fathers, Benedictine religious, and you see them full of joy, transparent, with a great interior liberty."

"They are visibly in their place, where God wants them, and they live their vocation in the joy and peace of the heart," the cardinal affirmed. "I think this is the first testimony that these religious give and it is a very convincing, very believable testimony. As the philosopher Bergson said in other times, their existence is an invitation; they have no need for words."

"Papal Visit 2008: Pope Benedict Returns To Yonkers Seminary After 20 Years"

By Shazia Khan

For NY1

March 20, 2008

In April, a Yonkers seminary will host Pope Benedict XVI, who visited the same place 20 years before as a cardinal. NY1’s Shazia Khan filed the following report.

Twenty years ago, Father Michael Morris was still a student at St. Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers, when a special guest from Vatican City paid a visit – Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the German man who will return to New York City in April as Pope Benedict XVI.

“The enthusiasm was incredible because we read his books," said Morris. "He's a scholar - that's his work. He's a teacher and he's a studier, he's a reader, he's a great student. And we were just thrilled to be able to meet him.”

Back in 1988, Ratzinger was the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, responsible for defending the church orthodoxy. He came to be known as “Cardinal No,” even “God's Rottweiler” for his strict adherence to the doctrine.

This April, Ratzinger will go back to St. Joseph’s Seminary as part of his papal visit.

“The pope's job is to proclaim the message of our faith in Jesus Christ and proclaim what that means and how people must live their lives and how to develop it,” said Father Gerard Rafferty, a professor at St. Joseph’s Seminary.

“In his last job, he was given the task of looking at what other people were doing and proclaiming and then trying to evaluate and help them evaluate whether in fact they were remaining consistent to the church,” said Rafferty.

St Joseph's has visiting cardinals plant a tree to commemorate their visits, and the tree Pope Benedict planted 20 years ago has now grown tall.

Another tree was planted in remembrance of Pope John Paul II’s visit to the seminary in 1995, the first visit made by a pontiff to the institution.

Bishop Gerald Walsh, the seminary’s rector, will join Edward Cardinal Egan to welcome the pope who will first greet seminarians before meeting a small group of children with disabilities in the chapel. He will then step outside and on to a stage to address more than 20,000 young Catholics, some of whom might be interested in religious vocations.

“The theme will be - make room for the Lord in your life, listen to what he is saying, and try to live your life the best you can,” said Walsh.

Seminarians are looking forward to being reintroduced to the scholarly pope.

“It’s not the rock star image of perhaps John Paul II, but there is a very solid, quiet teacher here that's got a power in the word the way he unfolds it,” said Rafferty.

And though it has been twenty years since the pope’s last visit, it might as well have been yesterday.

“Physically he looks exactly the same - I mean it is amazing- the only thing different about him is he is wearing white now,” said Morris.

"Former ‘globe-trotter’ plans to spend life as cloistered nun"

Leaving the world behind

By Maria Wiering
The Catholic Spirit

Mary Gibson plans to join the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of the Apostles in Kansas City, Mo., June 11. The Cathedral of St. Paul’s Sacred Heart Chapel holds a special place in her heart. “It in particular is my home, and the part [of the Cathedral] I will miss the most,” she said. -Photo by Dave Hrbacek / The Catholic Spirit

Mary Gibson's childhood dream was to see the world.

She pursued global studies at the University of Minnesota for a year because she wanted a job that would take her abroad. In 2005, she moved to Italy for a year and visited Austria, France and Germany.

However, at age 26, her globe-trotting days are done.

Gibson, a self-described "information junkie" with two blogs, may never again have Internet access. She loves food, but will only eat one meal a day for much of the year. A gregarious talker, she'll spend most of her days in silence.

And, judging by the way her eyes sparkle, she couldn't be happier.

"I feel like an engaged person," she said. "I'm really awaiting my beloved."

On June 11, this Minnesota wo­man will join the cloistered life of the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles in Kansas City, Mo.

Although the degree of strictness differs from one community to another, typically cloistered nuns and monks rarely leave the grounds of their cloister and limit their contact with the rest of the world.

The cloistered life

Gibson has been discerning God's will for her life since she started taking her Catholic faith more seriously in her early 20s. She was open to a religious vocation, but didn't expect to be called to cloistered life, she said.

However, during a 10-day discernment retreat with the nuns in November, she said she felt Jesus ask her to be with him there.

Before a year ago, she didn't know the community existed. She first heard of it from parishioners at St. John the Baptist in Excelsior, where she directs religious education. Some parishioners knew Sister Crystal Wirth, who joined the community last year.

Gibson stumbled across the community's Web site advertising the priestly vestments that members sew. After reading about the nuns, she said, she couldn't get the community out of her mind.

Following the rule St. Benedict wrote in the 6th century, the community's life revolves around liturgical prayer. They pray especially for priests.

Claire Roufs, religious life liaison for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, said young women joining cloistered communities is more common than most people think.

About one-third of women she's worked with who have joined religious life have joined cloistered communities, she said. That totals about five women in the last few years.

"Almost always they are very young and talented," she said. "It is such a mysterious vocation."

Discerning a call

Gibson grew up Catholic in Vesper, Wis. After she left home to become a paramedic, however, she stopped going to Mass. She still considered herself Christian, but faith didn't play a central role in her life.

She moved to St. Paul to work and take classes at the University of Minnesota. Within months, she was dissatisfied with her job, and her classes were forcing her to re-evaluate her beliefs, she said.

Her apartment was two blocks from the Cathedral of St. Paul, and the dome's golden cross was a constant reminder of what she had left, she said.

Gibson returned to Mass on a Sunday in February 2003 and spoke afterward with Father Joseph Williams, the associate pastor at the time.

A few weeks later, she called him to hear her confession. She wanted to come back to the church. For her penance, Father Williams asked her to say the Divine Mercy chaplet, which he prayed with her in the Cathedral's Sacred Heart Chapel.

Gibson helped to start the Cathedral's young adults group, attended daily Mass and transferred to the University of St. Thomas because of its Catholic studies program.

She also started asking God how she could serve him.

"Once I realized that he was truly there, I started realizing what I had to do is give back," she said. In October 2003 Gibson went on pilgrimage to Rome, where she "first encountered the fullness of the Catholic faith," she said.

She returned to Rome to study from fall 2005 to spring 2006 and ended her stay with a four-day retreat with cloistered American Benedictine monks in Norcia, Italy.

That's when she first thought about cloistered life, she said.

She realized she had many misconceptions of cloistered life. "You choose to be limited; you're not disconnected from the world," she said.

Cloistered men and women still receive and write letters to friends and family, and many receive visitors at least once a year. However, in choosing the cloistered life, they seek to detach themselves from worldly things. And that, for her, is true freedom, she said.

The invitation

Right now, the Benedictines of Mary live in a convent in Kansas City built for another order who had once taught at the adjacent Pius X High School. The community plans to build a priory on 120 acres of donated land in northwest Missouri. The sisters hope to be as self-sustaining as possible, raising bees, dairy cows and grain.

Peace engulfed Gibson during her 10-day stay with the nuns in November, she said.

"People think that people enter the convent because they're escaping something," Gibson said. That's not the case at all for her, she added. It was while she was thanking the Lord for all of the blessings in her life - her family, friends, travel, work, passions - that she felt the Lord ask her to give it back to him.

"He gave me the choice," she said - she could choose not to be a cloistered sister, but the Lord was inviting her to serve him in that way.

There, in the chapel, she said aloud, "Yes."

At 26, Gibson is at the average age of the community's 14 sisters, which doesn't surprise her. She's the oldest of the four aspirants who are expected to join the community in June.

Cloistered orders are gaining vocations, said Sister Therese, the community's prioress. "The young ladies of this world have had it. They're throwing away their lipstick and high heels and joining."

God also supplies the needs of the world at each age, she added.

"I think that's why the young ladies are finding us from all over the country - because the Lord wants this," she said. "What it's all about is that we have to get to heaven, and we have to take as many people as we can with us."

For more please check out Mary's blog - Veritatis Splendor, and consider helping her out by reducing her college debt through the Laboure Society.

"Former veterinarian chooses a life of prayer and service"

From The Catholic Sentinel

By Ed Langlois
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Sr. Maria Gabriel Standfield shares a laugh with Srs. Barbara and Rose Marie at Our Lady of Peace.Sentinel photo by Ed Langlois

-

When she was a hard-working veterinarian, Victoria Standfield commuted at all hours between Salem and Tigard. After midnight on April 1, 1997, she fell asleep at the wheel.

Her car careened off the road and clipped a signpost. The windshield shattered. Glass flew everywhere.

But she walked away without a scratch. Later, she found shards all over — even directly behind where she was sitting.

What’s the deal? she thought.

Now known as Sister Maria Gabriel, she sees the event as filled with meaning. For her, God sweats the details, loving us mightily in everyday life.

When Sister Gabriel, 43, professed lifelong vows of poverty, chastity and obedience last month at Our Lady of Peace Retreat House, 300 people came.

The crowd was too much for the chapel, so the Franciscan Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Sorrows converted the large dining room and meeting hall into a church.

Sister Gabriel feels a lot of support, worldly and other-worldly. She looks at religious life as an extension of the call of baptism, something all Christians inherit.

“It’s about living the life of Christ,” she sums up.

She is the second of three daughters born to a 30-year U.S. Army veteran and the woman with whom he fell in love when he was stationed in Germany during the Cold War in the 1960s.

Sister Gabriel (her parents sometimes slip up and call her Victoria), was born at Fort Ord, Calif. Charles and Helga Standfield are cradle Catholics. He was educated by nuns in Pensacola, Fla. and she grew up in Germany.

Helga taught preschool and Charles, even after he left the Army, worked on military transportation contracts.

The family bounced around as Army families do — California, Massachusetts, Colorado and back to Germany.

In fifth grade, Victoria went on a field trip to the University of California at Davis. The idea grew in her — she wanted to be a veterinarian.

A little later, when she was 12, she heard a missionary nun serving in Africa give a slide show on the ministry. The photos were so bright and colorful; that seemed like a good and noble life. She spent hours poring over Maryknoll magazine.

Sister Gabriel, who even then professed a belief in angels, gradated from high school in Wiesbaden. She sang in church choirs and was open about her faith in Jesus.

Not one to rush into things, she pursued the more standard course, getting a college degree in biology and heading to veterinary school at Davis.

One day, doing a rotation on animal heart disease, three nuns brought their beloved German shepherd into the university clinic. Young Dr. Standfield helped them and took careful note of them and their ways.

She graduated from veterinary school in 1993 and the next year moved to Salem to work. She became a member of St. Joseph Parish and felt her spiritual life intensify there.

As time went by, she felt called to more intense discipleship and considered religious life seriously.

By 1996, she was attending vocations retreats, including one at Our Lady of Peace. She admired the contentedness at the place and learned that this was the home of the same community of fascinating women who had brought their ailing dog to her years before in California.

Before long, she picked up a church magazine and ran across an advertisement. It showed a map of the U.S. and a map of China with a crucifix between. It said, “In Christ there is no east or west.” The words and image, especially the crucifix, caused her heart to thump. It was an appeal for vocations from the Franciscan Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Sorrows, which ministers in China and the U.S. and has members from both hemispheres.

While working as a veterinarian, she began joining the sisters for prayer and fun. She felt at home.

Her spiritual director, a chaplain at Fort Ord named Father Michael Drury had become a family friend years before. He asked her candid questions, wanting her to be under no illusions about religious life.

“I feel that she made a mature decision,” says Father Drury, a priest of the Diocese of Helena now serving in Montana. “I see her happiness. That is what makes me feel good.”

She read about St. Bernadette Soubirous and felt a kinship with her, as well as with St. Thérèse of Lisieux and St. Faustina Kowalska.

She was accepted into the Franciscans in 1999. After a pilgrimage to Europe, which included a stay at Assisi, she entered formation.

Her German relatives were a bit shocked. They said she was “crazy” but wished her luck.

For her father, the life change has taken some getting used to. A practical man, he felt good about her veterinarian career.

“She was making good money and she gave all that up,” says Charles, who now lives with Helga in Marina, Calif. “She just gave everything away. God must have called her.”

But he realizes that he is one of the tools God used to get to his daughter. He would often talk about the Sisters who taught him, using words of great admiration and affection.

Formation had its ups and downs. It was a thrill at first. Then came everyday life. But as she’s progressed, Sister Gabriel’s commitment and devotion have deepened.

“The way it has deepened for me is for me to remain docile at the times when the life is not so exciting,” she explains. “If you are open to gifts, you can be sustained and find joy in those times.”

Over the years, the Sisters get to know each other’s glories and foibles, like any family. Only then, Sister Gabriel says, can someone make a valid life commitment. She is delighted with her community. And she will likely get to know them all. There are 23 Sisters in the U.S. and 35 worldwide.

Sister Anne Marie Warren, superior of the Portland community, says she admires and appreciates Sister Gabriel’s honesty and enthusiasm. Both qualities have been great gifts to the community.

“Sister Maria Gabriel has a deep devotion to prayer,” Sister Anne Marie says. “Only if you build a relationship with Jesus can you sustain yourself in the hard times.”

Sister Gabriel has tended the frail and sick sisters, running the infirmary. She also leads the Franciscan Girls Club, helping girls grow in knowledge of the faith. She has traveled to the Sisters’ house in Gallup, New Mexico, where they work with girls who have had troubled lives. On occasion, she still practices as a veterinarian, specializing in small animal medicine.

Sister Gabriel, a trained scientist, has kept up on some current theory. Researchers say more and more that everything is linked by webs of influence. Energy waves tends to sweep past all matter, affecting it in parallel ways.

She’s not surprised. In her language, she sees that as one more movement of the hand of God.

"Poor Clares discuss their religious vocations"

By Tim Puet
2/26/2008
Catholic Times of Coumbus

CLOISTER - Sister Marie Therese (far left) Sister Imelda Marie (center) and Sister Marie St. Claire (right)pray at St. Joseph Monastery in Portsmouth, Ohio. (Catholic Times/Jack Kuston)

PORTSMOUTH, Ohio (Catholic Times) - Any notion that cloistered nuns who constantly pray before the Blessed Sacrament and spend much of their lives in silence must live a solemn, somewhat grim existence quickly disappears on a visit to St. Joseph Monastery in Portsmouth.

Five of the six Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration who live there gathered for an interview last week with the Catholic Times — the sixth, Sister Mary Vincentia, PCPA, was excused because of age. Throughout the hourlong session, smiles and laughter were abundant as they talked about what made then decide to spend their lives adoring Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament and praying for the world beyond the monastery.

Mother Dolores Marie, PCPA, abbess, said the monastery has been revitalized by the presence of three young women who have become part of the community since 2003. The newest member, Sister Mary Immaculate, PCPA, is in the second year of a two-year novitiate in which she is preparing for her first vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

Their vocation decisions

Sister Marie Ste. Claire, PCPA, and Sister Marie Therese, PCPA, both joined the order at about the same time and took their first vows a little more than a year ago. The vows will be renewed each year until 2011, when both take solemn vows of poverty, chastity and obedience for life.

Mother Dolores Marie, a member of the community since 1991, and the monastery’s mother vicar, Sister Imelda Marie, PCPA, a member since 1994, both came to Ohio in 2002 from the Poor Clares’ Our Lady of the Angels Monastery in Irondale, Ala., which was founded by Mother Angelica, best known as the founder of the Eternal Word Television Network.

All five nuns said the decision to enter the cloister wasn’t as difficult as it might appear to be because they felt an overwhelming desire to live the contemplative life.

"I found my Protestant friends understood my choice better and admired it more than my Catholic friends did," said Sister Marie Therese, an Alabama native. "It shocked so many people that a ‘normal girl’ who was very much into acting and the theater in high school would become a nun, but this was something I’d been drawn to for years, partly because my dad worked for EWTN."

"I was looking for love and realized the world couldn’t offer everything I was looking for," Sister Imelda Marie said. "I had plenty of friends in Louisiana where I grew up, and I know I could have gotten married and been happy in that life, but it just wasn’t what I was called to do.

"In this hidden life, you don’t always see or know whether your prayers have been answered, but as you trust more and more in God’s love, you find yourself realizing that he will meet your needs, and that’s a liberating thing."

"I grew up Catholic in a part of Florida where there weren’t many religious or priests from which I could take an example," said Sister Mary Immaculate. "I said the Rosary daily and prayed to find what I was meant to do. When I was 16, I began to realize the Lord wanted something more for me, and I wanted to give more for God. He has done so much for me and was calling me to serve him with an undivided heart."

God wins them over

Sister Marie Ste. Claire described herself as "a southern California girl who mostly likes Ohio but misses the beach."

"The Lord kept inspiring me with this desire to give him everything, even though I kept fighting it," she said. "Eventually, I came to realize God had given me his whole self in the Blessed Sacrament and I wanted to return that gift by giving myself to him. ...

"I went to college in New Hampshire with the idea of going to med school, but instead, that’s where I made the decision that led me here. After my first visit to St. Joseph’s, I knew Jesus was here. A friend at college used to say I’d marry the first guy who asked me, and he was right, but not in the way he expected."

Mother Dolores Marie came to the Poor Clares from a career in retail merchandising and said the last thing she would have anticipated while growing up was becoming a nun.

"I never was involved with religion until I went to work at EWTN as a set designer’s assistant," she said. "When I saw the nuns there in their habits, I was terrified. I tried my best to avoid being introduced to Mother Angelica, but it happened.

"I was caught up in a lot of worldly things, but in time I found myself increasingly drawn to spending time with the Blessed Sacrament. I’d go there sometimes not to pray, but just to be in the presence of Jesus. At first I didn’t realize I had a vocation, but in time I realized God was calling me to his service."

When Mother Dolores Marie was transferred to Portsmouth, there was concern that the monastery would have to close because of the declining health of the four elderly nuns who lived there, but the addition of the younger sisters eliminated that threat.

Local postulants wanted

Sister Mary Vincentia is the last of the older nuns remaining at the monastery. Two others are at the Mohun Health Care Center in Columbus and one has died.

A woman from Ireland is scheduled to enter the monastery March 31 to begin her postulancy, a year of discernment which will lead to the novitiate if she and the community agree she is suited for a nun’s life.

The monastery, In existence for 52 years, still is looking for its first potential postulate from Ohio or the surrounding states. Mother Dolores Marie said that may be in part because of its location away from large population centers. This is one reason why the nuns hope to move elsewhere within the diocese.

The Poor Clares’ life is limited to the monastery, except for necessary errands such as visits to the doctor (or more recently, to look for land for a new monastery, Mother Dolores Marie said). But they’re hardly isolated from the world. For instance, they were quickly made aware of the shooting and stabbing of a teacher at Portsmouth Notre Dame Elementary School on Feb. 7 through several phone calls.

Life in a cloister

The nuns themselves can write home and receive letters once a month. At Christmas time, they are allowed to send and receive letters to anyone.

Family visits are allowed twice a year for two days each, but take place with nuns and their families on the opposite side of a wooden latticework grille. The nuns’ adoration chapel is open to the public daily from 5:45 to 7 a.m. and 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., but when the nuns are at prayer during those times, they remain behind a wooden screen.

Pictures included with these stories are one of the few public glimpses the nuns have offered of their life in the monastery.

It’s a life lived in simple surroundings, which starts with a common wakeup time of 5 a.m. and continues through "lights out" at 10 p.m. Additional adoration occurs Wednesday and Saturday nights, with each nun assigned an hour on Wednesday and 90 minutes on Saturday.

Mass is at 7 a.m., usually with Father Joseph Klee of Portsmouth St. Mary Church, and the day proceeds through a set schedule which includes the Church’s Office of Readings, the Rosary, the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, the Franciscan Crown devotion to the seven joys of Mary, the Stations of the Cross, and set times for work, study, recreation, and free time.

Lunch at noon is the main meal of the day, with toast and peanut butter generally for breakfast, and a sandwich or cereal at supper. The main meal usually consists of a protein, a starch, two vegetables and fruit. Meat is eaten on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays, and on Church feasts and solemnities. Snacks and desserts are limited to Sundays and solemnities.

The monastery’s main source of revenue is the packaging of altar bread which comes from an outside supplier. That means the monastery is visited nearly every day by a United Parcel Service truck. At one time, the sisters made their own bread, but that stopped as the sisters got older.

The practice of silence

Most of the day is spent in silence; indeed, the word "Silence" is posted throughout the monastery. It’s not an absolute silence, since the nuns are permitted to speak to each other about things that are necessary during the day. Greater silence is observed from after 8 p.m. night prayers until the next morning.

The silence also is broken occasionally by one of the monastery’s three dogs — Jewel, an adult schnauzer, and Pippin and Merry, two black Labrador puppies.

Talk is done quietly and kept to a minimum, but as Mother Dolores Marie put it, "If something funny happens, we laugh. We don’t expect anyone to be inhuman or oblivious to the situations around us. We are not experts at silence, but we continually work at it and try to renew ourselves in our efforts to attain it."

She acknowledged that the sisters sometimes became as distracted as most laypeople do while praying. "It is part of the human condition," she said. "Especially when you have repetitive prayers, it is hard not to wander off to some other subject or thought. So we have to have humility and realize we are not capable of anything without the help of God. ...

"Sometimes it is easier than others to pray, but the point is to keep doing it, keep making the effort, no matter how we feel about it. We may feel that we haven’t prayed one bit, but in the mind of God, it may be the most fruitful time of prayer we have offered yet."

Testing the call

Any single woman who is between 18 and 35, has a high school education, is a Catholic in good standing, and is in good physical and psychological health is eligible to join the Poor Clares.

"I would encourage any young woman to spend time in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament to help discern the direction of her life," Mother Dolores Marie said. "You have to have a longing for a life of prayer, specifically a life of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament.

"A contemplative life is not for everyone, but it is a rich and fulfilling one, and I would encourage anyone who feels such a calling to not be afraid, but to listen to what God may be saying."

The convent also has a Web site, www.stjosephmonastery.com, can send and receive e-mail, and receives Portsmouth’s daily newspaper and the Catholic Times. Mother Dolores Marie monitors the various means of communication and informs the other nuns of significant events in the Church and the world.

"5 Questions: Sister Jeanne Haley"

5 Questions: Sister Jeanne Haley
Administrator of St. Patrick's Residence

From The Naperville Sun
March 17, 2008

"We're not just these holy nuns who give and give and give. We do, but we get so much in return," says Sister Jeanne Haley, administrator at St. Patrick's Residence in Naperville, at right, about her life as a Carmelite Sister for the Aged and Infirm. Here, she visits with resident Katherine Ferianc, seated, and Ferianc's daughter, Ellie Augustine of La Grange, March 10 in Naperville.
Danielle Gardner / Staff photographer

Growing up, Sister Jeanne Haley never thought of herself as nun material.

As a teenager she sometimes got into mischief. But she never forgot the pleasure she felt during the summer she volunteered at Sacred Heart Manor, a home for the elderly in Chicago run by the Carmelite Sisters. She was 14 at the time and her admiration for the joyful society of the nuns ultimately led her to the religious vocation she has cherished for 38 years.


For the last decade, Haley has been administrator at St. Patrick's Residence in Naperville, a non-profit, 210-bed nursing and rehabilitation facility served by the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm. Her goal is to make St. Pat's not only comfortable and homey for its residents, but also an integrated part of the Naperville community. St. Patrick's is represented at various city activities including Naper Days' annual Bed Races.

Haley was born in Oak Park, the third of six children. The family lived with her grandmother, who helped her parents care for the children, including younger sister Jeanne, who was developmentally disabled.

It was that sister's name that Haley took when she joined the Carmelites in 1970.

Through the years, Haley also has taken care of elders in Carmelite homes in New York City, Philadelphia and Davenport, Iowa. While serving the latter, she graduated from Scott Community College with a degree in nursing.

Haley had always wanted to be a nurse since reading Sue Barton books by Helen Dore Boylston as a young girl. Helping care for her younger sister also intensified her passion for the profession.
Haley's other interests include playing cards, puzzles and spending time with family.

1. What made you decide to become a nun?

I was 19 years old and I believed in what the sisters did. I'm not going to say God tapped me on the shoulder. He didn't. But I felt drawn to become a part of what their mission was. I dated in high school. I went to my senior prom. I wasn't all my life sitting saying 'oh yes, I want to be a nun.' But I felt called to it. ... Through all these years, the vocation just becomes stronger. I can remember as a postulant sometimes not believing I was this fortunate to be able to be part of this community - to be able to have my wish of caring for the elderly, of being a nurse and then putting it together, being a part of a community that did the things I wanted to do and had such a beautiful prayer life.

2. What are some of your other interests?

I like to bowl. I love the White Sox ... I don't care if the Sox are winning or losing, I just love to go to the games ... It's fun to get out to the ball park, to get the fresh air, to yell and scream. We have more laughs. We have a great big sign that says 'Nuns love the White Sox' and its got a picture of a nun with a baseball bat. We get our pictures taken with half the world. We've had old altar boys send us up hot dogs one year. We danced on the dugout with the mascot. We need to do it because we are human and we need to have fun. But it's also important for us to get out there and show people that religious can have fun.

3. What is your personal philosophy?

Trust in God and realize that it's not all about you. I think that's the only way we can live our lives. So if you think everything is about us and how we are going to handle things and what we are going to do and what we are going to achieve, we're going to be exhausted and not accomplish anything. But if we can understand that God put all these people in our lives making our lives better and to make what we do better, then it can be a joy. I don't always live by that rule as well as I should.

4. How would you describe yourself?

I would say I am someone that loves to be a part of a mission, someone that loves to be blessed to be in the community I'm in and someone who tries to be joyful and thankful to the Lord every day.

5. What are some of your personal goals?

I'm still striving to gain the balance of being an administrator and still staying who I am. I think I'm always striving to be the religious that I want to be and be joyful in doing it.

"Priest heeds call to Iraq"

By REX W. HUPPKE
McCLATCHY-TRIBUNE
CHICAGO - The Rev. Matt Foley has stood by the ornate oak altar of his church and made the sign of the cross over dozens of young soldiers bound for Iraq and Afghanistan.

Each time, his blessing has echoed through the Little Village sanctuary and back to a long-ago promise unfulfilled.

In the early 1980s, Foley faced diverging paths: Follow his brother into the Army, or follow his faith into the priesthood. Reluctantly, he felt pulled to the church.

But he told his brother, Mike, that he would join him in the service if war ever came.

The United States invaded Iraq in 1991. Mike commanded a company of Bradley Fighting Vehicles as they stormed across the desert. Matt was two years out of the seminary, sworn to the church, tied to his priestly duties at a North Lawndale parish.

There was no resentment, but in the decade that followed, the Irish Catholic priest could never shake the feeling he had let his brother down.

In 2000, Matt took over St. Agnes of Bohemia Catholic Church, becoming a dynamic and beloved figure known across Little Village as ‘‘Padre Mateo.’’

He marched with parishioners, protesting the neighborhood’s lack of parks. He boldly scolded the community for allowing gang violence to claim young lives.

When a man tried to break into the church’s donation box, the priest chased him down, tackled him and held him until police arrived.

But even as the parish flourished, Foley, 45, began to feel tugged toward a change, the same sensation he had when God pulled him into the priesthood. It was something in the worried eyes of the young men and women who sought his blessing before going to war.

‘‘I keep sending these people, and now I feel like it’s my turn to go,’’ said Foley, his head resting against the wall of a dimly lit prayer room a day before he was sworn in to the Army. ‘‘I just feel like it’s my turn to go. You can’t just keep blessing people.’’

On Feb. 27, by the church’s altar, Foley recited an oath to his brother, an Iraq veteran twice over.

‘‘I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic,’’ said Matt Foley, standing rigid, right hand raised, beside the family of a Little Village soldier serving in Iraq.

It was the culmination of more than a year of prayer and meditation. Foley had searched his soul, thought about the strong parish he had built and the people he would leave behind.

‘‘When you bury people’s children or their relatives, you’re really connected to them on a very high level,’’ he said. ‘‘I feel like I’m not going to be with these people who will forever be mourning their losses.’’

He also had to seek approval from the archdiocese of Chicago - to which he had vowed obedience - at a time when the church faces a shortage of priests.

The Rev. Claudio Diaz Jr., director of Hispanic ministries for the archdiocese, said Cardinal Francis George let Foley go because he recognized the dearth of Catholic priests in Iraq and believed Foley’s calling was sincere.

‘‘That’s part of who we are as priests,’’ Diaz said. ‘‘We remind the people of God to be attentive of God’s will in their lives. Simultaneously, as priests, we have to be attentive to the voice of God in terms of our ministry and service to his people.’’

Foley will leave in June, bound for military chaplain training in South Carolina. He has asked the Army to send him to Iraq as soon as possible, and Army officials say his wish will certainly be granted.

During his swearing-in ceremony, the priest read a fitting Gospel passage: ‘‘When you were young, you walked where you wanted to walk. But when you are old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will carry you where you do not want to go.’’

Up through college, Foley was a troublemaker, a partyer. As a political science major at Marquette University, he played rugby with fellow student and soon-to-be-famous comedian Chris Farley, known for his life of excess. Farley, who died in 1997, named one of his most revered ‘‘Saturday Night Live’’ characters, a bumbling motivational speaker, after Foley.

‘‘I was interested in law and drinking beer,’’ Foley said.

Yet he couldn’t escape a pull he had felt since his high school days in Libertyville, the sense that God was calling him. Maybe it came from memories of his Uncle Jerome, an Army chaplain who served two tours in Vietnam. Foley still recalls 1970s nights spent by the television, watching the end of the network newscast as names of the day’s soldiers killed in action scrolled down the screen, praying his uncle was safe.

By his junior year at Marquette, in 1983, Foley reached his crossroads. His brother, Mike, a senior and already enlisted, was sure Foley would become an Army man.

‘‘My roommate and I both became infantry officers,’’ Mike Foley said. ‘‘And Matt enjoyed being around us all the time. We’d tell him about what we were doing. I think Matt always liked that adventure, that leadership kind of thing.’’

But Matt couldn’t resist the spiritual pressure bearing down on him. He surprised everyone he knew by entering the seminary in Chicago.

‘‘I surrendered,’’ Foley said. ‘‘I let somebody else control me. I let my God guide me.’’

He finished the seminary in 1989 and became an associate pastor at St. Agatha in North Lawndale, a white priest in a nearly all-black community.

In 1994, barely able to speak a word of Spanish, he moved to a parish in Quechultenango, Mexico.

Six years later he returned to Chicago and took control of St. Agnes, a spiritual anchor in a culturally rich neighborhood divided by rival Latino gangs, struggling with issues of poverty and immigration.

Once again, Foley was a stranger relying on divine direction.

‘‘We started to notice a lot of things changing right away,’’ said Dolores Castaneda, a parishioner and activist. ‘‘He fixed the church. He fixed the school. He fought for us to have better places for the children to go. He joined marches, he got angry, he protested.’’

Quickly - more quickly then anyone could expect - he was embraced. They liked him because he admitted his own sins and warned them of theirs. He spoke of how he enjoyed hearing babies cry during Mass because they sounded full of life.

Since he arrived in 2000, Foley has buried nearly 30 members of the feuding Latin Kings and the Two Sixers street gangs. He never tried to hide his frustration.

‘‘He’d tell us that we don’t have compassion, we’re not really focused on God,’’ Castaneda said. ‘‘If you’re focused on God, you’re not killing your brother, you’re not killing your neighbor.’’

But what few knew about Padre Mateo was that his time in Little Village began expiring as soon as he felt comfort setting in. He said it’s the nature of his relationship with God, a connection that, in order to work, must routinely be renewed.

‘‘I’m so restless with my God,’’ Foley said. ‘‘When I get stripped of this place, which has been my life, my home, my family, I’m going to be brought to a place where I’m not going to know anyone. I’ll be a vessel that God’s going to use.’’

And he’ll fulfill a promise unkept. When Foley told his brother, now a reservist based in Georgia, that he was signing up, the response was simple.

‘‘About time,’’ Mike Foley said.

He was joking, but the priest knew it was time to move on. He felt the flutters of fear in his gut, worried he could lose his zeal, as though he still had to run to stay ahead of the college kid who never thought he would be a priest in the first place.

So Foley will stay with his parish until June, serving more than 6,000 people who attend Mass each Sunday and look to him for help.

Then he’ll pack his bags and let himself again be carried somewhere he doesn’t want to go, but needs to be.

"Pro-life group launches Humanae Vitae Priests web site"

Front Royal, Va, Mar 10, 2008 / 09:47 pm (Catholic News Agency).

Human Life International has launched a web site to help priests, deacons and seminarians teach and evangelize using Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae.

The site producers plan to supply offering reflections, commentaries, homily aids and solid practical resources for priests to preach about and defend Catholic teachings concerning marital love and contraception. The site is located at http://www.humanaevitaepriests.org/

According to John Mallon, director of HumanaeVitaePriests.org, the site will examine the “disastrous aspects of widespread contraception,” including its “medical, sociological, hormonal, psychological, cultural, pastoral, spiritual, even environmental aspects.” It will feature the commentary of special guest experts.

The site includes a special supplement from the magazine Inside the Vatican’s 1998 issue commemorating the 30th anniversary of the encyclical. The free supplement, titled “A Prophecy for Our Time,” includes interviews with Human Life International founder Father Paul Marx, Priests for Life president Father Frank Pavone, Dr. Janet Smith, and Dr. Alice von Hildebrand. It also contains a pastoral letter from Archbishop Charles Chaput and an article from then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger before his election to the papacy.

“Our prayer is that this project will be a positive effort to spread the light and truth of God’s plan for love, marriage and sexuality,” said Mallon.