Welcome to Tuesday. Amy McGrath, the Catholic challenger to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, sits down with NCR. The Chicago Archdiocese measures its use of energy. Longtime NCR columnist Jamie Manson says goodbye.
The death of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg - and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's decision to move forward with a confirmation hearing within weeks of the national election - has brought renewed attention to the Senate race in Kentucky, where McConnell is being challenged by Libertarian Brad Barron and moderate Democrat Amy McGrath.
McGrath is a former Marine Corps fighter pilot, mother of three and a Catholic. First seen as a long shot, she has been gaining on McConnell, with the most recent polls showing her down by seven points, 41% to McConnell's 48%.
She told NCR freelancer Melinda Henneberger that she sees her campaign as about corruption in Washington, not about abortion politics or the Supreme Court nominee.
"Sen. McConnell sees this as a chance to play politics again because he is the ultimate partisan," McGrath told NCR. "He sees this as an opportunity to divide us yet again. Justice Ginsburg was confirmed 96-3 in an era when Mitch McConnell wasn't the leader. He has built a system and a Congress - he has built it! - that is so polarized that the Supreme Court is now a weapon, [which] is so against what we should be doing and what has worked in our country for the last 200 years."
In summer 2015, the Chicago Archdiocese announced an ambitious goal of benchmarking the energy use of all 2,700 buildings and properties under its purview.
The announcement came a month after Pope Francis issued his social encyclical "Laudato Si', on Care for Our Common Home."
Benchmarking refers to measuring a building's energy use over time and in comparison to other properties of similar size and location, and then using that information to assess performance, identify improvements and quantify potential and real savings.
Five years after announcing its goal, the archdiocese continues to work toward benchmarking energy at all of its properties. It first emphasized quantity, by trying to benchmark the largest possible number of buildings. Now it's focused on quality, data that is more useful to its parishes, schools and organizations as they evaluate how they can use energy best.
At Global Sisters Report, St. Joseph Sr. Barbara Lum, who tended to John Lewis on Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama, in 1965, talks about the Black Lives Matter movement and what she would say to young activists today.
