Welcome to Wednesday. "Future of Faith" series proposes ways to elevate women's voices in the San Diego diocese. An NCR columnist turns to St. Angela, a medieval woman mystic who was drawn to evangelical poverty, for spiritual guidance.
The 2018 Pennsylvania Grand Jury report on clergy sex abuse sent shock waves through the U.S. Catholic Church. For Bridget Gramme, the moment felt like a "call to women" to improve the church.
"I'm a cradle Catholic, it's my community and my identity and my kids go to Catholic schools," Gramme said. "It's something we really believe in and the community is so important to us. Maybe it's time we step it up and not just sit around and let these things happen."
Along with Catholic professionals involved in a variety of ministries, Gramme formed a planning team with the goal of healing the church by centering the voices of women and youth.
This idea developed into a series called "Future of Faith," which resulted in three proposals designed to elevate women's voices in the diocese. Those proposals include forming a women's speakers' bureau, an all-women advisory council to the bishop and a diocesan synod on women's issues.
You can read more of the story here.
In his latest column for NCR, Franciscan Fr. Daniel Horan turns to the fascinating life of St. Angela of Foligno, a medieval laywoman, Third Order Franciscan and mystic canonized by Pope Francis in 2013.
Horan says that the relatively unknown St. Angela was "drawn to evangelical poverty, not as an end in itself, but as a means toward deeper appreciation of our existential dependence on God and need to care for one another."
"In addition to the reassurance of God's intimate relationship with all people and the need to follow Christ's example of evangelical poverty leading to greater love of neighbor, both of which are insights desperately in need of repeating today, Angela's mystical vision of God's relationship to creation is timely," Horan writes.
You can read more of Horan's column here.
This week, we began our series, Building a Common Future, in which we asked Catholic politicians, activists and scholars to offer advice to President-elect Joe Biden.
"Building our common future: It's what the United States, indeed, the entire world needs right now," we wrote in an editorial introducing the series.
Today's commentary comes from Marie Dennis, past co-president of Pax Christi International, and addresses President-elect Joe Biden's future decisions about U.S. foreign policy and national security. "The crises [Biden] inherits present his administration with a rare opportunity to contribute in substantial ways to a 'new post-pandemic normal' toward which Pope Francis has been incessantly directing our attention," she writes.
You can read Monday's commentary from Sen. Tim Kaine on immigration here. Tuesday's commentary from Dwayne David Paul on community policing can be found here.
Read the rest of Dennis' commentary here.
More headlines
- ICYMI: Popular Chicago priest Fr. Michael Pfleger has stepped aside from ministry following allegations that he sexually abused a minor more than 40 years ago.
- At Global Sisters Report, Jennibeth Sabay, a junior sister of the Sisters of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception of Castres, writes about how we are relational beings. "With this pandemic, we may face physical distancing and movement restrictions, but those will never hinder us from connecting and nurturing our relationships with God and fellow human beings."
- In the latest Notes from the Field post, Celina Kim Chapman writes about her year of service during the pandemic.
Final thoughts
In today's column, NCR political columnist Michael Sean Winters tries to predict what 2021 will bring the U.S. Catholic Church. He thinks a few themes will emerge: the relationship between the U.S. bishops and the Biden administration, the Year of the Family, the appointments of new bishops in some significant sees, and how the church will continue to cope with COVID-19. Winters also has a column looking forward to the year of politics in 2021, such as the decisions President-elect Joe Biden makes, new crises he must face and new votes in Congress. Sign up for the Distinctly Catholic list to get Winters' columns in your email.
Until Thursday,
Stephanie Yeagle
NCR Production/Online Editor
[email protected]
Twitter: @ncrSLY
