Author: Chris Lee

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Chris Lee

National Vocation Awareness Week is November 5-11

seminarian group
Seminarians from the Diocese of Madison are pictured with Bishop Robert C. Morlino of Madison and Fr. Gregory Ihm, vocations director for the diocese, right.
For more on discerning and answering God’s call, see the special section on vocations in this week’s paper. (Photo by Backflip)

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Catholic Church in the United States will celebrate National Vocations Awareness Week, November 5-11.

This annual event is a special time for parishes in the United States to actively foster and pray for a culture of vocations to the priesthood, diaconate, and consecrated life.

Cardinal Joseph Tobin, the chair of the U.S. Bishops’ Committee on Clergy, Consecrated Life, and Vocations, reminds us that each of us in the Church has a key role to play in the witness of our vocation in ordinary circumstances.

“As we go about our everyday life and most especially this week, we must keep vocations in our prayers, while, at the same time, being a mindful witness with our own vocation,” said Cardinal Tobin.

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Chris Lee

‘iGen’ are perhaps least religious in U.S.

Jean Twenge’s book iGen is one of the most fascinating — and depressing — texts I’ve read in the past decade. A professor of psychology at San Diego State University, Dr. Twenge has been, for years, studying trends among young Americans, and her most recent book focuses on the generation born between 1995 and 2012.

Since this is the first cohort of young people who have never known a world without iPads and iPhones, and since these devices have remarkably shaped their consciousness and behavior, Dr. Twenge naturally enough has dubbed them the “iGen.”

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Chris Lee

Clarification on the Issue of Funeral Rites and Those in Homosexual Civil or Notorious Unions

Recently, there has been media attention regarding a private and confidential communication to the priests of the Diocese of Madison regarding funeral rites and those in homosexual civil or otherwise notorious unions. The answers below are an attempt to correct misinterpretations of the communication and provide explanation so there is greater clarity. To all those who try or hope to try to live the challenge of following the natural law and thereby the Church’s teaching while struggling with same-sex attraction and perhaps many times faltering, please know you are loved and respected, and always welcome in the Catholic Church and invited to the truth of the Gospel. Jesus Christ loves you and wants your joy.

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Chris Lee

Brand new St. Paul University Catholic Center dazzles UW’s Library Mall

MADISON — At the heart of the great University of Wisconsin (UW) campus in Madison, an extraordinary new home of encounter with the Risen Christ is ready to welcome students back.

With great joy and thanksgiving, St. Paul University Catholic Center announces that just a few finishing touches remain on the new Church and Student Center as the community prepares to swing its doors wide open to a great new future.

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Chris Lee

Hope shines here!

Fonder Ponders column by Jackson Fonder

For the past year, we’ve been anticipating the opening of The Beacon, the new homeless day resource center operated by Catholic Charities.

The day finally happened, and The Beacon shined as a light of hope in the lives of over 200 men, women, and children experiencing homelessness in Dane County.

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Chris Lee

Schoenstatt Movement in Madison opens Father Kentenich Year

MADISON — On September 15, 1968, Fr. Joseph Kentenich, founder of the International Schoenstatt Movement, was called into eternity immediately following Holy Mass in the Trinity Church on Mount Schoenstatt, Germany.

This castle-like church was built as a monument to thank the Mother Thrice Admirable, Queen, and Victress of Schoenstatt, for her protection during the years when Hitler was persecuting the Church in Germany. This was Father Kentenich’s first Holy Mass in this church, and it set a seal on his fruitful life’s work.

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Chris Lee

Our Lady of the Rosary and the Battle of Lepanto

Word on Fire
Fr. Steve Grunow

In October, the Church commemorates the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, a celebration that has its origin not, as it would seem, in simply a prayer, but in a battle.

On October 7, 1571, a fleet of ships assembled by the combined forces of Naples, Sardinia, Venice, the Papacy, Genoa, Savoy, and the Knights Hospitallers fought an intense battle with the fleet of the Ottoman Empire.

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