Editor’s note: This is the first in a new periodic column in the Catholic Herald for young adults.
Hello to all! My name is Jon Leonetti. For this first column I have decided to give you a short biography of who I am, allowing readers to know a little bit more about me.
So here it goes . . .
The United States spans some 3,500 miles from coast to coast, and by August 2009, I will have walked it.
Doing God’s work includes serving as a Communion minister, usher, lector, serving on parish council, or other Church related activities. But our work can also be holy.
At the end of Mass, we are commissioned to “go in peace to love and to serve the Lord.” One way that we can love and serve God is through our work.
Human beings naturally recoil at the prospect of pain and suffering. When a sharp object pokes us, we instinctively pull away. When the unpleasant neighbor comes up on caller ID, we recoil from answering the phone. Our initial response is to avoid noxious stimuli and pain, similar to most animals.
Yet when dealing with painful or unpleasant situations, we can also respond deliberately and in ways that radically differentiate us from the rest of the animal kingdom.
I remember when my wife and I became engaged what great fun it was to go to the department stores and put together our gift registry. In fact, the greatest gifts I received (I mean, we!) were three different grills! I ended up returning them all and getting the daddy of all grills – what a gift!
Now that we just passed our 16th wedding anniversary, and the gas grill rusts on the back porch, I realize that there were other gifts far more important than the grills. In fact, perhaps the most meaningful gift was attending a weekend retreat for engaged couples before our wedding.
My wife and I had talked about many, many things during our dating relationship — I didn’t think there could be much more to discuss. But the opportunity to focus only on us — for a full weekend led by married couples sharing their own experiences and the wisdom of the Church — would have a far greater impact on our marriage than I realized at the time. In fact, I credit that experience for the ongoing success of our marriage.
In my 81 years as a Catholic, I have been warned to “Pray for a Happy Death.” Suddenly I seem to be in charge of one and I don’t even know what it means. What is a “Happy Death”?
It is said that St. Joseph had one because he died in the arms of Jesus and Mary. I think that would be a hard one to pull off for the head of our family. We’d need a lot of space for me with our 10 kids: Rob, Tom, Tim, Elizabeth, Kathi, Kris, Gretchen, Patty, John, Mark, and their spouses. And the 18 grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren. That’s a lot of arms!
Over the last several weeks, the Office of Catholic Schools has been busy moving forward with Catholic Schools Planning.
Between May and July, over 300 people attended one of 12 task force meetings conducted at locations throughout the diocese. Each meeting began with prayer, a brief history of the process, and an explanation of our goal: to find ways to strengthen our Catholic schools throughout the diocese and ensure that they are “available, affordable, accessible,” and that they offer both an unparalleled faith formation and academic education to all students now and for generations to come.
Once the planning process was underway, participants considered the various challenges currently facing Catholic schools, shared opinions and experiences, brainstormed ideas, and discussed possible courses of action as we look for ways to strengthen our schools.
In 1919, the U.S. bishops endorsed the idea that all Americans should have access to affordable health care. Ninety years later we are still waiting for that idea to be realized and our nation is engaged in a serious debate as to whether the vision of 1919 will finally come to pass.
In the short term, the outcome of the debate is in doubt. Thoughtful people have raised legitimate concerns about the cost of the program and the proper balance between the public and private sectors. And no plan can include abortion in any package of mandated benefits and issues.
But in the long term, the realities of the economic upheaval currently underway will make reform inevitable. For the trends in our society that make universal access to health care attractive are not going away.
A priest asked a class of second graders, “How many of you want to go to Heaven?” Every little hand went up.
The priest responded, “How many of you want to be a saint?”
The children glanced at each other with puzzled looks. Most of them put their hands down.
“Well, boys and girls,” the priest said, “Since no one wants to be a saint, we have a problem. To get to Heaven, you must be saintly or Christ-like. So let me ask again, ‘How many of you want to be a saint?'”
Every hand quickly went up! The priest’s hand joined their hands.
When Pope Benedict XVI visited the United States in April of 2008, I had the chance to attend the opening ceremony at the White House South Lawn.
As I listened to President Bush’s welcoming remarks to the pope, I was caught off guard by one line in particular, a powerful statement that seemed almost too philosophical to be spoken by a United States president: “In a world where some no longer believe that we can distinguish between simple right and wrong, we need your message to reject this dictatorship of relativism and embrace a culture of justice and truth.”
Inspiring letters from mission seminaries tell of the growing number of young men in Asia and Africa responding to our Lord’s call to the priesthood.
One recent letter, from a seminary in Nigeria, included such facts and figures — and then one line that spoke to the heart.
St. Augustine’s Seminary in Jos, Nigeria, is filled to capacity, with some 300 students. The rector, Fr. Sylvester Dagin, offers particulars about their formation and of their work on the seminary’s small farm, growing potatoes and vegetables.
