Worship Times

The Army is looking for a few good priests — 225, to be exact. It seems the priest shortage isn’t only affecting parishes; it’s also hit the military. According to a Dec. 9, 1999, report in Newsweek, 97 (less than 8 percent of the total) army chaplains are Roman Catholic priests. That is in contrast to 428,000 Catholic soldiers. “Unless we can attract more Roman Catholic priests to the army chaplaincy, we will be facing a situation where we are no longer providing for the free exercise of religion for almost a quarter of our soldiers and families,” Chaplain (Major General) Gaylord T. Gunhus, the Army’s chief of chaplains, is reported to have said to the National Conference of Ministry to the Armed Forces recently. Gunhus is working with the U.S. bishops to develop new initiatives for attracting priests to military service.
 

Thou shalt not eat meat?

Also reported on Newsweek’s website (Newsweek.com) is a claim by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals that Jesus was a vegetarian. Bruce Friedrich, PETA’s vegetarian campaign coordinator, claims Jesus didn’t really eat those biblical fish after the resurrection. They’re embellishments to give more symbolic heft to the story. Randall Balmer, professor of religion at Barnard College, Columbia University, and a vegetarian, is reported to have said of the PETA theory, “It sounds fishy to me.” Check out more of PETA’s claims for Jesus’ meatless diet at www.jesusveg.com.
 

Religion X

The X Generation may be losing its religion, but it is finding its soul, according to Wade Clark Roof, professor of religion and society at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and author of more than a dozen books on generational trends in religion, including A Generation of Seekers: The Spiritual Journeys of the Baby Boom Generation. Wade says in a report on the Salon.com website that Xers associate religion with institutions and organizations, but they see spirituality as associated with a personal search and finding purpose and meaning in one’s existence. He says of the X Generation, “There’s a lot of emphasis on one’s own experience. Xers are also looking to explore the Internet and visual sources wherever they are. There are a lot of 800 lines out there offering spiritual advice and CD-ROMs to buy. There’s been an explosion of resources. But with a greater range of options comes an additional burden because choices can be difficult.” See the full report at www.salon.com/news/feature/1999/10/09/genx/index.html.
 

Sex and the sacred

“How did pregnant and poor teenage girls become a symbol for what is wrong with the country,” asks Rich Heffern, “rather than, say, overpaid CEOs, old-growth forests fallen to timber companies, greed or an obscenely excessive nuclear arsenal?” 

Heffern, the former editor of Praying, wrote in the Dec. 17, 1999, issue of the National Catholic Reporter. His essay, “Sex in cahoots with the sacred,” ponders the connection between human sexuality and sanctity. He quotes theologian Rosemary Haughton as saying, “We have thought of sex as something which had to be sanctified. We must stop thinking this way. We are not asked to sanctify sex or convert it to Christian use. What we have to do is discover the sanctity that is already there and find out what it tells us about the meaning of Christian living.”

Heffern goes on to ask, “Why do so many of us loathe our bodies? Why has loving touch (without lust) become so rare? Why do we almost never hear forthright, honest discussion about our sexuality the way most of us experience it, despite high rental rates for porn videos, constant titillation and bombardment with sexual imagery in advertising and endless talk-show sex conversations? Why is sexuality so problematic for all of us?”
 

Saintly rolodex

The new Index of the Causes of Saints was released by the Vatican on Dec. 17, 1999. This Index is the 15th edition. The first was published in 1890 and the most recent in 1988; it comprises information dating from 1588 up to and including 1999, according to the Vatican Information Service. 

The preface of the Index gives information on the history and procedure of the causes of saints. In the first part, which is 402 pages long, mention is made of 1,921 causes.

The second part contains the list of early “blesseds” or “saints,” whose cults were confirmed by the Holy See prior to the year 1534. In order for them to be canonized, the heroic nature of their virtues and a miracle attributed to their intercession must be recognized. Currently, there are 1,430 “early blesseds.”

The third part comprises the list of blesseds, which at present numbers 1,742 from the year 1609 to 1999. Of these, John Paul II has proclaimed 940 blesseds and 295 saints.

The fourth section comprises the catalog of saints canonized from the congregation’s foundation (1588) up until today, a total of 591.
 

The artist, image of God the Creator

“None can sense more deeply than you artists, ingenious creators of beauty that you are, something of the pathos with which God at the dawn of creation looked upon the work of his hands. A glimmer of that feeling has shone so often in your eyes when like the artists of every age captivated by the hidden power of sounds and words, colors and shapes, you have admired the work of your inspiration, sensing in it some echo of the mystery of creation with which God, the sole creator of all things, has wished in some way to associate you” (John Paul II, “Letter to Artists,” Easter Sunday 1999; to view the entire letter, go to www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/letters/documents/).
 

Blessed Juan

Juan Diego is on that list of “blesseds” but may not make sainthood. ‘’We still have no date for the canonization of Juan Diego,’’ said Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera of Mexico City in a Catholic News Service report dated Dec. 7. Still, the Mexican bishops say the canonization process for Blessed Juan Diego is on track. Pope John Paul II beatified Juan Diego in 1990 during his second visit to Mexico.

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