Tag: Editor’s Picks
Sold-out Crozier Gala features ‘surprise’ grants
The Catholic Community Foundation’s signature fundraiser, the Crozier Gala, celebrated its silver anniversary April 20, but that didn’t mean the event was business as usual. Its board of directors did away with a formal “ask” two years ago and this year awarded “surprise” grants as a means of showcasing the good works the foundation does for local Catholic outreach.
ASU women launch Catholic sorority forming Trinitarian presence at public universities
TEMPE — The newest sorority at Arizona State University saw its first pledge class surrender themselves. These 23 young women didn’t submit to stereotypical stunts, however.
Foster care crucial for unaccompanied minors
GLENDALE — As a child, Johnson Toe spent 12 hours a day farming okra, rice, tomatoes and peppers on his grandmother’s farm in Liberia. The Glendale Community College sophomore arrived here as a refugee eight years ago, when he was 12. He’s still figuring things out with the help of Catholic Charities unaccompanied minors program. [...]
Catholicism in Japan: Past and present
Fr. Callistus Sweeney, OFM is thin and ascetic looking. His easy laughter is surprising if you didn’t realize Christian asceticism includes good humor. We talked after the 8 a.m. English Mass at the Franciscan Chapel Center in Tokyo.
The 37,000 that died at Hara Castle, and the few who pay homage
We didn’t go to Hara Castle. I wanted to, just to stand on holy ground – but that’s about all there is left, plus some wall ruins of the fortress. And it was a long journey.
Catholics respond to Boston Marathon explosions
A Prescott teenager and a New York artist are among the countless Catholics who was moved to action after hearing about the explosions (with video courtesy of Sacred Heart Parish in Prescott).
San Felipe de Jesus: The first Mexican saint and the first Japanese martyr
In the more than 50 years he had been here, had he seen Catholicism grow in Japan? I was talking with Jesuit Father Jose Aguilar, who lived at the Jesuit Residence by the 26 Martyrs Museum in Nagasaki. He was from Guadalajara.
How the lives of the Japanese martyrs can inspire us today
Martyrdom so steadfastly accepted by such youths is especially awesome. And who would have blamed them for surrendering? Yet these boys seem to have all been very devoted to the faith, and their intrepidity demonstrates a Holy Spirit not about to abandon them in their hour of need.
Catholicism struggles in Japan: More complex that mere secularism
The reasons for failure of the faith to grow in Japan is actually more complex than mere secularism. The Japanese government lifted persecution in 1873, but mostly because of pressure from the west, particularly the U.S. government, who bluntly told Japan that enlightened nations did not persecute people for religious beliefs.
Enigmatic martyrdom in Japan
The second century Father Tertullian wrote, “The blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church.” The rulers of Japan didn’t know this when they sought to create a fearsome spectacle of martyrdom in Nagasaki on Feb. 5, 1597.
