Why does a 15-year old Lutheran girl decide to become Catholic? When Anchorage teen Jamie Nagel began to think about joining the Catholic Church, she and her mom talked. Her mom wanted her to at least be confirmed in their family’s faith, and asked her to go through Lutheran confirmation classes, which were held in junior high. “I went to all the classes. Then I sat down and talked to her,” Nagel said.
A change to Alaska’s education tax credit program could have a big impact on the state’s Catholic schools, according to Alaska Catholic Conference executive director Mary Gore. And private schools are poised to get the word out. The program, in existence since 2011, provided tax savings to qualifying individuals and companies who donated to Alaska’s public schools and universities. Now, those same benefits have been extended to the state’s private schools.
I’ve been thinking about community lately, because I realize how important it is to me and to all of us. We can’t get along without some kind of community of friends, and the quality of the community we form says a lot about how healthy we are as human beings and especially as Christians.
In discussing the horrible Charlie Hebdo magazine massacre, the UK’s Daily Mail said the pope pointed at a friend, threw a pretend punch and said, “If my good friend Dr. Gasparri says a curse word against my mother, he can expect a punch.” My husband’s grandparents were all from Italy, and just recently I heard a fourth generation member of that family respond to the ultimate insult: “You disrespected my mother.” To an Italian, disrespect to a mother is free speech used despicably, so the pope’s point is taken. People who insult things that are sacred to you are likely to incite your ire.
Catholic outreach to Hispanics in the Anchorage Archdiocese is about to undergo a dramatic shift. Three members of the Congregation of the Mission, popularly known as Vincentians, will soon be serving the growing number of Southcentral Hispanics. Two of them are priests, and their arrival from Columbia will be determined by how quickly they receive their religious workers visas. But Deacon Arnold Hernandez is already in Anchorage, laying the groundwork for the mission by studying the needs and immersing himself in the local Hispanic culture.
The result: the little parish church, home to 25 families, was devastated. Flooring, crawlspace, wiring, the boiler -— everything was ruined. Fortunately, insurance covered the damage, and a repaired church emerged from the old. But two things were apparent. According to the Army Corps of Engineers, the rivers’ flow had been permanently changed, and unless the church, which sat lower than the nearby road, was elevated, a similar or even worse flood wasn’t far in the offing.
Personally, I like the Catholic idea that the New Year starts with the new liturgical year, Advent, a time of waiting. And instead of making all kinds of soon-to-be-forgotten resolutions, we commit ourselves to the exercise of waiting — conscious, prayerful waiting.
On an overcast December day, two women were in the process of making the hand-off of a very important job for the Catholic Archdiocese of Anchorage. Susan Bomalaski, who had served as the executive director of Catholic Social Services for nearly nine years, was cleaning out her office on her final day. Meanwhile, Lisa Aquino, who took over the position on Dec. 1, was continuing to learn the nuts and bolts of one of Alaska’s premier social service agencies.
It’s a hard Gospel truth, this idea of Christ being with the most marginalized. The truly poor in our midst often don’t smell very good, they often make maddeningly poor choices, and they are sometimes caught up in almost irreversible webs of addiction and despair. Sometimes, all we can do is love them, not fix them, and that can be tough.
Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish in Anchorage will take on an important new role when it is elevated to a co-cathedral on Dec. 12, the feast day of its patroness. It has been a long road for the diverse faith community, from its early days as a parish without a building, founded in a much-smaller Anchorage in 1970. Mass was held then at Turnagain Methodist Church. Later, the parish constructed a building which was intended to serve as both worship area and multi-purpose room until a church could be built. It took 30 years to bring that dream to fruition. Today parishioners worship in an expansive Spanish mission style church, with two bell towers, dedicated in 2005.