Catholic Men for Life, a lay apostolate at Anchorage’s Holy Family Cathedral, has invited all local Catholic men to gather on Saturday, Oct. 25, to peacefully pray for an end to abortion. The all-day vigil will begin with a 7 a.m. Mass at Holy Cross Church.
In an effort to combat the effects of domestic violence in Alaska, the Archdiocese of Anchorage is teaming with several other faith communities around Anchorage for a joint prayer service on Oct. 23 at St. Anthony Church (825 South Klevin Street).
The debate in favor of legalization has largely been framed in the language of personal freedom. Our personal freedom exists in the context of the communities to which we belong. As Catholics, we believe we have a responsibility to one another and to the wider community. Personal freedom that is not balanced by sensible regulation for the common good destroys the communities that are the guarantors of our personal freedom.
Anchorage’s Holy Rosary Academy is once again back among a select group of U.S. Catholic high schools honored by The Cardinal Newman Society for excellence in Catholic identity and education. The Cardinal Newman Society is a non-profit organization seeking to renew and strengthen Catholic identity in education. In September it announced the winners of its Catholic High School Honor Roll competition.
Planning for end of life situations is important. We should put in place an advance directive before our health takes a serious turn for the worse and we are no longer able to indicate our own wishes or make our own decisions. Advance directives can be of two types: living wills and health care agents.
Brokenness is something I know a lot about. Maybe we all do. We speak about brokenness in many ways. Broken promises. Broken hearts. Broken marriages. Broken lives. Broken bodies. Broken spirits. Broken minds. Brokenness is all around us. The world at times seems so broken. Out of order. It is a witness of original brokenness called original sin.
The Little Sisters of Jesus, with a unique charism and a long history of service to Western Alaska, have left their longtime home in the Nome area. The religious order has been a quiet presence in remote places like Diomede, Nome and King Island’s fish camp at Woolley Lagoon since the 1950s. Today, Alaska’s nine remaining Little Sisters live in an Anchorage convent, most in the St. Anthony Church area.
On the evening of Sept. 12, 2006, my wife and I were dining in Cracow with Polish friends when an agitated Italian Vaticanista called, demanding to know what I thought of “This crazy speech of the pope’s about the Muslims.” That was my first hint that the herd of independent minds in the world press was about to go ballistic on the subject of Benedict XVI’s Regensburg Lecture: a “gaffe”-bone on which the media continued to gnaw until the end of Benedict’s pontificate.
In a robbery, a person who plans the robbery is considered just as guilty under the law as the robber himself. A Catholic who votes for, advocates, counsels or in any manner assists in or approves of the committing of abortions is likewise an accomplice to the action. The Catechism of the Catholic Church makes…
The ruling against Alaska’s marriage amendment comes at a time when the Catholic Church is grappling with how to support and defend long-standing ideals regarding marriage as the life-long union of one man and one woman and family life as the basic institution for the rearing of children.