St. Columba Catholic Church

Quito, Ecuador, Sep 11, 2024 / 09:50 am (CNA).

The secret of the strength and resilience of the Ukrainian people in the midst of the ongoing war with Russia comes “from union with God” and from the Eucharist, affirmed the auxiliary bishop of Sambir in Ukraine, Hryhoriy Komar, during a Sept. 9 address to the International Eucharistic Congress in Quito, Ecuador.

“We have parishes where they have not stopped praying in the church for almost three years. People have their turn to pray day and night. Our strength is the Eucharist. The Eucharist is an invitation to communicate and forge communion with others. That is, to be with the people in the most difficult moments and to give one’s life for the people,” the prelate said in his remarks about the war that began on Feb. 24, 2022, with the Russian invasion.

At the Congress, the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic prelate said “the Eucharist is an invitation to participate in the suffering and resurrection of Christ… It is an encounter with the risen Christ, conqueror of death, with the One who gives life. Only he can heal shattered families, broken lives, and change death into life.”

At the beginning of his talk, Komar thanked the organizers of the Quito 2024 International Eucharistic Congress for the opportunity to “bear witness to the pain and tragedy.”

“The life of our people is divided into two parts: before and after that date [Feb. 24, 2022]. And now we know very well that our life will never be the same as before.”

According to data from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), more than 10 million Ukrainians have fled their homes since the invasion began. Of the total, more than 6.4 million are refugees abroad.

Komar spoke of the magnitude of the suffering his people are experiencing. “It is difficult to find words to describe all the horrors of the war in Ukraine. For many people in the world, war is something abstract, but for us it is a terrible reality that we live every day, experiencing the danger of losing our own lives or the lives of our relatives,” he said.

The prelate also underlined the mission of the Church to proclaim the truth and rejected any kind of malicious or manipulated narrative regarding the origin of the war between Russia and Ukraine.

“Some tell us that Ukraine provoked Russia to start this war. That is like saying something similar to a woman who has been raped. It’s unfair to describe the genocide that Russia is carrying out in Ukraine with the word crisis. It’s a lie. It’s false witness,” he emphasized.

‘Our priests are heroes’

Faced with this reality, the Church has had to reinvent itself to offer spiritual and material support in the midst of chaos. “Our churches are not only a place of prayer but also a place where one can find advice or take shelter during bombings,” Komar said.

He also recognized the heroic work of priests in his country: “I admire the fervor and sacrifice of our priests. They are heroes because with their prayers and daily deeds they support their people.”

Despite the immense suffering, the Ukrainian bishop said he maintains a firm hope in the prayer of Catholics around the world. “To overcome evil, we need a prayer for the conversion of all of us. In Ukraine, in Europe, in Ecuador, in the world,” he said.

He also called on the international community not to forget the pain of his people: “The war in Ukraine is not only Ukraine’s problem.”

Komar concluded his talk by asking the world to pray for Ukraine and to continue searching for the truth.

“May the world be stronger” thanks to solidarity with his country, he said, imploring: “Lord, king of peace and the universe, protect our people and Ukraine.”

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 11, 2024 / 09:20 am (CNA).

The South Carolina Department of Corrections could potentially execute one death row inmate every 35 days — or every five weeks — as the state resumes executions on Sept. 20 after a 13-year pause in carrying out the death penalty.

A recent South Carolina Supreme Court order decided that a five-week interval between executions was “reasonable” and “warranted” but left open the possibility of carrying out the death penalty more frequently if circumstances warrant it.

The ruling came after death row inmates requested a 13-week interval between executions and state Attorney General Alan Wilson asked the court to permit at least one execution per month. With the court’s decision in effect, the state could potentially execute 10 or 11 people within a calendar year.

In 2024 to date, no U.S. state has carried out more than four executions. In recent decades, the frequency of executions has declined throughout the country and some states have ended the use of the death penalty altogether.

There are more than 30 people on death row in South Carolina. Freddie Owens, who was convicted of murder, is scheduled to be executed on Sept. 20. The state Supreme Court announced its plans to schedule the execution of at least five other death row inmates following Owens’ execution.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, reflecting an update promulgated by Pope Francis in 2018, describes the death penalty as “inadmissible” and an “attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person” (No. 2267). The change reflects a development of Catholic doctrine in recent years. St. John Paul II, calling the death penalty “cruel and unnecessary,” encouraged Christians to be “unconditionally pro-life” and said that “the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil.”

Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, the executive director of the anti-death penalty group Catholic Mobilizing Network (CMN), told CNA that the frequency of executions proposed by the attorney general was “reckless” and “would be a major regression.”

CMN works closely with the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) on efforts to oppose the death penalty and uphold the human dignity of people who are incarcerated.

Murphy encouraged South Carolina officials to consider changes made in other states, such as Oklahoma, which reduced the frequency of executions after Attorney General Gentner Drummond wrote a letter to the state’s department of corrections that said staff had reported “distress they are experiencing due to the nonstop executions.”

Murphy said “even corrections officials know this is the wrong thing to do.”

“Our prayers remain with Freddie [Owens], who faces this imminent execution, for victims’ families and those impacted by acts of harm and violence,” Murphy added. “We also pray for every individual currently on South Carolina’s death row whose life is at risk.”

“All executions violate the sanctity of life, regardless of the pace at which they are set or how they are administered,” she said. 

“We have ways to keep society safe and uphold justice for victims’ families without violating the God-given dignity of the human person. And as such, there is no humane way for the state to take a life.”

The last time South Carolina executed a man on death row was in 2011, after which executions were paused because the state department of corrections could not find a drug company from which they could purchase the drugs required for lethal injection.

South Carolina has since obtained the drugs required to administer lethal injections and, in 2021, legalized executions by the electric chair and by firing squad. In July of this year, the state Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty — including executions through all of those methods — was legal, after which the corrections department announced its intent to resume executions.

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 11, 2024 / 08:50 am (CNA).

Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris debated abortion policy, contested each other’s records on the economy and immigration, and communicated different visions for American foreign policy during their first debate together on Tuesday night.

The Sept. 10 debate was hosted by ABC at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. As polls continue to show a tight race nationally and within key swing states, the two candidates sought to appeal to middle-class voters and paint each other as extreme.

Trump accused Harris of being “a Marxist” and criticized the economy of the Biden-Harris administration. 

“We have a nation in decline and they have put it into decline,” he said. “We have a nation that is dying.”

Harris alleged that Trump’s rhetoric contained “a bunch of lies, grievances, and name-calling.” 

“The American people want a president who understands the importance of bringing us together knowing we have so much more in common than what separates us, and I pledge to you to be a president for all Americans,” she said.

Federal vs. state approach on abortion

The two candidates sparred over how abortion rules should be set in the country, with Trump arguing in favor of a state-by-state approach and Harris favoring a federal law that creates a legal right to abortion. 

Trump refused to answer whether he would veto a national abortion ban as president and Harris dodged questions about whether she supports late-term abortion. 

“Donald Trump hand-selected three members of the United States Supreme Court with the intention that they would undo the protections of Roe v. Wade, and they did exactly as he intended, and now in over 20 states, there are Trump abortion bans,” Harris said in the debate. The Supreme Court repealed the long-standing abortion rule in 2022. 

If elected, Harris said she would “proudly sign” a law that would “put back the protections of Roe v. Wade.”

Trump maintained support for the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, crediting “the genius and heart and strength of six Supreme Court justices” for the accomplishment. 

“Each individual state is voting,” Trump said. “It’s the vote of the people now. It’s not tied up in the federal government. I did a great service in doing it. It took courage to do it and the Supreme Court had great courage in doing it.”

Harris did not directly answer a question from the moderators about whether she would support any restrictions on abortion but simply said she would support the standards set in Roe v. Wade. 

When later pressed by Trump about whether “she [would] allow abortion in the eighth month, ninth month, seventh month,” Harris interjected with “come on.” Trump continued, saying: “That’s the problem because under Roe v. Wade, you could do abortions in the seventh month, the eighth month, the ninth month,” to which Harris responded: “That’s not true.”

Harris alleged that Trump would “sign a national abortion ban,” which the former president called “a lie,” adding: “There’s no reason to sign a ban because … the states are voting.” 

But when moderators pressed Trump about his running mate J.D. Vance’s comment that Trump would veto a national ban on abortion, Trump said he had never discussed it with Vance and never said he would veto it.

The vice president also criticized Trump for people “being denied IVF treatments,” to which the former president said, “I have been a leader on IVF.”

Immigration and the economy

Both candidates sought to defend their records on border security and the economy during the debate. 

Trump accused the Biden-Harris administration of allowing “terrorists,” “common street criminals,” and “drug dealers” through the southern border, claiming that “millions” of immigrants have entered the country illegally, “taking jobs that are occupied by African Americans and Hispanics and by union [workers].”

“They are taking over the towns,” Trump said. “They are taking over buildings. They’re going in violently. These are the people that she and Biden let into our country.”

Harris criticized Trump for opposing a bipartisan immigration bill, saying he’d “prefer to run on a problem instead of fixing a problem.” She also said she “prosecuted transnational criminal organizations for the trafficking of guns, drugs, and human beings” while working as a prosecutor.

The candidates debated who had a stronger record on the economy, with Trump calling inflation during the Biden-Harris administration “probably the worst in our nation’s history” and alleging that “the only jobs they got were bounce-back jobs” that returned after the COVID-19 crisis.

Harris promoted her plan to establish a newborn tax credit of $6,000 and a tax deduction for start-up small businesses of $50,000. She also criticized Trump’s proposal to increase tariffs, alleging it would amount to a national “sales tax.” 

Trump disputed the characterization, saying that only “China and all of the countries that have been ripping us off for years” would pay the tax.

Foreign policy

The candidates debated the effects of the Biden-Harris withdrawal from Afghanistan and the best way to approach the Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Palestine conflicts.

Trump called the withdrawal from Afghanistan “one of the most incompetently handled situations anybody has ever seen.” Although he expressed support for leaving Afghanistan, he opposed how the administration handled it.

“We were getting out … but we wouldn’t have lost the soldiers, we wouldn’t have left many Americans behind and we wouldn’t have left $85 billion of brand-new beautiful military equipment behind,” he said.

Harris expressed support for Biden’s decision to leave Afghanistan but did not directly answer a question from the moderators about whether she takes any responsibility for the lives lost during the withdrawal. She also criticized Trump for his negotiations with the Taliban.

“He does not … appreciate the role and responsibility of the president of the United States to be commander-in-chief with a level of respect,” Harris said.

On Israel, Harris said the country “has a right to defend itself ” but criticized the way the Israeli military has handled its invasion of the Gaza Strip, saying: “Far too many innocent Palestinians have been killed — children, mothers. What we know is that this war must end. … We need a cease-fire deal and we need the hostages out.”

Trump asserted that if he were president, the war “would have never started” and criticized the Biden-Harris administration for lifting sanctions on Iran: “They had no money for terror. They were broke. Now they’re a rich nation.” 

Harris advocated continued military aid to Ukraine in its war with Russia, saying: “Because of our support … Ukraine stands as an independent and free country.” She claimed that if Trump were in office, Russia would win the war. 

Trump said he would “get the war with Ukraine and Russia ended if I’m president-elect, I’ll get it done before even becoming president.”

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 11, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Nearly 3,000 names are engraved in bronze at the 9/11 Memorial in New York City. But 10 of the victims in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks are different: They have no names. Instead, each is remembered as an “unborn child.” 

Among those memorialized this way are “Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas and her unborn child.”

On Sept. 11, Jack Grandcolas lost the two people he held most dear: his wife, Lauren, and their unborn child. His pregnant 38-year-old wife died on United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania after the passengers fought back against hijackers redirecting the flight to Washington, D.C. Grandcolas recounts his loss and search for hope in a memoir called “Like a River to the Sea: Heartbreak and Hope in the Wake of United 93.”

The book was published by Rare Bird on Sept. 6, 2022, and opens with a dedication to his lost child.

“Dear Son … or Daughter,” he begins. “I am writing this book at the advice of my therapist. She felt it would be helpful to share a little bit about your mom and dad, and why you will always have your place in history.”

Today, that child would be 22 years old. Her name would be Grace, if a girl — Gavin, if a boy.

Lauren was three months pregnant, Grandcolas recalls, when she flew from their home in California to New Jersey for her grandmother’s funeral. At her insistence, he stayed behind to care for their sick cat.

“We were giddy at the thought of becoming parents, having spent the previous decade trying to get pregnant,” he writes. “There had been plenty of heartbreak along the way, including a miscarriage in 1999, when Lauren was 36. Two years later, we had pretty much resigned ourselves to raising only cats ... and then a miracle happened.”

Lauren and their “miracle” were supposed to return to California on Sept. 11, 2001.

That morning, Grandcolas woke up to the sound of the answering machine. He fell back asleep, only to wake up again and spot what he calls the “shape of an angel.” 

Had someone he knew recently died?

It must be Lauren’s grandmother, he thought. Then he realized it was Lauren.

When he checked the answering machine, he heard a message that would change his life forever. 

“Honey, are you there? Jack? Pick up, sweetie,” he heard Lauren’s voice say. “Okay, well, I just want to tell you I love you. We’re having a little problem on the plane. I’m fine and comfortable and I’m okay for now. I just love you more than anything, just know that. It’s just a little problem, so I, I’ll … Honey, I just love you. Please tell my family I love them, too. Bye, honey.”

“In that moment I knew Lauren and our baby were gone,” he writes of his college sweetheart and their little one. 

His wife’s funeral was held at a Catholic church in Houston. Lauren, he says, was not a religious person. But in the months before her death, she began attending a weekly Bible study.

“One evening she came home and said, ‘I finally get it,’” he remembers. When he prodded her by asking, “Get what?” she responded: “The meaning of it all.”

While raised Catholic, Grandcolas struggled with his faith. 

“What kind of merciful God would take my sweet Lauren and our child?” he asked. He later concluded that it was not God but human ideology.

He encountered God again after a conversation with Bono, the lead vocalist of the famous rock band U2. Bono performed “One Tree Hill” — Lauren’s favorite U2 song — in her memory at a 2005 concert at the Oakland Coliseum. Afterward, Grandcolas opened up to the singer.

“Being brought up Catholic, you’re given all this guilt about things that you didn’t do right,” he told Bono. “I worry that I may have screwed up in this life and mortgaged my opportunity to see Lauren again.”

“You’ll see her again. I know it. We all screw up in life,” he says Bono reassured him. “That’s why God grants us forgiveness. It’s his most powerful gift.”

Bono’s words changed him and his faith, he says. 

“Ever since 9/11, I had questioned God and his plan for me,” he writes. “The night was a tribute to her but in a very important way it set me free, allowing me to be more forgiving of myself and rekindle my belief in God’s mercy.”

Grandcolas introduces readers to Lauren as a woman with a beautiful smile, radiant personality, and even a mischievous streak. They married after meeting in college and stayed together as he progressed with a career in the newspaper industry and she took charge as a marketing manager.

After losing her and their baby, he struggled with depression, PTSI (post-traumatic stress injury), heavy drinking, fear of abandonment, and survivor’s guilt. With the help of EMDR psychotherapy, he said, he discovered that “for all these years I had been mourning Lauren without fully grieving for the baby we lost.”

“Over the years that child grew up in my mind, growing older every year,” he writes. “I knew I would not be able to move on until saying goodbye to the baby I never got to hold.”

Today, the memory of Lauren and their unborn baby lives on at memorials across the country, through the Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas Foundation, and, now, his book.

“[A]s I continue to reflect on the highs and lows of the last two decades, I’ve come to realize that I am very lucky indeed,” he says. “I found true love, twice. I’ve endured a pair of horrific tragedies but still have a resilient spirit and zest for life. I’ll always carry the emotional scars of losing Lauren and our child, just as I’ll always have the physical scars from my burns, but all of my wounds continue to heal.”

“We all suffer loss. We all endure heartbreak. It’s how you respond to these cataclysms that define you,” he concludes. “Sometimes the most beautiful things grow out of our hardest moments.”

This article was first published on Sept. 11, 2022, and has been updated.

One piece from New York Fashion Week put fashion's throwaway tendencies on full display. Some NYFW-goers found themselves face-to-face with a towering clothing pile, animated and ambling about Manhattan.

More than 200 Catholic peace advocates gathered virtually for Pax Christi USA's national conference, which delved into the theme "We Are One Body: Being a Prophetic Church in a Time of Polarization and Conflict."

In anticipation of Pope Francis' Sept. 11-13 visit to Singapore, scholars and religious practitioners gathered for a conference there on Aug. 29-30 to discuss the Catholic Church's contributions to interreligious relations.

Pope Francis on Sept. 11 landed in Singapore, the world's most religiously diverse country, where he is expected to encourage the country's small but growing Catholic community and to continue his push for pluralism on the Asian continent.

Quito, Ecuador, Sep 10, 2024 / 18:08 pm (CNA).

Bishop Andrew Cozzens of the Diocese of Crookston, Minnesota, who is in Quito, Ecuador, for the International Eucharistic Congress, shared several “surprising” fruits of the recent National Eucharistic Congress, the first the U.S. has held in 83 years.

In an interview with ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner, Cozzens said the blessings flowing from the July event in Indianapolis exceeded all expectations.

“People experience this love of Jesus. And this love that comes when the entire Church is gathered to adore and love Jesus. In those moments, the blessings of God that come to us are great and change us,” said the prelate, who served as chairman of the National Eucharistic Congress.

Cozzens made reference to stories of profound healing and renewal, including couples who after the congress want to pray more every day, “priests who were thinking of leaving their ministry and who changed during this Eucharistic Congress,” or “bishops who normally experience burdensome and difficult things in their lives and who feel the courage that only comes from Jesus.”

Cozzens emphasized that when the “Church gathers and congregates around the Eucharist, Jesus wants to bring us many blessings.”

“It was a moment that changed our Church in the United States, and that is why I am here.”

Secularization: the challenge of our time

Cozzens identified secularization as one of the biggest challenges facing the Church today. He described it as a worldview in which people live as if “the world were all there is and God is not real.”

However, he reminded Catholics that “the sacraments are the strongest way in which God enters the world and wants to enter our lives.”

“But many people do not know that they need this encounter and think there is no benefit in this encounter,” he lamented.

Faced with this challenge, the prelate called on the faithful to be witnesses of the transforming power of Christ: “All of us who know that this encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist is important have the responsibility to witness to this reality in the world today.”

‘Jesus wants to change us and convert us in the Eucharist’

The bishop of Crookston also elaborated on Christ’s desire to transform man’s heart of stone into a heart of flesh through the Eucharist. “Jesus wants to change us and convert us in the Eucharist,” he said with conviction.

He highlighted how this encounter with Christ not only changes people individually but also has a social impact: “When we experience this love of Jesus for each one of us, it changes me. And when I change, I can experience the fraternity [that exists] in the world.”

“The heart is the part of us that makes the blood circulate, and that is what love is like,” Cozzens commented, noting that the main message of the Quito congress is that Christians must be “the heart of the world.”

“It’s not only human fraternity that is going to [be the agent of] love; it is the love of Christ that can heal the world,” he added.

Three keys to a deeper encounter with the Eucharist

Finally, Cozzens gave three recommendations to Catholics to deepen their relationship with the Eucharist and more fully experience its fruits. 

“First, go to confession,” he advised, explaining that confession purifies the heart and prepares it to receive the grace of the Eucharist.

Secondly, he invited the faithful to attend Mass not only on Sundays but also during the week. “The more you experience, the more your love will grow,” he said.

And third, he urged Catholics to spend time in Eucharistic adoration. “We need that time in silence with Jesus to speak heart to heart,” he said, noting that adoration is an opportunity for an intimate dialogue with the Lord.

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 10, 2024 / 17:38 pm (CNA).

The “spiritual darkness” that Mother Teresa describes in her writings can be difficult to comprehend, but this feeling of emptiness was not caused by either depression or a loss of faith, according to a lecturer at an academic conference organized by the Mother Teresa Institute.

St. Teresa of Calcutta’s “dark night of the soul” was a distinct charism that helped her build her faith and serve others rather than a mere chemical imbalance that induces depression or an abandonment of the Catholic faith, said Loyola University Maryland philosophy professor Derek McAllister at a Sept. 6 symposium held at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., one day after the saint’s feast day. 

“If it’s a mental emotional problem, they do not of themselves promote virtue or increase depth of relationship with God,” McAllister said. “Whereas we know with the dark night, the nights do of themselves greatly increase love, humility, patience, and the like. And they decidedly prepare one for deeper prayer.”

The lecture focused on some of Mother Teresa’s letters, which describe an emptiness and a spiritual darkness — essentially an inability to feel the presence of God. St. Teresa, who founded the Missionaries of Charity, was an Albanian sister who spent most of her life serving the poor in Calcutta, India. She was canonized in 2016.

“The darkness is so dark, and I am alone,” St. Teresa wrote. “Unwanted, forsaken. The loneliness of the heart that wants love is unbearable. Where is my faith? Even deep down, there is nothing but emptiness and darkness. My God, how painful is this unknown pain? It pains without ceasing.”

St. Teresa wrote that “the place of God in my soul is blank, there is no God in me” and “I just long and long for God and then it is that I feel he does not want me — he is not there.”

McAllister noted that other saints have had such feelings and referenced St. John of the Cross’ 16th-century poem “Dark Night of the Soul” and his subsequent commentaries on that poem. It describes the Spanish mystic’s crisis of faith and an inability to feel the presence of God even though God was truly present and guiding the experience.

“In darkness and secure, by the secret ladder, disguised — oh, happy chance! — in darkness and in concealment, my house being now at rest,” St. John’s poem reads.

McAllister cited St. John’s descriptions of his experience, noting that “he identifies, by name, melancholy and says that’s not what I’m talking about.” McAllister argued that an “affective condition that overwhelms people” does not accurately describe those experiences, but rather that the experience actively pushed St. John to grow closer to God.

“While you may experience desolation of God’s felt presence of the senses, you’re being purgated and drawn closer to God, but you don’t feel that you are while you’re experiencing that,” McAllister explained.

In the case of Mother Teresa, McAllister compared and contrasted the symptoms described in her writing with the criteria used to diagnose major depressive disorder.

According to McAllister, depression often includes an unhealthy introspection and a lack of realism, which he said “advice does little to remedy.” Further, someone who has clinical depression, he noted, will often experience chronic fatigue, insomnia, and a depressive affect. He also argued that depression does not promote virtue in and of itself: “That’s why it’s called a disorder.”

He cited her writing to show that she was seeking answers to her spiritual darkness, as when she said to her confessor: “Each time your yes or no [to a question] has satisfied me as the will of God.” He also said that she did not experience the other symptoms that commonly accompany depression or depressive affect in everyday activities. The fruits of her experience, he noted, also do not point to a disorder such as depression. 

“What’s this [spiritual darkness] for in and of itself?” McAllister asked rhetorically. “Does it bring about humility, charity, kindness, and growth in Christ? And just look at what happened. Yes, absolutely [it did].”

The conference was attended by numerous sisters in the Missionaries of Charity along with lay members of the order, some priests, and a few professors and graduate students.

It was held a short walk from the St. John Paul II National Shrine, which is displaying a Mother Teresa exhibit until Nov. 11. The exhibit contains a first-class relic of St. Teresa and many of her personal items. 

Father Brian Kolodiejchuk, the president of the Mother Teresa Institute, told CNA that the organization functions as “the academic arm of the Mother Teresa Center” that focuses on her writings and her words. He said there is “a lot more depth to Mother Teresa’s holiness” than many realize. 

“I think she has a message for the Church,” Kolodiejchuk said. “She was one of the great figures of the last century.”