Catholic Charities. Providing Help. Creating Hope.
VISION: Believing in the presence of God in our midst, we proclaim the sanctity of human life and the dignity of the person by sharing in the mission of Jesus given to the Church. To this end, Catholic Charities works with individuals, families, and communities to help them meet their needs, address their issues, eliminate oppression, and build a just and compassionate society.
MISSION: Rooted in the Mission of the Diocese of Youngstown "to minister to the people in the six counties of northeastern Ohio . . .(and) to the world community", we are called to provide service to people in need, to advocate for justice in social structures, and to call the entire Church and other people of good will to do the same.
GOALS: Catholic Charities is devoted to helping meet basic human needs, strengthening families, building communities and empowering low-income people. Working to reduce poverty in half by 2020.
KEY VALUE: Hospitality
WHAT WE DO: Organizing Love. "As a community, the Church must practise love. Love thus needs to be organized if it is to be an ordered service to the community" (Deus Caritas Est, par. 20)
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On Sunday (Twenty Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A http://usccb.org/bible/readings/101611.cfm we read in the Gospel of Matthew how Jesus responds to people trying to set him up. He knows of their unfaithfulness and duplicity. Jesus reminds his listeners that what belongs to Caesar is Caesar’s; what belongs to God is God’s. One lesson that we might be able to glean from this story is our own need to be faithful to the Gospel of the Lord by knowing how God fits into our lives, and doing the best we can to live that faith out daily.
In Catholic Charities http://www.ccdoy.org , we are called to be signs of truth and love in all of our interactions. We must remain faithful to our mandate to serve others in the name of the Church and of Jesus himself. When our clients come to our doors or call us, they expect a difference than a response they might get from another agency. We are called to be that sign of God’s love in the world, because we do not only follow the regulations and rules of being a transparent nonprofit social service agency. We bear the marks of the Church at work, each day.
Reflection from Church Documents and Official Statements
Political Responsibility: Election Year 2011
USCCB Releases Updated Introduction to 2007 Statement
In advance of the 2012 elections, the U.S. bishops reaffirmed their 2007 document, Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, in this coming election cycle and beyond, as the “continuing teaching of our Bishops’ Conference and our guidance for Catholics in the exercise of their rights and duties as participants in our democracy.”
Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), joined the chairs of nine USCCB committees in offering an Introductory Note to the document. The bishops discussed this action at their June meeting and authorized it at the September meeting of the USCCB Administrative Committee. Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship was approved overwhelmingly by the U.S. bishops in 2007.
“We urge our Catholic pastors and people to continue to use this important statement to help them form their consciences, to contribute to civil and respectful public dialogue, and to shape their choices in the coming election in the light of Catholic teaching,” the bishops wrote. “It does not offer a voter’s guide, scorecard of issues or direction on how to vote. It applies Catholic moral principles to a range of important issues and warns against misguided appeals to ‘conscience’ to ignore fundamental moral claims, to reduce Catholic moral concerns to one or two matters, or to justify choices simply to advance partisan, ideological or personal interests.”
The Introductory Note does not modify or interpret the document itself and emphasizes the importance of religious freedom. It raises six “current and fundamental problems, some involving opposition to intrinsic evils and others raising serious moral questions.” These are: abortion and threats to the lives and dignity of the vulnerable, sick or unwanted; threats to Catholic ministries, including health care, education and social services, to violate their consciences or stop serving those in need; intensifying efforts to redefine marriage; unemployment, poverty and debt; immigration; and wars, terror and violence, particularly in the Middle East.
The USCCB is launching a new website for Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship: www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/faithful-citizenship/. It will offer a wide range of web-based and written materials and tools to assist pastors, parishes, Catholic organizations and individuals.
The document with the new Introductory Note will be available in print by the end of October and is already available online: www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/faithful-citizenship/upload/Forming-Consciences-for-Faithful-Citizenship-2011.pdf
Some important date(s) this week:
http://www.americancatholic.org/Features/Saints/ByDate.aspx
See website for biographies of Saints and Blessed celebrated this week.
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SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22. Blessed John Paul II
1920-2005
“Open wide the doors to Christ,” urged John Paul II during the homily at the Mass when he was installed as pope in 1978.
Born in Wadowice, Poland, Karol Jozef Wojtyla had lost his mother, father and older brother before his 21st birthday. Karol’s promising academic career at Krakow’s Jagiellonian University was cut short by the outbreak of World War II. While working in a quarry and a chemical factory, he enrolled in an “underground” seminary in Kraków. Ordained in 1946, he was immediately sent to Rome where he earned a doctorate in theology.
Back in Poland, a short assignment as assistant pastor in a rural parish preceded his very fruitful chaplaincy for university students. Soon he earned a doctorate in philosophy and began teaching that subject at Poland’s University of Lublin.
Communist officials allowed him to be appointed auxiliary bishop of Krakow in 1958, considering him a relatively harmless intellectual. They could not have been more wrong!
He attended all four sessions of Vatican II and contributed especially to its Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World. Appointed as archbishop of Krakow in 1964, he was named a cardinal three years later.
Elected pope in October 1978, he took the name of his short-lived, immediate predecessor. Pope John Paul II was the first non-Italian pope in 455 years. In time, he made pastoral visits to 124 countries, including several with small Christian populations.
He promoted ecumenical and interfaith initiatives, especially the 1986 Day of Prayer for World Peace in Assisi. He visited Rome’s Main Synagogue and the Western Wall in Jerusalem; he also established diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Israel. He improved Catholic-Muslim relations and in 2001 visited a mosque in Damascus, Syria.
The Great Jubilee of the Year 2000, a key event in John Paul’s ministry, was marked by special celebrations in Rome and elsewhere for Catholics and other Christians. Relations with the Orthodox Churches improved considerably during his ministry as pope.
“Christ is the center of the universe and of human history” was the opening line of his 1979 encyclical, Redeemer of the Human Race. In 1995, he described himself to the United Nations General Assembly as “a witness to hope.”
His 1979 visit to Poland encouraged the growth of the Solidarity movement there and the collapse of communism in central and eastern Europe 10 years later. He began World Youth Day and traveled to several countries for those celebrations. He very much wanted to visit China and the Soviet Union but the governments in those countries prevented that.
One of the most well-remembered photos of his pontificate was his one-on-one conversation in 1983 with Mehmet Ali Agca, who had attempted to assassinate him two years earlier.
In his 27 years of papal ministry, John Paul wrote 14 encyclicals and five books, canonized 482 saints and beatified 1,338 people. In the last years of his life, he suffered from Parkinson’s disease and was forced to cut back on some of his activities. Pope Benedict XVI beatified John Paul II on May 1, 2011, Divine Mercy Sunday.
SHARING HOPE IN HARD ECONOMIC TIMES.
October is Respect Life Month. Catholic Charities is committed to working to protect and enhance human dignity and life through all of its services and ministries. One area that we promote life and dignity is through our guardianship and payeeship programs. Catholic Charities of Ashtabula County provides this important service by helping persons who are in need of support.
PAPAL INTENTIONS: October 2011
General Intention: That the terminally ill may be supported by their faith in God and the love of their brothers and sisters.
Missionary Intention: That the celebration of World Mission Day may foster in the People of God a passion for evangelization with the willingness to support the missions with prayer and economic aid for the poorest Churches.
Corporal Works of Mercy: The seven practices of charity toward our neighbor
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for current updates and calls to action that we can all use.
See our website at www.catholiccharitiesyoungstown.org for links to the our ministries and services.
For more information on Catholic Social Doctrine and its connection to our ministries, visit my blog at: http://corbinchurchthinking.blogspot.com/
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