The Archive

Day: November 1, 2008

Baking up a plan to help end homelessness

November 1, 2008 No Comments

Sweet Miss Giving’s is a new bakery in Chicago that opened last week to great fanfare. Mayor Daley not only attended the grand opening, he helped cut the ribbon. After all, the city had contributed nearly $100,000 towards its opening–because it’s part social service agency. The bakery is the brainchild of the Rev. Stan Sloan, CEO of Chicago House, which provides community-based support to people who have been marginalized because of HIV and AIDS. With the bakery, the organization is able to provide valuable job training to people like Mary, a former street hustler, and Stanley, an ex-convict who had been homeless since his release from prison.

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The living and the dead

November 1, 2008 No Comments

Thomas Lynch, writing in the New York Times, observes that the days following Halloween are ones set aside to honor the departed. “Whether you are pagan or religious, Celt or Christian, New Age believer or doubter-at-large, these are the days when you traditionally acknowledge that the gone are not forgotten. The seasonal metaphors of reaping and rotting, harvest and darkness, leaf-fall and killing frost supply us with plentiful memento mori. Whatever is or isn’t there when we die, death both frightens and excites us.”

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Bringing the saints to life

November 1, 2008 No Comments

Sister Gemma Legel wanted to help her students in Westland, Mich., learn about the saints in a more interactive way earlier this week. So, instead of her usual catechism class at Divine Savior Catholic Church, the students brought the parade of saints to life. They each dressed up as their chosen saint (there were several Joan of Arcs in attendance, for instance) and gave a presentation about that saint.

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The Halloween costume that went too far

November 1, 2008 No Comments

News reports abounded yesterday about Halloween costumes that were age-inappropriate or too “sexy.” So perhaps it wasn’t surprising that one New Jersey 8th grader was sent home to change when his costume was deemed too distracting. What caused the Associated Press to pick up the story for national circulation, however, was the fact that Alex Woinski, an honor-roll student from an interfaith family, had chosen to wear a white robe, a red sash, sandals, and a crown of thorns.

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Local saints

November 1, 2008 No Comments

God of grace,

we thank for the saints whom we ourselves

have known and loved.

It does not come easily to us to call them saints,

it seems as if ordinary mortals

are not good or great enough.

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All Hallows

November 1, 2008 No Comments

All Hallows—or All Saints as we know it now is something of a confusion in these latter days. Who we remember, what we remember, and why has been blurred: sometimes on accident, sometimes on purpose. All Saints, All Souls, and the difference between them lie at the intersection of the Church’s musings on Scripture, on the Church Expectant, the Church Triumphant, and the overarching principle of the baptized dead knit into the living Christ.

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