Georgetown students’ commission votes not to sanction pro-marriage group

Portland, Maine, Mar 14, 2019 / 12:19 pm (CNA).- Catholic Charities Maine has received a $100,000 grant from the Corporation for National and Community Service to support 165 volunters aiding the state’s senior citizens.

Maine’s U.S. Senators, Angus King and Susan Collins, made the announcement this week.

“In Maine, hundreds of seniors make significant contributions through our state’s Senior Corps programs, including the RSVP program,” the senators said in a joint statement March 11.

“One of the many ways these selfless individuals help their communities is through home visits and other volunteer activities, which prevent social isolation. We welcome this funding, which supports Senior Corps volunteers’ efforts to address the unmet needs in our communities.”

Through the Corporation for National and Community Service’s Senior Corps RSVP program, the volunteers will be trained under the Catholic Charities’ program SEARCH – Seek Elderly Alone, Renew Courage & Hope. The grant is a three-year program.

“The RSVP Program… strengthens public and nonprofit agencies like Catholic Charities Maine by building the infrastructure needed to efficiently and effectively mobilize experienced and skilled volunteers to support key programs,” Kathy Mockler, communications director for Catholic Charities Maine, told CNA.

The volunteers will provide home visits, chore assistance, and companionship. The volunteers will also help senior citizens with transportation to doctor’s appointments, grocery stores, and other health care resources.

Catholic Charities will be launching this ministry in Somerset County and expanding its outreach in Kennebec. The ministry already has 190 volunteers providing aid in Androscoggin, Sagadahoc, Franklin, Lincoln, and Cumberland counties.

Programs such as these help elderly people facing issues like abuse, financial exploitation, loneliness, and addiction. Mockler said the volunteers will help solve the problems unique to senior citizens, noting that Maine has a high rate of poor senior citizens.

“The median age is the oldest in the nation (44.6 years in 2015) and, according to the Economic Policy Institute, nearly half of older adults in Maine are economically vulnerable,” she said.

For the last 50 years, Catholic Charities Maine has used Independent Support Services to connect volunteers to isolated seniors. The SEARCH program was founded in 1975.

Michael Smith, director of mission at Catholic Charities Maine, told CNA the agency was grateful for the grant and expressed joy for the benefit it will bring to the community.

“We are thrilled to receive this award as it helps fulfill our mission in a personal and compassionate way to ‘love your neighbor as yourself’ (Mark 12:31) and we know how much it means to those we serve as they often note that without their volunteer they would ‘rarely get out of the house’ and that ‘it wouldn’t be possible to make important doctor’s visits and appointments without them.’”

Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Winona was also a recipient of a grant from the CNCS, for $235,443, as was Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Ogdensburg, for $73,110, and Catholic Charities Chemung/Schuyler, for $42,367.

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Front Royal, Va., Feb 5, 2018 / 03:45 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Following allegations that Christendom College mishandled student sexual assault reports, the college’s administration has said it is committed to doing better.
 
Donna Bethell, chair of the college’s board, told CNA that Christendom takes recent reports seriously, and has hired an outside firm to conduct a review of the college’s policies regarding sexual assault prevention and reporting.
 
“We have brought in a professional group that is expert in sexual assault policies and procedures, and they are reviewing our entire program and will give us a report on whether we are meeting best practices – not just Title IX, those are regulatory minimum requirements – but best practices in providing our students with the protection and services they need.”
 
In mid-January, the small Catholic college in Front Royal, Virginia was rocked by allegations that the administration had mishandled several cases of sexual assault in the Christendom community. The initial allegations were published in a series of blog posts by Catholic writer Simcha Fisher.
 
Among those who came forward with their stories is Adele Smith, who says that she was raped by her then-boyfriend during a date in Shenandoah National Park in 2009. Smith was a sophomore at Christendom, where her boyfriend was also a student.
 
Smith told CNA it took her a while to process what had happened to her. She eventually filed a report with both local police and the park service, but was told that there was very little chance of a conviction.
 
Meanwhile, she said, her alleged rapist was continuing to verbally harass her on campus, and her physical and mental health were suffering.
 
“I developed major depressive disorder and rape-related PTSD,” she told CNA. “I’ve been on medication ever since. I’ve struggled a lot with self-harm and suicidal ideations. Medication and therapy is the only thing that’s been helpful in coping with that.”
 
Smith told CNA she approached the administration during her junior year. She said she was told that because there was no policy against sexual assault in the student handbook, and because the alleged rape took place off-campus, the school could only investigate the harassment charges.  
 
Christendom notified the male student that he was being charged with harassment following what was described as “a prior incident” between the students, according to a July 19, 2011 letter obtained by CNA. The letter said that he was not allowed to talk to Smith or transmit messages to her through other people, during the ensuing investigation.
 
Christendom found the male student guilty of harassment, according to an Aug. 8, 2011 letter also obtained by CNA.

According to the letter, the college sanctioned the student with a year’s housing suspension, two semesters of disciplinary probation, a prohibition from contact with Adele Smith, and restricted access to campus for one semester.  

Initial reports said the student was restricted from on-campus housing for only a semester, though the letter sanctioning the student explicitly stated that he would be subject to “Housing Suspension for 1 year.” A representative from Christendom College told CNA she was unable to clarify the term of the student’s suspension from on-campus housing.

Initial reports also said that the student lived with a founding professor of the college during his housing suspension, though CNA was unable to verify this

Smith acknowledged the complexity of her situation. “I don’t have any proof, because I have no witnesses,” she told CNA.

She said it was several points in the investigative process that made her feel her concerns were being dismissed.

“[T]he sense that reputation was more important was just pretty damaging to my faith and to my confidence and to my self-esteem, because you’ve already been victimized by one person, and then a whole institution just kind of tells you that you don’t really matter.”

She noted that documents charging and sanctioning the male student, which were reviewed by CNA, did not mention the rape allegations. Smith said that omission was “shattering.”
 
When she reached out to the administration for updates on the investigation, “it was always really slow getting a response.”
 
She also believes the school should have been proactive in ensuring that she did not have to attend classes with the male student while the investigation was ongoing.
 
“The burden of me not encountering my rapist was entirely on me. They handed me his class schedule and the time that he would be allowed in the library.”
 
It was up to her to avoid him, she said, and on a small campus, this was often difficult.
 
There were usually two different sessions of a class, Smith said. “I would go to the 9:30 for example, and if he was there, I would leave and I would go back to the 10:30 class.”
 
Smith also said that when her father wrote a letter to college president Dr. Timothy O’Donnell, the president responded with a letter, obtained by CNA, which mentioned Smith by her first name, but referred to her alleged rapist with the formal title “Mr.”  
 
“I thought it was incredibly insulting,” Smith said. “It was just kind of another subtle message to us that we didn’t matter, that I didn’t matter to the school, that I wasn’t even deserving of that small indicator of respect.”
 
She also said that she raised the question of why a policy against sexual assault was not part of student handbook.
 
“I was told that these sort of things take time, and that there were a lot of other factors involved in terms of changing the code of student conduct,” she said. A policy against sexual assault was added to the handbook for the 2013-2014 school year.

Donna Provencher is vice president of communications & victim outreach for the Christendom Advocacy and Support Coalition (CASC), a group not affiliated with the college. She told CNA that Smith’s story is not unique.
 
CASC has “spoken to 12 victims whom the [Christendom] administration personally failed,” Provencher said. She says the group is also aware of six more potential victims via friends or family members.
 
In total, the group alleges there occurred “18 known rapes and sexual assaults between the 1980s and 2016, 16 of those between 1998 and 2016 under [current Christendom president Timothy] O’Donnell.”
 
In a Jan. 24 statement, O’Donnell acknowledged failings, and announced that a thorough review process was being undertaken.
 
“We have failed some of our students,” he said. “I am grateful to each woman who has come forward with her story… To those students who have been harmed, I am deeply sorry. We will do better.”

CASC has called for additional steps to both prevent sexual assault on campus and improve how reports of assault are addressed.
 
Although the college does not accept federal funding and is therefore not bound by Title IX regulations, the advocacy group believes the school should voluntarily adhere to reporting regulations so that prospective students and families can see the statistics regarding sexual assault cases.
 
The group has called for faculty and staff training to help them recognize signs of abuse, and for a full-time nurse to be made available to students.
 
In addition, it says, an independent panel should be used to assess rape cases, because the president and dean of the college could have conflicts of interest between protecting students and protecting the reputation of the school.
 
Amanda Graf, director of student affairs at Christendom, said that many of these recommendations have been implemented by the college in recent years, or are currently being considered.
 
A presentation is given to students during freshman orientation outlining the college’s expectations regarding student behavior, policy on assault – including definitions – and instructions on how to file reports, she said.
 
Faculty members, student life staff, and resident assistants are trained in how to receive reports of assault, and to recognize signs of it.
 
“Obviously, it’s not just, ‘Do you have a process in place? Do you have the right paperwork?’ But it’s ‘Do the students trust the people that they’re reporting to? Do they actually believe that when a report is made, something will happen?’” Graf said.
 
She said efforts in the last several years have included adding more female staff members on campus, creating more formation events, and spending more time getting to know the students “so they are really confident and comfortable bringing us any reports they might have.”
 
Questions of whether to increase the nurse practitioner’s office hours and who should adjudicate cases of sexual assault will be discussed with the firm conducting the review of Christendom’s practices, Graf said. She noted that adjudicating cases of sexual assault currently falls under the Student Affairs Department at Christendom, which she said is in line with practices as most colleges.

“We’re really interested in doing an in-depth study of how effective our education has been and how we can improve it,” she said. “Going forward, we have this great firm that is going to make sure we’re doing everything in the best way to serve our students and to serve our mission.”
 
Graf stressed the importance of discussing challenging topics in order to move forward and improve.
 
“We always need to be having these conversations,” she said.
 
Members of CASC have called for President O’Donnell’s resignation, pointing to numerous reports of poorly handled assault cases during his tenure.
 
Bethell told CNA that from what she has seen, the Christendom community “very strongly” supports the president.
 
“While nobody for a minute says bad things could not have happened, they also want to say that this is an excellent institution that has played a very important and positive role in their lives, and you don’t want to lose sight of that,” she said.
 
In recent days, Bethell said, the college has issued an open invitation to alumni who want to discuss anything that happened to them while they were students, and meetings have begun being held.
 
“We’re hoping to help to heal, and also to learn how we can improve our practices and policies, and recognize what happened,” she said. “The truth is what’s most important to us, and the welfare of our students and alumni. That’s an ongoing process, and it’s already begun to bear fruit.”

[…]

Father J.J. Mech, rector of the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Detroit, stands next to the life-sized statues of the apostles that have now been installed in the cathedral’s worship space, along with first-class relics of each apostle. The “Journey with the Saints” pilgrimage, which will be dedicated Feb. 8, 2024, in a special ceremony with Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron, is part of the cathedral’s ongoing transformation into an “apostolic center for the arts and culture.” / Credit: Photo courtesy of the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament and Detroit Catholic

Detroit, Mich., Jan 29, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

At the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Detroit, the band is getting back together. The band of Christ’s 12 apostles, that is. 

On Feb. 8, Detroit’s mother church will publicly unveil its long-awaited “Journey with the Saints” project, a permanent installation of 14 “larger than life” statues accompanied by first-class relics of each apostle, the latest accomplishment in the cathedral’s ongoing mission to turn itself into an apostolic center in the city of Detroit.

Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron will join Father J.J. Mech, rector of the cathedral, to dedicate the new installation during a special event at 7 p.m.

From its central perch on Woodward Avenue, the looming gothic cathedral of the Archdiocese of Detroit stands out in its neighborhood. Following Vigneron’s instruction to turn the church into a “cathedral of the arts,” Mech has spent the last several years converting the cathedral into a hub of missionary activity and beauty, drawing people to the faith via “shallow entry points.”

“Our goal is that we are going to be more accessible to people off of Woodward,” Mech told Detroit Catholic. “We want this to be a flexible public space, maybe even a community hub for not only spiritual enrichment but cultural enrichment, and it will be a safe place, and we will have security and all of that.”

The name “Cathedral of the Arts,” Mech explained, is a reminder that the proof of God is beauty — a principle that guides each of the new initiatives he and his team have undertaken on the cathedral’s campus. 

The latest project, the installation of the seven-and-a-half-foot-tall statues and relics encircling the cathedral’s interior worship space, is the crowning jewel of those efforts, transforming the cathedral into a permanent pilgrimage site, guided by the men who knew Christ most intimately during his time on earth.

Complete with first-class relics, the new installation is among the first of its kind in North America bringing together all 12 of Christ’s apostles for veneration, and the only exhibit in the world with the relics accessible in this way. 

The 14 statues — including two eight-foot angels — each were carved from a single tree trunk in St. Ulrich Groeden, in modern-day Italy, in 1927. The statues were rescued from St. Benedict Church in Highland Park, which closed in 2014. After undergoing extensive restoration, the statues were installed in the cathedral’s nave in December.

The statues include two angels, 10 of the original 12 apostles, St. Paul, and St. Matthias, the apostle who replaced Judas. Mech discovered that he had relics corresponding to the 12 saints, part of a collection of nearly 200 relics owned by the cathedral, all of which he hopes to be able to one day put on display.

The relics and the signage were installed beneath each statue beginning on Jan. 8, in time for the dedication and blessing of the new reliquary pilgrimage on Feb. 8.

“I am so excited about the transformation that is happening,” Mech said. “When you come in, there will be three main signs that tell you how to go on a pilgrimage, what the goal of a pilgrimage is, and how to interact with these relics. [Pilgrims] are going to walk away transformed, different, and they are going to enter through prayer.”

“Journey with the Saints” is much more than a museum of Church history, Mech said, but a rare opportunity to invoke the help of Catholicism’s greatest saints.

“It’s not just about looking at a pretty statue and touching some bones. [Pilgrims] are going to have a purpose when they walk away,” Mech said. “People can decide what they want intercession for, what they are hoping for when they pray to a particular saint, and when they walk away, they’ll keep praying for that.”

Mech said those whose prayers have been answered through the intercession of the saints will be invited to return to the cathedral and contribute a tile to a mosaic art piece that will be installed to show how God is answering prayers through the project. 

While the saints and relics are the culmination of a long-sought project, it’s all part of a greater vision for Detroit’s cathedral, Mech said.

Another piece of the puzzle will be dedicated on May 12, when Archbishop Vigneron will unveil a new outdoor grotto at the cathedral in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary. 

During the height of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, as the archbishop emotionally addressed the faithful during a livestreamed Mass from the cathedral, he entrusted the archdiocese to the protection of Our Lady of Lourdes and pledged to build the grotto “as a perpetual reminder” of her care and in memory of the lives lost to COVID-19.

Under the guidance of the archbishop, the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament finished a majority of the work on the grotto this fall, including statues of St. Bernadette Soubirous and Our Lady, whose face will reflect the one St. Bernadette saw in Lourdes, France, in 1858.

“People are already presently coming to pray [at] the grotto with the Blessed Mother,” Mech said. “We put some beautiful landscaping in this fall so people would feel welcomed, and in fact, we have used the site in a couple of ways for prayer services already.”

The grotto will also connect seamlessly with a garden walk that is being created around the cathedral’s plaza lawn, which will include art, benches, solar charging stations, a dog park, a bird sanctuary and pollination habitat. 

Working alongside the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the cathedral’s co-director of family ministries, Christine Broses, is spearheading the transformation of two previously empty lots on the corner of Trowbridge and John R Streets into green space for wildlife to thrive. 

“We learned that the city of Detroit is a north, south, east, and west crossing for bird migration,” Broses said. “So a lot of birds fly over the city of Detroit, but they don’t have anywhere to stop and rest because there isn’t a lot of green space. Creating green space is really important for the city and for wildlife in general, and research shows hearing birds and having green space in neighborhoods helps improve people’s mental health.”

Last spring, Broses oversaw the planting of native flowers in the area, and the next step is to let the space grow wild, which will inevitably attract birds and bees over the coming years. Broses said the final step will be to add educational plaques and pathways to make the spot accessible to schools and families. 

Mech wants the garden spaces and pathways to be welcoming and intends to build benches — something the neighborhood is currently lacking.

“We did a study of our neighborhood and found there is not a single park bench in any of the parks in our area,” Mech said. “We want to have park benches so people can come and rest and enjoy themselves. This will be a place where community can be built, and people will realize that the cathedral is not a fortress; we are actually unleashing the Gospel.”

And there is more. 

In June, construction began on the Cathedral Arts Apartments, which will include four stories and 53 two-bedroom housing units for low-income Detroiters. The $19.7 million project is the joint effort of the Archdiocese of Detroit; MHT Housing, Inc.; and the city of Detroit and will include a community space and workforce training center.

The next big construction project will be to convert the cathedral’s dormant gymnasium into a community center, Mech said — he hopes to host beehives on the roof to harvest honey that can be sold to raise money for the community.

At the end of the day, the vision of a “Cathedral of the Arts” — like the cathedrals of old — is about listening to the Holy Spirit and making a difference from the very small to the large scale, so that everyone who steps onto the property is transformed, Mech said.

“When we get people onto the campus, they start to see what we are doing, and they get involved,” he said. “Then, the Holy Spirit does the rest and helps them to get to know Our Lord in new and wonderful ways.”

[…]