Washington D.C., May 21, 2019 / 12:51 pm (CNA).- Archbishop Wilton Gregory expressed “deep gratitude and immeasurable joy” as he took charge of the nation’s capital see Tuesday.
“I want to be a welcoming shepherd who laughs with you whenever we can, who cries with you whenever we must, and who honestly confesses his faults and failings before you when I commit them, not when they are revealed,” Gregory said to applause during his May 21 installation Mass as Archbishop of Washington, D.C. in Washington’s National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
“We stand at a defining moment for this local faith community,” Gregory said.
“Our recent sorrow and shame do not define us; rather, they serve to chasten and strengthen us to face tomorrow with spirits undeterred.”
Calling his installation as the seventh Archbishop of Washington an “indescribably humbling moment,” Gregory pledged himself to a new era of openness in Washington.
The archbishop’s installation Mass was presided over by apostolic nuncio Archbishop Christoph Pierre and attended by eight cardinals, more than 50 bishops, some 300 priests, and nearly 100 deacons.
U.S. bishops’ conference president Daniel DiNardo, reportedly still recovering from a March stroke, was not in attendance.
The celebration was held at the National Shrine instead of Washington’s St. Matthew’s Cathedral in order to accommodate the crowds, numbering about 3,000.
Members of the faithful from around the archdiocese gathered outside the basilica waving flags and banners of welcome, and singing before the Mass began.
A Gospel choir led the music during the Mass.
Acknowledging the scandals that have rocked the Church, both in Washington and around the world, Gregory said, “We have been tossed about by an unusually turbulent moment in our own faith journeys recently and for far too long.”
“We clerics and hierarchs have irrefutably been the source of the current tempest.”
Recalling the image of the apostles’ fear on stormy seas, Gregory told the assembly that true peace is found by remembering that Christ was in the apostles’ boat.
“He invites us to place our trust in Him – not in trite and easy programs – but in Him and Him alone.”
Despite the pressure of recent scandals, Gregory said he had already received an “affectionate and embarrassingly gracious welcome.”
“The example I wish to set forth for you is that of a man filled with the faith, hope and joy of knowing Jesus Christ is in the boat.”
Gregory thanked Pope Francis for the “righteous challenge – more an opportunity” to carry the Gospel message to the poor, the marginalized, and the neglected.
“Beginning today, that is my take here in the Archdiocese of Washington.”
Gregory’s appointment was first reported on May 28, and his installation has been eagerly anticipated. Technically, Washington has been without an archbishop since Cardinal Donald Wuerl’s resignation was accepted by the pope in October last year, though Wuerl himself has served as interim leader of the archdiocese since that time.
Gregory paid tribute to his predecessor during the homily, calling Wuerl a “cherished friend” and “above all, a true Christian gentleman.”
The Archbishop of Washington is generally viewed as one of the most influential Churchmen in the United States; the five most recent archbishops were all created cardinals – including the now-laicized Theodore McCarrick. While Gregory, 71, is widely expected to be named a cardinal in the future, it is usual for the pope to wait until the previous cardinal archbishop from the same diocese turns 80 years old and becomes ineligible to vote in a conclave. Wuerl will turn 79 in November.
As a former president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops from 2001 to 2004, Gregory was responsible for helping to lead the American hierarchy through the fallout of the Church’s 2002 sexual abuse scandals. He oversaw the formation and implementation of the “Dallas Charter” and USCCB’s “Essential Norms” in 2002.
Gregory’s appointment is also history because he is the first African-American to be appointed archbishop in Washington, D.C.; the city itself is more than 50% African-American. Gregory is also the first convert to Catholicism to be appointed Archbishop of Washington.
If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!
Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.
Sister Mary Regina of the Holy Angels, the first religious sister to join Mother Angelica’s monastery in Hanceville, Alabama, died July 22 at age 78 after a battle with cancer. / YouTube/EWTN July 24, 2023
The exterior of the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center at Kansas State University. / Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
CNA Staff, Oct 2, 2023 / 17:15 pm (CNA).
There’s a quote from Jerome Tang, head coach of the Kansas State University (KSU) basketball team, that Father Gale Hammerschmidt likes.
“I didn’t come to rebuild. I came to elevate,” Tang said after taking the team’s helm last year. (His team bowed out of the NCAA Tournament last spring after making it to the Elite Eight.)
Hammerschmidt, chaplain at St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center at Kansas State, said he thinks “elevation” is an appropriate word for what the Catholic community he leads is doing right now. On Jan. 28, the local bishop dedicated the Catholic center’s brand-new, $20 million church — a project more than two decades in the making.
But now that the new church is open, the real work of bringing the Catholic faith to students on campus can continue. The grand new church presents an opportunity to “elevate everything we do here at St. Isidore’s,” Hammerschmidt told CNA.
“We know that the work is just now beginning. And if we’re going to create a beautiful space, we want to be able to do beautiful things in the space. And nothing is more beautiful than a soul encountering the living God,” the priest told CNA.
Hammerschmidt, a Kansas native and 1995 Kansas State alum, was ordained to the priesthood in 2012 and was assigned to St. Isidore’s in 2017. The Catholic center sits just across the street from the Kansas State campus, which is itself the lifeblood of the small city of Manhattan. There had been discussions about the need for a new church building for several years before he arrived.
“I already knew that there was a need to build a new church. This is something that had been talked about for probably 20 years, honestly, even since right around the time that I was graduating from college,” Hammerschmidt told CNA.
Father Gale Hammerschmidt. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Part of the reason was that the population served by St. Isidore’s had outgrown the old space, which sat about 400 and was regularly filled to bursting on Sundays with overflow seating in the student center library.
Grace Gorges, a K-State student studying graphic design, got involved with the Catholic community at the college as soon as she arrived at KSU. From the get-go, “the Masses were always crowded, always overflowing,” she said, adding that the fallout from COVID made things even worse when parts of the sanctuary had to be roped off for distancing purposes.
The campaign to raise money for a new church was dubbed “Home Away from Home.” About $5 million had already been raised before Hammerschmidt’s arrival, and the campaign ultimately raised nearly $20 million for the project, he said. Some 1,500 individual donors contributed to the campaign.
Nebraska-based lead architect Kevin Clark came to Manhattan in 2017 and began asking the community what they wanted their new church to look like. Countless students requested a beautiful interior, “traditional-looking in nature,” the priest said.
“We want this to look like a church that has been standing forever and will stand forever,” he recalled students telling him.
“We wanted to make sure that it was an epic-looking building” with an interior that would raise hearts and minds “to the beauties of heaven,” he said.
The congregation kneels during the dedication Mass for the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center at Kansas State University. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Given her involvement in the community and her interest in beauty and design, Hammerschmidt asked Gorges to serve on the building committee, which meant she would have a say in the church’s aesthetic. Gorges said she was invited to help design the church’s tile flooring. She researched churches online for inspiration and also drew from her personal experience of visiting numerous beautiful sacred spaces on a trip to Italy.
Ridge Pinkston, a fifth-year senior when CNA spoke with him, studying medieval history, was also chosen to be on the building committee. He told CNA that the committee — which included Hammerschmidt, diocesan board member Doug Hinkin, and others — was given almost complete control over the look of the new church.
He said the committee had numerous meetings with the architect to figure out the look of everything in the new church — they spent an entire two-hour meeting designing the look of the altar, for example. He said the building committee “represented the body of owners” to the architect and designers, similar to how when a family builds a house, the architects and contractors consult them on how they want it to look. He said it was a “huge privilege” and a great learning process to be a part of the committee as a student.
Despite his interest in medieval architecture, the churches that Pinkston primarily drew inspiration from were mainly stateside; most are located in the Archdiocese of Denver. They included the medieval revival-style chapel at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary and the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception and Holy Ghost Catholic Church, both in downtown Denver.
Ultimately, the architects and designers of St. Isidore’s produced a neo-Gothic interior with pointed arches that dropped many a jaw when it was unveiled. The interior also features numerous instances of vine imagery — an image of Jesus himself, but also a subtle nod to the college’s agricultural heritage. Evergreene Architectural Arts, a renowned design studio in New York, provided the decoration, Hammerschmidt said.
Not everything in the interior is entirely new, however. Hammerschmidt said at the request of students, stained-glass windows depicting the seven patron saints of the seven original colleges at Kansas State (the university was originally Methodist-founded) were saved and incorporated into the new church. Among those saints are the church’s namesake, St. Isidore — an 11th-century Spaniard and patron saint of agricultural workers — as well as the namesake of the student center, St. Robert Bellarmine. A much-loved crucifix that hung over the tabernacle in the old church was also used again in the new church.
The crucifix in the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Gorges said she loves the triumphal arch over the altar in the finished church, which draws one’s eyes toward the focal point of the crucifix, and onward to heaven. A beautiful church, she said, is “not the end-all-be-all by any means. But if it’s at all possible, beauty matters. And we should be trying to live that in our daily lives.”
Pinkston said his favorite design element in the new church, apart from the ceiling of the apse, is the new altar itself, which he said really strikes him as being designed in a way that calls to mind a place where sacrifices are made.
“Rightfully, that should be one of the most beautiful features,” he said of the altar.
The designers also took care to design the exterior of the church to match the native limestone buildings of Kansas State, in an effort to make the church an integral part of the campus it serves.
Bishop Gerald Vincke of Salina, Kansas, dedicated the diocese’s newest church on Jan. 28. The 14,000-square-foot structure can accommodate about 700 for Sunday Masses.
Bishop Gerald Vincke of Salina, Kansas, sprinkles holy water during the dedication of the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center on Jan. 28, 2023. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Hammerschmidt said daily Masses at St. Isidore’s were already attracting nearly 200 students on a regular basis. A key part of the Catholic center’s success, he said, is the presence of missionaries from the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS). FOCUS maintains a presence on college campuses with the goal of winning people to the Catholic faith through authentic friendships and forming others to go out and do the same through Bible studies, small groups, and retreats.
“We also work closely with the high schools in the state of Kansas, especially the Catholic high schools. And we have many strong Catholic high schools in our area. And so we just have students who, the first day they show up in Manhattan, they already know about us,” Hammerschmidt said.
In addition, he said, the Catholic center is in cooperation with the local Diocese of Salina and the nearby Diocese of Wichita, whereby Wichita — which has been blessed in recent years with large vocation numbers — sends a priest to serve as Hammerschmidt’s associate. Large numbers of students come to KSU from Wichita — Gorges among them — who get involved with the Catholic center thanks to strong word of mouth.
“It’s good for them to have one of their own priests looking after them … I think it’s working phenomenally well.”
Stained-glass windows in the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Working at St. Isidore’s, Pinkston said he has gotten to know “the regulars” that came to the church before the rebuild, but now with the new church, he said he sees many more people coming in to pray whom he has never seen before. He also said it was inspirational for him to see a friend — a man who is joining the Catholic Church this Easter — weeping openly when he first saw the new church’s interior.
“That was really the first time I’d ever seen him express emotion … That’s definitely a huge blessing to be able to see that happening,” he said.
Hammerschmidt was almost overwhelmed by the support of the many students, alumni, and others who made the new church possible. Months on from the chapel’s opening, the 9:09 p.m. daily Mass is always well attended, with about 300 students attending regularly. As of September, St. Isidore’s has 40 student-led Bible studies with around 400 Bible study participants.
“The outpouring of joy and gratitude has been incredible. The number of people who we will just see walking through the church from out of town is unbelievable,” Hammerschmidt said.
“And then beyond that, we had so many more hundreds of people praying for the project, and we just have been supported unbelievably well.”
Hammerschmidt said he wants the students and community of Kansas State to take ownership of the magnificent new church and to use it for their spiritual benefit.
“We want to let everybody in Manhattan and on K-State’s campus know that we built this church for them,” he said.
“If they just need a place of encounter with God to just come in to be seated, to be immersed in the beauty and the silence and to just let God speak. That’s our hope. For the Catholics, for the non-Catholics, for the students, for nonstudents, just for anyone who needs a place to encounter the living God, this would be the place for them.”
Light from the stained glass in the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center. Jacob Bentzinger
CNA Staff, Feb 11, 2024 / 08:00 am (CNA).
If you’re giving up sweets for Lent, you may not be happy to learn that this year Ash Wednesday falls on Valentine’s Day. But while the day typically marked b… […]
2 Comments
“We clerics and hierarchs have irrefutably been the source of the current tempest.”
The good archbishop certainly got that right. Having Roger Mahony as one of your episcopal guests of honor is a sure sign that storms will continue. Mahony, a gospel choir “leading the music” at a Catholic bishop’s installation Mass – all that was missing was Ted McCarrick. Did Jim Martin make the trip down from New York? Also, I am sure that the soon-to-be Cardinal Gregory will be doing his utmost from his new perch in Washington to bring about the election of whatever the Democrats vomit up in 2020.
“We clerics and hierarchs have irrefutably been the source of the current tempest.”
The good archbishop certainly got that right. Having Roger Mahony as one of your episcopal guests of honor is a sure sign that storms will continue. Mahony, a gospel choir “leading the music” at a Catholic bishop’s installation Mass – all that was missing was Ted McCarrick. Did Jim Martin make the trip down from New York? Also, I am sure that the soon-to-be Cardinal Gregory will be doing his utmost from his new perch in Washington to bring about the election of whatever the Democrats vomit up in 2020.
“this local faith community,”
Does that mean the diocese? If so, why doesn’t he say so, instead of using silly circumlocutions?