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The Deacon's Bench

The always-interesting John Allen has some insight and context in today’s New York Times regarding the Vatican’s new document Dignitas Personae: The roughly 67 million Catholics in the United States make up nearly one-quarter of the American population, but just 6 percent of the global Catholic total of 1.1 billion. Ninety-four percent of the Catholics…

A reader (and newly ordained deacon!) alerted me to this happy news: 23 men were ordained last week in N’ahlins. The Clarion Herald newspaper has a full write-up, including biographies of the men and more pictures (in a pdf file) in its December 6 and December 13 editions. Congratulations! Ad multos annos!

Some very bright news during this dark season: vocations in Beantown are up. Way up. From the Boston Globe Enrollment at St. John’s Seminary has doubled over the last two years, a stunning turnabout for an institution that seemed to be spiraling toward closure in the wake of the clergy sexual abuse crisis. The stone…

The recession is growing — and so are the needs of the faithful. The Catholic Review in Baltimore offers a glimpse at what is happening in that archdiocese: Not so long ago, Oredolapo Roberts lived in a four-bedroom house, owned a successful business and drove her kids around in a new Chevy Tahoe. Then the…

From our Down Under Desk, news of a married man (and convert) being ordained a Catholic priest: Former Anglican priest Bavin Clark, a married father of four, is to be ordained as a Catholic priest for the Brisbane archdiocese. The Wynnum Herald reports the novice deacon is living proof times are changing, when he becomes…

Several weeks ago, I received a couple of e-mails from concerned voters, who were convinced that the men offering invocations at Barack Obama’s inaugural would be Louis Farrakhan and Rev. Jeremiah Wright. So this news might surprise them: Aretha Franklin and Dr. Rick Warren, an evangelical minister of the Saddleback Church, are among the select…

Sad news from the pages of this morning’s New York Times: Behind the red-brick walls encircling the Convent of Mercy in Brooklyn, generations of nuns have taught the illiterate, sheltered the homeless and raised orphans. They are known as the Walking Sisters, ministering in the community as well as inside their convent. Now, after 146…

The controversy over Maryknoll’s Roy Bourgeois shows no signs of quieting down any time soon. A group of nuns has now issued a statement of support for Bourgeois: More than 100 Roman Catholic nuns from 22 religious congregations have written the Vatican protesting the threatened excommunication of Rev. Roy Bourgeois, a Maryknoll priest who publicly…

The wickedly good ad campaign for a Certain Religious TV Station (ahem) has just gotten a nice mention in the Gray Lady — along with a look at how churches are using marketing to get people in the pews: The most visible current campaign is an assertive effort from the Collegiate Churches of New York,…

I’ve been looking for a good excuse to post this, just because I love the song so much. And no, it has nothing to do with Handel. Rocco points out that this Leonard Cohen classic could well end up being the #1 song in Britain this holiday season. He’s partial to the Jeff Buckley interp.…
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