{"id":85,"date":"2009-10-09T10:23:51","date_gmt":"2009-10-09T10:23:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2009\/10\/october-24-lay-fast-for-priests.html"},"modified":"2009-10-09T10:23:51","modified_gmt":"2009-10-09T10:23:51","slug":"october-24-lay-fast-for-priests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2009\/10\/october-24-lay-fast-for-priests.html","title":{"rendered":"October 24: Lay Fast for Priests"},"content":{"rendered":"

With World Priest Day<\/a> approaching on October 25, a number of people will be joining an international fast for the world’s priests<\/a>:  <\/p>\n

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Anna Rae-Kelly saw the Catholic priesthood becoming embattled as a result of the clergy abuse scandal that rocked the Church beginning in 2001. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Suffering from a decline in prestige and reputation among the general public, the priesthood frequently became the butt of jokes and the center of calls for change in longstanding traditions and practices including celibacy and an unmarried clergy.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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That is why Rae-Kelly felt a call to action.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

“If they are under attack, we don’t receive the Eucharist and the sacrament of reconciliation,” Rae-Kelly said. “After the abuse scandal, they were weakened and we were weakened as a result.”<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

She organized what has since come to be an international phenomenon called the Lay Fast for Priests.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

“For some time, I had felt called to pray for the priests in America and all over the world,” Rae-Kelly said. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

This year, the Lay Fast for Priests will be held on Oct. 24. The fast is to be observed until 3 p.m. that day, the hour when Christ died on the cross. Participants refrain not only from food but from anything else that is “significant” to them. For example, Rae-Kelly has known of people fasting from talking, television, or other aspects of everyday life. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

At 3 p.m., the fast is broken with prayer. Past fasters have prayed in their own homes or held services in their parishes. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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<\/span><\/font><\/div>\n
You can find more information at the link<\/a>. <\/span><\/font><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/font><\/div>\n
And a web page has been set up for the event, as well.  Check it out<\/a>. <\/span><\/font><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With World Priest Day approaching on October 25, a number of people will be joining an international fast for the world’s priests:   Anna Rae-Kelly saw the Catholic priesthood becoming embattled as a result of the clergy abuse scandal that rocked the Church beginning in 2001.  Suffering from a decline in prestige and reputation among…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":204,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-85","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-people-in-the-pews","category-vocations"],"yoast_head":"\nOctober 24: Lay Fast for Priests - The Deacon's Bench<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2009\/10\/october-24-lay-fast-for-priests.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"October 24: Lay Fast for Priests - 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Prior to that, Deacon Greg worked for 26 years as a writer and producer for CBS News, where he contributed to \"The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric,\" \"60 Minutes II,\" \"48 Hours,\" (Emmy Award, Writers Guild of America Award) and \"Sunday Morning.\" He was co-writer for the acclaimed documentary \"9\/11,\" hosted by Robert DeNiro. (Emmy Award, Christopher Award, Peabody Award, Writers Guild of America Award.) His radio essays were featured in the bestselling book \"Deadlines and Datelines\" by Dan Rather. He's also a two-time winner of the Catholic Press Association Award. Other places you may find him: AMERICA, U.S. CATHOLIC, CATHOLIC DIGEST, REALITY (Redemptorist Communications) and THE BROOKLYN TABLET. He also contributes homiletic reflections to the parish resource CONNECT!, published by Liturgical Publications. In November 2009, he began serving a three-year term as a consultant to the Communications Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Deacon Greg grew up in Maryland (Go Terps!) but he and his wife today live in the beautiful borough of Queens, New York. You can contact Deacon Greg at dcngreg@gmail.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/author\/gkandra"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/204"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}