Catholic News Around Indiana

Compiled by Brandon A. Evans

Diocese of Evansville

Diocesan Choir heads to Italy for 10-day pilgrimage

By MARY ANN HUGHES (Message staff writer)

There will be high notes and strong voices during the Diocesan Choir’s pilgrimage to Italy, but Jeremy Korba is hoping that the pilgrims are touched by the quiet moments — because those are the times, he believes, when faith can come alive.

He’s the director of the choir which began a 10-day trip to Italy last Tuesday. The itinerary includes visits in Venice, Florence, Siena, Assisi, Padua, Rome and Vatican City.

Jeremy has been the director of the Diocesan Choir for about five years. Its members, which often include as many as 110 people from parishes all over the diocese, sing at ordinations and other diocesan events including the Chrism Mass.

Of that larger group, 35 are heading to Italy this week, along with 25 others including spouses.

Last Sunday, the choir presented a concert at St. Benedict Cathedral in Evansville which featured several of the songs they will be singing in Italy. Terri Abbot was the first person to arrive for the concert. “I came early,” she said, “so I can hear everything they are doing. I just know the music today will be exceptional. It will be really beautiful.”

Before the concert began, the four members of the Colbert family talked about the upcoming trip. Colton Colbert is 12, and a male soprano in the choir. He said he was “very excited” about the trip, and looking forward to seeing Pope Benedict XVI. His older brother, Remington, who is a tenor with the choir, said, “I’m looking forward to the food.”

The family, which also includes father, Ken, has sung with the diocesan choir during Chrism Masses and at the last diaconate ordination.

About 400 attended last Sunday’s concert at the cathedral which began with an introduction by the choir director who told the audience that members range in age from 12 to 82. “We have professional musicians and those who cannot read music.”

He said the group will sing at a High Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City, perform a short recital in the Sistine Chapel, and sing during a papal audience.

Photo caption: Benedictine Father Gregory Chamberlin offers a blessing to the Diocesan Choir last Sunday at the conclusion of their concert at St. Benedict Cathedral in Evansville where he serves as pastor. The group left Tuesday for a 10-day trip to Italy with scheduled stops in Venice, Florence, Siena, Assisi, Padua, Rome and Vatican City. (Message photo by Mary Ann Hughes)

(For this story and more news from the Diocese of Evansville, log on to the website of The Message at www.themessageonline.org)

 

Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend

Catholics, Mennonites reflect on ‘blessed are the peacemakers’

By Ann Carey

SOUTH BEND — “Blessed are the Peacemakers” was the theme of a day of reflection between Catholics and Mennonites at St. Matthew Cathedral in South Bend on Sept. 18.

At the prayer service that started the day, Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, who led the service, told the approximately 55 participants that he was pleased to find upon his recent arrival in this diocese that a Catholic-Mennonite dialogue was ongoing here. He said that many Mennonites and Amish live in his former Diocese of Harrisburg, Pa., but Catholic-Mennonite relations were not as well established there.

After the 9 a.m. prayer service in the cathedral, the dialogue got underway in the St. Matthew School auditorium with opening talks on ecumenism by Bishop Rhoades and Marlene Kropf, an associate professor in Spiritual Formation and Worship at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart. Kropf is also the denominational minister of worship for the Mennonite Church USA Executive Leadership and co-chair of the bi-national Mennonite Church Worship Council.

Kropf explained that Mennonites believe the church is “the bride of Christ, unblemished and pure.” Thus, for generations, Mennonites formed their own strong communities and lived their faith without getting involved with outside people or issues.

Mennonites developed “a kind of myopia” because they didn’t always recognize the face of Christ in neighbors, strangers and people of other faiths, Kropf said. That attitude changed as Mennonites began to work for peace with other churches and ecumenical organizations, she explained.

Today, Mennonites recognize that “The love of Christ joins unlikely people together into one family,” with Christ calling that Christian family to the same commitment to peace, she said.

“I believe God wants us to step inside each others’ homes and take the risk of intimate friendship,” Kropf concluded. “And I also believe that if our friendship brings us closer to Christ, that will be worth it, and that is our call.”

 

Queen of Angels welcomes man from outer space

By Kay Cozad

FORT WAYNE — Spirits were soaring out of this world at Queen of Angels School on Sept. 17 when students and staff welcomed a special visitor. NASA astronaut Michael T. Good addressed the assembly with a presentation on space flights that the students will not soon forget.

Good is from Ohio and is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame. Recently retired from the U.S. Air Force, Col. Good has logged over 30,000 hours in more than 30 different aircraft. 

But the students of Queen of Angels School were most impressed with the fact that the man in the blue NASA one-piece uniform was a real astronaut who had been in space not once but twice. 

Good was a member of the crew of the STS-125 space flight that repaired the Hubble Space Telescope in 2009 and participated in the delivery of supplies to the International Space Station on space flight STS-132, the final flight for the space shuttle Atlantis, in 2010. 

Queen of Angels School is a Project READS site, an after- school tutorial program for kindergarten through third-grade students, sponsored by the Allen County Education Partnership (ACEP), which coordinated Good’s visit. Fifth-grade teacher Karen Chesterman, who for many years facilitated a young adult astronaut program at Queen of Angels, is Project READS coordinator at the school and passionate about space. She said, “I’ve always wanted to have an astronaut come. God smiled down on us and gave us Mr. Good!”

Ann Miller, principal of Queen of Angels, was thrilled to welcome Good as well, and said, “We are so blessed to meet a true astronaut.”

In opening the presentation, “No Dream is Impossible,” Good explained to the rapt audience that space was his dream. He encouraged the students to dream big and make those dreams come true. “Think about your own dreams, work hard and persevere. Stick with it and set high goals to turn your dreams into reality,” said Good. 

Photo caption: Astronaut Col. Michael Good high-fives a student after an assembly at Queen of Angels School where he presented a talk on his space travels on Sept. 17.

(For these stories and more news from the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, log on to the website of Today’s Catholic at www.todayscatholicnews.org)

 

Diocese of Gary

No briefs available this week

 

(For news from the Diocese of Gary, log on to the website of the Northwest Indiana Catholic at www.nwicatholic.com)

 

Diocese of Lafayette

All-Catholic meet off to enthusiastic start

By Kevin Cullen

NOBLESVILLE — Amanda McCauley is a 17-year-old senior at Our Lady of Providence High School in Clarksville, across the Ohio River from Louisville, Ky. She’s been running cross country races since she was in the sixth grade.

But the inaugural Indiana Catholic Cross Country Championships — held Sept. 11 at St. Theodore Guerin High School — were refreshingly different.

“We don’t have any all-Catholic meets,” she said shortly before toeing the starting line. “It’s good competition and there are some way bigger schools up here. We don’t play any of them in any other sports.

“We’re getting different comments. Already, during warm-ups, people are saying, ‘Good job!’ and ‘Good luck! They’re a lot nicer than the people from the public schools we run against.”

More than 700 fleet-footed teenagers from 18 Catholic high schools traveled from all over the state for the rain-dampened races. The event featured four 3.1-mile races: for varsity boys, varsity girls, junior-varsity boys and junior-varsity girls.

All that was followed by a Mass, then a lunch provided by Guerin Catholic boosters.

“This event is not about cross country, but about our shared faith, and a celebration of the Indiana (Catholic) high school community,” said Cliff Babbey, event director. His son, Mark, is on the Guerin cross country team.

“This is the only sport where this concept is possible and we are thrilled, stunned and humbled to see how enthusiastically folks have taken to the event,” he said.

Mark Brunsman, 18, is a runner for Oldenburg Academy in Oldenburg, 45 minutes from Cincinnati.

“I felt united, as a Catholic, to see all those Catholic (school) names. Some had crosses on the backs of their shirts,” he said. “It was a new experience to run in an all-Catholic race. It has more of a social aspect than a normal meet.”

Participating teams came from as far away as Lake Michigan on the north to the Ohio River on the south, and from the lllinois border on the west to the Ohio line on the east.

Photo caption: Teammates from Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School, Indianapolis, gather before a race at the first Indiana Catholic Cross Country Championships, held Sept. 11 at St. Theodore Guerin High School in Noblesville.

 

Local Church priest to run New York City Marathon

By Caroline B. Mooney

NOBLESVILLE — Nov. 7 will mark the culmination of years of training for Father Joshua Janko as he will be among more than 45,000 runners in the ING New York City Marathon.

The 26.2-mile race, with a course through New York City’s five boroughs, is one of the premier running events in the United States. One of the largest marathons in the world, it had 43,659 finishers in 2009. More than 100,000 runners apply annually to the race, so a lottery drawing picks the participants.

Father Janko, 34, is associate pastor of St. Alphonsus Church, Zionsville. He said he was flipping through TV channels last November “and all of a sudden I saw part of the NYC marathon. I saw the man who won. He was a naturalized citizen, and he was so excited and proud that it triggered something in me. I had been talking about doing this for 10 years. I trained a couple times, but I kept getting injured. I just said, ‘I want to be there next year.’”

He applied early this year and found out he had been selected in April.

Father Janko started his running career the summer before seventh grade.

In 1995, while still in college, Father Janko started running the OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini-Marathon, a race in downtown Indianapolis that draws nearly 40,000 runners. He has missed running the “mini” only twice since then.

“It’s been an annual event for me,” he said. “It’s neat because it starts off the season for the Indianapolis 500, and because of the sheer number of people there.

“I started practicing my faith more in my junior year in high school, and I started to think about God more as I ran,” Father Janko said. “I always pray before I run.”

Anyone who would like to sponsor Father Janko spiritually can post prayer pledges on his blog site: http://fatherjoshua.blogspot.com after Sept. 19.

Photo caption: Father Joshua Janko at the 2009 “Race for Vocations” in Indianapolis (Photo provided)

(For these stories and more news from the Diocese of Lafayette, log on to the website of The Catholic Moment at www.thecatholicmoment.org)