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Evangelist’s two-day festival in Omaha draws a crowd of 105,000

OMAHA, Neb. – Members of more than 275 churches in Omaha attended the Luis Palau Heartland Festival July 14-15 to listen to Palau and to praise Jesus. Omaha’s event was the first time a Catholic archdiocese or diocese had publicly endorsed the Palau festival, with Omaha Archbishop Elden F. Curtiss making an appearance onstage to address the crowd of more than 45,000 people the first night. An estimated 105,000 attended the event over the two days.

Gun collection reveals trend

UPDATED For the second time since May, St. Gregory the Great collected guns July 21 to get them off of the street in response to an escalating violent-crime rate in the city. The Baltimore City parish expects to hold two more firearm compilations before the year is out. It’s a growing trend for religious communities of many denominations throughout Baltimore to not only pray for an end to violence, but to be proactive in reducing a murder rate that is on course to surpass 300 by the end of 2007. “As a parish, we feel like we need to get involved to make our community and city safer,” said Monsignor Damien Nalepa, pastor of St. Gregory the Great, whose parish collected three handguns, four rifles and a sawed-off shotgun July 21. “The problems in the city are our problems.”

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