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As Cardinal William H. Keeler blessed the new world headquarters for the Baltimore-based Catholic Relief Services Sept. 12, he marveled at the craftsmanship of the renovated building and said it’s a testament to what can be accomplished when Catholics and Jews join forces. Comparing the $33 million project to his work with the Jewish-Catholic affairs for the U.S. bishops, the retiring head of the Archdiocese of Baltimore called the partnership between the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation and CRS to provide a state-of-the-art facility for the international relief agency in the old Stewarts Building an ecumenical accomplishment that will benefit people worldwide.

WASHINGTON – Because of growing deficits and declining enrollments faced by its center-city Catholic schools, the Archdiocese of Washington announced a proposal Sept. 7 to reconfigure a consortium made up of the 12 schools. According to the proposal, four of the 12 Catholic schools currently in the Center City Consortium would make up a new consortium and the other eight schools would form a values-based charter school group by the next school year. Charter schools are publicly funded but privately run. Under the proposed plan, the parishes would lease their buildings to the charter operator.

HUNTINGTON, Utah –The wrenching search for six lost miners was over, leaving only funerals, a public memorial service and a private committal service for the three Catholic miners attended by family members. A funeral Mass for Luis Hernandez and Juan Carlos Payan was celebrated Sept. 6 at Mission San Rafael in Huntington. Concelebrated by Father Donald E. Hope, pastor of the mission and other parishes in the area, Father Omar Ontiveros of the Cathedral of the Madeleine in Salt Lake City and Father Oscar Martinez of St. Joseph Parish in Ogden, the Mass focused on resurrection.

TAYBEH, West Bank – Beer flowed freely, the smell of grilled meat wafted in the air and the beat of the traditional “darbuka” drum resounded through the hillside as this all-Christian Palestinian village celebrated its version of the German Oktoberfest. Later, when evening fell over the village and people had their fill of sticky Arabic sweets and custard-filled doughnuts, the drum beats were replaced by the pounding sounds of Palestinian hip-hop groups while young, fashionably dressed Palestinians danced to the hypnotic rhythms. The Taybeh Oktoberfest has been celebrated in September for the past two years out of deference to Muslims who will mark their monthlong Ramadan fast in October.

SEOUL, South Korea – The Seoul Archdiocese has cautioned Catholics against meeting or consulting with an excommunicated African archbishop residing in South Korea. Lay Catholics are to consult with their parish priests if they are invited to any meeting with Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, former archbishop of Lusaka, Zambia, the Sept. 9 archdiocesan bulletin advised. The Asian church news agency UCA News reported the bulletin told Catholics, “Former Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, who married a member of the Unification Church and caused a scandal, was excommunicated by the Vatican.”

MESA, Ariz. – A college campus is accustomed to high-speed objects flying across its grounds: students bicycling down the mall, professors hurrying to their next class, a sport utility vehicle adorned with pictures of Pope John Paul II disseminating campus ministry information. OK, so only students at Arizona State University’s Polytechnic campus in Mesa will experience that last example. That’s because Father Michael Goodyear, a Legionaries of Christ priest who is chaplain of Polytechnic’s John Paul II Newman Center, recently outfitted his SUV with pictures and messages of his office’s namesake. “When Bishop (Thomas J.) Olmsted (of Phoenix) asked me to come to the Polytechnic and initiate campus ministry, there was no history of anything there,” Father Goodyear said.

OAKLAND, Calif. – Their family home in Fallujah, Iraq, was shelled, burned and looted. They languished for two years in Istanbul, Turkey, within the cultural and vocational limbo accorded refugees who are waiting to be permanently resettled somewhere, sometime. Now that Hana, Wafa and Sana Toma have found a permanent home in the Oakland Diocese with the help of Catholic Charities, they speak with a single voice: “We want to work. Now.” Wafa and Sana Toma have spent their adult lives as educators – Wafa as an English grammar teacher at a technical institute and Sana as an elementary school instructor near Fallujah. Hana Toma worked for many years as a journalist covering culture and archaeology for a daily newspaper before becoming an Arabic/English translator at the Ministry of Culture in Baghdad, Iraq.

RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. – Oscar-winning actress Jane Wyman, once married to future president Ronald Reagan, joined the Catholic Church as an adult and became a benefactor to several Catholic causes. Ms. Wyman died Sept. 10 at her home in Rancho Mirage. The cause of death was not disclosed. While her age was placed at 90, other sources suggested she may have been 93. “The death of Ms. Wyman marks the loss not only of a great actress, but a great woman of faith and a personal friend,” said a Sept. 10 statement from Bishop Gerald R. Barnes of San Bernardino. “Her support of the work of the Catholic Church in the Coachella Valley and the Diocese of San Bernardino made possible many wonderful things, including the Blessed Junipero Serra House of Formation,” Bishop Barnes said.

VATICAN CITY – On the feast of the Most Holy Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Pope Benedict XVI said the church is called to be like the mother of God and look to Christ. The church is called to pay witness to the sanctity of life and work toward a future of peace, he said. The pope used his general audience Sept. 12 to share reflections about his Sept. 7-9 visit to Austria. He returned briefly to the Vatican from his papal summer villa south of Rome to greet the estimated 12,000 people gathered in St. Peter’s Square and thank all those who made his apostolic pilgrimage a success. “It was a great joy for me to return as the successor of Peter” to Austria’s Marian sanctuary at Mariazell, helping celebrate the shrine’s 850th anniversary, the pope said.

When Pamela Protani spent part of her day feeding and playing with children with mental and physical disabilities at a South African orphanage last month, she was stunned by the reception she received on the streets of Pretoria. “It was indescribable,” said Ms. Protani, a parishioner of St. Joseph in Fullerton who was one of 16 Catholics from the Archdiocese of Baltimore to participate in a two-week mission to Africa in mid-August. “Children from all over the neighborhood came up and took us by the hand,” she remembered. “Even on the main street, people were blowing horns, waving and taking photos. It was very humbling.” Representing seven parishes, the Baltimore pilgrims ministered in South African and Tanzanian orphanages, AIDS clinics and schools run by the Missionaries of Charity, the religious order founded by Blessed Teresa of Calcutta. They donated more than 150 pounds of clothing, toys, candy, rosaries, holy cards and other items.