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ST. LOUIS – As the last surviving member of the Contemplative Sisters of the Indwelling Trinity, Sister Mary Joseph Therese Fuller said she is happy to see that the devotion to Our Lady of America is gaining momentum.

In Father Patrick Carrion’s family, the religious life was always viewed as a genuine vocation. Growing up, he saw examples of religious life from his uncle, a priest, and his great aunt, a sister. Later, his older brother, Michael, would also become a priest.

WASHINGTON – As many as 1,000 family members, friends, co-workers and community members attended the funeral Mass for slain journalist Chauncey Bailey in Oakland, Calif., at St. Benedict Catholic Church. Father Jay Matthews, pastor, was a longtime friend of Bailey and was the main celebrant of the Mass. He said the church can seat 400 comfortably but 700 crowded in Aug. 8, with hundreds more outside, to pay their respects to a man who died trying to make their community a better, safer place to live. Eighty members of Bailey’s family came from across the country, and the National Association of Black Journalists sent a delegation from its convention in Las Vegas. Father Matthews said Bailey, who was African-American, was a well-loved member of the community, and said it was a “very uplifting ceremony.” Bailey, 57, was editor of the Oakland Post weekly newspaper. He was shot and killed the morning of Aug. 2 while walking to work.

“This guy may have saved my life,” my good friend Lt. Col. Robert Dalton said to me as he sat down in my kitchen and placed a book in front of me recently. “What guy?” I asked. “That guy,” replied Bob, a retired member of the United States Marine Corps and Davidsonville resident, as he then tapped his index finger on the book cover.

A bust of the first Catholic Chief Justice of the United States may get booted from its prominent perch in front of Frederick’s City Hall if a group of civil rights activists gets its way. Pointing to Chief Justice Roger Taney’s role in writing the controversial Dred Scott v. Sanford decision that declared blacks to be non-citizens, members of the Frederick chapter of the NAACP are calling on city leaders to take down the bust.