Home Page

OTTAWA – Tony Vella, the great-nephew of Father George Preca, said he hopes the charismatic Maltese priest’s life and virtues will be remembered long after his June 3 canonization. Vella called his mother’s uncle, whom he knows as “Dun Gorg,” a “pioneer of the lay apostolate.” Vella, 64, of Kingston, Ontario, served Blessed Preca as an altar boy in his native town of Hamrun, Malta, and “used to see him pretty well every day,” Vella said in a May telephone interview from Kingston. When Blessed Preca began his ministry, Malta, an island nation off the coast of Italy, was largely illiterate. Although Malta is Catholic, the faith there was mingled with superstition. As a deacon, Blessed Preca started “religious discussions” with sailors in the Grand Harbor area and began building relationships with local youths.

ROME – U.S. President George W. Bush has been invited to visit the Sant’Egidio Community, a Catholic lay community known for leading high-profile peace negotiations as well as being active in the fight against the death penalty and HIV/AIDS. The White House received the invitation but as of May 23 still had to decide if the president would visit with the community’s leaders, sources in Rome told Catholic News Service. Bush is scheduled to be in Rome June 8-9. Sant’Egidio spokesman Mario Marazziti told CNS that until the president’s schedule was finalized there was no comment on the proposed visit.

VATICAN CITY – Vatican and Israeli representatives said they finally have a concrete plan for reaching an agreement on financial and juridical issues related to Catholic institutions in Israel. “The talks took place in an atmosphere of great cordiality, mutual understanding and good will, and produced important progress and hope for yet further advances in the coming months,” said a joint statement issued after the representatives met May 21 at the Vatican. The meeting marked the first time in five years that the full membership of the bilateral permanent working commission met to discuss the issues related to church property, taxation and the legal rights of church institutions in Israel.

APARECIDA, Brazil – More than halfway through a major meeting in which bishops from Latin America and the Caribbean are hammering out pastoral priorities, the “great continental mission” that several bishops predicted would emerge has not been a priority. “We haven’t discussed it, so we don’t know what it will be like or if it will be done. We haven’t addressed it yet,” said Archbishop Joao Braz de Aviz of Brasilia, Brazil. Instead, as the bishops met in small groups or subcommissions on different topics May 22 and 23, several issues discussed since the meeting began May 13 were missing from the outline on which their discussions were based. The outline, which will also serve as a framework for a document that will guide pastoral work in the region for the next 10 to 15 years, contains 16 topics grouped under seven major themes.

When the second collection basket is passed to parishioners around the Archdiocese of Baltimore June 2 and 3, their donations will be given to evangelization programs nationwide in the black, Native American, Eskimo and Aleut communities. The Black and Native American Missions collection has been conducted throughout the United States since 1884, with proceeds distributed as grants to dioceses supporting and strengthening evangelization programs that would otherwise be in danger of disappearing, according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. The idea is to bring existing Catholics in those groups back to the faith and to encourage others to examine the dogma and consider converting to Catholicism, said Therese Wilson Favors, director of the office of African American Ministries for the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Northwood resident Barbara Williams discovered it was possible for a 74-year-old black woman to become a college graduate when she received her bachelor’s degree May 20, and now she wants to inform the youth of her race the only obstacle in their way of educational achievement is complacency. Armed with a hard-earned diploma from Morgan State University, the St. Francis Xavier, Baltimore, parishioner wants an opportunity to speak with black students in the Baltimore public and Catholic schools to urge them to take advantage of educational opportunities and not to squander their prospects.

MILWAUKEE – Marquette University is receiving $51 million from an alumni couple to help build a new law school facility. A university news release described it as “the largest gift ever made by individuals to a Wisconsin college or university” as well as one of the largest gifts ever given to any U.S. law school. Raymond A. and Kathryn A. Eckstein of Cassville, Wis., and Boca Raton, Fla., said they made the gift as an “expression of gratitude” to the university. Raymond Eckstein, a retired transportation entrepreneur, is a 1949 graduate of the law school. His wife received her bachelor’s degree in speech from Marquette that year.