Saginaw, Mich., Oct 29, 2018 / 06:00 pm (CNA).- Bishop Joseph Cistone of the Diocese of Saginaw, Michigan planned one final diocesan event before succumbing to lung cancer in October: forty hours of continuous Eucharistic adoration to pray for the suffering of the Church, against a backdrop of country-wide revelations of sexual abuse.
After Cistone’s death, members of the diocese are participating in the forty hours of adoration, and are praying not only for the Church, but also for the late bishop’s soul.
Bishop Cistone died Oct. 16 after announcing in February that he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. He said at that time that he would undergo a treatment plan involving both chemotherapy and radiation. On Oct. 1 the diocese announced that the cancer had spread to other parts of Cistone's body, and that he had begun an aggressive course of chemotherapy.
His funeral was held Oct. 23 at Saginaw's Cathedral of Mary of the Assumption.
The forty hours of adoration began Oct. 28 with Mass at that same cathedral at 10 a.m, followed by a procession through the Cathedral to begin adoration. The adoration is scheduled to end after 7 p.m. vespers prayer on Tuesday Oct. 30.
Sister Esther Mary Nickel of the Religious Sisters of Mercy told CNA that the prayer intentions for the forty hours of adoration are for the diocese of Saginaw, the suffering of the Church, and for the repose of the Bishop Cistone’s soul.
Sister Nickel said on the first night of adoration, men from the local chapter of the Knights of Columbus volunteered to stand guard at the door all night.
"I was so surprised that people came through the night," Sister Nickel said.”I must say we're having a wonderful turnout. I'm grateful.”
Sister Nickel said that Catholics in the Saginaw diocese had been experiencing various hardships lately, in addition to the bishop’s death. Police raided the bishop’s home in March, as well as the diocesan chancery and its cathedral rectory, as part of an ongoing investigation into sex abuse allegations against several diocesan priests. Two priests have been placed on leave from their duties after a recent wave of accusations of sexual abuse against priests in the diocese.
The practice of forty hours of adoration draws its roots back to Rome over 500 years ago, begun by St. Philip Neri. Sister Nickel said the forty hours devotion was “near and dear” to Cistone's heart, and this event was the last one he approved for the liturgy office before his death. She said Bishop Cistone had a great devotion to St. John Neumann, a great proponent of the practice in the United States, who started the practice at his parish in Philadelphia in 1840.
Sister Nickel said Cistone brought this tradition back from Philadelphia to Saginaw with him, as well as his desire that his priests in particular would cultivate a devotion to the blessed sacrament.
Martha Arvizu, a lifelong Saginaw resident and a parishioner of the diocese since the ninth grade, told CNA it can sometimes be difficult for her to quiet her mind from the noise of daily life. She and her 91-year-old mother, who Arvizu said always wants to be there with her daughter despite being hard of hearing, attended the adoration service Sunday night.
"It's wonderful to come and be in the silence and get in the presence of our Lord," Arvizu said. "He's very forgiving and He walks with us.”
Arvizu said despite the difficult circumstances present in the Saginaw diocese and elsewhere in the Church, she plans to continue to practice her faith.
"I think if you lose your faith, you're nowhere," she reflected. "If you have your faith, and you believe in your faith, nothing can deter you. [God's] there to help us along, and what our destiny is, he's the only one that knows…I think our faith will get us through anything."
She said although there is at least one parish in the diocese that offers perpetual adoration, it was nice to be able to stay in adoration as long as they wanted under the protection of the Knights.
"We probably should do it more often, as long as we have preparation," "This was very well planned, they let everyone know that they were going to do this. I think it's a positive thing, and even those who have been going that don't come all the time find it enriching…[Adoration’s] something we all need, especially at this time, with the loss of our bishop.”
If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!
Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.
Washington D.C., Nov 10, 2017 / 05:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Proposed tax legislation under consideration in Congress needs many changes to avoid further harming the poor, the U.S. bishops have said.
“Doubling the standard deduction will help some… […]
A sign welcoming patients from East Texas is displayed in the waiting area of the Women’s Reproductive Clinic, which provides legal medication abortion services, in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, on June 15, 2022. / Credit: ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 11, 2023 / 18:15 pm (CNA).
A woman who sued Texas state officials so she could obtain an abortion has decided to get an abortion in a different state after the state Supreme Court blocked a lower court ruling that could have granted her an abortion.
“Kate [Cox’s] case has shown the world that abortion bans are dangerous for pregnant people and exceptions don’t work,” Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, which is representing her in the lawsuit, said in a statement.
“She desperately wanted to be able to get care where she lives and recover at home surrounded by family,” Northup said. “While Kate had the ability to leave the state, most people do not, and a situation like this could be a death sentence.”
The Texas Supreme Court intervened in the litigation on Dec. 8 after Travis County District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble issued a temporary order that would have restricted state officials from enforcing Texas abortion laws against hospitals and doctors who would have performed the abortion for the woman.
Gamble’s Dec. 7 order came amid the preborn child’s diagnosis of trisomy 18. Only about 5%-10% of babies born with this condition will live past their first birthday. Her order also claims the woman’s doctor determined that she could suffer long-term health complications, such as future fertility problems, if she continued the pregnancy.
The Supreme Court’s intervention restored the state’s ability to enforce its laws but did not put an end to the litigation, noting that the ruling is “without regard to the merits” of the case and it allows the case to proceed. The pro-abortion group will continue the litigation “because the issues in this case are capable of repetition,” they said in a Dec. 11 court filing.
The litigation is scheduled for a hearing on Dec. 20 in the Travis County District Court.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has accused Gamble of being an “activist judge” and has argued that the ruling failed to show any “reasonable medical judgment and a life-threatening physical condition” and did not meet “the legal standard” for a permissible abortion under Texas law.
State law prohibits abortions in most circumstances, with an exception when the life of the mother is at risk or she could face serious problems with her physical health.
The exterior of the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center at Kansas State University. / Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
CNA Staff, Oct 2, 2023 / 17:15 pm (CNA).
There’s a quote from Jerome Tang, head coach of the Kansas State University (KSU) basketball team, that Father Gale Hammerschmidt likes.
“I didn’t come to rebuild. I came to elevate,” Tang said after taking the team’s helm last year. (His team bowed out of the NCAA Tournament last spring after making it to the Elite Eight.)
Hammerschmidt, chaplain at St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center at Kansas State, said he thinks “elevation” is an appropriate word for what the Catholic community he leads is doing right now. On Jan. 28, the local bishop dedicated the Catholic center’s brand-new, $20 million church — a project more than two decades in the making.
But now that the new church is open, the real work of bringing the Catholic faith to students on campus can continue. The grand new church presents an opportunity to “elevate everything we do here at St. Isidore’s,” Hammerschmidt told CNA.
“We know that the work is just now beginning. And if we’re going to create a beautiful space, we want to be able to do beautiful things in the space. And nothing is more beautiful than a soul encountering the living God,” the priest told CNA.
Hammerschmidt, a Kansas native and 1995 Kansas State alum, was ordained to the priesthood in 2012 and was assigned to St. Isidore’s in 2017. The Catholic center sits just across the street from the Kansas State campus, which is itself the lifeblood of the small city of Manhattan. There had been discussions about the need for a new church building for several years before he arrived.
“I already knew that there was a need to build a new church. This is something that had been talked about for probably 20 years, honestly, even since right around the time that I was graduating from college,” Hammerschmidt told CNA.
Father Gale Hammerschmidt. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Part of the reason was that the population served by St. Isidore’s had outgrown the old space, which sat about 400 and was regularly filled to bursting on Sundays with overflow seating in the student center library.
Grace Gorges, a K-State student studying graphic design, got involved with the Catholic community at the college as soon as she arrived at KSU. From the get-go, “the Masses were always crowded, always overflowing,” she said, adding that the fallout from COVID made things even worse when parts of the sanctuary had to be roped off for distancing purposes.
The campaign to raise money for a new church was dubbed “Home Away from Home.” About $5 million had already been raised before Hammerschmidt’s arrival, and the campaign ultimately raised nearly $20 million for the project, he said. Some 1,500 individual donors contributed to the campaign.
Nebraska-based lead architect Kevin Clark came to Manhattan in 2017 and began asking the community what they wanted their new church to look like. Countless students requested a beautiful interior, “traditional-looking in nature,” the priest said.
“We want this to look like a church that has been standing forever and will stand forever,” he recalled students telling him.
“We wanted to make sure that it was an epic-looking building” with an interior that would raise hearts and minds “to the beauties of heaven,” he said.
The congregation kneels during the dedication Mass for the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center at Kansas State University. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Given her involvement in the community and her interest in beauty and design, Hammerschmidt asked Gorges to serve on the building committee, which meant she would have a say in the church’s aesthetic. Gorges said she was invited to help design the church’s tile flooring. She researched churches online for inspiration and also drew from her personal experience of visiting numerous beautiful sacred spaces on a trip to Italy.
Ridge Pinkston, a fifth-year senior when CNA spoke with him, studying medieval history, was also chosen to be on the building committee. He told CNA that the committee — which included Hammerschmidt, diocesan board member Doug Hinkin, and others — was given almost complete control over the look of the new church.
He said the committee had numerous meetings with the architect to figure out the look of everything in the new church — they spent an entire two-hour meeting designing the look of the altar, for example. He said the building committee “represented the body of owners” to the architect and designers, similar to how when a family builds a house, the architects and contractors consult them on how they want it to look. He said it was a “huge privilege” and a great learning process to be a part of the committee as a student.
Despite his interest in medieval architecture, the churches that Pinkston primarily drew inspiration from were mainly stateside; most are located in the Archdiocese of Denver. They included the medieval revival-style chapel at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary and the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception and Holy Ghost Catholic Church, both in downtown Denver.
Ultimately, the architects and designers of St. Isidore’s produced a neo-Gothic interior with pointed arches that dropped many a jaw when it was unveiled. The interior also features numerous instances of vine imagery — an image of Jesus himself, but also a subtle nod to the college’s agricultural heritage. Evergreene Architectural Arts, a renowned design studio in New York, provided the decoration, Hammerschmidt said.
Not everything in the interior is entirely new, however. Hammerschmidt said at the request of students, stained-glass windows depicting the seven patron saints of the seven original colleges at Kansas State (the university was originally Methodist-founded) were saved and incorporated into the new church. Among those saints are the church’s namesake, St. Isidore — an 11th-century Spaniard and patron saint of agricultural workers — as well as the namesake of the student center, St. Robert Bellarmine. A much-loved crucifix that hung over the tabernacle in the old church was also used again in the new church.
The crucifix in the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Gorges said she loves the triumphal arch over the altar in the finished church, which draws one’s eyes toward the focal point of the crucifix, and onward to heaven. A beautiful church, she said, is “not the end-all-be-all by any means. But if it’s at all possible, beauty matters. And we should be trying to live that in our daily lives.”
Pinkston said his favorite design element in the new church, apart from the ceiling of the apse, is the new altar itself, which he said really strikes him as being designed in a way that calls to mind a place where sacrifices are made.
“Rightfully, that should be one of the most beautiful features,” he said of the altar.
The designers also took care to design the exterior of the church to match the native limestone buildings of Kansas State, in an effort to make the church an integral part of the campus it serves.
Bishop Gerald Vincke of Salina, Kansas, dedicated the diocese’s newest church on Jan. 28. The 14,000-square-foot structure can accommodate about 700 for Sunday Masses.
Bishop Gerald Vincke of Salina, Kansas, sprinkles holy water during the dedication of the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center on Jan. 28, 2023. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Hammerschmidt said daily Masses at St. Isidore’s were already attracting nearly 200 students on a regular basis. A key part of the Catholic center’s success, he said, is the presence of missionaries from the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS). FOCUS maintains a presence on college campuses with the goal of winning people to the Catholic faith through authentic friendships and forming others to go out and do the same through Bible studies, small groups, and retreats.
“We also work closely with the high schools in the state of Kansas, especially the Catholic high schools. And we have many strong Catholic high schools in our area. And so we just have students who, the first day they show up in Manhattan, they already know about us,” Hammerschmidt said.
In addition, he said, the Catholic center is in cooperation with the local Diocese of Salina and the nearby Diocese of Wichita, whereby Wichita — which has been blessed in recent years with large vocation numbers — sends a priest to serve as Hammerschmidt’s associate. Large numbers of students come to KSU from Wichita — Gorges among them — who get involved with the Catholic center thanks to strong word of mouth.
“It’s good for them to have one of their own priests looking after them … I think it’s working phenomenally well.”
Stained-glass windows in the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center. Credit: Jacob Bentzinger
Working at St. Isidore’s, Pinkston said he has gotten to know “the regulars” that came to the church before the rebuild, but now with the new church, he said he sees many more people coming in to pray whom he has never seen before. He also said it was inspirational for him to see a friend — a man who is joining the Catholic Church this Easter — weeping openly when he first saw the new church’s interior.
“That was really the first time I’d ever seen him express emotion … That’s definitely a huge blessing to be able to see that happening,” he said.
Hammerschmidt was almost overwhelmed by the support of the many students, alumni, and others who made the new church possible. Months on from the chapel’s opening, the 9:09 p.m. daily Mass is always well attended, with about 300 students attending regularly. As of September, St. Isidore’s has 40 student-led Bible studies with around 400 Bible study participants.
“The outpouring of joy and gratitude has been incredible. The number of people who we will just see walking through the church from out of town is unbelievable,” Hammerschmidt said.
“And then beyond that, we had so many more hundreds of people praying for the project, and we just have been supported unbelievably well.”
Hammerschmidt said he wants the students and community of Kansas State to take ownership of the magnificent new church and to use it for their spiritual benefit.
“We want to let everybody in Manhattan and on K-State’s campus know that we built this church for them,” he said.
“If they just need a place of encounter with God to just come in to be seated, to be immersed in the beauty and the silence and to just let God speak. That’s our hope. For the Catholics, for the non-Catholics, for the students, for nonstudents, just for anyone who needs a place to encounter the living God, this would be the place for them.”
Light from the stained glass in the new St. Isidore’s Catholic Student Center. Jacob Bentzinger
Leave a Reply