St. Anthony of Padua relics to visit Kansas City — and one will stay

Jonah McKeown   By Jonah McKeown for CNA

October 7, 2022 Catholic News Agency News Briefs 0 Print

 

Saint Anthony of Padua, by El Greco (c. 1580). / null

Denver Newsroom, Oct 7, 2022 / 14:00 pm (CNA).

Several parishes in Kansas City, Missouri, are set to host traveling relics of St. Anthony of Padua this weekend — and one of the parishes will get the privilege of keeping one of the relics of the famed Franciscan.

St. Anthony Parish in the Scarritt Renaissance neighborhood of Kansas City is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year. Father Andres Moreno, the church’s pastor, told CNA that several months ago he asked the Basilica of St. Anthony in Padua, Italy, if their parish community could keep one of St. Anthony’s relics in honor of their anniversary, and the basilica agreed.

Father Mario Conte, OFM Conv., who is bringing the relics from Padua to Kansas City, told CNA that this is his first trip abroad with St. Anthony’s relics post-COVID. Conte is one of the 50 friars who minister in the Basilica of St. Anthony in Padua and the editor of the English edition of The Messenger of St. Anthony magazine. Before COVID, Conte traveled all over the world with St. Anthony’s relics in order to deepen devotion to the saint.

St. Anthony, who is known by many Catholics as the patron saint of lost things, was a 13th-century Franciscan and an associate of St. Francis of Assisi. He is today honored as a doctor of the Church.

Conte said that at each of three parishes in Kansas City, he will celebrate and preach two Masses, one in English and one in Spanish, with a time for veneration of the relic in between.

“When you have the chance to touch and connect through a relic, it’s like giving, in a certain way, your hand to St. Anthony. You feel closer to him,” Conte told CNA.

“People know that when they touch a relic, it’s just bones. But I think that they also realize a connection with a dear friend, who is in the Communion of Saints, and so is very close to God.”

The Catholic Church has a long tradition of giving honor to relics — objects that have a direct association with the saints or with Christ himself. First-class relics are parts of a saint’s body, such as flesh, blood, hair, or teeth; second-class relics are items or fragments of items owned by a saint; and third-class relics are those items that a saint touched or that have been touched to a first-, second-, or other third-class relic. Relics are not worshipped but are given honor — “venerated” — because of the saint’s love of and closeness to God. Those praying with relics often ask for that saint’s intercession.

Conte said the relic he is bringing that will return to Padua consists of several layers of skin from the saint, inside a glass lamp held by a small golden statue of St. Anthony. The relic that the basilica is donating to St. Anthony parish is Ex Massa Corporis (from the body mass) — a piece of the saint’s flesh, but not an identifiable piece of the body.

The relics Conte is bringing will be on display and available for veneration at Holy Cross Parish from noon to 6 p.m. Central time on Oct. 7, with an English Mass celebrated at noon and a Spanish Mass at 6 p.m. On Oct. 8, the relics will be at Our Lady of Peace parish with an identical Mass schedule. Finally, on Sunday, Oct. 9, the relics will come to St. Anthony Parish, with English Masses celebrated at 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. and Spanish Masses at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., and veneration between 9 a.m. and the end of the 6 p.m. Mass.

Both of the relics coming to Kansas City were taken from the saint’s remains after his tomb was opened for a second time, in 1981. The only other time St. Anthony’s tomb was opened was in 1263, just a few decades after his death. At that time several relics were taken, including his tongue and jaw, both of which are still venerated in Padua.

Born in Lisbon, Portugal, in 1195, St. Anthony moved to Padua, Italy, after joining the Franciscan order. Anthony is known not only for his eloquent preaching and frequent rebukes of heretics but also for his loving care for the poor he encountered.

In 1224, St. Francis of Assisi gave Anthony permission to teach theology in the Franciscan order, which he did in several French and Italian cities while strictly following his Franciscan vows and preaching regularly to the people. Later, he dedicated himself entirely to the work of preaching as a missionary in France, Italy, and Spain, teaching an authentic love for God to many people who had fallen away from Catholic faith and morality.

Beyond his God-given gift for preaching, Conte noted that Anthony had a great love for the poor and the marginalized and did all he could to help them. For this and other reasons, St. Anthony is a great example and a powerful intercessor for Catholics, he said.

“Through all his life, Anthony did all he could to help people … fighting for those who needed his help,” he noted.

St. Anthony’s feast day is celebrated June 13. In 2015, Pope Francis declared the Shrine of St. Anthony in Padua a minor basilica.

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‘Our country should be better than this’ says DiNardo after synagogue attack

April 29, 2019 CNA Daily News 0

Washington D.C., Apr 29, 2019 / 10:30 am (CNA).- The president of the U.S. Bishops’ Conference has condemned the shooting at a synagogue near San Diego on April 27, and offered prayers for those affected.

“I, along with my brother bishops, am greatly saddened and deeply concerned over the news that another house of worship has been subjected to violence,” said USCCB President Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston.

“Our country should be better than this,” DiNardo said in a statement released April 28.

“Our world should be beyond such acts of hatred and anti-Semitism. This attack joins an all too long list of attacks against innocent people, people of all faiths, who only want to gather and to pray,” he said.

Saturday’s shooting at Chabad of Poway Synagogue in Poway, California, killed one and injured three others. The shooter has been arrested and charged with murder. This is the second deadly shooting at a synagogue in six months. The shooter, John Earnest, wrote and published an anti-Semitic manifesto prior to the attack.

Earnest has also claimed responsibility for a March arson attack on a mosque in Escondido, California.

San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy also expressed his closeness to the local Jewish communittee.

“Our hearts go out to everyone at Chabad House Poway for the senseless violence that took place earlier today. Houses of worship should be places of peace. Know that the entire Catholic Community of San Diego and Imperial Counties is keeping you in our prayers,” McElroy said in a statement.

The bishop asked that all the parishes of the diocese offer a special prayer for the victims of anti-Semitism at Sunday Mass, and circulated a draft for inclusion in the prayers of the faithful. 

“For the victims of the Chabad shootings and their families; for the Jewish community, our elder brothers in faith, who are once again subjected to the evil of anti-Semitic hatred and violence, this time in our own diocese; and for our world, so consumed by anger and division, that we might understand that the gift of peace you give in today’s Gospel is a command for us to love every man and woman in the human family; we pray to the Lord.”

Cardinal DiNardo said that violence in the name of religion or or committed against people of faith was was always and everwhere intollerable.

“Unfortunately,” he said, “both in the past and today, too many preach such hatred in the name of God. This cannot be abided; it must end.”

The cardinal’s statement echoes last month’s message from Pope Francis condemning anti-Semitism. In March, speaking to representatives from the American Jewish Committee, said that for Christians, anti-Semitism is “a rejection of one’s own origins” and a “complete contradition.”

At the March audience, Pope Francis referred to interfaith dialogue as an “important tool” in increasing understanding between Judaism and Christianity, and stressed the importance of forming new generation of young people who are committed to interreligious dialogue.

Citing the “rich spiritual heritage” shared by Christians and Jews, the pope said that members of both faiths should seek each other out during this time of “depersonalizing secularism” in the Western world.

The shooting follows the devastating attack on a Pittsburgh synagogue last year.

On Oct. 27, 48-year-old Robert Bowers entered Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Synagogue equipped with an assault rifle and three handguns. Shouting anti-Semitic slogans, Bowers killed eight men and three women. He also injured six others, including four policemen. After a shootout with Pittsburgh Police and SWAT, Bowers was wounded and eventually surrendered.

Following that attack, several Pennsylvania bishops issued round condemnations of the rising tide of anti-Semitism.

Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia said that “Religious and ethnic hatred is vile in any form, but the ugly record of the last century is a lesson in the special evil of anti-Semitism. It has no place in America, and especially in the hearts of Christians.”

Scranton’s Bishop Joseph Bambera, who is the head of the Committee for Ecumenism and Interreligious Affairs at the USCCB, issued a statement on Sunday, claiming the act of violence to be cowardly.

“Anti-Semitism is to be condemned and has to be confronted by our nation. The Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops stands with our Jewish brothers and sisters during this time of great distress. May God grant peace to the dead, healing to the injured, and comfort to the families of those hurt and killed and to all the Jewish Community.”

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