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Priests & Leadership of Archdiocese of Anchorage Advance Strategic Planning Process
On Thursday this past week, our strategic planning process received some renewed energy. After Listening Sessions held around the Archdiocese last spring, the Leadership Team (Department Heads of Archdiocesan Staff) spent several months studying and summarizing the results and developed from them the Mission, Vision, Values and a set of Priorities. These were shared with the priests of the Archdiocese on Thursday. Early in his pontificate, Pope Francis issued an Apostolic Exhortation, The Joy of the Gospel in which he lays out his basic vision for advancing the mission of the Church today. In brief points, these are the […]
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Mass Celebrating Consecrated Life 5:30 PM Saturday At Our Lady Of Guadalupe Co-Cathedral – Anchorage
This Saturday evening, February 2 the Archdiocese of Anchorage will celebrate a Mass in honor of the consecrated men and women religious serving in the Archdiocese. Please come help us in honor these men and women at Our Lady of Guadalupe Co-Cathedral at the 5:30 PM Mass. Many different Congregations of Religious Orders have served the people of the Archdiocese in various capacities and ministries throughout our history. It will be a privilege to honor them at Mass on Saturday evening. Please come join us. Peace, +pde
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Catholic Schools Are Such A Blessing
Each January we highlight and celebrate the great work and ministry of Catholic Schools. We are blessed in the Archdiocese of Anchorage to have four Catholic Schools within the Archdiocesan system: Lumen Christi (7th– 12thGrades) in Anchorage, Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton (Pre-K – 6thGrade), Our Lady of the Valley (Pre-K – 8thGrade) in Wasilla and St. Mary’sin Kodiak (Pre-K – 8thGrade). There is also one independent Catholic School, Holy Rosary. I’m very grateful to all of our school principals, teachers, volunteers, families, parishes and donors who keep this wonderful ministry of Catholic education alive and well here in the Archdiocese of Anchorage. This […]
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USCCB Retreat
Just a few days ago, our USCCB Retreat concluded. We gathered at the request of Pope Francis, and enjoyed the direction and wisdom of the Preacher of the Papal Household, Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, OFM. With nearly 280 bishops registered, which is a similar number of those who are present for our plenary assemblies, we experienced a unique opportunity over the course of six days to pray together. While Bishops gather regularly for retreats on a Regional basis, this year’s retreat was a rare gathering of the entire body of bishops from the United States. As […]
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Gospel Joy: Following & Pointing To Christ
This Third Sunday of Advent is traditionally known as Guadete Sunday. As we progress in the Advent season, we are to rejoice at the approach of our Savior. Today’s readings focus our attention on John the Baptist, who pointed the way to Christ, and serves as a model of how we are to discover the Gospel Joy of doing the same. Last Sunday we heard that “the word of God came to John.” (Luke 3: 2) This ‘encounter’ for the Baptist became the defining moment of his life. I reflected last week that even for […]
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Comfort, Give Comfort To My People
On Tuesday this week I had the pleasure of visiting one of our assisted living facilities to have Mass with the residents and staff. After Mass, I also was able to celebrate the Sacrament of Anointing the Sick with many of the people who were present. Such moments never fail to move me at a profound level. A scripture passage from the Advent season kept coming to mind: Comfort, give comfort to my people. This is exactly what Christ brings into the world – the abiding presence and comfort of our God. I love these […]
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On The Feast Of St. Nicholas; A Gift Of Prayer & Solidarity
Last Friday morning, within 30 minutes of the 7.0 earthquake that struck the Anchorage area, I received a phone call from the Apostolic Nuncio to the United States, Archbishop Christophe Pierre. He was concerned of the report he heard, and wanted to know how the people of the Archdiocese were doing after the earthquake. Yesterday I sent the Archbishop a brief report of our condition and of the damage assessments. Today, I received the following message of prayer and support. While we continue to experience strong aftershocks and put our homes, businesses, parishes, and lives […]
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Advent: A Time To Increase And Abound In Love For One Another
Spending time with today’s Mass readings, prayers, and scripture from the Liturgy of Hours drives home a strong invitation from this Advent season: conversion of life to the LORD. What stands out most is the call to grow in good deeds to others. Spend some time praying and reflecting on the Opening Prayer for Mass on this First Sunday of Advent: Grant your faithful, we pray, almighty God, the resolve to run forth to meet your Christ with righteous deeds at his coming, so that, gathered at his right hand, they may be worthy to […]
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ADVENT: The LORD Comes
In some ways, our earthquake, ‘end of times’ experience yesterday, and the aftershocks through the night, were too graphic of an ‘ending’ to this liturgical year. Though it felt somewhat ‘like the end’ several times yesterday, here is a reflection to begin the new liturgical year and Advent. May this ‘new year’ hold much grace for you, your family, for our Church and world! Over the course of my childhood, our home was a bee hive of activity during Advent. The center piece during that liturgical season was the Advent Wreath, and I remember vividly […]
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7.0 Earthquake Today In Anchorage
Dear friends, thanks for all the prayers and offers of assistance today. At 8:29 this morning, a 7.0 earthquake struck 7 miles north of Anchorage, 25 miles below the earth’s surface. It went on for quite some time. I’m happy to report that for such a strong earthquake, we have yet to hear of any serious personal harm, and early reports reveal limited damage to our church structures. On the feast of St. Andrew, the one church to suffer some structure damage is St. Andrew in Eagle River. Also, a house at St. Patrick’s parish […]
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Welcome
Welcome to the latest Catholic blog, Truth in Love. It seems only fitting that today, the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, should mark the inauguration of this site. As many who have followed my family’s story already know, the pilgrimage sight of Lourdes, and my own mother’s devotion to the Blessed Mother played a significant role in the life of each of my siblings. (link to story from Criterion) Years ago, when my mother visited Lourdes as a young woman praying about her own future and vocation, she sought the Blessed Mother’s intercession. As […]
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Ash Wednesday
Sorry this is a little late, but wanted to share this thought with you before we get too deep into the Lenten Season. Today we begin the 40 days of fasting, prayer, and giving alms in preparation for the great celebration of Easter. Hopefully, we have all made our Lenten resolutions of giving something up, or taking on some extra practice of virtue. Surely, we will all follow the Church’s guidelines of fasting and abstaining at the appropriate times (http://www.usccb.org/lent/fast.shtml). But at the heart of all these good works, do we understand the reason, the […]
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Infinite Presence
At times, we can become overwhelmed by the realities of our day, the demands of our walk of life. In such moments, we can lose sleep, or be tempted to the “usual, sinful habits” as a means of “release” or escape. But we all know that these responses never really work, but only add to the sense of tension, and now add to it the reality of sin, which often leads to a sense of shame and low self-esteem. As our Lenten journey continues, the more we take our call to conversion seriously, we can also […]
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Holy Families
When I was a kid growing up, I loved visiting my grandparents homes, both Grandma & Grandpa Etienne, and Grandma & Grandpa Voges. The Etienne’s were a small family. Dad had only one sister growing up, having lost a sister at a young age. The Voges’ on the other hand were a family of nine children. Each family had deep roots in the Catholic Faith. In fact, my parents, and my grandparents, and probably their parents were all from Perry County, and never lived anywhere other than Perry County, Indiana. So, family roots ran deep; […]
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Friendship
This past week I had my first visitors to Cheyenne. Two college seminary friends who are now priests, Fr. Marvin Enneking of the St. Cloud Diocese, and Fr. Mark McCormick of Rapid City came to see how the new bishop is getting along. Their visit reminded me of the precious gift of friendship. It makes me appreciate the role friendship plays in helping us understand the relationship Christ seeks to have with each of us. When I was a student in Rome, there was an Italian preist who worked in the Congregation For […]