Saginaw Pilgrims Blog will keep tabs on area travelers to World Youth Day

Keep up-to-date with 70 pilgrims from the Catholic Diocese of Saginaw on the Web at http://www.saginawpilgrims.blogspot.com/. They are traveling to the 2008 World Youth Day celebration in Syndey, Austrailia

The youth and young adults will update the site live from Down Under to share their experiences of faith as they ecounter the global community of the worldwide Church.

The group will leave Michigan on July 7 to participate in two weeks of WYD events that will culminate July 20 with Mass celebrated by Pope Benedict XVI.

To learn more about WYD 2008 in Sydney, log onto http://www.wyd2008.org/.

U.S. Bishop's launch Pauline Year Website

WASHINGTON, D.C. - In time for the Year of St. Paul, beginning June 28, the Secretariat of Divine Worship of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has launched a website dedicated to the Pauline year honoring the 2000th anniversary of the birth of St. Paul.

The site is designed to provide resources and related materials to those interested in participating in and learning more about the year-long celebration.

The website contains links to dates and events for liturgical observances that will mark celebrations throughout the year. Several links connect directly to the Vatican website to provide access to documents, for example, which explain related plenary indulgences granted by Pope Benedict XVI and homilies he has delivered in anticipation of the Year of St. Paul; others explain guidelines for Votive Masses and provide readings and prayers for participants’ use in Holy Hour observances honoring St. Paul.

Monsignor Anthony Sherman, executive director of the USCCB’s Secretariat of Divine Worship explained that growing interest among Catholics since Pope Benedict announced the Pauline Year a year ago has spurred the need for the website and greater access to information about the observance.

"Many dioceses have asked for resources for the Pauline Year and, through this website, we hope to provide practical and easy-to-use resources," Monsignor Sherman said. This includes a Spanish language version of the site, according to Monsignor Sherman, that should be ready over the next couple of weeks.

Pope Benedict announced the special observance in honor of St. Paul on June 28, 2007 at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside-the-Walls while celebrating First Vespers of the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul.

The Secretariat’s Pauline Year website resources are available at www.usccb.org/liturgy.

July newsletter now available online

The Catholic Diocese of Saginaw Monthly Newsletter for July 2008 is now available online.. Click here to sign up to have the newsletter sent each month to your e-mail.

Dublin is site of 50th International Eucharistic Congress in 2012

VATICAN CITY, (VIS) - Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday announced that the next International Eucharistic Congress will take place in 2012 in Dublin, capital of Ireland.

The Pope made the announcement during his homily, transmitted by satellite from the Vatican to thousands of faithful gathered on the Plains of Abraham in Quebec, for the closing Mass of the 49th International Eucharistic Congress, held in that Canadian city from 15 to 22 June. The Eucharistic celebration was presided by Cardinal Jozef Tomko, pontifical legate and president emeritus of the Pontifical Committee for International Eucharistic Congresses.

Commenting on the theme of the congress - "The Eucharist: gift of God for the life of the world" - the Holy Father said: "The Eucharist is our most precious treasure. ... It is the Sacrament par excellence ... It contains all the mystery of our salvation, it is the source and the summit of the
activity and the life of the Church."

"It is, then," he continued, "particularly important that pastors and faithful should always seek a more profound understanding of this great Sacrament. Each will thus be able to strengthen his faith and better achieve his mission in the Church and in the world, recalling the fecundity of the Eucharist for his personal life, and for the life of the Church and the world."

"Participation in the Eucharist", said Pope Benedict, "does not distance us from our fellow man; quite the contrary, being the most exalted expression of God's love, it calls us to commit ourselves alongside our brothers and sisters to facing the challenges of the present and to making the planet a pleasant place to live. To this end, we must struggle tirelessly so that all people may be respected from conception to natural death, that our rich societies may welcome the poorest and restore their dignity, that everyone may feed themselves and their family, and that peace and justice may shine out on all continents."

The Pope, who had been speaking French, then pronounced a few words in English: "I sincerely hope that this Congress will serve as an appeal to all the faithful to make a similar commitment to a renewal of Eucharistic catechesis, so that they themselves will gain a genuine Eucharistic awareness and will in turn teach children and young people to recognise the central mystery of faith and build their lives around it."

Read the entire Vatican Information Service story here.

Who fears God is never afraid

VATICAN CITY, (VIS) - On Sunday, Pope Benedict XVI appeared at the window of his study to pray the Angelus with pilgrims gathered in St. Peter's Square.

"In today's Gospel," he said, "we find two invitations from Jesus: on the one hand, 'to have no fear' of men, and on the other 'to fear' God. Thus we are stimulated to reflect on the difference that exists between human fears and fear of God. Fear is a natural aspect of life. From childhood we experience forms of fear that then reveal themselves as imaginary and disappear; later other fears emerge which have specific roots in reality, these must be faced and overcome with human commitment and trust in God.

"But," the Pope added, "there exists - and above all today - a deeper form of fear, an existential fear, which sometimes spills over into anguish. It is born of a sense of emptiness, associated with a certain culture that is permeated with widespread theoretical and practical nihilism. Faced with the broad ... panorama of human fears, the Word of God is clear: those who 'fear' God 'are not afraid.' Fear of God, which Scripture defines as 'the beginning of true hope,' means to have faith in Him, and sacred respect for His authority over life and over the world."

"Those who fear God are serene even amidst the storms because God, as Jesus revealed to us, is a Father full of mercy and goodness. Those who love Him are not afraid. ... Believers, then, are afraid of nothing, because they know they are in the hands of God, they know that evil and the irrational will not have the last word, but that the one Lord of the world and of life is Christ, the Word of God incarnate."

Finally, the Pope turned his attention to St. Paul who, "strong in the presence of Christ and comforted by His love, did not even fear martyrdom."

Then, recalling that on June 28 he will inaugurate a Jubilee Year commemorating the 2,000th anniversary of the birth of the Apostle of the Gentiles, the Holy Father concluded: "May this great spiritual and pastoral event also arouse in us a renewed faith in Jesus Christ Who calls us to announce and bear witness to His Gospel, without fear."

SAGINAW -- A crew from the Midland-based Bierlein Construction works to bring down the final corner of the former St. Mary Cathedral School building on Wednesday afternoon. The school, which was raised in 1920, closed its doors to students in 1984 when it merged with Saginaw's SS. Peter & Paul and St. Stephen high schools to form Nouvel Catholic Central High School on Wieneke Road in Saginaw Township. It was later sold to a tri-city jobs program in 1988, but has sat abandoned since 1990. The demolition is part of the on-going St. Mary Cathedral campus renewal effort, the Restoration & Design Project for the Cathedral Campus.

5 priests to celebrate jubilees on June 23

SAGINAW – Five Catholic Diocese of Saginaw priests will be honored during a special Mass to mark significant jubilee anniversaries of their ordination at 4 p.m. on June 23 at St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish in Bay City.

This year’s jubilarians include:

• Father Michael L. Maher, 60 years


• Father Joseph W. Roach, 60 years


• Father Richard C. Ratajczak, 50 years


• Father Joseph D. Ryan, 50 years


• Father Peter J. Gaspeny, 25 years