Day: February 26, 2022

Paul Farmer dies; Catholic physician founded clinic network for rural poor

BUTARO, Rwanda — Dr. Paul Farmer, a Catholic physician who helped found a network of clinics serving the rural poor in Haiti and Rwanda, died in his sleep Feb. 21 on the grounds of a clinic he had founded in Butaro. He was 62. Farmer graduated from Duke University with a degree in medical anthropology. […]

Students at Maryland Catholic school reach out to counterparts in Ukraine

Students at a Catholic school in southern Maryland are writing letters to their counterparts in Ukraine to offer their prayers and support. “Our students have written to make a connection,” said Lila Hofmeister, principal of at St. Michael’s School in Ridge. “The stress these children (in Ukraine) are living under by being in a state […]

New bill aims to boost children’s safety online

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In Washington, one doesn’t need to go bird-watching with binoculars to spot a rare creature. Instead, all one needs to do is look at the hawks and doves in the Capitol. Inside, there is an increasingly rare breed: a bill with bipartisan support. The Kids Online Safety Act will please some in […]

Priest discovers Kentucky parish has ties to Father Augustus Tolton

RHODELIA, Kentucky — On a wintry January day at the old St. Theresa Cemetery in rural Meade County in Kentucky, Janice Mulligan laid a simple wreath of magnolia leaves on the grave of Matilda Hurd, a woman who died a slave and whose grandson is now a saint in the making. Hurd, who died in […]

Ukrainian pastor in New Jersey fears for family’s safety, homeland’s future

NEWARK, New Jersey — There is a tremor in his voice when Redemptorist Father Taras Svirchuk speaks about the situation in Ukraine. For now his family is safe, including his mother and sister, who live in Western Ukraine. But the future is unknown, he said, after Russia began a military invasion of his home country […]

How to pregame Lent: Septuagesima, Carnival, and Shrovetide

Mardi Gras celebration in Binche, Belgium. / Marie-Claire/wikimedia. (CC BY 3.0 SA) Denver, Colo., Feb 26, 2022 / 07:21 am (CNA). Sunday, Feb. 27 is Septuagesima Sunday, followed by Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays. Sunday kicks off Carnival season, which comes right before Shrovetide, which culminates in Shrove Tuesday – more popularly known as Mardi Gras. […]

Ukrainian Catholic leader: ‘No one has the right to stay silent’

Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. / Aid to the Church in Need. Rome Newsroom, Feb 26, 2022 / 07:45 am (CNA). No one can afford to be silent in the face of the bloodshed happening in Ukraine, the leader of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, […]