Stories from our Archives
August 2008
Onward, Christian soldiers
Like the Marines, the Church is looking for good men in a source that knows well the value of discipline and commitment. Read More...
Ordination Day 2008
Relatively few Catholics are able to attend the conferring of Holy Orders, but this sacrament is rich with symbolism and meaning. A Benedictine Brother captures the ceremonies in Lake Charles, La.,
for EXTENSION readers Read More...
A parish in northern Wyoming is the testing ground for an innovative program that pairs rural engaged couples with “marriage veterans.”
Award honors churches who ‘open doors to all’
Even if they don’t win the $1,000 prize, any church can get some winning tips on how to make facilities and programs more accessible from a Chicago organization.
The Jubilee Year honoring the great evangelist St. Paul.
The ‘spaghetti church' that's now exuberating with the evangelistic spirit.
A Q-and-A on the centennial of one of the nation's oldest charitable gift annuity programs.
A rural parish on the plains of South Dakota celebrates its own centennial.
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Evan Solet of the Bayou Eagles Dancers processes in for a Mass honoring Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha at Holy Family Church in Grand Caillou, La., last July. Native American Catholics find a welcome place at the Lord’s Table in southern Louisiana.Elderly sisters who fled New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina are praying for a safe return to a new haven.
While working and studying full-time at the College of the Ozarks, Mandy Renyer is grateful to have a Catholic ministry on campus thanks to Catholic Extension's aid.
The College of the Ozarks’ student body reflects its Bible Belt setting, but a very talented couple is bringing a new Catholic dimension to the campus.
In eastern Arizona, Catholic Extension aid has enabled Father Ed Fronske, OFM, to immerse himself in the Native American community on the Apache Indian Reservation.
With prayer and cultivation, the sisterhood still calls. Two young women explain how a dynamic Newman center in Missouri helped guide them in their vocation discernment and decision to enter religious communities.
Detachment from material things provides a powerful example from this group of women religious, whose entire lives are dedicated to praying for the Universal Church.
Long before most noticed the growing populace of Hispanic Catholics in the South, this year¹s Lumen Christi Award recipient was already reaching out to them in the back roads of Arkansas. Even now as he battles MS, Monsignor R. Scott Friend continues to inspire vocations to the priesthood in his mission diocese. And not far away, more than 100 parishes on the Gulf report on their post-Katrina status, ranging from fully-repaired to temporary Masses in a Quonset hut.
The closing of the Chicago Archdiocese¹s minor seminary this year leaves only one diocesan high school facility in the nation for students contemplating the priesthood. This is one of the many ways our nation¹s seminaries are evolving in response to changing demographics, vocation trends and rising expenses, which are outlined in this month's cover story.
Combined in number, those in state and local jails would comprise the largest "parish" in the Diocese of San Angelo. Bringing the Catholic Faith to the imprisoned requires the help of many volunteers as well as Catholic Extension.
Next, read how a tiny mission in the Deep South is finally getting a real church to call home after staying in seven unlikely spaces from the Pizza Hut to a Presbyterian church.
The international Cursillo movement is celebrating the 50th anniversary of its spiritual renewal outreach in the United States. Our cover story describes how it’s not only brought members of the Blackfeet Indian tribe back to the Faith but also formed them into missionaries to other reservations around the country. Plus, the mission Diocese of San Angelo is dedicating a shrine to some of America’s earliest missionaries, who were martyred while bringing the Faith to this part of modern-day Texas.
Respect for elders is a longstanding tradition in Native American culture. Our story describes how one remote reservation on Arizona’s border with Mexico is capitalizing on that with an innovative intergenerational catechetical program that’s spreading nationwide. And 200 years ago, after Baltimore became the nation’s first diocese, read how the next wave quadrupled the Church’s presence in the United States.
Seminarians around the country need the prayers and support of the whole Church for their formation. In this issue, several veteran priests share some “fatherly” advice with those just starting out in their ordained vocation. Also, Catholic Extension’s new president, Father Jack Wall, is profiled in his journey from pastoring a rejuvenated inner-city parish to now working with pastors trying to do the same thing in poor and remote communities all around the country.
As we enter into the Lenten season with Ash Wednesday this month, EXTENSION presents the story of a West Texas mission parish that has rallied around a unique cross-making project to raise funds for its desperately-needed church renovation. Plus, a Louisiana parish offers a model of faith and vocations for African-American Catholics during Black History Month.
These days, young new priests often are tapped to become pastor of a parish soon after ordination. Father Scott Garrett talks about doing just that in the wilds of Alaska’s Bristol Bay region, where he covers 15 scattered villages. Then to the opposite side of the country, two Missionary Sisters of Jesus, Mary and Joseph are converting the hearts of teens with “Jesus rallies.”