Author Archives: Tereza Ma

Criminal Justice reform moves forward this session

Posted on by
Reply

By Andre de Gruy
JACKSON – Mississippi Legislature wrapped up their 2019 work early but not without passing several criminal justice-related bills. All three are now on the Governor Phil Bryant’s desk awaiting his signature.
HB 1352, the Criminal Justice Reform Act of 2019, went through several changes during the session.
The final version focused on updating drug court statutes to facilitate different types of “intervention” courts such as mental health courts as well as ensuring people have access to the programs primarily through fee waivers. The oversight commission membership was expanded to include a person with a background in mental health to reflect the broader scope. While some drug courts were allowing medically-assisted treatment the new law will mandate this when appropriate. These treatment methods although controversial have strong support from the medical community as one of the best evidence-based methods to treat opioid addiction.

JACKSON – Mississippi Lawmakers wrapped up the 2019 session a few days early. Several bills related to Catholic Social Teaching passed this year. (Photo courtesy of Shutterstock)


Some of the other features of HB 1352 are designed to help people reentering society from jails or prison. People will no longer face a driver’s license suspension for an inability to pay a fine or for a drug conviction that is unrelated to operating a vehicle. The “Scarlet F” of a felony conviction that follows tens of thousands of Mississippians for their lifetime, preventing many from fully participating in the economy, their families, and their communities, will be easier to remove. Expungement, whipping a conviction off a person’s record, will be available to more nonviolent offenders.
People exiting prison to post-release supervision or parole will have an additional 30 days to get on their feet before they have to start paying supervision fees. Finally, people with drug convictions will no longer face a lifetime ban on receiving SNAP benefits.
SB 2781, the Fresh Start Act, is aimed at ending automatic bars to securing an occupational license because of a conviction of a crime unrelated to the field. For example, many people become skilled barbers in the correctional system yet can’t get a license upon their release.
Another important bill is SB 2328, the Forensic Mental Health Act. This bill amends forensic mental health statutes to facilitate faster administration of justice, relieve burdens on sheriffs and insure constitutional protections for criminal justice system involved people with mental health concerns. Approximately 20 percent of Mississippi’s jail population suffers with a serious mental illness. In a relatively small number, probably less than 20 people a year, the illness is so severe they are not competent to be prosecuted and cannot be restored to competency. This act is designed to speed up evaluations to make this determination and to expedite moving the person from the jail to a hospital.
In addition to the changes in the “intervention” courts in HB 1352, the Legislature appropriated additional funds to the Supreme Court to update the data system used to track and evaluate the courts and to facilitate development of mental health courts.
While all of this is good there is still much left to do. These new laws will have little if any impact on the state’s large prison population. Despite significant decreases in prison population after the 2014 reforms, Mississippi only moved from number two to three in incarceration rate. Prisons all over the state remain overcrowded, putting guards and inmates in jeopardy and diverting money from recidivism reduction and reentry programs to security needs. To avoid significant increases in corrections spending – taking money away from education, health care and other important needs – Mississippi’s institutions will need to continue reforms in 2020 with the intent of safely reducing the prison population.

(André deGruy is a member of St. Richard Parish, the diocesan Faith In Action Team and The Mississippi State Public Defender.)

Pope signs letter to young people at popular Marian sanctuary

Posted on by
Reply

By Carol Glatz Catholic
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – The place Pope Francis chose to sign his letter to young people is an important and popular sanctuary housing the Holy House of Loreto.
According to tradition, the tiny stone house is considered to be the home where the Mary was born and raised and also the house in which the Holy Family was thought to live when Jesus was a boy. It also is held to be the place where Mary received the angel’s annunciation and conceived the Son of God through the Holy Spirit.
With his visit, the pope will encourage young people and pray that Mary “takes them by the hand and guides them with joy” to their own generous declaration of “Here I am, the servant of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word,” Archbishop Fabio Dal Cin of Loreto told Vatican News March 21.
By signing a document based on a synod’s discussions about young people, faith and vocational discernment, the pope also is making a symbolic gesture, connecting the place venerated to be the home of “a very special family” with all the world’s families and the family of the universal church, the archbishop said in a video interview posted on the sanctuary’s website, www.santuarioloreto.it.
The pope signed the document – titled in Spanish, “Vive Cristo, esperanza nuestra,” (“Christ, Our Hope, Lives”) – in the basilica housing the shrine March 25, the feast of the Annunciation.
The gesture at the sanctuary, like the document itself, is a renewed call to focus on “accompanying the younger generations,” Archbishop Dal Cin told Vatican News.
This reflects a similar historic visit, he said, when St. John XXIII went to the shrine of Loreto in 1962 to entrust to Mary the Second Vatican Council, which began a week later.
In Loreto, St. John prayed that Mary, “as ‘Help of Bishops,’ to intercede for me as bishop of Rome and for all the bishops of the world, to obtain for us the grace to enter the council … with one heart, one heartbeat of love for Christ and for souls.”
On the 50th anniversary of St. John’s visit to Loreto, Pope Benedict XVI visited the shrine in 2012 to entrust to Mary the Year of Faith, which began a week later, and the Synod of Bishops on the new evangelization.
Archbishop Dal Cin said Pope Francis entrusting to Mary the letter to young people at the same shrine shows a similar desire that she help the world’s bishops so the document would have a fruitful pastoral outcome.
Millions of people visit Italy’s most important Marian shrine each year. It was even popular with St. John Paul II, who went to this eastern seaside town five times during his pontificate.
The small house, which is surrounded by a large, intricately carved marble structure inside the main basilica, is actually made of three stone walls. The shrine’s caretakers say research has shown the brown and tan stones came from Palestine. The stones, now smooth from the touch of centuries of pious hands, were hand cut in the shape of bricks – a technique used by the Nabatei tribe, which was then also present in Palestine.
According to tradition, the Holy House was carried by angels from Nazareth, Israel, to this hillside town the night of Dec. 9-10, 1294, after making a three-year stop in Croatia. The shrine’s custodians say the stones were actually removed from the Holy Land and carried by ship by a member of the Angeli family.
The family name is also the Italian word for “angels,” thus being the probable reason for the more popular notion of winged angels flying the house to Italy.

But where are the others?

Posted on by
Reply

IN EXILE
By Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI
Most of us have been raised to believe that we have right to possess whatever comes to us honestly, either through our own work or through legitimate inheritance. No matter how large that wealth might be, it’s ours, as long as we didn’t cheat anyone along the way. By and large, this belief has been enshrined in the laws of our democratic countries and we generally believe that it is morally sanctioned by Christianity. That’s partially true, but a lot needs to be nuanced here.

Father Ron Rolheiser


This is not really the view of our Christian scriptures, nor of the social teachings of the Catholic Church. Not everything we acquire honestly through our own hard work is simply ours to have. We’re not islands and we don’t walk through life alone, as if being solicitous for the welfare of others is something that’s morally optional. The French poet and essayist, Charles Peguy, once suggested that when we come to the gates of heaven we will all be asked: “Mais ou sont les autres?” (“But where are the others?”) That question issues forth both from our humanity and our faith. But what about the others? It’s an illusion and a fault in our discipleship to think that everything we can possess by our own hard work is ours by right. To think this way is to live the partially examined life.
Bill Gates Sr., writing in Sojourners some fifteen years ago, challenges not only his famous son but the rest of us too with these words: “Society has an enormous claim upon the fortunes of the wealthy. This is rooted not only in most religious traditions, but also in an honest accounting of society’s substantial investment in creating fertile ground for wealth-creation. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all affirm the right of individual ownership and private property, but there are moral limits imposed on absolute private ownership of wealth and property. Each tradition affirms that we are not individuals alone but exist in community – a community that makes claims on us. The notion that ‘it is all mine’ is a violation of these teachings and traditions.” Society’s claim on individual accumulated wealth “is rooted in the recognition of society’s direct and indirect investment in the individual’s success. In other words, we didn’t get there on our own.” (Sojourners, Jan-Feb., 2003)
Nobody gets there on his own and so, once there, he needs to recognize that what he has accumulated is the result not just of his own work but also of the infrastructure of the whole society within which he lives. Accordingly, what he has accumulated is not fully his, as if his own hard work alone had brought this about.
Beyond that, there’s something else which Benjamin Hales calls “the veil of opulence” which lets us naively believe that each of us deserves everything we get. No so, says Hales. A lot of blind luck in involved in determining who gets to possess what: “The veil of opulence,” he says, “insists that people imagine that resources and opportunities and talents are freely available to all, that such goods are widely abundant, that there is no element of randomness or chance that may negatively impact those who struggle to succeed but sadly fail through no fault of their own. … It turns a blind eye to the adversity that some people, let’s face it, are born into. By insisting that we consider public policy from the perspective of the most-advantaged, the veil of opulence obscures the vagaries of brute luck. But wait, you may be thinking, what of merit? What of all those who have labored and toiled and pulled themselves up by their bootstraps to make their lives better for themselves and their families? This is an important question indeed. Many people work hard for their money and deserve to keep what they earn. An answer is offered by both doctrines of fairness. The veil of opulence assumes that the playing field is level, that all gains are fairly gotten, that there is no cosmic adversity. In doing so, it is partial to the fortunate. … It is an illusion of prosperity to believe that each of us deserves everything we get.” (New York Times, August 12, 2012)
Scripture and the Catholic social teaching would summarize it this way: God intended the earth and everything in it for the sake of all human beings. Thus, in justice, created goods should flow fairly to all. All other rights are subordinated to this principle. We do have a right to private ownership and no one may ever deny us of this right but that right is subordinated to the common good, to the fact that goods are intended for everyone. Wealth and possessions must be understood as ours to steward rather than to possess absolutely. Finally, perhaps most challenging of all, no person may have surplus if others do not have the basic necessities.
In any accumulation of wealth and possessions we have to perennially face the question: “Mais ou sont les autres?”

(Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser, theologian, teacher and award-winning author, is President of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, TX.)

Beginnings and endings for Norbertines

Posted on by
Reply

Millennial reflections
By Father Jeremy Tobin, O.Praem
Holy Week is upon us and we will be immersed in all the rituals and ceremonies celebrating death and life. The legislative session is mercifully over, and the politicians are all out campaigning to get reelected. We still fight for the same social justice issues that so much need to be addressed, but these days, we do it with a fresh spirit. Is it the coming of Spring perhaps? There is some new energy that gets released when the Vernal Equinox arrives.

Father Jeremy Tobin

So, the coming of Easter is a new beginning. We celebrate death and resurrection. We do this so often in our own lives. Spring is a time of letting go – perhaps in the form of “spring cleaning.” Perhaps in the form of a walk outside to witness the transformation of the landscape. Out in the woods around our priory new creatures emerge; birds have staked out their turf. The fresh green leaves, the blossoms and the extended daylight say out loud life continues. Even death is the seed that produces new life.
Endings and beginnings. During my 30-years of work in Chicago, I got to know a lot of folks with roots in Mississippi. One family moved back to Vicksburg in the early 80s. They waited until they heard a blizzard was about to bury Chicago and the temps would plummet to invite me South for a visit. For three years in the 80s I spent the week after New Year’s in Vicksburg eating soul food and talking about the old days. I did not know then that my community would seek to establish a foundation in Mississippi.
We Norbertines came to Jackson, Mississippi, in 1990 at the invitation of the late Bishop William Houck. We took up residence at Jackson St. Mary Parish, 653 Claiborne Avenue. In November, 2004, we moved into the new priory on Midway Road. Bishop Joseph Latino blessed it. From then till now more than 15 Norbertines were part of this community. Mississippi changed all of us, for me – the change was profound.
A lot happened in 29 years. I reconnected with Mississippi people related to Chicago people I knew. I learned so much more about the struggle for justice that shapes my life.
But, as we all got older, no young blood stepped forward to replace us. So, our leadership in De Pere Wisconsin decided to close the priory and move us back to St. Norbert Abbey. This has been in the works for a couple of years and now we are selling the property and moving back by June. People are shocked but I have to get this out there.
We live in a fast-paced changing world. Climate change is going on right now even though we may be unaware. A chunk of a massive glacier in Antarctica, the size of the state of Florida is rapidly coming apart. The sea levels are dramatically rising. Nothing we can do about it now. Scientists are measuring the changes anticipating the outcome. There are pictures from space. There are oceanographer ships out there close by. They write about the warm water hollowing out the glacier until giant pieces collapse. Our planet is changing. We need to reread Laudato Si again. Maybe it is the first time. There is wisdom and a plan to protect our common home.
Lent is so much about mercy and compassion. The Scripture readings for Sundays and weekdays make for great reflection. The prodigal son, the woman awaiting stoning, the woman at the well. The morning I am writing this, at the Carmelite monastery we read from John 5: 17-30. Jesus is describing his identity and mission. In verses 22 and 23 he says, “Nor does the Father judge anyone, but he has given all judgment to his Son, so that all may honor the Son as they honor the Father…” We see just how a merciful judge Jesus is. “Has no one accused you?…Neither will I accuse you. Go and sin no more.”
We will miss our home in the deep South, but we must also embrace our beginnings and our endings. Me? I will move back with my brother Norbertines and then return to Jackson and take up residence at Holy Family Church on Forest Avenue off Watkins with Father Xavier Amirtham, our Norbertine pastor, for another year. I hope to do what I am doing now and be useful. I hope to continue writing for the Mississippi Catholic until I “really retire” up North. There will be more to come. Be blessed everyone.

(Father Jeremy Tobin, O.Praem, lives at the Priory of St. Moses the Black, Jackson.)

Speaking up can lead to healing

Posted on by
Reply

Dounce of Prevention
By Reba J. McMellon, M.S., LPC
Whether the perpetrator of abuse is a family member, a member of the clergy, a teacher or a stranger, publicly coming forward can take years and sometimes decades. People often wonder why report the crime after so much time has passed.

(Reba McMellon,


If a child is in the second grade and is being sexually abused, they can’t get in their car, move away, get an apartment and thus find safety. Second graders have very little power over their lives. They have to go to school every day and blend in academically, learn all sorts of basic math skills, eat breakfast, play on a sports team, interact like a normal child. If the abuse is ongoing, they learn to compartmentalize the trauma so they can go on to the next day, the next year and on with some semblance of a life. Sometimes the trauma of sexual abuse gets buried so deeply it doesn’t surface for decades.
This can be the case no matter how old the person is when the abuse happens. Memories sometimes are repressed completely until triggered later in life. Others don’t completely forget what happened but minimize it and put a lot of energy into not dealing with the damage.
When working with adult survivors of sexual abuse, it is quite common to have women come for counseling in their early 30s, after the birth of their first child.
The experience of pregnancy is one in which the body has been taken over by something one is not completely in charge of. The experience of giving birth is sometimes traumatizing. Having an innocent child of your own changes perspective and sometimes triggers memories. It is common for new mothers come to counseling with excessive worry and fear that something bad was going to happen to their child.
This prompts the survivors to uncover the trauma and walk through it.
It is rare someone wakes up and decides to publicly report sexual abuse and exploitation out of the blue. More often, it is after working with a counselor or spiritual director for a long period of time to build skills, confidence and understanding that it was not their fault. More often than not, it takes years to realize it was life-altering abuse.
Male survivors of sexual abuse often seek counseling after a long history of unstable relationships, promiscuity or the inability to be intimate. Men often come to counseling well into adulthood with a lot of life behind them, before disclosing childhood sexual abuse.
Counselors don’t always encourage the survivor to disclose their abuse publicly. When there is imminent danger to others, reporting the perpetrator is encouraged. If the abuser still has access to children, disclosing the crime publicly serves the greater good and empowers the survivors.
Publicly reporting childhood sexual abuse and exploitation should not be confused with sharing the trauma with trusted friends and family members. Keeping the abuse a complete secret perpetuates the shame and damage.
It takes a strong stable person to be able to speak out with confidence and tell publicly what happened to them. It can be retraumatizing. The public will question the legitimacy of the report and agencies will investigate whether the “story” is credible. Bear in mind, we are talking about intimate and horrifying facts.
The public can unwittingly say incredibly insensitive things such as, “those people just want attention.” It would take a severe personality disorder to humiliate themselves and others for attention. There is a small percentage of individuals who falsely report. It is not difficult to diagnose such a person through the interview process, when the interviewer is appropriately trained.
Statistics consistently show that one in three females are sexually abused before the age of 18. One in five males are sexually abused before age 18. These numbers haven’t gone up or down drastically in the 35 years I have studied child sexual abuse. What we can change is how we respond to reports of abuse whether it’s decades later or immediate.
The healing that can result by breaking the silence of sexual abuse is encouraging. I’ve often said a person cannot recover from what they haven’t uncovered. Wonderful strides have been made in our society when it comes to responding to allegations of sexual abuse.
If you’re tempted to wonder what difference reporting abuse makes now, after all these years, please know it makes all the difference in the world. It leads to healing, safety and hope for the future.
The Lord is close to the broken hearted, He saves those whose spirit is crushed. Psalm 34:19

(Reba McMellon, M.S. is a licensed professional counselor with 35 years of experience. She worked in the field of child sexual abuse and adult survivors of sexual abuse for over 25 years. She can be reached through The Mississippi Catholic or rebaj@bellsouth.net.)

The Best of Enemies

Posted on by
Reply

By John Mulderig
NEW YORK (CNS) – “The Best of Enemies” (STX) is an appealing fact-based drama that promotes humane values and Gospel-guided behavior. On that basis, many parents may consider it a rewarding film for older teens, the inclusion of some mature material notwithstanding.
Set in 1971 Durham, North Carolina, writer-director Robin Bissell’s adaptation of Osha Gray Davidson’s 1996 book – subtitled “Race and Redemption in the New South” – traces the evolving relationship between no-nonsense civil rights activist Ann Atwater (Taraji P. Henson) and C.P. Ellis (Sam Rockwell), the head of the local Ku Klux Klan.
The two, who initially want nothing to do with each other, are forced to spend time together as leading participants in an arbitration process deciding the future of the city’s still-segregated educational system. A damaging fire at a black school has brought the issue to a head and Bill Riddick (Babou Ceesay), an expert in mediation, has been brought in to try to achieve consensus.
He sets up a series of meetings collectively called a charette, at the end of which a panel made up of an equal number of blacks and whites will vote on whether to maintain the status quo. As the process unfolds, Ann and C.P. gain insights into each other’s lives and characters.
C.P. begins to question his racist views – which are based, in part at least, on the fact that he has always avoided having any dealings with African Americans. The gas station he owns, for example, will not serve black customers.
For her part, fiery Ann comes to see that C.P. is not entirely evil. In fact, in some respects, he’s quite vulnerable.
This is particularly true with regard to one of his three sons, a developmentally disabled lad confined to a home for whom C.P. cannot afford the kind of care he would like. Ann, who carries a Bible with her and says grace before each meal, intervenes with a friend on the staff of the facility where the boy lives to bring about an improvement in his situation.
Though C.P. at first reacts to this thoughtful gesture with disdain, not wanting to be indebted to Ann in any way, in the long term it becomes an important turning point in the evolution of his outlook. His gradual change of heart, which will ultimately have very positive consequences, also is encouraged by his sensible wife, Mary (Anne Heche).
Bissell evokes strong performances from his fine cast and his picture’s themes of reconciliation and equal dignity for all will be on target for believing moviegoers. The story he tells might seem pat if it were not derived from real events. As it is, viewers can come away from “The Best of Enemies” hopeful, despite the many fraught and contentious circumstances of our own era.
The film contains some nongraphic violence, including gunplay and the threat of rape, an act of sexual aggression, a few uses of profanity and of crude and crass language and racial slurs. The Catholic News Service classification is A-III – adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 – parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13

Unplanned

Posted on by
Reply

By John Mulderig
NEW YORK – The hard-hitting, fact-based drama “Unplanned” (Pure Flix) dares its viewers to confront the reality of what happens when a baby is aborted.
That’s an effective strategy on the part of co-writers and directors Chuck Konzelman and Cary Solomon, not least because the peculiar institution of our day thrives on concealment, muddled thinking and Orwellian euphemisms. But it also means that this emotionally unsparing film is not for the casual moviegoer of any age.
Adapted from the eponymous 2011 memoir by Abby Johnson (Ashley Bratcher), “Unplanned” traces her steady rise to become one of the youngest Planned Parenthood clinic directors in the country. Yet it also shows how she gradually became uneasy about the organization’s marketing of abortion.

Emma Elle Roberts and Jared Lotz star in a scene from scene from the movie “Unplanned,” the story of Abby Johnson, a former Planned Parenthood clinic director, and her decision to join the pro-life movement. The Catholic News Service classification is A-III — adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R — restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian. (CNS photo/Unplanned.com)


The conversion in her outlook reaches a dramatic climax when Abby is asked to assist a doctor performing the procedure and witnesses via sonogram what it actually involves. As the child in the womb tries to move away from the suction tube and medical containers quickly fill with blood, this scene may prove as upsetting for the audience as it was for Johnson.
Her new stance is welcomed by Abby’s husband, Doug (Brooks Ryan), and parents Kathleen (Robin DeMarco) and Mike (Robert Thomason), all of them pro-life. It also brings reconciliation with some of the protestors she once considered adversaries, including 40 Days for Life activists Shawn (Jared Lotz) and Marilisa (Emma Elle Roberts).
Unsurprisingly, Abby’s ornery former superior, Cheryl (Robia Scott), views her change of heart in a different light. Once Abby’s mentor, infuriated Cheryl becomes the moving force in a lawsuit against her ex-protege as well as against Shawn. Kaiser Johnson steals this portion of the picture playing Shawn and Abby’s unflappable lawyer, Jeff.
While Cheryl is clearly the villain of the piece, the script avoids demonizing all those associated with Planned Parenthood. Nor does it present all pro-life activists in a positive light. Whether this sense of balance will give “Unplanned” any traction with supporters of legal abortion is open to question, however.
Given that the full horror of slaughtering the unborn is on display here, the parents of older teens will have to decide whether the informative value of Abby’s story outweighs its disturbing elements. Those also include a sequence showing the sufferings Abby endured after taking RU-486 in the second of her own two abortions.
The film contains gruesome images of abortion and dismembered fetuses, much medical gore, a mild oath, a few crass expressions and a vague sexual reference. The Catholic News Service classification is A-III – adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R – restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

(Mulderig is on the staff of Catholic News Service.)

Lenten rites pave way to Easter conversion

Posted on by
Reply

By Berta Mexidor
JACKSON/ MADISON – Lent begins with the penitential sign of ashes on Ash Wednesday, but does include some joyful moments for the faithful.
Bishop Joseph Kopacz, celebrated Ash Wednesday Mass at the Cathedral, blessing ashes to mark the forheads of those in the church.
The Sunday, March 10, Bishop Kopacz, assisted by Deacon Mc Gregor celebrated the Rite of Election and call to continuing conversion for 43 catechumens and 10 candidates for confirmation during Mass at St. Francis of Assisi Parish. Pastor Father Albeenreddy Vatti and Father Frank Cosgrove were also on hand.
Mary Woodward, chancellor, presented a book with their names to the bishop before all the catechumens and candidates received a blessing and a Pastoral Priorities prayer card from Bishop Kopacz.
The group represented all age groups and included members of parishes around the diocese. The Rite of Election and call to continuing conversion mark the final preparations for Easter, when the catechumens will receive first communion and candidates will be confirmed.
Lauren Roberts, a catechumen from Jackson St. Richard, explained that she was baptized into the church years ago, but her fiancé, family and friends helped her to decide to take this step toward full, active membership in the church. Maria Vera is sponsoring Alberto and Alexis Jiménez. She said she wants to show them the road to Christ.

Ash Wednesday

JACKSON – Mary Woodward places ashes on the forhead of a member of the Cathedral of St. Peter the Apostle on Ash Wednesday. (Photos by Maureen Smith)

Above, Mr. Wesley Lindsay marks a woman's forehead. The ashes are a reminder to turn from sin during Lent and prepare for Easter.

Rite of Election

Tome nota

Posted on by
Reply

Vírgenes y Santos. Celebraciones

Semana Santa. Abril 14-21
Domingo de Ramos. 14 de abril
Viernes Santo. 19 de abril
Pascua de Resurrección. Domingo 21 de abril
Santa Catalina de Siena. 29 de abril

Convocatoria

Retiro para jóvenes hispanos mayores de 18 años. Hombres y Mujeres. A celebrarse el sábado, 6 de abril en la parroquia Sacred Heart, Canton desde las 8:30 a.m. a 5 p.m. Donación de $10 dólares por persona que incluye comida y playera. Regístrese en la parroquia ó llame a la Diócesis al 601-960-8484.

Retiro para jóvenes de 13 a 17 años.
A celebrarse el sábado, 13 de abril de 8 a.m. a 5 p.m. en St. Jude, Pearl. Contactar a las hermanas

Ambiente Seguro
Para reportar un abuso: Licenciada Valerie McClellan, trabajadora social.
Por favor, contáctela al 601-326-372

Las parejas comparten su amor y compromiso en el Día Mundial del Matrimonio

Posted on by
Reply

Por Berta Mexidor and Maureen Smith
JACKSON – Ochenta y dos parejas celebraron más de 3,500 años de matrimonio el domingo 24 de febrero, en la Catedral de San Pedro Apóstol. La mayoría de las parejas celebraron 50, 25 o especiales aniversarios de matrimonio.
Cada pareja recibió un certificado y la bendición del obispo Joseph Kopacz, en misa oficiada por el mismo. Charlene Bearden, coordinadora de la Oficina del Ministerio Familiar de la Diócesis de Jackson, organizó la celebración del Día Mundial del Matrimonio. “Creo que este día muestra que la fe es sólida, fuerte”, dijo Bearden. El día del matrimonio es un evento mundial para honrar este sacramento y reconocer a quienes son llamados a esta vocación.

JACKSON – Catedral de San Pedro. En la recepción, después de la misa celebrada el 24 de febrero. (i-d) El matrimonio de Isidro y Carmen Vieyra conversan con sus hijos. Su hija Cyntia Vieyra y su novio Gustavo García están próximos a casarse. (Foto por Berta Mexidor)

Carmen e Isidro Vieyra de santa Teresa en Jackson celebraron 25 años de matrimonio. Ellos creen que Dios siempre les está ayudando en el viaje. “Nunca se dé por vencido” dijo Isidro, a lo que Carmen añadió “Dios da paciencia y amor para entenderse”. La hija de ambos, Cyntia Vieyra y su novio Gustavo García, con seis años de relación, y siguiendo el ejemplo de Carmen e Isidro, están decididos a llevar su fe y su compromiso al siguiente nivel. Esta joven pareja tomará los votos el próximo mes de mayo. Ambos expresaron, al mismo tiempo, el deseo de tener “todos los niños que Dios quiera”
quieren tener “todos los niños que Dios quiera” dijeron ambos al mismo tiempo.