Around The World

By Catholic News Service

 Catholic high schools hire private companies to run cafeterias

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Many Catholic high schools across the country have contracted with independent companies to operate their cafeterias as a way to improve food quality and respond to students' requests for more nutritious choices. DeMatha Catholic High School in Hyattsville, Md., switched to a private caterer last year following a mandate from the school's board of trustees. The students at the boys school are now provided with breakfasts and lunches by a branch of Three Brothers Cafe, a Maryland restaurant. Tom Ponton, the school's director of development, told Catholic News Service that the change was simply to give the school a different way of managing cafeteria services. He did not think the nutritional value of the food necessarily changed. But Gregg Repole, a graduate of DeMatha and a son of one of the three founding brothers of the restaurant, said the quality has improved. While caloric intake in foods such as pizza or burgers may not shift too much with different suppliers, he said, the quality of the food is much better with the catering program because ingredients are fresh and the company does not use many processed foods.

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Little Rock ministry hopes study edition of Gospels has wide appeal

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (CNS) -- The Little Rock Scripture Study, known worldwide for its group Bible studies, has developed a personal study edition titled "The Four Gospels." The Gospels are "the core preaching of the church, the Gospel of Jesus Christ," said Cackie Upchurch, director of the ministry. The Little Rock Scripture Study, created by the Little Rock Diocese, develops and distributes Bible study materials to parishes and small faith communities. But it has ventured into other projects in the past few years, such as "A Year of Sundays," a reflection on the Sunday Gospels, and "What the Bible Says About ...," a free study series available on its Web site at www.littlerockscripture.org. "The Four Gospels" ($24.95) personal study Bible also can be ordered from the site, as well as from www.amazon.com. It will eventually be expanded to include the entire Bible. "'The Four Gospels' is really our first major offering for personal use as well as for groups," Upchurch told the Arkansas Catholic, Little Rock's diocesan newspaper. "Our hope is that people who may never join a study group will still benefit a great deal from the study tips and tools that are scattered throughout the text itself."

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In South Africa's largest cities, U.S. bishops see hope, problems

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (CNS) -- A U.S. bishops' delegation touring some of Johannesburg's poorest areas saw an active Catholic parish as well as some of the migration problems facing South Africa's largest city. In Johannesburg's Alexandra Township, the delegation visited St. Hubert's Catholic Church, where about 10 members of a youth choir were rehearsing. Oblate Father Ronald Cairns told the two U.S. bishops and other delegation members that his parish is thriving, with between 500 and 700 of its members involved in church activities. "We have a strong parish council," about 400 young people in catechism classes, active sodalities and parishioners training for the priesthood, Father Cairns said Aug. 29. Johannesburg's oldest township is four square miles and is home to about 540,000 South Africans as well as people from other African countries, the priest said. It has a 70 percent unemployment rate. Johannesburg was the first stop on an Aug. 28-Sept. 6 visit to South Africa by a church delegation that included Bishop John H. Ricard of Pensacola-Tallahassee, Fla., and Bishop John C. Wester of Salt Lake City. Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington, was to join them Aug. 31.

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Pope says families should create 'spiritual terrain' for vocations

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI said Catholic parents should make sure to create a "fertile spiritual terrain" for priestly vocations as they educate their children in the faith. The pope, speaking at a Sunday blessing at his summer residence outside Rome Aug. 30, said he hoped for a vocations revival in the Year for Priests, which began in June. The year marks the 150th anniversary of St. John Vianney, the patron saint of parish priests. "When couples dedicate themselves generously to the education of their children, guiding and orienting them toward the discovery of God's design of love, they prepare that fertile spiritual terrain where vocations to the priesthood and consecrated life arise and mature," the pope said. He offered a prayer that in the Year for Priests, "Christian families may become small churches in which all the vocations and charisms given by the Holy Spirit will be welcomed and valued." The pope said the history of Christianity features innumerable examples of saintly parents and families, including Blessed Luigi and Maria Beltrame Quattrocchi, who were beatified in 2001. The couple had four children, including two sons who became priests.

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Archbishop hopes synod address problems facing African cities

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (CNS) -- One problem the bishops of southern Africa hope to address at the October Synod of Bishops for Africa is growing urbanization and the competition for resources it brings, said Johannesburg Archbishop Buti Tlhagale. "There are informal settlements in every city" in South Africa, with the influx of people from other African countries as well as from South Africa's rural areas, said the archbishop, president of the Southern African Catholic Bishops' Conference. Meeting with members of a U.S. bishops' delegation in the Johannesburg township of Soweto Aug. 30, Archbishop Tlhagale said other cities with urbanization problems include Luanda, capital of Angola; Harare, Zimbabwe's capital; and Mozambique's capital, Maputo. People moving from rural areas into the city live in poor settlements without clean water or electricity and have no access to health care or education. Without parishes in these informal settlements, the Catholic Church faces the dilemma of "how to catechize" there, the archbishop added. "The church wants to respond to poverty" and, at the synod, "will focus on how we as church can respond to some of these challenges," he said. The Synod of Bishops for Africa will be held at the Vatican Oct. 4-25 and will focus on the theme "The Church in Africa in Service to Reconciliation, Justice and Peace."

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Pope accepts resignation of Scranton bishop for health reasons

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI has accepted the resignation of Bishop Joseph F. Martino, 63, from the pastoral governance of the Diocese of Scranton, Pa., for health reasons. He has appointed Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia to be apostolic administrator for the diocese. The pope also has accepted the resignation of Scranton Auxiliary Bishop John M. Dougherty, who is 77. Canon law requires that all bishops submit their resignation to the pope when they turn 75. Cardinal Rigali named Msgr. Joseph C. Bambera, pastor of St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in Archbald and St. Mary of Czestochowa Parish in Eynon, as his delegate for day-to-day administration of the diocese. At a news conference in Scranton Aug. 31, Bishop Martino said he had been experiencing insomnia, "crippling physical fatigue" and frequent bouts of the flu brought on by the stress of his work as bishop. "As the song says, you have to know when to hold them and when to fold them, and I think it is time for me to move on," he said, adding that he felt he left the Diocese of Scranton "a little leaner, with greater energy to do the work of God more efficiently and more effectively."

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Bishop says U.S. church sees 'great deal of hope' in South Africa

PRETORIA, South Africa (CNS) -- A U.S. bishops' delegation chose to visit South Africa because it has "similar dynamics (to) the United States, with a similar history in many ways," said Bishop John H. Ricard of Pensacola-Tallahassee, Fla. "We see a great deal of hope here," he told leaders of the Southern African Catholic Bishops' Conference in Pretoria Aug. 29. Meeting at Khanya House, the SACBC headquarters, Bishop Ricard said the U.S. bishops set up a solidarity fund for the church in Africa nearly five years ago because of the "sense that the church needed to focus on Africa, not just as a continent facing poverty and disease, but rather as a sister church that is developing and growing." Bishop Ricard, chairman of the U.S. bishops' Subcommittee on the Church in Africa, and Bishop John C. Wester of Salt Lake City visited Zimbabwe Aug. 26-28, then traveled to South Africa, where they were to remain until Sept. 6. They were to be joined by Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington, who also planned to visit Swaziland.

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Robert Schindler, who fought to care for daughter Terri Schiavo, dies

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (CNS) -- Robert Schindler Sr., a Catholic and the father of the late Terri Schiavo, died from heart failure early Aug. 29 in St. Petersburg. He was 71. Schiavo, who died in 2005, was at the center of a lengthy legal battle that resulted in a Florida court ordering her feeding tube removed. A funeral Mass for Schindler was to be celebrated Sept. 4 in Southampton, Pa., at Our Lady of Good Counsel Catholic Church. A private burial service was to follow at Holy Sepulcher Cemetery in Philadelphia. "My dad was a man of integrity, character and compassion who was blessed with a close and loving family," his son, Bobby Schindler, said in a statement. "He taught all three of his children to respect and value life and to love our fellow man. Even at the height of the battle to save my sister Terri's life, when his patience and temperance was near exhaustion, he managed to display a gentleness of spirit," he said. "Yet it was his unfathomable strength that allowed him to shoulder up his own heartache and lead us through our darkest hour. What greater legacy could a man leave behind?" o