• The Seminary Education Fund
• The Priests’ Pension Fund
• The Bishop D’Arcy Catholic Education Fund
• Any one of the four diocesan high schools, which include Bishop Dwenger and Bishop Luers in Fort Wayne; Marian in Mishawaka; and Saint Joseph in South Bend
• Women’s Care Center
• Christ Child Society
• St. John the Baptist Parish, Fort Wayne
• St. Monica Parish, Mishawaka
Make checks payable to the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend and designate which memorial you would like to contribute to.
Then send to:
Diocese of Fort Wayne,
P. O. Box 390, Fort Wayne, IN 46801.
Friday, February 22, 2013
Friday, January 25, 2013
Statement to the faithful
January 24, 2013
I wish to thank Bishop Rhoades and all the people of our beloved Diocese for the prayers of so many, which have been poured out on me. They are an enormous consolation. Please continue them.
Pray that my YES to God and His Will, be full and whole-hearted and never begrudging, but a strong YES. I hope my Yes has the same spirit of Our Lady at the Annunciation and also her Yes at the foot of the cross.
It is good to be home. I send you all my love and gratitude.
I wish to thank Bishop Rhoades and all the people of our beloved Diocese for the prayers of so many, which have been poured out on me. They are an enormous consolation. Please continue them.
Pray that my YES to God and His Will, be full and whole-hearted and never begrudging, but a strong YES. I hope my Yes has the same spirit of Our Lady at the Annunciation and also her Yes at the foot of the cross.
It is good to be home. I send you all my love and gratitude.
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Statement by Most Reverend John M. D’Arcy
January 9, 2013
I want to give all my beloved friends in the Fort Wayne – South Bend Diocese an update. I am receiving excellent care. I met this morning with my medical team. The oncologist and her associate are under Dana Farber, one of the top cancer treatment centers in the country.
I have a very rare form of cancer. Very rare. It is quick striking and came as a surprise, “like a thief in the night” as the Scripture says. I am now undergoing 15 days of radiation, which is palliative and has eased many symptoms. After that, there will be some consideration of chemotherapy. The doctors here are in close communications with my doctor in Fort Wayne.
Now, most importantly, I ask everyone for your prayers. Pray that I will accept this and whatever is to come with a full heart and a full “Yes” to God. I am grateful to God for the extraordinary life He has given me and the graces He has poured out on me. I thank God for my family and that I was born in the Catholic faith, which has always defended and defends in these troubled times the dignity of life and of the human person and the nature, which God has given us. Over everything, I am grateful for the gifts of the Holy Priesthood. I never felt worthy of it. I thank God with all my heart that I was appointed by Christ through the Church as shepherd of our beloved diocese.
Pray that God will find my heart pure and holy and pray that I will trust God and rely, not on my own goodness, but on the merits and sacrifice of Christ our Savior.
Above everything, pray for me and for my soul and that I will be found worthy to enter into the heavenly place that God has prepared for all of us, where I hope to meet my dear parents and so many loved ones.
Please pray for me.
Bishop John M. D’Arcy
I want to give all my beloved friends in the Fort Wayne – South Bend Diocese an update. I am receiving excellent care. I met this morning with my medical team. The oncologist and her associate are under Dana Farber, one of the top cancer treatment centers in the country.
I have a very rare form of cancer. Very rare. It is quick striking and came as a surprise, “like a thief in the night” as the Scripture says. I am now undergoing 15 days of radiation, which is palliative and has eased many symptoms. After that, there will be some consideration of chemotherapy. The doctors here are in close communications with my doctor in Fort Wayne.
Now, most importantly, I ask everyone for your prayers. Pray that I will accept this and whatever is to come with a full heart and a full “Yes” to God. I am grateful to God for the extraordinary life He has given me and the graces He has poured out on me. I thank God for my family and that I was born in the Catholic faith, which has always defended and defends in these troubled times the dignity of life and of the human person and the nature, which God has given us. Over everything, I am grateful for the gifts of the Holy Priesthood. I never felt worthy of it. I thank God with all my heart that I was appointed by Christ through the Church as shepherd of our beloved diocese.
Pray that God will find my heart pure and holy and pray that I will trust God and rely, not on my own goodness, but on the merits and sacrifice of Christ our Savior.
Above everything, pray for me and for my soul and that I will be found worthy to enter into the heavenly place that God has prepared for all of us, where I hope to meet my dear parents and so many loved ones.
Please pray for me.
Bishop John M. D’Arcy
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Statement from Bishop John M. D’Arcy
Statement from Bishop John M. D’Arcy
January 1, 2013
Since retirement, I come home to Boston to celebrate Christmas Mass with my family and visit with them. Shortly after this Christmas, I began to feel unwell. After consulting my doctor’s office in Fort Wayne, on Sunday, December 30, I went to Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital in Brighton, Massachusetts, where I grew up and the place of my family home.
After extensive tests, they found cancer in the lung and the brain. They kept me overnight – my first night in a hospital since I was born in that same hospital 80 years ago; so, I am ahead of the game thanks to the Good Lord.
I will return to the hospital for more tests and in a few days begin radiation, but I will be able to stay at my family home in Brighton where we all grew up with our dear parents. It is my hope in two to three weeks to return to the Diocese of Fort Wayne – South Bend and the people I have loved and served for over 1/4 century. My doctors there will pick up on my medical care and probably some chemotherapy.
It is my hope to keep all the commitments I have made to the parish missions and Confirmations. Of course, that will depend on the advice of my doctors.
I would like to request the prayers of all the people of the diocese -- priests, seminarians, religious and laity. I trust in the goodness of God and Mary his mother. As I have told so many people over the years, it is a time for trust in His goodness and love. And your prayers will help me to do that.
Most Reverend John M. D’Arcy
Bishop Emeritus
Diocese of Fort Wayne – South Bend
January 1, 2013
Since retirement, I come home to Boston to celebrate Christmas Mass with my family and visit with them. Shortly after this Christmas, I began to feel unwell. After consulting my doctor’s office in Fort Wayne, on Sunday, December 30, I went to Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital in Brighton, Massachusetts, where I grew up and the place of my family home.
After extensive tests, they found cancer in the lung and the brain. They kept me overnight – my first night in a hospital since I was born in that same hospital 80 years ago; so, I am ahead of the game thanks to the Good Lord.
I will return to the hospital for more tests and in a few days begin radiation, but I will be able to stay at my family home in Brighton where we all grew up with our dear parents. It is my hope in two to three weeks to return to the Diocese of Fort Wayne – South Bend and the people I have loved and served for over 1/4 century. My doctors there will pick up on my medical care and probably some chemotherapy.
It is my hope to keep all the commitments I have made to the parish missions and Confirmations. Of course, that will depend on the advice of my doctors.
I would like to request the prayers of all the people of the diocese -- priests, seminarians, religious and laity. I trust in the goodness of God and Mary his mother. As I have told so many people over the years, it is a time for trust in His goodness and love. And your prayers will help me to do that.
Most Reverend John M. D’Arcy
Bishop Emeritus
Diocese of Fort Wayne – South Bend
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Gambling
Op-Ed from Bishop John M. D'Arcy
Sometime ago, a number of pastors of other Christian churches along with members of their flocks have approached me or their friends in the Catholic community and asked if I would consider weighing in on the proposal for a gambling casino in our community. While moved by their respect for the Episcopal Office, I felt the need to study the matter before taking a position. The Catechism of the Catholic Church makes a brief, but clear, presentation of Catholic teaching.
"Games of chance (card games, etc.) or wagers are not in themselves contrary to justice. They become morally unacceptable when they deprive someone of what is necessary to provide for his needs and those of others. The passion for gambling risks becoming an enslavement."
So we must look at the effects. Some would claim that since the vast majority of people who gamble do it for entertainment and do not become addicted, that such gambling casinos should be approved. In my judgment, after serious study, such a position does not hold up.
Most of the money realized from gambling for the private companies who sponsor it, as well as the funds realized by the government, comes from problem gamblers; from the addicted; and it is the addict whose family is harmed, because he has lost his free will to a machine.
The gambling addict repeatedly uses up his or her salary to feed his addiction. The very people that Catholic social teaching requires us to put at the forefront and whose dignity we are bound to try to restore are the most seriously injured by this addiction.
It is the machines, the video games, which have brought technology in a massive degree to the gambling industry. The machines are programmed to intensify the addiction. The Vanier Institute on the Family estimates that "4 percent of the population with a serious gambling problem contributed 23 percent of the revenues." The same Vanier Institute reports that, "The personal cost of pathological gambling can include bankruptcy, family break up, domestic abuse, assault, fraud, theft, homelessness and even suicide. Up to 90 percent of pathological gamblers have considered suicide, and 20 percent of those in treatment actually attempted it."
Some would say that since only 2 to 5 percent of those who gamble are addicted, that it is appropriate for the government to sponsor casino gambling. But with the increases of machine gambling, seem to indicate that such a position is not consistent with Catholic social teaching.
The increase of machine gambling, machines programmed to support the addict, makes clear that there is a moral issue here that many choose to avoid. For example, a 1998 study commissioned by the State of Montana, found that problem and pathological gamblers account for 36 percent of electronic gambling device revenues. A Louisiana study found that 30 percent of all spending on river boat casinos came from problem and pathological gamblers.
The Catholic Bishops of the state of Kentucky came to a similar conclusion. Here is what their report says:
"The Catholic Conference of Kentucky opposes expanded gambling because the social costs are intolerable and the common good suffers in such significant ways when gambling becomes highly professionalized. Research indicates that families and communities are hurt by false profit of professional gambling occurs through casinos and machine gambling. These vehicles bring about gambling in excess with harm caused to people and communities. The American Psychological Association recognizes compulsive gambling as a disease."
In other words, the government and the private companies make their money on the backs of the poor and addicted.
Another principal of Catholic social teaching is the common good. People in government take an oath of office for the well-being of all. They should not gain necessary revenues on the backs of those who have already lost their human dignity through serious addiction.
As is often the case, Americans turn to something basic in our culture to defend gambling; namely, freedom. But freedom must always be subjected to the rights of others and to truth and to the common good.
The proper understanding of freedom. The dignity of the human person and the responsibility of duly elected leaders to seek the common good when coupled with the terrible effects of gambling indicate, that the introduction of casino gambling in our community is a moral issue, and in my judgment such introduction will be seriously harmful to many in our community and many others who will come from nearby cities and towns. We should learn from countless other communities and keep our wonderful community away from casinos, which intensify the experience of addiction.
Sometime ago, a number of pastors of other Christian churches along with members of their flocks have approached me or their friends in the Catholic community and asked if I would consider weighing in on the proposal for a gambling casino in our community. While moved by their respect for the Episcopal Office, I felt the need to study the matter before taking a position. The Catechism of the Catholic Church makes a brief, but clear, presentation of Catholic teaching.
"Games of chance (card games, etc.) or wagers are not in themselves contrary to justice. They become morally unacceptable when they deprive someone of what is necessary to provide for his needs and those of others. The passion for gambling risks becoming an enslavement."
So we must look at the effects. Some would claim that since the vast majority of people who gamble do it for entertainment and do not become addicted, that such gambling casinos should be approved. In my judgment, after serious study, such a position does not hold up.
Most of the money realized from gambling for the private companies who sponsor it, as well as the funds realized by the government, comes from problem gamblers; from the addicted; and it is the addict whose family is harmed, because he has lost his free will to a machine.
The gambling addict repeatedly uses up his or her salary to feed his addiction. The very people that Catholic social teaching requires us to put at the forefront and whose dignity we are bound to try to restore are the most seriously injured by this addiction.
It is the machines, the video games, which have brought technology in a massive degree to the gambling industry. The machines are programmed to intensify the addiction. The Vanier Institute on the Family estimates that "4 percent of the population with a serious gambling problem contributed 23 percent of the revenues." The same Vanier Institute reports that, "The personal cost of pathological gambling can include bankruptcy, family break up, domestic abuse, assault, fraud, theft, homelessness and even suicide. Up to 90 percent of pathological gamblers have considered suicide, and 20 percent of those in treatment actually attempted it."
Some would say that since only 2 to 5 percent of those who gamble are addicted, that it is appropriate for the government to sponsor casino gambling. But with the increases of machine gambling, seem to indicate that such a position is not consistent with Catholic social teaching.
The increase of machine gambling, machines programmed to support the addict, makes clear that there is a moral issue here that many choose to avoid. For example, a 1998 study commissioned by the State of Montana, found that problem and pathological gamblers account for 36 percent of electronic gambling device revenues. A Louisiana study found that 30 percent of all spending on river boat casinos came from problem and pathological gamblers.
The Catholic Bishops of the state of Kentucky came to a similar conclusion. Here is what their report says:
"The Catholic Conference of Kentucky opposes expanded gambling because the social costs are intolerable and the common good suffers in such significant ways when gambling becomes highly professionalized. Research indicates that families and communities are hurt by false profit of professional gambling occurs through casinos and machine gambling. These vehicles bring about gambling in excess with harm caused to people and communities. The American Psychological Association recognizes compulsive gambling as a disease."
In other words, the government and the private companies make their money on the backs of the poor and addicted.
Another principal of Catholic social teaching is the common good. People in government take an oath of office for the well-being of all. They should not gain necessary revenues on the backs of those who have already lost their human dignity through serious addiction.
As is often the case, Americans turn to something basic in our culture to defend gambling; namely, freedom. But freedom must always be subjected to the rights of others and to truth and to the common good.
The proper understanding of freedom. The dignity of the human person and the responsibility of duly elected leaders to seek the common good when coupled with the terrible effects of gambling indicate, that the introduction of casino gambling in our community is a moral issue, and in my judgment such introduction will be seriously harmful to many in our community and many others who will come from nearby cities and towns. We should learn from countless other communities and keep our wonderful community away from casinos, which intensify the experience of addiction.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Suspension of Communion from the cup to be lifted
Letter from Bishop D'Arcy to priests
My Dear Brother Priests,
I have consulted with the other bishops of Indiana and also our regional vicars, as well as our College of Consultors. There was a general, though not unanimous, consensus that it is time to consider the lifting of the suspension of Communion from the cup. We have also consulted particular health officials. Taking everything into account, this suspension is lifted effective on the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, Jan. 10.
Please be sure to tell the people in your announcement that they have every right to refrain from receiving the Precious Blood from the cup if they wish.
I thank all of you and our dear people for the collaboration in this matter.
With every best wish and prayer, I remain
Sincerely yours in our Lord,
Most Reverend John M. D'Arcy
My Dear Brother Priests,
I have consulted with the other bishops of Indiana and also our regional vicars, as well as our College of Consultors. There was a general, though not unanimous, consensus that it is time to consider the lifting of the suspension of Communion from the cup. We have also consulted particular health officials. Taking everything into account, this suspension is lifted effective on the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, Jan. 10.
Please be sure to tell the people in your announcement that they have every right to refrain from receiving the Precious Blood from the cup if they wish.
I thank all of you and our dear people for the collaboration in this matter.
With every best wish and prayer, I remain
Sincerely yours in our Lord,
Most Reverend John M. D'Arcy
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
The appointment of Professor Cavadini to the International Theological Commission
Statement from Bishop John M. D'Arcy
December 7, 2009
The appointment by Pope Benedict XVI of Professor John Cavadini, Ph.D., chair of the theology department at Notre Dame to the International Theological Commission should not be allowed to pass without a comment from the local bishop.
This appointment brings honor to our diocese and to Notre Dame, especially to its theology department. The meaning and purpose of this appointment is made clear from a homily Pope Benedict gave when he celebrated Mass for the 30 members of this International Commission, the highest group of theologians in the church. It was the first meeting attended by Dr. Cavadini.
Pope Benedict asked what is a theologian and what is the work of theology. In a kind of examination of conscience for theologians, he gave the Christmas analogy of the Magi and noted that while the learned academicians and the scribes were able to point the travelers towards Bethlehem, they did not go themselves. They gave information, but did not receive formation for their own lives. They did not go in prayer and faith to see the child.
The pope said that in the last 200 years, we have observed similar things. Great specialists and great theologians, teachers of the faith, have taught us many things; but they have not been able to see the mystery itself that Jesus is the Son of God and that in a determined historical moment, the Triune God has come among us. He even says that for those teachers — the great mystery of Jesus, if the Son made man is reduced to a historical Jesus, a truly tragic figure, a phantom, someone who remained in a tomb, who is truly dead.
The pope explained how in our time, we have learned about the Divine Mystery from the little ones from the saints. He spoke about St. Bernadette, to whom Our Lady came at Lourdes; St. Therese of Lisieux, with her — non-scientific reading of the Bible, who at the same time went into the very heart of the Scriptures. He refers to St. Josephine Bakhita, the African slave girl of whom he spoke in his encyclical on hope; and to Blessed Theresa of Calcutta and St. Damien who went to Molokai to live and die with the lepers. He makes clear that God also comes to the learned, but they also must be humbled. He gives the example of St. John, who stood at the foot of the cross and was a humble fisherman, but is rightly called the theologian; and St. Paul, the brilliants scholar of the law, who was reduced to blindness and had to be lifted up and healed by Christ before he could receive his mission to explain the Divine Mystery. As Paul wrote in the First Letter to Timothy, "I was mercifully tested."
Pope Benedict XVI did not speak of himself, but as someone who has been in his presence and has long read his teachings. It is evident that the Holy Father has combined humility, and prayer, and adoration, with great learning.
Pope Benedict XVI has pointed out a serious problem in theology; namely, separation of learning from holiness and faith in the life of the church. Another example in recent years has been those who have attempted to separate theology from catechetics.
Also for John Cavadini, this gap does not exist. He has always linked teaching and a spiritual life and prayer with study. His classes show a person who prays and binds himself closely, not to some proposed church of the future, but to the real church of the bishop and the faithful. He sees theology as at the service of the church and of her needs.
Our professor has bridged this gap, linking always a life of prayer and holiness with study and learning and always respecting the communion that must exist between theology and catechetics, and this may well be why the Holy Spirit, acting through the Chair of Peter, has chosen him for this commission, the highest group of theologians in the church and why this appointment is so important and why it can be expected to enrich the work of the International Commission.
As his friend and bishop, I am delighted with this appointment which brings honor to us all.
December 7, 2009
The appointment by Pope Benedict XVI of Professor John Cavadini, Ph.D., chair of the theology department at Notre Dame to the International Theological Commission should not be allowed to pass without a comment from the local bishop.
This appointment brings honor to our diocese and to Notre Dame, especially to its theology department. The meaning and purpose of this appointment is made clear from a homily Pope Benedict gave when he celebrated Mass for the 30 members of this International Commission, the highest group of theologians in the church. It was the first meeting attended by Dr. Cavadini.
Pope Benedict asked what is a theologian and what is the work of theology. In a kind of examination of conscience for theologians, he gave the Christmas analogy of the Magi and noted that while the learned academicians and the scribes were able to point the travelers towards Bethlehem, they did not go themselves. They gave information, but did not receive formation for their own lives. They did not go in prayer and faith to see the child.
The pope said that in the last 200 years, we have observed similar things. Great specialists and great theologians, teachers of the faith, have taught us many things; but they have not been able to see the mystery itself that Jesus is the Son of God and that in a determined historical moment, the Triune God has come among us. He even says that for those teachers — the great mystery of Jesus, if the Son made man is reduced to a historical Jesus, a truly tragic figure, a phantom, someone who remained in a tomb, who is truly dead.
The pope explained how in our time, we have learned about the Divine Mystery from the little ones from the saints. He spoke about St. Bernadette, to whom Our Lady came at Lourdes; St. Therese of Lisieux, with her — non-scientific reading of the Bible, who at the same time went into the very heart of the Scriptures. He refers to St. Josephine Bakhita, the African slave girl of whom he spoke in his encyclical on hope; and to Blessed Theresa of Calcutta and St. Damien who went to Molokai to live and die with the lepers. He makes clear that God also comes to the learned, but they also must be humbled. He gives the example of St. John, who stood at the foot of the cross and was a humble fisherman, but is rightly called the theologian; and St. Paul, the brilliants scholar of the law, who was reduced to blindness and had to be lifted up and healed by Christ before he could receive his mission to explain the Divine Mystery. As Paul wrote in the First Letter to Timothy, "I was mercifully tested."
Pope Benedict XVI did not speak of himself, but as someone who has been in his presence and has long read his teachings. It is evident that the Holy Father has combined humility, and prayer, and adoration, with great learning.
Pope Benedict XVI has pointed out a serious problem in theology; namely, separation of learning from holiness and faith in the life of the church. Another example in recent years has been those who have attempted to separate theology from catechetics.
Also for John Cavadini, this gap does not exist. He has always linked teaching and a spiritual life and prayer with study. His classes show a person who prays and binds himself closely, not to some proposed church of the future, but to the real church of the bishop and the faithful. He sees theology as at the service of the church and of her needs.
Our professor has bridged this gap, linking always a life of prayer and holiness with study and learning and always respecting the communion that must exist between theology and catechetics, and this may well be why the Holy Spirit, acting through the Chair of Peter, has chosen him for this commission, the highest group of theologians in the church and why this appointment is so important and why it can be expected to enrich the work of the International Commission.
As his friend and bishop, I am delighted with this appointment which brings honor to us all.
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