Stewardship of Time
This summer try adding a Mass Journal into your routine. Draw from the Readings or the homily and take time to write and reflect how God is speaking to you each Sunday.

Stewardship of Talent
Thank you to our ministry volunteers who celebrated with us last Thursday evening. Please pray for them!

Stewardship of Treasure- June 2nd & 3rd
Envelopes: $4,817.00
Loose: $4,376.31
Maintenance: $170.00
__________________________
TOTAL: $9,363.31
Needed to operate weekly: $15,907.89
Difference: $6,544.58

May EFT: $18,261.10

As you have noticed, the summer edition of the Weekly is going to be a bit lighter. We have done this to save on costs, but will maintain a vibrant E-news weekly and social media presence to provide additional faith formative resources and articles. We will resume the larger Weekly this fall.

1968 Cathedral Class Reunion (50th Reunion) on June 23rd, 2018 in the School Hall, following the 4pm Mass. We look forward to hosting and it is handicap accessible. No need to RSVP, just show up!

Have some news you would like to share? Please email Katie Price at [email protected].

We are hosting a Cathedral Parish Ministry Volunteer Appreciation Reception on June 14th at 6:30PM in the Cathedral Atrium. If you are a part of a Cathedral Ministry you are invited and we hope you will attend! If you are able to join us, please R.S.V.P. by June 8th to [email protected] or by calling the Cathedral Offices at 522-3342.

Cathedral Min Invite

Dominic is a seminarian for our diocese in formation at Kenrick Seminary in St. Louis. Dominic will be entering his third year of theology studies and will be ordained a deacon next spring. We are happy to welcome Dominic to the Cathedral Parish for the summer!

This weekend we celebrate the feast formally titled the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, but popularly known as Corpus Christi. Every time the Church gathers to celebrate the Mass, the Eucharist, which is the body, blood, soul, and divinity of our Lord, is at the center of our worship. We must avoid the danger of growing lax in our reverence and awe due to our familiarity with this great and wonderful sacrament, which is one reason why the Church dedicates a particular day of solemnity to focus solely on this mystery. The Eucharist is the life source of the Church, the ultimate manifestation of Christ’s presence among us, and it has been the strength of the faithful for the Church’s entire history. It is not a sign or symbol, because a sign or symbol points to another reality. It is itself a reality because the Holy Spirit changes the humble gifts of bread and wine that we offer into the real presence of Jesus.

Two years ago at Father Braden’s first Mass, the rector of Saint Meinrad Seminary preached and in his homily he recounted a wonderful story told by the 20th century American Catholic writer Flannery O’Connor. In a letter, Flannery recounted that she was invited to a dinner party and how she felt out of place in a group of “intellectuals.” She goes on to say that she said nothing all night until the conversation turned to the Church and the Eucharist and that her hostess talked about that, even though she had left the practice of the faith, she still thought that the Eucharist was a wonderful “symbol.” Having heard enough, Flannery stated: I then said, in a very shaky voice, ‘Well, if it’s a symbol, to hell with it.’ That was all the defense I was capable of but I realize now that this is all I will ever be able to say about it, outside of a story, except that it is the center of existence for me; all the rest of life is expendable.

May we have the same grace that Flannery O’Connor did to recognize just how vital the Eucharist is for us. The Eucharist has been the strength of martyrs, it has comforted the faithful over the centuries in the face of adversity, it is the source and summit of our life of faith, and the remedy for our mortality that will lead us to everlasting life.

 Father Christopher House is the Rector-Pastor of the Cathedral and serves in various leadership roles within the diocesan curia, specifically Chancellor and Vicar Judicial.

Stewardship of Time & Talent
Summer plans can mean lower Mass attendance, which leads to a greater need for volunteer and financial support. Please consider stewarding your talents in Liturgical Ministry this summer or sharing an extra gift toward the offertory during these summer months.

Stewardship of Treasure- May 19th & 20th
Envelopes: $5,113.00
Loose: $3,649.00
Maintenance: $1,434.00
__________________________
TOTAL: $10,196.00
Needed to operate weekly: $15,907.89
Difference: $6,864.67

Stewardship of Treasure- May 26th & 27th
Envelopes: $5,335.00
Loose: $2,281.35
Maintenance: $70.00
__________________________
TOTAL: $7,686.35
Needed to operate weekly: $15,907.89
Difference: $8,221.54
April EFT: $18,486.10

We want to extend a big Thank You to the Cathedral Council of Catholic Women who have generously supported the new Alpha series (launching June 20th) with a donation of their resources, time and talents! We would not be able to host this program without these amazing women! Thank you ladies!

We are looking for childcare volunteers for the What’s for Dinner program! If you are willing and available the first Thursday of most months, please let us know. Please contact the Parish Offices if you would like to volunteer. We would love to continue providing an evening of family formation for our Parish! The next What’s For Dinner is Thursday, June 7th. We will be hosted by the Knights of Columbus and Deacon Larry will be leading us in faith formation.

Have some news you would like to share? Please email Katie Price at [email protected].

*Note from Cathedral: We thought this would be an interesting article for sharing because many of our families will be welcoming home loved ones from college for the summer. Perhaps you know someone in college or a young adult, please invite them to come to Sunday Mass with you at the Cathedral, or to Alpha starting June 20th. We have many opportunities in the Diocese for them to get involved with their faith. For more information please reach out to the staff.

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On April 24, Bishop Robert Barron, theologian and founder of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries, spoke with the staff of The Torch, Boston College’s Catholic Newspaper, on the subject of religion and skepticism. The Bishop began by describing skepticism as a perspective that often “traps” its adherents “in Plato’s Cave,” unable to broaden their views. He then went on to describe possible benefits of the outlook, especially in the context of the university, and to offer advice to students as they continue their search for the truth.

The Torch (T): Do you think, given the restrictions of skepticism, there are any benefits to it?

Bishop Barron (B): I think skepticism is not a bad attitude, and I think it’s good for college students to be skeptical. That’s how you learn. If you don’t ask questions, and you don’t wonder about things, you’re not going to make any progress. So, I’m not against it at all. I think it’s really healthy. However, we’ve got to be skeptical of our skepticism. If you take it too far, it becomes uncritical, and it becomes a block to real knowledge. I would say, “Yeah, unleash your skepticism about a lot of things—including skepticism. Be skeptical of the secularist ideology, because sometimes it’s as though [people said], “Oh no, that’s fine, no one should ever question secularism.” That’s the default position. Actually, I would be just as skeptical about that as about anything else. So, yes to skepticism, but not so far that it blocks your access to reality. The danger with excessive skepticism is that you end up living in a very, very narrow space, this little tiny world that you have control over. And that just makes your life cramped.

T. You mentioned having faith in skepticism itself. Do you think there are other, non-religious areas where people hold on generally to a kind of faith they don’t acknowledge?

B. Yes, and it’s a very important thing. Here, I’d rely on the great John Henry Newman. Cardinal Newman said this a lot in his writings, that in every area of knowledge, especially the sciences, something like faith is always operative. Even if you’re making progress in a science, you’re not at every stage of the process personally verifying everything. In fact, you accept all kinds of things on faith: findings that have been done, experiments that have been conducted, settled science that’s happened over the centuries. These you accept on a kind of faith, and then you move forward with your own investigation.

In fact, in every area of life, including the most basic things, something like faith or trust is operative. In this regard, Newman says that even that you know who your parents are—can you absolutely prove that with apodictic certitude? Or are you taking it on the testimony of lots and lots of people [who] you’ve come to trust? You trust in GPS systems—have you verified it before you set out on your journey, or are you accepting on faith that this is based on the work that a lot of people have done? So, there’s an analogy between religion and the role that faith plays, and the role that faith plays in the sciences.

T. On that note, something many college students have heard, especially with the rise in popularity of the STEM fields, is the statement, “Science is my religion.” What would your response be to that sort of statement?

B. Well, first of all, it’s a pretty pathetic religion. I love the sciences, I think they’re great, and the Catholic Church applauds the sciences. And some of the greatest figures in scientific history have been ardent believers—Gregor Mendel, who invented modern genetics, or Father Lemaître, who discovered the Big Bang Theory. So, we’re not opposed to science at all.
But science looks at reality through a certain narrow lens, an “aspective” reality. That’s an example of what I call scientism, which is the reduction of all knowledge to the scientific form of knowledge. So, science does give you knowledge about certain dimensions of reality, but not everything. There are other ways of knowing that are non-scientific.
Here’s the test case—how do you prove scientifically that science is the only way to know reality? See, that’s what scientism claims. But you can’t verify that empirically; you can’t do an experiment to prove it, you can’t use the scientific method to show that only the scientific method delivers truth. Does that make sense? And that’s why [scientism is] a self-contradictory position. And then [I’d] say, just in answer to the question directly, it’s a pretty narrow, pathetic religion, if you’d say, “Only what I can empirically verify and control is of ultimate meaning and value to me.” Because religion has to do with your ultimate good, your ultimate concern, and if science is your religion, it’s a pretty pathetic religion.

T: Do you think there are specific challenges Catholic colleges face in preaching the Gospel today?

B: Sure, one of them that’s huge is scientism—this aggressive, sort of arrogant, domineering attitude on the part of the scientists. That’s a block. The second thing I’d say would be the whole range of the Church’s teachings on sexuality, which are seen very often as oppressive to people today. And then, relatedly, the third thing I’d say is what I call the culture of selfinvention— that we all have the right and the prerogative to invent ourselves, to determine what’s true for us, and to determine what’s morally right for us. The Church speaks for objective truth and value, and that puts it often at odds with a culture that says, “No, no, it’s up to me to invent the truth and invent the good.” So, I’d say those are the three major obstacles that we face on college campuses.

T: Do you have advice, both for college students who are strong in their faith and those who are still unsure, trying to wade through this sea of different opinions?

B: For those who are strong in their faith, I’d say to keep going to Mass, to keep living the Catholic life, and to do so in a public way. Let people see that you are a person of faith. Don’t do it aggressively—you’re not beating people over the head—but you’re not ashamed of it, and you’re willing to show, publicly, that you’re a believer.

And for those who are searching, I love people who are searching. I’m much more worried about people who are shut down, like those who embrace scientism. That’s the danger —“I’m shut down; there’s nothing beyond what I can see and control.” Someone who’s searching, I love that. I would just say, “Keep searching.” Don’t limit your search to what ideological secularism tells you, but let the mind and heart go all the way, because what they want, finally, is God. It’s only in God that my mind and my heart and my soul are at rest. So I tell searchers, “Keep searching.” And don’t let people limit your passion and your hunger for the truth and for the good.

What I’d say to both groups is [to] keep reading great Catholic literature. So you’re on a college campus, you’ve got access to books, you have the time to read and study. Gosh, everybody from Augustine, to Thomas Aquinas, to G. K. Chesterton, to John Paul II, to Thérèse of Lisieux—there’s so many people you can read [who] are great on these issues. Take the time to delve into the Catholic tradition.

T: If you had to choose one author out of those, someone who you think really speaks to today’s university landscape, do you have one in mind?

B: Well, yes, I suppose I would say Chesterton. But I might even choose someone who’s up at your college, Peter Kreeft, who I think [has] translated a lot of those people into language that contemporary university students can relate to. He’s taught undergraduates at Boston College for decades, so I’d say Peter Kreeft is a great person for people to study on college campuses.

Word On Fire Catholic Ministries is a nonprofit global media apostolate that supports the work of Bishop Robert Barron and reaches millions of people to draw them into— or back to— the Catholic faith. For more information, wordonfire.org.

Excitement is growing around the launch of the Alpha series at Cathedral! What is Alpha? Who is invited? Who should we invite or how can I help? These are all great questions. For more information and answers, please check out https://spicathedral.org/alpha or contact Katie Price at [email protected].

All are invited!

Alpha involves radical hospitality, dinner, and engaging conversations on some of life’s biggest questions! We will grow together as a Parish and this is a great way to get to know fellow parishioners and Cathedral guests.

Alpha begins June 20th at 6PM in the Cathedral Atrium.

Discussion is impossible with someone who claims not to seek the truth, but already to possess it. (Romain Rolland)

My youngest daughter and I were studying together the other evening for an exam she had the next day. At midnight, my very practical wife (who frequently saves us d r e ame r s f r o m s t a r v a t i o n a n d impoverishment) called timeout for sleep. But neither of us wanted to stop. We were discussing the reasons in the Catholic just war tradition for calling a war “just,” and in what sense the detonation of the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki could be called just.

I love studying with my children, as we launch into wild tangents of exploration that often blow our collective minds. The problem is, we don’t get through the material efficiently and end up panicking around 11:00 p.m. Yet, to this very point my daughter made an astonishing comment before we blitzed through the rest of the material last time: “I think school kills the desire to learn, since just when we start getting excited about what we’re learning in class the teacher says, ‘Okay, we have to move on to get through everything else.’ And then I’m like, okay forget it. What’s the point?”

“The point” is philosophy, philo sophia, awakening the love of wisdom and knowledge in learners. Leading people to wonder, to fall in love with the quest of the mind after everything. Teachers are inciters of fascination, architects of wonder. And it’s those who eagerly engage in dialogue who are in love with wisdom, with knowledge, with truth.

What Catherine and I did that night was the art of dialogue, of dia logos, which is literally to “think through” another person. Not talking “at” another person, or even “with” them, but thinking through them. My daughter’s thinking “got into” me, and mine into her. It’s really quite amazing. Insights are had in the active, interpenetrating exchange of ideas with another. A dialogue partner helps me to “think through” the truth of the matter we are together seeking. Their thinking influences, disrupts, smacks, illuminates mine, and mine theirs.

Effective, fruitful dialogue requires a number of skills and attitudes if it to yield new insights. Among those, humility is crucial. Humility is an open, willing disposition to learn from anyone and anything—to be corrected and to correct—as well as the persistent realization that I, on my own, never fully possess the whole truth and nothing but the truth. God alone is truth, we are stewards of truth, and truth is only held as a common stewardship. It’s not private property.

St. John of the Cross says it, “Always prefer to be taught by all, rather than to desire teaching even the least of all.” Why? To ensure that you always remain open to the common discovery of new vistas of understanding, new perspectives and insights. The tendency we have is to devolve into monologue, into cliques of agreeable others, or into the pseudo-safety of relativism’s shallow and vapid tolerance of others’ ideas that ostensibly absolves us from the risky duty of engaging in the hard work of “reasoning together” (cf. Isaiah 1:18).

The transformation of humanity into a united community is hard work, and dialogue bears the lion’s share of that work. Which means dialogue is an art of charity, the specific manner by which love binds people more closely together. No dialogue, no unity. This means married couples and families should be the experts, the premier contexts for the art of dialogue, where it is learned, practiced, perfected, and then extended out into the wider civic community, church, and world.

And dialogue, like love, takes time. It requires time “wasted” together, especially time spent face to face. I love the saying, “Children spell love T-I-M-E.” Love requires time-with-me. In your marriage, parenting, friendships—in your relationship with God— the quantity of time invested is an essential ingredient of the quality of your investment. Quality time requires quantity time.

When I think of my closest friendships, all of them, without exception, are relationships in which we do dialogue full throttle. Knock-down, drag-out bliss, enjoying every minute of our joint journey into the Unknown. And it is in those relationships that my deepest, most impactful, challenging, meaningful, and life-changing insights emerge. Over drinks, over meals, during walks, while working on projects together we discuss difficult, fascinating, complex, banal, transcendent issues. Grimacing, pounding the table, shaking heads, nodding, laughing, modulating voice pitch—it’s a wild, unruly, meandering encounter from which I always walk away enlightened, challenged, uplifted, humbler, wiser. Deo gratias.

My grandfather wrote in a letter he sent to Patti and me after our first son was born, “As your children grow, you love them by falling in love with learning all over again every time they ask you a question, want to read a book, or show you a flower they found outside the front door. Time spent speaking with them on anything and everything. That’s your long-term investment in their excellence.”

Amen.

 Dr. Tom Neal presently serves as Academic Dean and Professor of Spiritual Theology at Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans, Louisiana. He has worked for twenty years in adult catechesis, retreat ministry and teaching theology in various contexts trying to make present for others the “Word made fresh.” Tom received a Masters in Systematic Theology from Mount St. Mary’s University and a PhD in Religion at Florida State University.