CHARLOTTE — The Diocese of Charlotte Office of Vocations invites all young men aged 15-19 to attend the annual Quo Vadis Days retreat to be held June 11-15 at Belmont Abbey College.
This five-day vocations camp includes talks by local priests, seminarians and others on the vocations to the priesthood, marriage and fatherhood.
The goal of Quo Vadis Days is to challenge young men to ask the fundamental question “Quo vadis”? or “Where are you going?”, while equipping them with the tools and opportunity to discern God’s will for their lives.
The retreat attempts to strike an effective balance between the activity of a summer camp and the quiet of a retreat. The day is structured to include Mass, the Liturgy of the Hours, Eucharistic Adoration, time for personal reflection and interaction with priests and seminarians of the Diocese of Charlotte.
There is also time devoted to activities and fellowship.
In a letter to participants, Father Christopher Gober, director of vocations for the Diocese of Charlotte, notes, “Quo Vadis Days is an opportunity for you to deepen your faith, develop new friendships and explore the meaning and purpose of your life.
“Our days together will offer you the opportunity to spend time with priests and seminarians from the Diocese of Charlotte as well as other young men your age who are trying to figure out God’s plan. Hopefully, this camp will help you to know Jesus more deeply and help you to discern your vocation in life while having a lot of fun!”
There is a cost of $150 for the Quo Vadis Days retreat that covers lodging at Belmont Abbey College, all meals and retreat materials. The registration deadline is Friday, June 1.
Financial aid is available. Contact the Office of Vocations at 704-370-3353 for details.
For questions regarding registration, contact Sister Mary Raphael at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 704-370-3402. For questions about the camp itself, contact Father Jason Barone at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 704-370-3351.
To register, go to www.charlottediocese.org/vocations/quo-vadis-days.
— SueAnn Howell, senior reporter
Partnering with St. Mary Parish to help people affected by the damage
GREENSBORO — In the wake of a tornado that struck the Greensboro area last month, Catholic Charities Diocese of Charlotte is working in partnership with St. Mary Church to provide assistance. Catholic Charities has been able to help more than 300 people affected by the storm so far, and relief efforts continue.
The EF2 tornado with 135-mph winds touched down April 15 east and northeast of Greensboro, damaging more than 1,000 homes and businesses and leaving nearly 200 destroyed. One person died and two others were injured in Greensboro when a tree landed on top of a vehicle. No other injuries were reported in the storm. President Donald Trump declared a “major disaster” May 8 and federal funds and assistance will be given to those affected by the storms.
Catholic Charities staff met with Father Charles Strollo, pastor of St. Mary Church, on April 20 to assess the damage and plan how best to respond, said Joe Purello, director of Catholic Charities’ Office of Social Concerns and Advocacy.
St. Mary Church is located less than one mile away from a neighborhood seriously affected by the tornado. The church has held two special collections to help those affected.
“We’re a Vincentian parish,” Father Strollo said. “Offering assistance and working hand in hand with Catholic Charities flows from the charism of charity for which our founder, St. Vincent de Paul, is well known. When Catholic Charities contacted me with a request that we partner in this response, the answer was very easy: yes! Working with Catholic Charities was the most effective way to help the victims of this tornado, parishioners and non-parishioners alike. Fortunately for this effort, our parish has an active social ministry committee who have been eager to assist with Catholic Charities.”
The church has served as a base for Catholic Charities staff and volunteers to work with the parish to offer disaster response assistance. Help has been provided in English and Spanish.
“For the last few weeks, we’ve been giving out water, snacks, emergency supplies, cleaning supplies, toiletries and gift cards to help people replace food and other items lost,” said Becky DuBois, regional director of the Piedmont Triad office in Winston-Salem. “We’re slowing down on emergency assistance and transitioning to case management.”
They’ve helped 340 families so far, DuBois said. Some people lost their homes or aren’t able to return to them, and some people had items just damaged. Catholic Charities is interviewing the families and determining what assistance can be provided next for their long-term recovery, DuBois said.
Catholic Charities has been working with volunteers from additional parishes located in the Piedmont-Triad region and staff are collaborating with non-profit community partners such as the Red Cross and Team Rubicon.
DuBois said Catholic Charities will continue meeting with families who need help through May.
“Parishes know best what the needs are in their communities, so it is natural that Catholic Charities engages with parishes that are closest to where the disaster happened,” Purello said. “The model of working with a parish as a Catholic Charities disaster response base of operations works very well. Parishes often have excellent facilities and resources that are brought to the table to respond to disasters. The pastor, staff and parishioners of St. Mary Church have been so hospitable and generous.”
— Kimberly Bender, Online reporter
Want to help?
Donate online: Click on the blue “Donate” tab at the top of Catholic Charities’ website homepage, www.ccdoc.org.
Doante by mail: Make a check payable to Catholic Charities and send it to Catholic Charities Diocese of Charlotte, 1123 South Church St., Charlotte, NC 28203. Please write “Disaster Response” in the memo section.
Donate by phone: Call 704-370-3281 to make a donation by credit card.
Interested in helping out? Contact your local Catholic Charities office to see learn where you may be needed.
WINSTON-SALEM — Be grateful and pray often.
That was the advice to 2018 graduates of Wake Forest University from Cardinal Timothy Dolan, who was in Winston-Salem May 20 to deliver the baccalaureate sermon and celebrate Mass.
What does it mean to be grateful? Cardinal Dolan explained, “Gratitude is precisely that virtue that draws us out of ourselves. Towards what? Towards God.”
Dr. Nathan Hatch, president of Wake Forest University, welcomed Cardinal Dolan, whom he has known for years through their shared ties with the University of Notre Dame. The son of a Presbyterian minister, Hatch was the first Protestant to serve as Notre Dame’s provost, its second highest-ranking position.
Though Wake Forest is now a private, independent university, it was founded by Baptist church leaders and continues to celebrate its Christian heritage. Twenty-five percent of Wake Forest students identify as Catholic.
Wait Chapel was filled nearly to capacity for the baccalaureate on Pentecost Sunday, where Dolan was also presented with an honorary degree.
“With his engaging demeanor, with his preference for conversation over confrontation, and his optimistic and clear-eyed vision for the Roman Catholic Church, Cardinal Dolan has helped ignite a new passion in America’s Catholic population, especially among its youth,” Hatch noted in his presentation, also commending the cardinal’s “exceptional ability to handle contentious issues with clarity and grace” and “his work in encouraging dialogue and finding common ground and unity.”
In between quoting Dante, St. Augustine, Shakespeare and John F. Kennedy, Cardinal Dolan peppered his baccalaureate sermon with his usual self-deprecating humor. He thanked Wake Forest for the honorary degree, which was, he said, “especially appreciated by one who’s just paid off tuition for my earned degree of 33 years ago.”
“I relish commencement ceremonies like this,” he said, glancing at Hatch and faculty leaders seated behind him on the stage, clad in their academic regalia. “For one, I’m not the only one on campus in a medieval costume.”
During his baccalaureate address, Cardinal Dolan encouraged the 2018 graduates to cultivate the habit of gratitude – to their parents and everyone who has helped them along the way, but most of all to God.
“We graduates have been the recipients of lavish gifts, mostly unmerited, and that we could not have gotten here by ourselves,” he emphasized.
Gratitude enables people to reach outside of themselves and act selflessly, he said. Education can help draw people out of themselves, away from selfishness, and towards the expression of gratitude.
“A classical goal of a liberal arts education, for which Wake Forest is renowned, is that we are liberated from a life sentence of self-absorption,” he said.
“That we would gather here in this venerable chapel, on a campus of a celebrated institution of higher learning founded by those with very deep Christian roots, at a beautiful service including readings from the Holy Bible, hymns, prayers and benediction, that all makes this sentiment of gratitude particularly fitting.”
In his homily at Mass later that day in the Sutton Center, Cardinal Dolan reflected on the actions of the apostles in the Upper Room at Pentecost – and how what they did should be a model today for people, especially the 2018 graduates.
“What did they do when Jesus left them and returned to His heavenly Father? They prayed. They were scared, they were confused, they were frustrated, they were discouraged, and they knew that the Master had taught them that, boy oh boy, when you are at a critical moment in your life there’s nothing more effective that you can do than pray.”
Cardinal Dolan encouraged people to pray just as the Apostles did – patiently waiting to do God’s will, remaining active in the Church, and invoking the help of the Holy Spirit and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
“This is a day of intense prayer,” he concluded. “How fitting, Wake Forest University, that you began this joyful commencement weekend with a baccalaureate, which is a program of prayer. How fitting that you, our Catholic family, would come together for the prayer of the Mass, and how fitting that we renew that at this conclusion of this intense time of prayer at Pentecost.”
Father Marcel Amadi, campus minister at Wake Forest University, thanked Cardinal Dolan, the graduating students, and all those who helped to organize and support the day’s events, including St. Leo the Great, Our Lady of Mercy and Holy Family parishes (particularly Knights of Columbus Assembly 2282, and Councils 10504, 9499 and 2829) and the diocesan Campus Ministry program.
Elizabeth Orr, Wake Forest’s director of Catholic programming, said students were inspired by Cardinal Dolan’s visit to campus. The 2018 Catholic graduates received a special blessing from the cardinal and Father Amadi at the end of Mass.
John Scott Galle, a 2018 graduate who read a prayer at the baccalaureate and served as a lector at the Mass, called the day’s events and Cardinal Dolan’s visit “an extraordinary honor and such a blessing.”
Galle said the campus ministry program has really come a long way since he first arrived and attended events and Mass in the basement of a campus dormitory building. The campus ministry now has its own space and a strong core of leaders under the direction of Father Amadi, and welcoming Cardinal Dolan – the first cardinal to visit Wake Forest University since Cardinal Francis Arinze in 1999 – is a sign of God’s grace at work.
“At the end of the day, it’s a great reminder that what we do is for the glory of God and His Son Jesus Christ,” Galle said.
— Patricia L. Guilfoyle, editor
BELMONT — More than 300 students graduated from Belmont Abbey College May 12, during commencement exercises that followed a Baccalaureate Mass at Mary Help of Christians Basilica.
Graduates included 111 non-traditional students from the college’s Center for Continuing & Professional Studies, including Susan K. Fitzgerald, who was named the first-ever Loughridge Center for Continuing & Professional Studies Student of the Year.
Mary Theresa Jacobeen was valedictorian. Abbey Student of the Year was Gavin Schaffer, a student-athlete on the men’s volleyball team who served in several leadership roles on campus, including on the student-athlete advisory committee and as president of the Student Government Association.
Dr. Julia Beeman, chair and associate professor of criminal justice, was honored with the 2017-’18 Adrian Award for Teaching Excellence. Faculty and students nominated her for the award. The homilist for the Commencement Mass was Raleigh Bishop Luis Rafael Zarama. Bishop Zarama, alumnus George Horner and avid supporter Bob Luddy received honorary degrees from the college.
— Photo provided by Rolando Rivas
Memorial Day Mass offered for military personnel and their families
CHARLOTTE — People must pray and act for God’s gift of peace in the world today, Bishop Peter Jugis told hundreds gathered for a Memorial Day Mass at St. Patrick Cathedral.
The May 28 Mass was offered for all men and women in the military – deceased, active and retired – and their families.
“It is important that everyone pray for peace, because in our modern world today, with the weapons of mass destruction which are so readily available, wars and conflicts anywhere in the world we know can escalate to the point of potentially enveloping the whole world. So any conflict, any war, anywhere in the world should be of concern for everyone in the world,” Bishop Jugis said.
“For that reason we cannot let up on our prayers – asking God for peace, asking God to change hearts and to bring conversion, and to grant the grace of reconciliation to those who are in conflict with each other, to remove hatred.”
“Peace is a gift from God,” he emphasized. “God has already placed a desire for peace in our hearts. That’s the way He made us as human beings. We have this innate desire for harmony with others.”
“Conflict is the result of sin,” he continued. “Conflict doesn’t come from God, it comes from sin, whether as the result of jealousy, envy, hatred, revenge or pride.”
“We must act on that gift that God has given to us,” Bishop Jugis said. “We must work and pray to bring it about in the world.”
In so doing, people should follow Jesus Christ’s example, he said, particularly keeping in mind the Beatitudes and His words, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they are called children of God.”
The Church must act “as a leaven in the world for peace, being a prophetic witness and challenging the world because of the message of Christ we carry and implement to bring peace and reconciliation into the world.”
The bishop concluded by asking for God’s mercy and kindness “for all those who have given their lives in service to our country, and for those who are currently serving, for our veterans, and for all the sick and disabled.”
— Patricia L. Guilfoyle, editor. Videography provided by James Sarkis.
Pictured at top: Retired Army Col. Rebecca Tomsyck and Army Reserve Lt. Col. Nicole French, both of Charlotte, greet Bishop Peter Jugis after the Mass for the Military offered May 28 at St. Patrick Cathedral in Charlotte.
