Latest news with #Franciscan
Yahoo
4 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Sharpsville native, Kennedy Catholic graduate ordained a priest in Erie
SHARON, Pa. (WKBN) — A big step of faith for a Sharpsville native and 2015 Kennedy Catholic graduate. Reverend Michael Christopher Scanga was ordained Friday into the sacred priesthood. He was one of two men who officially became priests in the Diocese of Erie at St. Peter Cathedral. The other was the Reverend Brandon Matthew Feikels. Both graduated from Gannon University. Scanga said the Cathedral was packed, and he was so grateful for the support. 'It really is an incredible time. It was overwhelming for me. I felt like my emotions needed time to catch up to what just happened, because my heart was just so full,' Scanga said. 'But it was also so beautiful for me to see the faces of my family and of my friends.' Scanga credits his family and the Shenango Valley Catholic community for instilling his faith. 'The perspective I have now, I just really appreciate the teachers I had in school; they really believed in me and all my peers,' Scanga said. 'I encountered Jesus through people in my life who were praying every day.' After high school, Scanga did not join the seminary right away, instead studying psychology at a Franciscan university in Steubenville. 'All my friends thought that I was going to go to seminary right away, but I needed some time to sort of figure it out,' Scanga said. 'I went in different directions in college, but ultimately, at the end, I still felt called to be a priest. I couldn't deny it.' Scanga said the biggest moments for him during his time at the seminary were every day moments with fellow seminarians and the relationships he built along the way. 'I've never laughed harder in my life than in seminay,' Scanga said. 'People have this exalted view of seminary, and it is a beautiful place, but it's so human in the best of ways. All of us are just real with each other…we're learning and growing together.' Scanga said he encourages all men, Catholic or not, to explore their faith and be open to being a priest. 'There aren't a lot of [priests]. We need more to take care of our people,' Scanga said. 'Don't be afraid. Jesus still calls people today, and it's worth it.' Scanga has been assigned to Saint James' Parish in Erie, where he served while he was in the seminary. On June 7, Reverend Travis Seagraves will be ordained to the priesthood in the Diocese of Youngstown. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Atlantic
22-05-2025
- General
- Atlantic
In Times of Trouble, Seek Moral Beauty
Want to stay current with Arthur's writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. Maximilian Kolbe was a Polish priest and Franciscan friar who was arrested by the Gestapo in 1941 for hiding Jews and publishing anti-Nazi tracts, then sent to Auschwitz. He might have survived the camp and the war had he looked out for himself. Instead, he volunteered to take the place of a man randomly selected to be starved to death in retribution for another prisoner's escape. After several weeks without food, he was still clinging to life and leading other prisoners in prayer. The impatient guards finished him off by lethal injection. Kolbe submitted calmly, offering his arm to the executioner and waiting for death. His story lives on, in no small part because the man whose place Kolbe took, Franciszek Gajowniczek, did survive the camp. In the decades after the war, his account of Kolbe's self-abnegation came to inspire millions of people, of all faiths and no faith. This is an example of how an act of moral beauty—visible in any form of charity, kindness, compassion, forgiveness, courage, or self-sacrifice—can acquire an extraordinary power. When you can see moral beauty in others, you will find goodness in yourself as well. If you're frustrated with, or cynical about, the state of the world today, or if you simply want a sure way to get happier, looking for such moral beauty might be just what you need. Jonathan Freedland: The unheeded warning Acts of selflessness are at the center of many ancient teachings and religious traditions, both Abrahamic and karmic. Kolbe's own Christian faith teaches, 'Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.' Charity toward others is one of the Five Pillars of Islam. Dharma in Hinduism refers to the righteous path that a person's life should take, which includes being honest, avoiding causing harm, and showing generosity toward others. Although self-sacrifice might seem unnatural and against human nature, the reverse is true. Some evolutionary biologists contend that altruism is an innate trait that evolved to foster cohesion in kinship groups; they note that the characteristic is also found among nonhuman primates. This behavior extends even to laying down one's life for friends and kin, a phenomenon that scholars believe occurs because of what they call 'identity fusion': I am willing to die for you because I believe my membership in this community is paramount, so defending it is worth my sacrifice; in that sense, I am dying for me, too. Such courage and self-sacrifice toward kin can certainly be inspiring, but moral beauty is most striking in acts of goodness toward others with whom one does not have obvious ties, exhibiting a degree of altruism that is clearly contrary to one's individual interests. This occurs when a person helps another for no reason at all, forgives someone who truly does not deserve it, or—in the most extreme circumstances—gives up their life for a stranger. Witnessing this kind of moral beauty elicits what the social psychologist Jonathan Haidt calls 'moral elevation,' which is experienced both psychologically and neurologically. Indeed, researchers writing in the journal Brain Research have identified specific areas of the brain that are stimulated by moral beauty. The psychologist Rhett Diessner has written a great deal about moral beauty and elevation. With his co-authors, he notes that this association induces 'pleasant feelings of warmth in the chest, feeling uplifted, moved.' Further, as Diessner told me by email, new research undertaken in his laboratory at Lewis-Clark State College, in Idaho, demonstrates that these 'magical' feelings lead to a desire to be better people ourselves and to help others. This results in prosocial actions, which can provide higher levels of individual and collective happiness. Happiness derived from self-sacrifice is much deeper than plain positive feelings. Psychologists writing in 2016 showed that people feel that their life has more significance when they either help another person, without self-aggrandizement or any expectation of gain, or work to make the world a better place. The scholars found this has the greatest benefit when people are suffering from a loss of their sense of significance, perhaps after being rejected in a relationship or losing a job. Arthur C. Brooks: A compliment that really means something Putting all the research together, we know that witnessing acts of moral beauty can elevate us to higher happiness, all the more so if we imitate these acts. We should seek out moral beauty in our lives, especially in times of suffering, when we need inspiration and a reminder that there is good in the world. Here are three ways to do so. 1. Keep more morally beautiful company. One obvious way to find more moral beauty in your life is to spend time with people who are generous and dedicated to other-serving behavior—and to avoid those who are not. This is not always easy; in fact, we commonly seek out people who are negative in the ways that we are—especially toward others—because making common cause helps us feel bonded to them. But this can create a vicious cycle that only intensifies unhappiness through mutually reinforcing negativity. So ditch the gossip circle, and find friends who are more positive and generous than you are, people who model the moral beauty—and thus the happiness—that you want in your life. 2. Make moral beauty your leisure pastime. I have met many people who have dramatically improved their lives by dedicating their leisure time to serving others. They may spend their weekends and free time volunteering in their communities or take service trips instead of beach vacations. What they typically tell me is that when they volunteer for the first time, they're deeply inspired by the people they meet, and want to feel that way more. When they make serving others a way of life, their happiness and sense of meaning rise—just as the research predicts. 3. Practice gratitude. Humans are not by nature grateful creatures. Our survival as a species has favored individuals who are vigilant, suspicious, and hyperaware of threats, rather than those who bask in the glow of gratitude. This has resulted in what psychologists call 'negativity bias,' which causes things we resent, such as others' bad behavior, to grab our attention, whereas the things that we're grateful for, such as acts of moral beauty, tend not to. (This shared bias obviously explains in part the appeal of the mean-gossip circle.) You can override this tendency by consciously focusing on things you're grateful for. By taking time each day to reflect thankfully, you will start to notice acts of generosity and self-sacrifice, and people who are good and kind. You'll see moral beauty all around you if you only stop to notice it. Arthur C. Brooks: The bliss of a quieter ego One last, important point: We are naturally drawn to moral beauty, and it is very good for us to follow that attraction. But many of us have a competing fascination with moral depravity. By way of illustration, from 2018 to 2021, documentary content on streaming services increased by 63 percent, with the largest growth in the genre of true crime; from 2019 to 2024, the number of true-crime-podcast listeners nearly tripled. According to the Pew Research Center, these trends were especially clear among women and people under 30. Scholars have tried to account for this rising interest only in a glancing way, suggesting that it provides a complex kind of pleasure that combines pursuit of knowledge with 'cultural tourism.' Maybe this anodyne description suffices, but it's hard not to feel that, at some level, such morbid curiosity is akin to focusing not on the beautiful acts of Maximilian Kolbe, but on the sadistic, deviant behavior of his captors. This is not actually an argument based on taste—or, rather, distaste. It concerns the risk to well-being, with potential longer-term damage to character. We know that consuming news about crime can raise fear and lead people to overestimate the danger of being a victim of crime. By analogy, treating moral ugliness as a form of entertainment may almost certainly arrest and even reverse the effects of moral beauty in your life. Instead of achieving elevation, expect depression. But choose what's morally beautiful, and you will be rewarded.
Chicago Tribune
21-05-2025
- Health
- Chicago Tribune
Franciscan Health undecided on reopening Chesterton urgent care
Franciscan Health hasn't decided yet whether to reopen its ExpressCare in Chesterton, although a state senator said he cleared the way legally in recent legislation to support restarting the operation. The Franciscan Health building at 770 Indian Boundary Road houses the Emergency Department and doctors' offices. ExpressCare also operated inside the facility until Jan. 1. The closing occurred because House Bill 1004, passed in 2023, required health care providers to charge ambulatory rates for urgent care services, making it too expensive for Franciscan to continue Express Care. Under the prior arrangement, ExpressCare — the only urgent care facility in Chesterton — operated 24 hours a day and worked closely with the Emergency Department. The setup allowed patients who came in with non-emergency needs to the Emergency Department to be seamlessly transferred to ExpressCare within the same facility, said Lauri Keagle, a spokeswoman for Franciscan Health. Since Franciscan ExpressCare in Chesterton was open around the clock, there were higher operating costs, Keagle said. It had been the only Franciscan Health in Northwest Indiana where they operated an Emergency Department and ExpressCare at the same site. The ExpressCare signs outside the building are now covered up. State Sen. Rodney Pol, D-Chesterton, said he worked with Franciscan officials to include language in House Bill 1004, the 2025 version, to fix the issues that caused the closure of ExpressCare. However, Franciscan hasn't made a decision yet. 'We are currently evaluating the new language with our legal team and advisors,' said a statement prepared by Keagle. Pol said he would be surprised if a legal issue is blocking the reopening of ExpressCare. He said there may be another issue involved. The amendment that Pol was able to include created an exemption to allow for an urgent care facility to operate in a community with less than 20,000 residents, qualifying Chesterton. 'This was an issue I had to fight painstakingly for, fueled in large part from the outrcy from the community that did not know it (the closing) was coming,' Pol said. Pol talked about the issue with the Chesterton Town Council at its May 12 meeting. Councilwoman Erin Collins, D-2nd, called what Pol had done 'a significant win for Chesterton and surrounding communities.' House Bill 1004 in 2025 was 'very contentious' because it pitted the intent of lowering costs at nonprofit hospitals versus the impact on hospitals that serve the most Medicaid and Medicare patients and the viability of those facilities, Pol said. 'Trying to get support for an amendment that saves just the Chesterton facility from the prior 2023 legislation was no easy task as the battle raged on within the respective caucuses and out on the Senate floor,' Pol said. Keagle, in a reply from Franciscan, stated: 'We thank Sen. Pol for his tremendous effort to assist both Franciscan and his constituents with this legislation. Due to the complicated nature of the topic, we're evaluating the legislative language with our legal team and advisors to determine if it allows us to reopen.'
NDTV
20-05-2025
- NDTV
In Portugal: Why Travelling To A Chapel Made Of Human Bones Made Perfect Sense For A Birthday Trip
Portugal: Visiting a chapel made of human bones is not your usual birthday trip. No one wants to be reminded of mortality on the day they celebrate being born, but well, death is the only truth, like it or not. So, as I looked for day trips from Lisbon on my birthday last year, a little town glowed on the app. "The Town With The Human-Bone Chapel". Capela dos Ossos. And just like that, all other day trips were thrown out of the window, and I settled for Evora, a little reminder of life and death in central Portugal. The entry to the Chapel of Bones is chilling. The message on the entrance arch, even more. "We the bones that are here, for yours we wait." Neat. Grim. And just so true. The message of "dust to dust" echoes in every bone that holds up the Chapel of Bones. The chapel was built in the first half of the 17th century and is the oldest Chapel of Bones in Portugal. It was dedicated to the cult of the Souls of Purgatory (the cult of the dead or the cult of the abandoned, developed in Italy's Naples when the Plague killed more than half of the city's population). The bones of the burials connected to its convent were used to build the chapel. The skulls and bones of over 5,000 monks were turned into its walls. Capela dos Ossos lies within the Church of San Francisco at the southern edge of the town. For most day trips from Lisbon, this isn't the first stop. It is revealed to you after a fashion. The walk through Evora starts at its entrance, through its gardens and museum. First comes the Church of St Francis. It's only once you have ooh-ed and aah-ed at the interiors of this catholic place of worship that you are taken to the next stop: Capela dos Ossos. The Chapel of Bones, built by Franciscan friars, was inaugurated in 1816. Sunlight filters in through three windows in the bone-walls into a chamber that is otherwise quite dark. If you look up, you see a ceiling made of bricks painted white, with death motifs all over it. Yet another morbid message is scribbled on the roof: "Melior est dies mortis die nativitatis (Better is the day of death than the day of birth)". Is it? Maybe. Capela dos Ossos forces you into reflection. The chapel is a place of sober contemplation on the human facts of life and death, and that no one really escapes the latter, no matter who you are. So, "we the bones that are here, for yours we wait". Outside of Capela dos Ossos, the town diffuses into a tangle of white and yellow alleyways and lanes where you can pick up everything from an ice cream cone to fake Birkenstocks. Cork-soled sandals are everywhere. The city is among the world's largest exporters of cork. And pork. The best ham and pork products in Portugal come from this little town. The pigs, that feed on cork-oak acorns, later go on to serve as gastronomical delights around tables in Portugal. Evora is also home to some brilliant, unfussy food and wine. Robust reds and light whites that go very well with Portuguese food. At lunchtime, the entire city slows down to a stop. There's no one on the streets. The souvenir shops are shuttered shut. The bars and taverns have their shades drawn. The city holds you by the shoulders and sits you down for a leisurely lunch. Who was I to stray from the ways of Evora. So, a little Google search took me to Bistro Barao, a Tripadvisor-recommended legend, a door in a narrow lane that you can pass by without a second look. Bistro Barao seats 14 people at once. The room that the entrance leads to is a low-ceilinged, literal hole in the wall. It leads to another of the same, with three more tables inside. The restaurant is run by Manuel and Margarite. Margarite ruffles up the delicacies that her husband Manuel then takes to his guests. A team like no other. I chose a table by a wall that had scribbles from guests world over who Manuel, the one-man serving army at Bistro Barao, has served. He spoke very little English. I spoke zero Portuguese. But Google Translate bowed to Manuel's instincts as he brought me some of the best fish curry I have ever had... outside of Bengal, that is. He also picked a white to go with the fish. It was divine. An equally divine high accompanied me as I traipsed out of the restaurant, feeling full and fulfilled, out in a town where time seemed to have lost all meaning. Life is laidback in Evora. All of Evora's alleys eventually lead to Praça do Giraldo, the town square. A fountain lies at the centre of the square. The Henriquina Fountain's eight jets symbolise the eight streets that radiate from Praca do Giraldo. The municipality buildings and Evora's major banks are all around this square. There are many little keepsake stores around, in case you wanted to pick a bit of Evora to take home. From the city's well-preserved old town centre, you can still see the medieval walls that partially surround it. There are many monuments scattered all over town that date back to various historical periods, starting 2,000 years ago. Romans took over the town in 57 BC and turned it into a walled city. Then came the Moors, under Tariq ibn-Ziyad. After 400 years of Islamic rule, Gerald the Fearless snatched Evora from the Moors in 1165 AD, and Portuguese king Alfonso I got the town under his rule the following year. The Roman Temple from around the 1st century BC is still around. It began being called the Temple of Diana long after; as recently as the 17th century. All around Evora lie the dust of civilisations past. The stories of its many conquerors. The many men and women who built and are buried in Evora. The monks whose bones were dug up. The skulls that still wait for the ones who haven't yet made it there. Inside that bone-chilling bone chapel.
The Irish Sun
18-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Irish Sun
Fans make same joke about ‘hilariously random combo' as Michael D Higgins beams in unexpected pic with football legend
FANS compared Michael D Higgins and Zlatan Ibrahimovic to "classic big man-small man combinations" after their random meeting in Italy. President Higgins and wife Sabrina 2 Michael D Higgins is in Rome for the inauguration of Pope Louis XIV Credit: Getty Images - Getty 2 He met with Zlatan Ibrahimovic Credit: Twitter/President of Ireland And it was during this trip that he met and beamed in a pic with former star Ibrahimovic. The photo, which was shared to Ireland ' account, showing the big Swede presenting Higgins with an AC Milan jersey with 'Higgins 1' on the back. The contrast in heights between the two, as well as the sheer randomness of the meeting, led to the photo going viral . Some made light of the number on the back of the shirt. Read More on Football One quipped: "Ah Cmon I know he's the President and all that. But he's too small to be a goal keeper…" And a second posted: "1? Michael D would be a terrible goalkeeper, surely?" Others, meanwhile, used the chance to compare the pair to past great striking combinations One joked: "hilariously random combo. i giggled." Most read in Football A second said: "would've been a devastating partnership for Harry Redknapp circa 2008" A third posted: "[Jermaine] Defoe and [Peter] Crouch under Redknapp" Pope Leo holds baby & waves to crowds in St Peter's Square as world leaders gather for Pontiff's inauguration mass A fourth said: "Little man big man combination." which another echoed by saying: "Classic big man small man combination" And a sixth kept it closer to home, tweeting: " The Mass of Inauguration started at 10am in St Peter 's Square to officially begin the Pontificate of - and many world leaders have travelled over for the important event. During the ceremony, the new pontiff is given the pallium and the fisherman's ring as symbols of his new authority - but this may be slightly tweaked as every pope is free to make it more personal. US Vice President It is expected that Leo following the Mass. In the afternoon, the President and Sabina visited St Isidore's College in The Franciscan Community are this year celebrating the 400th anniversary of the College, which was founded by Irish Franciscan Luke Wadding in 1625.
