Catholic Theological
Society of America

Hello Colleagues,

Just want to let you know that I have developed a new website on Pope Francis's reform of the church.  It is an effort to inform Catholics in the U.S. of the teachings and views of pope Francis, something that they do not often hear from the U.S. bishops and priests. Check it out if you like.

John Connolly

https://www.ref21cencath.com/

During graduate studies in ethics and society at the University of Chicago Divinity School in the late 1980s, I lived a few blocks from the Henry Moore sculpture commemorating the first self-sustained nuclear reaction, a key moment in the development of the atomic bomb. I often wondered what went through the minds of those brilliant contributors to the Manhattan Project as they labored under the bleachers of Stagg Field. As we mark the 75th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, perhaps this reflective return to that site, published in the Martin Marty Center's "Sightings," will aid your own reflections on those deeply troubled times--and on ours. 

https://divinity.uchicago.edu/sightings/articles/moral-reckoning-under-mushroom-cloud

CFP - due 10/1/20, Annual Meeting of the Society for Christian Scholarship in Music (Feb. 25-27, 2021) Mercer University, Macon, GA.

CFP - due 8/15/20, Newman: Scholar, Convert, Reformer, Cardinal, Saint (Oct. 23), Regis College.

Rev. Valentine J. Peter, “Val
November 20, 1934 – June 30, 2020

Father Valentine J. Peter expanded Father Flanagan’s dream of changing the way America cares for her children and families. He led the growth of Boys Town from the Village of Boys Town, Nebraska, eventually to 19 sites in 14 states and Washington D.C. 

An Omaha native, Father Peter was the fourth executive director of Boys Town. He assumed the post June 15, 1985.  Under his direction, Boys Town grew to provide direct care, including hospital treatment, to more than 43,000 children each year. A million more were helped each year through outreach and training programs. 

Father Peter is on the boards or committees of more than 20 national and local organizations. He has published numerous books and popular and scholarly articles.  Father Peter holds doctorate degrees in both Canon Law and Theology. 

His service to children as a youth advocate, educator, and friend has spanned more than four decades. Father Peter retired as Executive Director of Boys Town on July 1, 2005.  He served as Executive Director Emeritus and Senior Associate Pastor at the Immaculate Conception Dowd Memorial Chapel for a number of years before fully retiring and moving to New Cassel Retirement Home in Omaha.  He continued his mission of working with Boys Town alumni until his passing. 

Father Peter passed away on June 30, 2020 and is buried in his family plot in Omaha, Nebraska.  

Above text was written and posted online by:

Boys Town National Alumni Association, June 2020,  accessed  July 27, 2020 at https://www.boystownalumni.org/article.html?aid=157.

See also: 

https://heafeyheafey.com/rev-val-j-peter/

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon him.
May the souls of all the faithful departed,
through the mercy of God, rest in peace.

On June 3, 2020, the CTSA Board approved a Statement on Racial Injustice.  The full text of the document is posted at https://ctsa-online.org/BoardStatements.  

Acknowledgements:

The members who contributed to produce this statement include the leadership of the CTSA Committee on Underrepresented Ethnic and Racial Groups (CUERG), Cristina Lledo Gomez and Melissa Pagán-Rubalcaba, with a special intervention by Joseph Flipper in consultation with Bryan Massingale, and Board members María Pilar Aquino, Paul Lakeland, and Kevin Burke. The Board is grateful for their contribution.

Join the conversation by logging into the CTSA website and post a comment.

Fr. Daniel R. Kendall, S.J. passed away at 2:30 a.m., Tuesday, May 26 at Sacred Heart Jesuit Center in Los Gatos. Please keep him and his fellow Jesuits in your prayers.

Dan's bio listed on USFCA's website:  https://www.usfca.edu/faculty/daniel-kendall

Eternal rest grand unto Dan, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon him.
May His soul and the souls of the faithful departed
through the mercy of God,
rest in peace.

The CTSA remembers long standing member Sr. Suzanne Noffke, O.P. who died on April 14, 2020.  The following text is from the Dominican Sisters of Racine, Wisconsin (https://oppeace.org/blog/2020/04/15/sr-suzanne-noffke-op/).

Sr. Suzanne Noffke, OP, a Racine Dominican author and linguist, went home to God on Tuesday, April 14 after a long illness. She was 83 years old. Born Ione Noffke, she entered the aspirancy at 15. At 18, she was received into the Congregation received the name Sister Suzanne. A few years later she began teaching and earned a bachelor’s degree from Dominican College and a doctorate in linguistics from the University of Wisconsin- Madison.

She went on to serve as president of the community, as well as a translator, writer and historian, but was best known as one of the world’s leading experts on Saint Catherine of Siena. She lectured internationally and led numerous retreats based on the life and thought of Saint Catherine. She also published annotated translations of all of Catherine’s extant works (The Dialogue, 1980; The Prayers, 1983; The Letters of Catherine of Siena, 2000, 2001, 2007, 2008), and a two-volume thematic Anthology (2011), a book of essays (Catherine of Siena: Vision Through a Distant Eye, 1996, 2006), and numerous articles.

In an interview, Sr. Suzanne said, “Every phase of my ministry has been exciting and filled with meaning for me, but especially meaningful has been my work with making accessible to others our community history and the life and thought of our patron, Catherine of Siena.” She shared her knowledge and wisdom generously throughout her lifetime.

Please hold Suzanne, her family and her many friends in your thoughts and prayers and love. May she rest in peace.

Sr. Suzanne’s body will be cremated. A Memorial Service will be held at a later date.

Eternal rest grant unto Suzanne, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon her.
May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed,
through the mercy of God, rest in peace.

Remembering CTSA member Joseph Martos who died on March 24, 2020.  To date, an obituary has not been posted on the web.  In its place, I provide you with his biography as posted on his website.

BIOGRAPHY

Joseph Martos is a retired professor of religion and philosophy living in Louisville, Kentucky, where he divides his time between writing, social activism, and public speaking. He has held full-time teaching positions in Louisville KY, Allentown PA, Cincinnati OH, and Sioux City IA, and he has taught summer courses in over a dozen universities in the United States, Canada and Australia. Earlier in his career, he was a high school teacher and, before that, a parish religious education director. He did graduate study in philosophy and theology at Gregorian University and Boston College, and he earned a doctorate from DePaul University in Chicago, writing a dissertation on Bernard Lonergan’s theory of transcendent knowledge. Dr. Martos has written seven books on the sacraments, the most popular of which is Doors to the Sacred: A Historical Introduction to Sacraments in the Catholic Church. He has also co-authored four books on spirituality with Fr. Richard Rohr, and he has co-edited two books on Christian history and church practices with sociologist Pierre Hégy. May God Bless America: George W. Bush and Biblical Morality, written just prior to the 2004 election, was on religion and politics. His book, The Sacraments: An Interdisciplinary and Interactive Study, has an accompanying website, www.TheSacraments.org. Deconstructing Sacramental Theology and Reconstructing Catholic Ritual, written for an academic audience and published in 2015, documents the historical development of Roman Catholic doctrines about the sacraments, proves that they are based on misinterpretations of biblical and early church texts, and shows why they have become disconnected from the lives of Catholics today. Honest Rituals, Honest Sacraments: Letting Go of Doctrines and Celebrating What’s Real, published in 2017, makes the same argument for the general reader, using less technical language and suggesting ways to develop authentic sacramental practices in the future. His current project is reworking a course about Bernard Lonergan’s Insight: A Study of Human Understanding into an online program that can be accessed by people who are interested in learning how the human mind works by becoming familiar with their own cognitional operations. Dr. Martos has a continuing interest in world peace, social responsibility, and ecology. He has taught courses on Christian ethics and he has been a member of local and national organizations such as Pax Christi, Bread for the World, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and Amnesty International. As a member of his parish’s social justice committee, he has visited Nicaragua and reported on conditions there, and he has also made trips to rebuild hurricane-damaged homes. He is an avid news reader and distributes internet articles daily to people interested in national and world affairs through his free news service, NewsLinks.Dr. Martos and his wife Arden live in a Victorian house in Old Louisville, where they are active members of the neighborhood association. Both remarried, between them they have eight children, fourteen grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren (accessed on 4/7/20 at https://josephmartos.academia.edu/).

Eternal rest grant to Joseph, O Lord,
and let light perpetual shine upon him.
May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed,
through the mercy of God, rest in peace.