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The ou Diocese of Savannah Vol. 80, No. 13 $.50 PER ISSUE Thursday, March 30, 2000 Contents Headline Hopscotch 2 News 3 Commentary 4-5 Cathedral 6 Youth Ministry 7 Faith Alive! 8-9 Notices 10-11 Last But Not Least 12 Pope preaches peace, reconciliation on Holy Land pilgrimage Pope John Paul II prays at the Western Wall, Judaism's holiest site, March 26 in Jerusalem. He was the first pope in history to pray at the wall. The prayer has been placed in the Yad Vashem Museum. o o _c a. Jerusalem (CNS) W ith slow but determined steps, Pope John Paul II made his long-desired pilgrimage to the Holy Land, preaching peace and reconcilia tion among the region’s peoples and religions. From the heights of Mount Nebo in Jordan to the shores of the Sea of Galilee in Israel, the pope visited holy sites of the Old and New Testaments, making dramatic gestures of respect for Jews and Muslims and pleading for the unity of Christians. Walking carefully through a mine field of political sensitivities, Pope John Paul also urged a renewed com mitment to the Middle East peace process, guaranteeing the security of Israel but also satisfying the Palestinians’ right to a homeland. The March 20-26 trip culminated in Jerusalem with visits to the city’s holi est Muslim, Jewish and Christian sites. While at every step he made over tures to other religions and other Christian churches, he brought energy to his own personal prayers at church es marking the site of the Angel Ga briel’s annunciation to Mary in Na zareth, Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem and, especially, his death in Jerusalem. In fact, instead of resting before go ing to the airport, the pope returned to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher to pray at what is believed to be the site of Jesus’ crucifixion, death and resur rection. The pope brought the same intensi ty of prayer with him March 26 to Jerusalem’s Western Wall, the holiest site of Judaism. The stooped pontiff stood and placed his trembling hand upon the massive stone blocks of the 2,000- year-old wall, as Jews have done for centuries. As is the Jewish practice, (Continued on page 3) Ascension to remain on Thursday in Atlanta Province Atlanta a rchbishop John F. Donoghue has announced that the obser- XT^vance of the feast of the Ascension, a holy day of obligation, will remain unchanged and will be celebrated on Thursday, May 24 in the Archdiocese of Atlanta and the dioceses of the province. Last summer the Holy See approved a request by the U.S. Latin- rite bishops to permit each ecclesiastical province in the country to transfer observance of the Ascension from Thursday to the follow ing Sunday. Approval required that at least two-thirds of the bish ops of a province vote in favor of the change. An ecclesiastical province consists of an archdiocese and the dioceses under it. Archbishop Donoghue is the metropolitan of the province that consists of the dioceses of Charleston, South Carolina, Raleigh and Charlotte, North Carolina, Savannah and Atlanta, Georgia. The bishops of these dioceses voted to observe the Ascension on Thursday, May 24, 2000. The Church’s liturgical law provides for the transfer of three Solemnities of the Lord—the Epiphany, the Ascension and the Body and Blood of Christ—to Sunday if they are not observed as holy days of obligation. The Epiphany and Corpus Christi were transferred to Sunday in the U.S. in or before 1969 because they were not observed as holy days in the United States. The Ascension is the other solemnity in that category, but the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, with the Holy See’s approval, has left it to each province to transfer it from Thursday to Sunday or not. Cathedral renovation at mid-point The exterior restoration of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist can be seen from the street. But the interior restoration has been off-limits to the public for 9 months. The Southern Cross takes you inside the Cathedral for a look at the renovations on page 6. The dedication of the restored Cathedra! is set for November 29.