Fall 2012 - Saint Thomas More - Yale University

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Not For Sale Katie Byrnes, Assistant Chaplain This past year, our community became a partner in the Not For Sale program’s international anti-slavery efforts. As a new partner, we joined NFS to focus on new ideas, diverse networks, and innovative ventures that will result in a more immediate, effective, and sustainable plan to tackle the root causes of human trafficking. Not For Sale continues to coordinate across social sectors such as local non-profit organizations, industry leaders in business and governments to facilitate investments and incubate social enterprises. By doing so, they create futures for communities that are at risk for human trafficking. These sustainable solutions are being executed successfully in specific regions, which can then be replicated across the globe. By becoming a Not For Sale partner, we are now an important part of the solution to help people whose freedom has been stolen. As Catholics, we are committed to ensuring freedom and hope for those most vulnerable around the globe. Latino Ministry at Yale Fr. Eddie DeLeón, Assistant Chaplain Human trafficking is the second fastest growing criminal industry in our world today, grossing an estimated $32 billion every year. The global slave trade presently holds over 30 million people in bondage, which is more than at any other time in history. Men, women, and children are bought and sold like commodities and forced to work in brothels, hotels, restaurants, factories, fields, and more. Traffickers prey on vulnerable populations, from refugees to slum dwellers, using deceptive tales of rewarding work to coerce victims. In most Not For Sale concert at STM cases, trafficking victims are marginalized people who live in poverty and lack opportunities. Not For Sale recognizes that ending human trafficking requires not only educated and equipped abolitionists but also resources to provide alternative economic opportunities to people living in poverty. This spring we screened The Dark Side of Chocolate exposing the unfair conditions around the cocoa industry and hosted a discussion about our responsibility as consumers to make better choices. Attendees feasted on fairly traded chocolate as a sweet reward! We encourage everyone to partner with Not for Sale. Learn more at www. notforsalecampaign.org. Latino liturgical celebrations are powerful ways to experience the Divine in the very ordinariness of life. Many liturgical celebrations can draw the community into a deeper relationship with both God and each other. Last December was one such experience. We, at Saint Thomas More Chapel, celebrated the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The presence of both graduate and undergraduate students, accompanied by other members of the Yale community, made it an incredible experience. The 10 pm Mass began outside at the piazza with a candlelight procession accompanied by the sweet Procession begins in the Golden Center piazza melodious sounds of a mariachi band. The bilingual Mass encouraged full and active participation of the gathered assembly and was followed by a fiesta consisting of Mexican food, piñata breaking and more mariachi music. There was laughter, joy and pride. However, to end simply with the sharing of this celebration through an article would be a mistake for this was a clarion call to all members of the community that within our midst are over 500 Latino students on the Yale campus who need to be served. With this event, working closely with La Casa Cultural and the Latino faculty, STM will embark on new initiatives to provide creative outreach for our Latino students! Hasta la proxima. STM Young Alumni Group Will Edwards '02, alumni trustee One of Saint Thomas More Chapel’s great gifts is the warm sense of community that it fosters, a connection that lasts long after students graduate and go into the world. It was with this in mind that, earlier this year, a group of STM alumni formed the Young Alumni Group. The mission of the group is to maintain that vibrant sense of community among alumni by connecting them to the chapel and its programs, to serve as a network and resource for graduating seniors, to engage the alumni community in social or service events, and to promote ways for the group to support the continued success of the chapel and center. Young alumni at the Yale Club HHS Mandate Dialogue Christian Burset GRD'11, LAW'13 We are off to a strong start. After just a few months, the group has nearly eighty members around the country, and we held an enjoyable kick-off event at the Yale Club of New York City at the end of April at which Fr. Bob spoke and visited with a group of about thirty recent graduates. We are in the process of Bl. John Paul II once called Saint Thomas More a symbol of “the inalienable dignity of the human conscience” and “[t]he defense of the Church’s freedom from unwarranted interference by the State.” In the spirit of our chapel’s patron, the Graduate Council and Catholic Law Students’ Association cosponsored a panel discussion on one of today’s most controversial questions of conscience: the Obama Administration’s proposed mandate that all employers—including many religious charities—insure the full spectrum of FDA-approved contraceptives and sterilization procedures. The mandate has drawn fire from a range of religious leaders and institutions, including the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and Sr. Carol Keehan of the Catholic Health Association, who supported the Administration’s health reform but attacked the mandate as “unacceptable.” These critics argue that the mandate damages religious liberty by forcing institutions to pay for treatments that violate their beliefs. Though the mandate has sparked controversy among many faiths, our panel offered three distinctly Catholic perspectives on the issue. Marc DeGirolami, an assistant professor at Saint John’s University Law School, discussed the legal and constitutional implications of the mandate. Matthew Boudway ’98, an associate editor at Commonweal Yale alumni and friends reconnect in NYC developing plans for further events and other outreach in the coming year and we are excited to keep building momentum. If you are a young alumnus/a and are interested in becoming part of our group, please join us. We are always happy to welcome new members and their ideas. Together, we can bring the wonderful sense of community developed at STM beyond the Yale campus. Contact: Jamie Cappetta, jamie.cappetta@yale.edu Magazine, focused on the debate’s cultural and theological dimensions. Finally, Ashley McGuire, editor-in-chief of the web magazine Altcatholicah and a fellow at The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, offered her perspective as a frequent commentator on faith, gender, and religious liberty. The session concluded with a spirited question-and-answer session. Because the discussion took place at the Yale Law School—part of the Graduate Council’s ongoing effort to expand its outreach—it was able to attract a number of new faces as well as STM regulars. The event even raised our profile beyond Yale, thanks to a callout on the Catholic legal theory blog Mirror of Justice. Students praying by candlelight at Our Lady Of Guadalupe Mass 4 5
Bulldog Days David Suwondo '13 This past April, hundreds of newly-admitted future Yalies descended on campus for Bulldog Days, the university’s threeday program for students accepted to the Class of 2016. This year, equipped with a giant Saint Thomas More Chapel poster board and custom T-shirts proudly identifying ourselves as Catholic, the members of the Undergraduate Council (UGC) staffed a table at the university-wide Extracurricular Bazaar, where we reached out to hundreds of Catholic pre-frosh and handed out flyers filled with photos from the past year at STM and highlights of Catholic life at Yale. That evening, the UGC hosted a well-attended marshmallow dodgeball in the piazza and later—amidst an impressive dessert buffet featuring a flowing chocolate fountain—the new Yalies were warmly welcomed by the UGC and the chaplains. Gathering in the courtyard and the lecture hall, members of the incoming Class of 2016 listened to short reflections given by the UGC co-chairs, watched a welcome video prepared by the UGC, and accompanied us on tours of the chapel and center. For me, seeing the awe and excitement on each new face that day was an incredibly moving experience. It was deeply gratifying and humbling to welcome the newest members of our community to a place that has truly become home for me, to see the expressions of wonder and amazement on each of their faces as they walked through the doors of the Golden Center for the first time, and to give them a taste (literally and figuratively) of the vibrancy of Catholic life at Yale and the community that sustains it here at STM. But what’s even more moving for me is the knowledge that for many of these students, those doors will soon become familiar ones, through which they will pass countless Marshmallow dodgeball during Bulldog Days David Suwondo '13 more times throughout their bright college years at Yale. They will be the next lectors and Eucharistic Ministers; soup kitchen volunteers and CCD teachers; Small Church Communities and UGC members. Three years ago, when I first walked through those now-familiar doors, I felt that same sense of awe and amazement. Three years later, I still do. Chocolate fountain during Bulldog Days The Church and Occupy Wall Street: What Are Christians to Think? Craig A. Ford, Jr., m.a.r. '12 As 2011 came to a close, it seemed to many here on campus that the Occupy Wall Street demonstration was only beginning to take shape. As lively conversation ensued that doubtlessly reflected the varied political and economic perspectives of the community at Saint Thomas More Chapel, the questions themselves seemed to take on a particular urgency in New Haven as the Green became the demonstration site of Occupy New Haven—what do these occupiers here want? Why should I care about Occupy here? Who’s actually protesting here, and why are they doing so? The Graduate Council decided to contribute to this conversation by hosting an event that offered alternative ways to think about the Occupy movement that reflected Christian concerns. On January 15th, nearly fifty students accepted the Graduate Council’s invitation to attend The Church and Occupy Wall Street: What are Christians to Think? The event featured a panel of individuals representing different perspectives from which to approach the Occupy movement: Professor Kathryn Tanner, Yale Divinity School, who researches topics at the intersection of theology and economics; Rev. John Gage, pastor of the United Church on the Green, whose community provided access to restrooms and meeting space for Occupy New Haven; Jeremy Kessler, a student at Yale Law School, whose work has provided a historical perspective into the significance of the Occupy movement as a collective act of conscientious objection; and Nathan Schneider who was among the first journalists to interview occupiers at the Occupy Wall Street site. Together these panelists provided students with the tools for engaging the issues raised by Occupy Wall Street and for thinking more broadly about how to continue Christ’s mission in our complicated world. Occupy New Haven ESTEEM Capstone Conference 2012 "ESTEEM helped me see that the Church not only welcomes my full participation but requires it. It was a privilege to have this space to really discuss the problems facing the Church, the promise of the future, and how our own gifts can fit." -ESTEEM participant 2012 ESTEEM Year 2 Michelle Towster GRD'13 Engaging Students to Enliven the Ecclesial Mission, or ESTEEM, is a program that educates and empowers Catholic college and graduate students to continue their involvement in the Church following graduation through leadership in their local parishes and dioceses. This past year, thirteen students met biweekly to discuss topics including church history, ecclesiology, governance, Catholic social teaching, and our baptismal call as Catholics. We were blessed with both inspiring mentors from the community and wonderful guest speakers such as Professor Janet Ruffing, Yale Divinity School and Professor Paul Lakeland, the Chair of Catholic Studies at Fairfield University. We also participated in a benefit concert for Not for Sale, an organization on a mission to abolish human trafficking and learned about this modern-day problem and how we as Catholics are called to act. Our year’s work culminated in the ESTEEM Capstone Conference in April, where we were able to meet with and learn from the other ESTEEM groups from across the country including: Ohio State; Michigan State; UCLA; Sacred Heart University; Stanford; California State East Bay; and Purdue. It was at this event, discussing the themes that had shaped our year, that the members of our group realized how much we had learned and grown as Catholics and leaders. "I enjoyed my ESTEEM experience tremendously. It was great to be able to sit down with a student and discuss such a wide range of non-academic subjects. I already knew my mentee, but it was fun to really talk about issues that affect us in life. Even though our official ESTEEM time has concluded, I know we will continue to meet and then be in touch over the years." -Professor Nancy Ruddle, ESTEEM mentor 6 7
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Fall 2012 - Saint Thomas More - Yale University

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