‘Origins’ this week features limbo document, text on education in Africa

Here’s the rundown on what’s in the latest issue of Origins: CNS Documentary Service:

• What happens to infants who die without having been baptized remains one of theology’s thorniest questions and one that the church has yet to answer definitively despite the once widely taught theory of limbo, observes the International Theological Commission in a new study. Growing numbers of unbaptized infants give the question new urgency, it notes, and developments in theology and in society during the last 50 years give “serious theological and liturgical grounds for the hope that unbaptized infants who die will be saved and brought into eternal happiness even though there is not an explicit teaching on this question found in revelation.” (Subscribers: click here; also, CNS story here)
• Archbishop Celestino Migliore, Vatican ambassador to the United Nations, says that education, particularly the education of women, holds the key to African development.  (Subscribers: click here)

When grief meets grace

What would you do if an alcohol-impaired driver was responsible for your 23-year-old son’s death? The Leaven in Kansas City, Kan., has the incredible story of how one mother in that situation not only forgave the driver but also allowed him to console her and how she drew close to him as if he was a member of her family. This is a story of faith and mercy you won’t soon forget.

Man owes his life to prayer and an organ donor

Billy Maggio was well on his way to becoming a military jet pilot when cancer derailed his plans. He’s alive today thanks to the prayers of thousands of strangers and a timely liver transplant, according to this Florida Catholic story.

Abuse crisis response stresses caring, knowledge

The clergy sex abuse scandal brought forth all kinds of disconcerting emotions from Catholics nationwide, but The Record in Louisville, Ky., reports that a positive and promising result developed “away from the glare of television newscast floodlights and the voice recorders of newspaper reporters.” This story might not be all that unusual since many dioceses have similar programs, but it serves as a reminder that, as one archdiocesan official says, the church is no longer naive about the problem.

The journey to Easter

Staff photographer Michael Alexander of  The Georgia Bulletin in Atlanta tells the story in words and pictures of one couple’s journey to Catholicism despite some very personal challenges.

John Paul II film makes local premiere at Polish Film Festival

Movie-making is a big part of the makeup of Los Angeles, so it seems natural that a Polish film festival would be held there. The Tidings in Los Angeles has details on this year’s festival, highlighting films with Catholic themes to be shown.

After car wreck, priest ‘joyfully carries cross’

The Arkansas Catholic in Little Rock tells an inspirational story about a local priest’s recovery from a nasty traffic accident that’s left him unable to walk. A second story in the same edition tells how parishioners performed a “Catholic Extreme Makeover” to renovate his home for handicap accessibility.

Hunting for cold eggs

A 3-year-old boy high-fives his father after collecting a basket of eggs at the parish Easter egg hunt at St. James the Less Church in Highland, Ind., April 7. Temperatures in the low 20s had children bundled up with hats and gloves over their Easter outfits for the annual event. (CNS photo/Karen Callaway, Northwest Indiana Catholic).

Bipartisan STRIVE Act a good start to the immigration debate

In his column in the Denver Catholic Register, Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput says a bipartisan proposal introduced in Congress last month on immigration reform isn’t perfect but has many positive elements. The paper also covered a talk by the archbishop on immigration reform in which he called current immigration laws not only inadequate but schizophrenic.

Koala countdown

The next World Youth Day in Sydney, Australia, isn’t until 2008, but the National Catholic Register notes that it’s less than 500 days away and updates readers on preparations both in Australia and the United States.