A bankruptcy judge approved a $39.2 million settlement Oct. 21 between the Diocese of Duluth and victims/survivors of clergy sexual abuse. Announced at a press conference in Duluth, the decision gives final approval to a joint agreement reached earlier this year and ends a nearly four-year bankruptcy process for the diocese. It settles all claims against the diocese and 30 of its parishes.
Without knowing it, Joan Gecik has been preparing for her new job as executive director of The Catholic Cemeteries her entire life — personally and professionally. But the first notable influence came in early childhood. After Sunday Mass, her parents would take their 10 kids out for a picnic at the cemetery — a free, safe and beautiful place.
Milah Kourouma was caught off guard when she sat down for a Pre-Synod Prayer and Listening Event for college students at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul Oct. 15.
Six years ago, Jen Collins was newly married and enrolled in both Luther Seminary and Bethel Seminary in St. Paul. “It was difficult to find a place to live that was affordable for our income; we didn’t have a lot of wiggle room,” she said. “We knew we wanted to be fairly close to the seminaries and my husband’s job in Minneapolis. ”The need for affordable housing, which the Metropolitan Council, a regional planning and policy-making body for the Twin Cities area, defines as costing households no more than 30 percent of their annual gross income, is found not only in the inner cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. It’s prevalent, and increasing, in the suburbs.
Celeste Raspanti, a volunteer archivist at the Cathedral of St. Paul, remembers stories her mother told about their family forging a friendship at the dinner table with St. Frances Cabrini as they helped her minister to the poor in Chicago.