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Deacon Steve Greco is a permanent deacon of the Diocese of Orange. He is founder of Spirit Filled Hearts Ministry, and host of Empowered by the Spirit. In this episode, he speaks with Knight of Columbus and Spirit Filled Radio host Michael Klett. What are the Knights of Columbus all about? And, how are they affiliated with our local Catholic parishes? Tune in and find out!
Originally broadcast on 5/29/22
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WASHINGTON (CNS) — Crux, an online news feed about the Catholic world established a year and a half ago by the Boston Globe, will get a new partner effective April 1 after the Globe announced March 11 that it would cut ties with Crux.
The Globe gave rights to use the Crux name and logo to its associate editor John L. Allen Jr., who told Catholic News Service that he would keep Ines San Martin, Crux’s Vatican correspondent. Others affiliated with Crux are being laid off by the Globe except for the site’s editor, Teresa Hanafin, who will be reassigned within the newspaper.
Crux’s new partner is the Knights of Columbus. In a March 15 announcement, the Knights said its own news website, Catholic Pulse, would merge into Crux’s, with Crux’s new tagline being “Keeping its finger on the Catholic Pulse.”
The Knights added it will “respect the editorial freedom of Crux, trusting it to present news and commentary in a way that serves the good of the church.”
The Globe, in its announcement, cited financial reasons for splitting off Crux from the newspaper. Allen told CNS he was informed of the details March 9, two days before the Globe’s announcement.
“It’s really important for me to say that I’m clearly disappointed that this happened. That said, I am infinitely grateful to the Globe for what they have given me; they have spent considerable resources,” Allen said March 14. “I don’t want any messages from sour grapes coming from me.”
The Globe, whose reporting on the clergy sex abuse scandal in the Archdiocese of Boston formed the basis for the movie “Spotlight,” which won Oscar for best picture Feb. 28, delivered less than two weeks later its decision to part ways with Crux, which focused on reporting about the Catholic Church. “I’m aware of the irony,” Allen said.
“The problem is the business,” said a March 11 memo to Globe employees from editor Brian McGrory and Boston Globe Media Group digital managing editor David Skok. “We simply haven’t been able to develop the financial model of big-ticket, Catholic-based advertisers that was envisioned when we launched Crux back in September 2014.”
In an email to The Atlantic magazine, McGrory wrote, “I loved Crux. We all did. It was a terrific idea, a noble mission, and very well executed by a small, deeply experienced, hard-working staff. We made the words work, but not the numbers. They simply didn’t add up. So we decided, quite literally, to cut our losses and focus on the core of our business.”
Allen said Crux was getting 1 million page views a month, more with Pope Francis’ U.S. visit last September and the wintertime “dust-up” between the pope and Republican presidential aspirant Donald Trump.
The Knights’ announcement said, “The plans are for Knights of Columbus to be the main sponsor and partner. Crux will also continue to solicit advertising and may allow some level of additional co-sponsorship especially for the coverage of specific topic areas that align with the joint K of C-Crux mission of providing quality Catholic journalism through this platform.”
Will a revamped Crux will be flooded with ads like one appearing at the end of the Politico.com story on the Crux shakeup, inviting readers to click through to a story, “Her Dress Dropped Jaws at the CMT Awards”?
Replied Allen, “God, I hope not.”
The Annual Michael Doss Charity Golf Tournament will take place April 15 at the Coyote Hills Golf Course in Fullerton, with proceeds supporting a number of local charities and community services projects.
Grand Knight Virgil Smith says organizations including HOPE, Special Olympics, the American Wheelchair Mission, People with Intellectual Disabilities, Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, His Nesting Place and the La Habra Life Shelter are beneficiaries of the charity event.
Michael Mercer, tournament organizer, says in addition to the golfing there will be a number of contests and side-events, including up to 12 different opportunities to purchase raffle tickets for a wide array of great prizes. Perhaps the most desired is the raffle for a week’s stay in one of Hawaii’s most popular vacation spots, Maui Schooner Resort, located on Maui’s Gold Coast, with beautiful sand beaches and warm Pacific Ocean water. Raffle tickets are $10 each or six for $50, also sold at other locations and times. Winner need not be present at the April 15th drawing.
The golf tournament entry fee is $125 per person, with an 8:00 a.m. shotgun start, and check-in beginning at 6:30 a.m. Golfers will be provided locker and shower room facilities for men and women, GPS-equipped carts and beverage service on the course.
Golfers and sponsors may participate by contacting the Knights of Columbus/Michael Mercer at (714) 943-3734; mailto:[email protected]; http://www.kofc8599.org; or Virgil Smith Council Grand Knight, at (714) 293-0739. They’ll also provide further information about the raffles.
LEVITTOWN, Pa. (CNS) — The Knights of Columbus has announced an initiative designed to bring the Knights into closer cooperation with parishes.
Changes were noted in an address delivered by Supreme Knight Carl A. Anderson in November to a San Antonio meeting of state deputies and reprinted in the December issue of Columbia, the Knights’ magazine. “We will use our resources of time, talent and money to strengthen parish-based and parish-sponsored programs,” he wrote.
According to Anderson, the 1.9 million-member Catholic fraternal group, organized into over 15,000 councils operating in the United States and a number of other countries, will continue its focus on spirituality, charity, unity, brotherhood and patriotism. But it will strive to bring its activities into greater identification with parishes under the supervision of parish pastors, avoiding duplication or any perception of competition.
Among the changes involved, the Knights will not build or acquire any new council halls. This change, where parish rather than separate facilities are used for meetings and activities, has already allowed the formation of councils that would not have been able to afford a building, and will avoid members having to devote too much time and effort to support the building by renting it for unrelated activities.
In another significant change, by the end of this year, the Knights of Columbus will no longer sponsor Scout groups. Instead, the group will work to support parish youth ministry programs, including parish-based Catholic Scouting.
The Knights, Anderson wrote, should strive to integrate the activities of their Squires Circles — affiliated groups of boys and young men ages 10 to 18 — with those of the parish youth ministry. He said councils and assemblies in the U.S. and Canada that do not currently have Squires groups should not begin new ones but instead should support existing parish-based youth ministry programs.
The Knights, Anderson wrote, are devoted to building up the family as the domestic church and to evangelizing family life, a work that can be done most effectively by working in and with the parish.
Andrew T. Walther, vice president for communications and strategic planning of the Supreme Council, noted in an interview with Catholic News Service that it is important to remember that the Knights of Columbus was founded in 1882 in a parish by a parish priest — Father Michael McGivney, recently declared venerable, whose sainthood cause has taken its first steps. In re-emphasizing its focus on the parish, Walther said, the organization is going back to its roots.
“Most of our councils are based in parishes,” Walther said, and Knights traditionally put themselves at the service of the parish. The group “really wants to focus in a very specific way on what we’re doing in the parish,” which includes prayer and the sacramental life, charitable works, and taking a holistic approach to being united with the parish. Different parishes have different priorities, and the Knights of Columbus can be flexible to help with different needs, he noted.
Walther said the change in sponsorship of Scout groups is not intended to diminish the Knights’ commitment to Catholic Scouting, but to bring it back to focus in the parish.
Asked whether the lack of a council hall would lessen the fellowship aspect of the Knights’ interaction with each other, Walther said he didn’t think that would be a problem. Members in current parish-based councils find ways to get together and experience fraternity, he said. “I don’t think you need a separate building. I don’t think you lose fraternity, and you gain a lot of unity with the parish.”
The current initiative is designed to promote “the involvement of families within the parish. The parish is our home, and we should be working first and foremost through our parish.” Making the parish and interaction with the parish the top priority is, he said, a re-assertion of the model on which the Knights were founded.
