St. Louis emeritus Archbishop Raymond Burke

Pope Benedict XVI named St. Louis emeritus Archbishop Raymond Burke to the Vatican’s influential Congregation for Bishops on Saturday.

The congregation, or Vatican office, is responsible for recommending Roman Catholic bishop candidates around the world to the pope.  Over time - and Burke is only 61 - the Congregation’s members can have a significant impact on the direction of the Catholic church.

Burke will join another former St. Louis archbishop, Cardinal Justin Rigali, at the Congregation for Bishops. He’ll be the fifth American member of the office.

Burke left St. Louis to become the prefect, or leader, of the Apostolic Signatura - often described as the Vatican’s version of the Supreme Court. Burke also is a member of two other Vatican offices, the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, which interprets canon law, and the Congregation for the Clergy, which regulates the formation and training of diocesan priests and deacons.

Whispers in the…

Culinaria manager Tom Collora, Jr. works the phones at the customer service counter on Sept. 15. Photo by Robert Cohen.

Today’s A1 story about a crucifix on display at the new downtown Schnucks, called Culinaria, is creating a lot of traffic on stltoday.com.

And I’m getting a ton of phone calls and e-mails from people supporting Tom Collora, the store’s manager. Many of those readers feel like Christianity is under attack in American society, and that newspapers are the voice of such a movement.

Many of the callers are angry - both at those who have complained about the crucifix, and at the newspaper for reporting the story.

Some have used language we wouldn’t be able to print in the newspaper. Two have said they were canceling their subscriptions. One suggested a large swatch of his fellow Americans “go back to their own countries.”

Many more have (calmly) made valid points about cherished, Constitutionally-protected American values, like…

Monsignor Vincent Bommarito - credit: UNICO-St. Louis

Last week, the Aquinas Institute of Theology named the Monsignor Vincent Bommarito, pastor of St. Ambrose Parish in the Hill as the recipient of its Great Preacher Award for 2009.

The award, given annually by the Dominican seminary, promotes “compelling and imaginative preaching that powerfully engages hearers with the Word of God,” Aquinas president, the Rev. Richard Peddicord, said in a release.

In the same release, Bommarito said, “Next to praying the words of the institution narrative, proclaiming the Living Word is critical in exciting the hearts of all to embrace the Lord - and each day graced by the Lord gives rise to hope and thanksgiving.”

The Great Preacher Award will be presented to Bommarito on Thursday, October 29, 2009, at Rose of the Hill, 2300 Edwards, in St. Louis.

St. Louis Archbishop-elect Robert J. Carlson

Pope Benedict XVI has named Robert James Carlson as the next Roman Catholic archbishop of St. Louis.

The 64-year-old archbishop-elect has led the Saginaw, Mich. diocese since 2005. He will be the 10th ordinary, or leader, of St. Louis Catholics since 1827.

Carlson’s new assignment was announced publicly at 5:18 a.m. St. Louis time on the Vatican’s website.

Carlson was also the bishop of Sioux Falls, SD for ten years before his tenure in Michigan. He succeeds Archbishop Raymond Burke, whose four-and-a-half year tenure as St. Louis Catholic leader ended in June when the pope named him to lead the Vatican’s supreme court.

Like Burke, Carlson is trained as a canon, or church, lawyer. Burke is now the head of the Vatican’s version of the supreme court.

From the Saginaw diocese’s website:

A native of Minneapolis, Minn., he was ordained to the priesthood on May 23, 1970 for the Archdiocese of St.…