Chaput to Philly

the NCR interview with Chaput is HERE.

Keep him in your prayers.

I am aware of him because he is Native American, and I worked in the IHS and in many areas, the people were Catholic, although in some places, the priests were liberal and demoralized so the people were also.

His 1997 interview with the NCR, when he left Rapid City to go to Denver, is HERE:

Archbishop Chaput was born in 1944 in Concordia, Kan., a town of 7,000 people. Though he is a member of the Prairie Band Potawatomi tribe, he did not grow up on a reservation or within the Native American culture. Yet, he still looks to his roots. “There's a great convergence between my Franciscan vocation and Native American spirituality,” Archbishop Chaput said, explaining that both traditions have a great reverence and natural humility before God and creation, a willingness to sacrifice for the community and respect for elders and others.

Native Americans make up 40 percent of the Catholic population of Rapid City. Having a bishop who shares their culture has been a source of pride for many of them, but Archbishop Chaput's popularity has transcended ethnic lines.

“I think there's a greater unity here between the native people and the non-native people than when I arrived, and I think that's as much a function of the fact that I' Indian as anything else, and that's not something everybody can bring to the diocese,” Archbishop Chaput said. “I think native people feel comfortable with me and they feel like they belong to the Church because their bishop is one of them. And I think non-native people have seen that I' not a threat to them, as well. Native people can have leadership in the Church and it can be a good thing for everyone. I just hope that energy continues to grow.”

one needs to note that the Oklahoma Indians (which include those in southern Kansas) don't have reservations. They have been "assimilated" for awhile, but keep their traditions.