The congregation at Trinity Lutheran Church in Kent is focusing on the stewardship of creation during the month of September with a new theme each week that is tied to land, wilderness and forest.

On Sunday, worshippers are invited to bring produce or plants from their gardens to share as part of the land theme.

Those attending a potluck dinner at 5 p.m. are asked to base their dishes on healthy eating from the land. A program at 6 p.m. will include speakers and exhibits about topics including organic farming, community gardens, beehives and honey and flower gardening.

On Sept. 21, a special program at 7 p.m. will focus on wilderness and feature the work of Denny Reiser, a local photographer. Reiser will share photos and the history of Cuyahoga Valley National Park.

From 1:30 to 3 p.m. Sept. 28, the congregation will gather at Oak Hill Trail in Cuyahoga Valley National Park for a short talk about the park from a ranger. After the talk, the group will hike along the Oak Hill Trail or the Towpath Trail, which is suited for people using scooters and parents with children.

Trinity, which is part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, is at 600 S. Water St. in Kent. For more information, go to www.trinitykent.org or call 330-673-5445.

In other religion news:

Events

Celebration Church — 688 Dan St., Akron. 6 p.m. Sunday. Financial Peace University. Nine-week course provides families and individuals with practical tools to gain control of their finances and set themselves up for long-term financial success. For more information or to register, call Matthew Reid at 330-762-7458.

Doylestown Zion Lutheran Church — 65 W. Clinton St., Doylestown. 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sept. 20. Yard/Bake Sale for the benefit of “Clothe-A-Kid.” 330-658-2611.

Faith United Methodist Church — 1235 Tallmadge Road, Brimfield. 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Saturday. Swiss steak dinner: Swiss steak, mashed potatoes, vegetables, coleslaw, applesauce, desserts and beverage. $9 adults, $4 youth. For more information, go to www.brimfieldfaith.com.

FallsCreek Community Church — 149 Northmoreland Ave., Munroe Falls. Sept. 25. Financial Peace University. Nine-week course provides families and individuals with practical tools to gain control of their finances and set themselves up for long-term financial success. For more information or to register, call 330-686-1400.

First Grace United Church of Christ — 350 S. Portage Path, Akron. 6 p.m., Sept. 20. Dinner and Jazz, with the Jazz Workshop Ensemble. $15 per person. 330-431-0677.

First United Methodist Church — 245 Portage Trail, Cuyahoga Falls. 5:30 p.m. Sept. 20. Rejoicing Spirits worship service. Rejoicing Spirits is an inclusive, meaningful Christian community that welcomes, embraces, values and celebrates the gifts of all our brothers and sisters. For more information about the service, go to www.rejoicingspirits.org.

Grace United Church of Christ — 13275 Cleveland Ave., Lake Township. 6 to 8 p.m. Sept. 20. Shrimp Boil, silent auction and quilt raffle to benefit the work of Back Bay Mission in Biloxi, Miss. Tickets are $15 adults and $8 children ages 3-8. Tickets must be purchased by Sept. 17, call 330-699-3255.

Home Missionary Baptist Church — 1922 Oakes Drive, Akron. 2 p.m. Sept. 20. Car, Truck and Motorcycle Show. Games, prizes and more. Everyone welcome.

Hudson United Methodist Church — 2600 Hudson Aurora Road, Hudson. 4 p.m. Saturday. Special celebratory worship service to mark the 50th anniversary. There will be a gala dinner at the church. Dinner tickets are $30 per person. The church will also memorialize its golden anniversary during a Sunday worship service at 9:30 a.m. with fellowship afterwards. For more information, call 330-650-2650.

Mount Zion Baptist Church — 327 Cuyahoga St., Akron. 10:45 a.m. Sept. 21. 88th annual Men’s Day. Minister Kyle Earley of Cleveland will present Christian Men Walking From Darkness Into the Light Of Jesus Christ.

New Horizons Christian Church — 290 Darrow Road, Akron. 7 p.m. Thursday. Financial Peace University. Nine-week course provides families and individuals with practical tools to gain control of their finances and set themselves up for long-term financial success. For more information and to register, call Jim Bane at 330-733-3533.

Our Lady of the Cedars of Mount Lebanon Maronite Catholic Church — 507 S. Cleveland-Massillon Road, Fairlawn. 7 p.m. Sept. 23-Oct. 1. Nine Day Novena. St. Theresa Little Flower of the Infant Jesus and of the Holy Face. 330-666-3598.

St. Hilary Parish — 2750 W. Market St., Fairlawn. Sept. 30. The Feast of St. Francis. From St. Francis to Pope Francis to You! Creating a Climate for Solidarity. A 90-minute multimedia presentation and discussion. For more information, call Katie McCarthy at 330-867-1055, ext. 217 or email kmccarthy@sthilarychurch.org.

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church — 515 48th St. NW, Canton. 6-9 p.m. Sept. 20. Art and Music Fest. Art ranging from paintings, quilts, pottery and photography will be on display. There will be a “Bach to Boogie” musical concert at 7 p.m. featuring Bob Morrison, 88, on the organ and piano, and Jackson Carruthers, 18, on the piano. Free admission.

St. Philip’s Episcopal Church — 1130 Mercer Ave., Akron. 5:45-7 p.m. Friday. Spaghetti dinner. $7 adults, $5 ages 10 or younger. 330-535-7295.

Trinity UCC — 215 High St., Wadsworth. 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Farmers market. Fresh produce from local farms and gardens. Baked goods, fresh eggs, honey, herbs and more. 330-334-2536 or www.ucctrinity.com.

Unity Chapel of Light — 503 Northwest Ave., Tallmadge. 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday. Rummage sale. Furniture, children’s clothing, toys, household items and more. Proceeds will benefit the church.

Women’s Interfaith Spiritual Heritage — Crown Point Ecology Center, 3220 Ira Road, Bath. 4-6 p.m. Sunday. Cosmic Walk. The Cosmic Walk is a meditation on our origins from the first Flaring Forth to the Galaxies, to our Solar System, to the birth of our planet and its amazing evolution of life in a myriad of different forms. For more information, go to www.neowish.org.

Performances

Levi Brenner Farm — 3575 Muffly Ave. SW, Tuscarawas Township. 4-8 p.m. Saturday. Summer Singing in The Barn, featuring Glory Way QT, The Southern Aires and Four By Grace. A love offering will be taken. For more information, call 330-447-4339 or go to www.downhomegospelradio.com.

Malone University — Johnson Center Chapel, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. 6:30-8:30 p.m. Thursday. The Malone University Department of Multicultural Services welcomes Hollywood gospel hip-hop artist Prodigal Son and Amour with Standard and The Hawk opening. Free to the public.

Malone University — Stewart Room of the Randall Campus Center, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. 7 p.m. Sept. 27. The Northeast Ohio Fellowship of Christian Athletes will host comedian John Branyan. Admission is $15. Tickets can only be purchased online at www.johnbranyan.com.

North Canton Community Christian Church — 210 N. Main St., North Canton. 4 p.m. Sept. 21. Free concert featuring Bob Blyer’s 13-piece Meadowbrook Big Band. A freewill offering will be accepted. 330-499-5458.

Speakers

Malone University — Johnson Center for Worship and the Fine Arts, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. 6:30-9:30 p.m. Saturday. The Center for Theology and Ministry and Logos Bible Software welcome Old Testament scholar John Walton and his program — Exploring the Lost World of Scripture — is free to the public. RSVP at www.walton.eventbrite.com or call 330-471-8382.

Malone University — East Campus Auditorium, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. 7:30 p.m. Wednesday. The College of Theology, Arts, and Sciences’ Department of History, Philosophy and Social Sciences will host attorney Timothy Belz as he discusses: Hobby Lobby: The First Amendment religious and legal issue, in recognition of Constitution Day. Free to the public.

The deadline for Religion Notes is noon Tuesday. Items must be in writing. Please fax information to 330-996-3033, email it to religion@thebeaconjournal.com or send it to Religion, Akron Beacon Journal, 44 E. Exchange St., Akron, OH 44309.

Bishop Abraham D. Allende was officially installed on Saturday to lead the Cuyahoga Falls-based Northeastern Ohio Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Allende was elected in May to a six-year term.

He is the first Hispanic and the fourth bishop to shepherd nearly 62,000 Lutherans in 179 congregations in a territory bordered by the Ohio/Pennsylvania line on the east that runs from Ashtabula County down to Jefferson County and extends west to Richland County.

The Puerto Rican native succeeds Bishop Elizabeth A. Eaton, who was elected last year as presiding bishop of the 4 million-member denomination.

Eaton presided at Allende’s installation, which took place at St. Paul Episcopal Church in Akron.

Allende, 69, took charge of the bishop’s office on Sept. 1. Reared in the Clairton, Pa., area, he earned an undergraduate degree in education at California University of Pennsylvania and did graduate work in Spanish literature at Kent State University.

He earned a Theological Education for Emerging Ministries certificate at Trinity Lutheran Seminary.

Before being elected bishop by members of the local general assembly, Allende served as pastor and mission developer of Iglesia Luterana La Trinidad in Canton and pastor of The Lutheran Church of the Covenant in Maple Heights.

He and his wife, Linda Gotthardt (who teaches English as a second language at the University of Akron), live in Stark County’s Plain Township and have one adult son, David, who lives in Akron.

To learn more about the synod, go to www.neos-elca.org.

Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com. She can be followed at www.twitter.com/ColetteMJenkins.

The Rev. Ronald J. Fowler has started a new chapter in his life story.

On Wednesday, Kent State trustees honored the pastor laureate of Arlington Church of God and community activist with a resolution and reception for his contributions to the university community during the past seven years.

Fowler said he “just felt it was time” to leave his post as special assistant to the president at his alma mater “to do something different.”

“I just knew my job was finished, and now I’m going back to my passion: mentoring leaders. I’ve started a network for pastors all over the nation,” Fowler said. “We’re still in the development stages, but there are four other facilitators assisting me with a network of 28 pastors.”

Although the initiative, called “Let’s Network,” primarily was formed for the Anderson, Ind.-based Church of God, Fowler said he regularly mentors pastors in other denominations, including those in Christian Methodist Episcopal, African Methodist Episcopal Zion, Progressive Baptist and National Baptists churches. His expectation is that the reach of the ministry will expand.

Let’s Network serves as a forum in which pastors can seek advice and support and can engage in peer collaboration and dialogue.

“The joy of this ministry is that we are helping pastors of small churches, which are typically under-resourced,” Fowler said. “The goal is to keep these pastors healthy and give them a place to bounce around ideas. It gets pretty lonely in ministry. The hope is that this will meet the significant need for leadership support.”

Fowler, 78, retired in 2008 as pastor of Arlington Church of God after 37 years. Known throughout the Akron area as a man of integrity and a champion for racial reconciliation, his community involvement has included service on the Akron Board of Education and the board of directors of Summit Education Initiative. He also has shared his insight on various committees, boards and task forces at the school district, local foundations and universities.

He returned to Kent State in 2007 to chair then-President Lester A. Lefton’s Commission on Inclusion. Two years later, he became a special assistant to the president for community engagement and also served as a member of the presidential search committee that recommended Beverly J. Warren as the school’s 12th president and Lefton’s successor.

During his tenure at KSU, Fowler helped to advance the university’s relationship with the community and the Akron and Cleveland school districts, improved the recruitment and retention of students with diverse backgrounds and mentored students. He also worked with alumni and the Pan-African faculty and staff association and assisted with acquiring major gifts to the university.

In June, Fowler made a decision to shift gears and focus on Let’s Network.

“I always wanted to coach. My dream was to coach in the NFL — that’s why I majored in health and physical education. But on my way to the NFL, I ended up in seminary and my life has never been the same,” Fowler said with a hearty laugh. “Let’s Network is giving me an opportunity to realize that dream to coach — not players in the NFL, but pastors on the mission field.”

Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com. She can be followed at www.twitter.com/ColetteMJenkins.

VATICAN CITY: The battle lines are being drawn before a major church meeting on family issues that appears to represent a key test for Pope Francis.

Five high-ranking cardinals have taken one of Francis’ favorite theologians to task over an issue dear to the pope’s heart: Whether Catholics who divorce and remarry without an annulment can receive Communion.

They have written a book, Remaining in the Truth of Christ, to rebut German Cardinal Walter Kasper, whom Francis praised in his first Sunday blessing after he was elected pope as “a great theologian” and subsequently entrusted with the setting the tone for the two-year study on marriage, divorce and family life that the Vatican will open Oct. 5.

Kasper, for a decade the Vatican’s top official dealing with the Orthodox and Jews, delivered an introductory speech to cardinals earlier this year on the issues to be discussed during the synod in which he asked whether these divorced and remarried Catholics might be allowed in limited cases to receive the Eucharist after a period of penance.

The outcry that ensued has turned the 81-year-old Kasper into the biggest lightning rod for internal debate that the Catholic Church has seen in some time.

Conservatives, including the five cardinal authors, have vehemently opposed Kasper’s suggestion as contrary to Christ’s teaching on marriage.

The second most powerful man in the Vatican has backed their view: Cardinal George Pell, one of Francis’ key advisers, wrote in another new book that debating something that is so peripheral to begin with and so clear in church teaching amounts to “a counterproductive and futile search for short-term consolations.”

“Every opponent of Christianity wants the church to capitulate on this issue,” he wrote. “We should speak clearly, because the sooner the wounded, the lukewarm and the outsiders realize that substantial doctrinal and pastoral changes are impossible, the more the hostile disappointment (which must follow the reassertion of doctrine) will be anticipated and dissipated.”

Francis, however, seems to think otherwise. He praised Kasper’s speech and confessed that he even re-read it before going to bed the night after Kasper delivered it. He called it “profound theology” that did him much good and represented a true love for the church.

The debate — unusually raw and public for such “princes of the church” — has crystalized the growing discomfort among conservatives to some of Francis’ words and deeds, and sets the stage for what is likely to be a heated discussion on family issues for the foreseeable future.

Church teaching holds that Catholics who don’t have their first marriage annulled — or declared null by a church tribunal — before remarrying can’t participate fully in the church’s sacraments because they are essentially living in sin and committing adultery. Such annulments are often impossible to get or can take years to process, leaving untold numbers of Catholics unable to receive Communion.

Francis has asserted church doctrine on the matter but has called for a more merciful, pastoral approach: He reportedly told an Argentine woman earlier this year that she was free to receive Communion even though her husband’s first marriage was never annulled. Knowing the issue is divisive, though, he has convened the whole church to debate the issue.

The new book asserts there really is no better solution — and no grounds to argue for it citing the practice of the ancient church — since Catholic doctrine is clear. The authors include two of the highest-ranking Vatican officials, both appointed by Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI, a great friend to conservatives and traditionalists: Cardinal Gerhard Mueller, head of the Vatican’s doctrine office, and Cardinal Raymond Burke, the American head of the Vatican’s supreme court.

“These are not a series of rules made up by the church; they constitute divine law, and the church cannot change them,” the book says. Kasper’s assertions, reading of history and suggestions for debate “reinforce misleading understandings of both fidelity and mercy.”

Kasper has agreed there can be no change to church doctrine and no sweeping allowances. But he has said that the matter must be looked at on a case by case basis, that mercy is God’s greatest attribute and the key to Christian existence, and that God always gives faithful Catholics a new chance if they repent.

It is rare for cardinals to publicly and pointedly accuse another cardinal of being wrong, and rarer still for a cardinal to question the pope.

Burke has questioned Francis’ first encyclical on the excesses of capitalism and obliquely criticized Francis’ decision to not focus on abortion.

How would Dr. Phil help Abraham and his family sort through their family issues?

Members at Beth El Congregation hope to help answer that question on the second day of Rosh Hashana on Friday during A Bibliodrama: A Family Crisis. The presentation, which adopts the format of The Dr. Phil Show, will focus on the Torah reading for the first day of Rosh Hashana, Chapter 21 of Genesis.

In the Scripture, the promise given to Sarah and Abraham that Sarah would give birth to a son is realized. But after three years, a crisis arises when Sarah demands that her husband banish his first-born child, Ishmael, and his mother, Hagar (Sarah’s handmaiden), from the household.

The drama presentation will explore the family crisis and attempt to answer questions like: how did Hagar and Ishmael feel being rejected by Abraham; what was Hagar’s relationship with Sarah; what kinds of emotions did Abraham experience in putting Hagar and Ishmael out; how healthy was Abraham’s relationship with his wife and how did Ishmael feel about the competition in the family?

The three-hour Rosh Hashana service begins at 8:30 a.m., with the final hour devoted to the bibliodrama. The second day of Rosh Hashana, the Jewish new year, is open to the public. Beth El is at 750 White Pond Drive in Akron. For more information, go to www.bethelakron.com or call 330-864-2105.

In other religion news:

Events

Akron Missionary Baptist Church — 17 W. Cuyahoga Falls Ave., Akron. 6 p.m. Saturday. Pre-Women’s Day Service “Praise, Preach and Pack.” Speaker is first lady Theresa Norwood of St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church.

Apostolic Church of Barberton — 1717 W. Turkeyfoot Lake Road, Coventry Township. 6 p.m. Sunday. Worship Weekend with the Rev. Tyler Walea as special guest. Anointed worship, preaching and singing. 330-745-5550.

Boardman Baptist Church — 350 E. Bath Road, Cuyahoga Falls. 11 a.m. Sunday. Will participate in Back To Church Sunday, a national movement of churches across America. Everyone is welcome to attend.

Centenary United Methodist Church — 1310 Superior Ave., Akron. 10:45 a.m. Sunday. The United Methodist Men of Centenary United Methodist Church will host their Annual Men’s Day. Pastor Oliver Campbell Jr. will have a call to the Men of Centenary to show true leadership in helping to implement the church’s vision of the new beginning, to have a viable church meeting the spiritual needs of the congregation and provide outreach for a family oriented community. For more information, call 330-807-9559.

The Chapel in Marlboro — 8700 state Route 619, Marlboro Township. 10 a.m. Sunday. Annual 100 percent Attendance Day. Special guest and speaker for the day is the president of Moody Bible Institute, Dr. J. Paul Nyquist. For more information, call 330-935-0132.

Christ is the Answer Ministries — 379 E. South St., Akron. 10:30 a.m. Sunday. Youth Day. Pastor Donald Robinson of Greater New Peaceful Will Missionary Baptist Church of Long Beach, Calif., will speak. Special guest at 5 p.m. is Minister Darrell Williams and Anointed Praise.

Doylestown Zion Lutheran Church — 65 W. Clinton St., Doylestown. 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday. Yard/Bake Sale for the benefit of Clothe-A-Kid. 330-658-2611.

FallsCreek Community Church — 149 Northmoreland Ave., Munroe Falls. Sept. 25. Financial Peace University. Nine-week course provides families and individuals with practical tools to gain control of their finances and set themselves up for long-term financial success. For more information or to register, call 330-686-1400.

The First Friday Club — Quaker Station, 135 S. Broadway, Akron. 11:15 a.m. Oct. 3. The Most Rev. Richard G. Lennon, bishop of the Diocese of Cleveland, will address the topic Religious Freedom, TODAY. Cost of the luncheon is $15. For reservations, call 330-535-7668 or go to www.firstfridayclubofgreaterakron.org.

First Grace United Church of Christ — 350 S. Portage Path, Akron. 6 p.m. Saturday. Dinner and Jazz, with the Jazz Workshop Ensemble. $15 per person. 330-431-0677.

First United Methodist Church — 245 Portage Trail, Cuyahoga Falls. 5:30 p.m. Saturday. Rejoicing Spirits worship service. Rejoicing Spirits is an inclusive, meaningful Christian community that welcomes, embraces, values and celebrates the gifts of brothers and sisters. For more information about the service, go to www.rejoicingspirits.org.

Grace United Church of Christ — 13275 Cleveland Ave., Lake Township. 6 to 8 p.m. Saturday. Shrimp Boil, silent auction and quilt raffle to benefit the work of Back Bay Mission in Biloxi, Miss. Tickets are $15 adults and $8 children ages 3 to 8. Tickets must be purchased by Sept. 17. Call 330-699-3255.

Home Missionary Baptist Church — 1922 Oakes Drive, Akron. 2 p.m. Saturday. Car, Truck and Motorcycle Show. Games, prizes and more. All are welcome.

Lakemore United Methodist Church — 1536 Flickinger Road, Lakemore. 4 to 6:30 p.m. Saturday. Swiss steak dinner. $7 for adults, $3 ages 3 to 12. Menu includes: Swiss steak, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, coleslaw, applesauce, bread, dessert and beverage. Carryout available. For more information, call 330-733-6531.

Mogadore Christian Church — 106 S. Cleveland Ave., Mogadore. 5 to 7 p.m. Saturday. Swiss steak dinner. $8 adults, $4 5 to 12. Menu includes: Swiss steak, mashed potatoes, green beans, applesauce, coleslaw, rolls, beverage and dessert. For more information, call 330-628-3344 or go to www.mogadorechristian.com.

Mount Haven Missionary Baptist Church — 545 Noble Ave., Akron. 11 a.m. Sunday. Annual Family and Friends Day. The Senior Ushers will host a Pound Cake Extravaganza and the Nurses Guild will provide free ice cream to everyone in attendance following morning worship.

Mount Zion Baptist Church — 327 Cuyahoga St., Akron. 10:45 a.m. Sunday. 88th annual Men’s Day. Minister Kyle Earley of Cleveland will present Christian Men Walking From Darkness Into the Light Of Jesus Christ.

Oak Hill Presbyterian Church — 2406 Ardwell Ave., Akron. 8:30 or 11 a.m. Sunday. Back to Church Sunday. Join us for worship at either 8:30 or 11 a.m.

Our Lady of the Cedars of Mount Lebanon Maronite Catholic Church — 507 S. Cleveland-Massillon Road, Fairlawn. 7 p.m. Tuesday to Oct. 1. Nine Day Novena. St. Theresa Little Flower of the Infant Jesus and of the Holy Face. 330-666-3598.

The Pavilion of Praise Church — 976 W. Waterloo Road, Akron. 7 p.m. Friday. A night of preaching, singing and dancing before the Lord. The free event is open to the public. Worship and welcome guest speaker Elder Emmitt Nevels from Youngstown, where Bishop Emmitt Nevels Sr. is the pastor. For more information, call 330-400-7810.

St. Hilary Parish — 2750 W. Market St., Fairlawn. 7 to 9 p.m. Sept. 30. The Feast of St. Francis. From St. Francis to Pope Francis to You! Creating a Climate for Solidarity. A 90-minute multimedia presentation and discussion. For more information, call Katie McCarthy at 330-867-1055, ext. 217, or email kmccarthy@sthilarychurch.org.

St. John CME Church — 1233 S. Hawkins Ave., Akron. 10:45 a.m. Sept. 28. Annual Friends and Family Day. An outdoor community fellowship with lunch, games and door prizes will follow the service. Meet new pastor, the Rev. Reynard Monmouth. For more information, call 330-864-3060.

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church — 515 48th St. NW, Canton. 6-9 p.m. Saturday. Art and Music Fest. Art ranging from paintings, quilts, pottery and photography will be on display. There will be a Bach to Boogie musical concert at 7 p.m. featuring Bob Morrison, 88, on the organ and piano, and Jackson Carruthers, 18, on the piano. Free admission.

St. Matthew Rectory — 2603 Benton St., Akron. 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Thursday. A Cancer Spirituality Group for those on the cancer journey, those who are facing the diagnosis of cancer or have faced the diagnosis in the past or are interested in exploring and talking about the cancer experience in the context of spirituality. 330-628-5725.

Trinity UCC — 215 High St., Wadsworth. 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Farmers market. Fresh produce from local farms and gardens. Baked goods, fresh eggs, honey, herbs and more. 330-334-2536 or www.ucctrinity.com.

Wintergreen Ledges Church of God — 1889 Vernon Odom Blvd., Akron. 5:30 to 7 p.m. Friday. Dinner’s On-Free Hot Meal. Free personal hygiene and cleaning supplies while they last. For more information, call 330-753-3027.

Performances

Christ Presbyterian Church — 530 W. Tuscarawas St., Canton. 7 p.m. Sept. 28. The 10th season of the Christ Church Music series will begin with the Cleveland Orchestra Piano Quintet performing on the recently purchased Bosendorfer grand piano.

Malone University — Stewart Room of the Randall Campus Center, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. 7 p.m. Sept. 27. The Northeast Ohio Fellowship of Christian Athletes will host comedian John Branyan. Admission is $15. Tickets can only be purchased online at www.johnbranyan.com.

New Beginning Fellowship Church — 4567 state Route 43, Brimfield. 6 p.m. Saturday. Southern Gospel Singing featuring the Gospel Echoes of Aurora and Calvary’s Love of Doylestown.

North Canton Community Christian Church — 210 N. Main St., North Canton. 4 p.m. Sunday. Free concert featuring Bob Blyer’s 13-piece Meadowbrook Big Band. Freewill offering. 330-499-5458.

Shoreline Community Church — 790 Carnegie Ave., Akron. 7 p.m. Friday. McDougal Family Concert. Free. For more information, visit www.shorelinechurchakron.com.

Shoreline Community Church — 790 Carnegie Ave., Akron. 4 to 9 p.m. Sept. 27. Fall Harvest Music Festival featuring Stevens Family Bluegrass, the McDougal Family, grace Haydu, the Maxwells, Mike Radebaugh, and Galen Oakes present The Elvis Gospel Show. Free. For more information, go to www.shorelinechurchakron.com.

Springfield Baptist Church — 1920 Krumroy Road, Akron. 7 p.m. Sunday. The Anderson Trio will perform. Love offering.

Speakers

St. Michael The Archangel Catholic Church — 3430 St. Michael Drive NW, Canton. 7 p.m. Monday and 8:30 a.m. Tuesday. Father James Walker, Catholic Exponent Scripture columnist, will reflect on the message Jesus proclaimed, the methods he used, and the man himself. He will also reflect on the challenges of today’s increasingly digital, skeptical and individualistic culture. For more information, call Justin Huyck at 330-492-3119, ext. 18.

The deadline for Religion Notes is noon Tuesday. Items must be in writing. Please fax information to 330-996-3033, email it to religion@thebeaconjournal.com or send it to Religion, Akron Beacon Journal, 44 E. Exchange St., Akron OH 44309

Bishop Blase Cupich of Spokane, Washington, will be named the next archbishop of Chicago, The Associated Press has learned.

Cupich will succeed Cardinal Francis George, according to a person with knowledge of the selection, who spoke Friday on the condition of anonymity because the person wasn’t authorized to speak publicly. George, 77, has been battling cancer and has said he believes the disease will end his life.

The Archdiocese of Chicago has scheduled a news conference for Saturday morning. A spokeswoman for the archdiocese would not comment.

Pope Francis’ choice for Chicago has been closely watched as his first major appointment in the U.S., and the clearest indication yet of the direction he will steer American church leaders. Cupich is a moderate, and is not among U.S. Roman Catholic bishops who have taken a harder line on hot-button topics. Francis has called the church’s focus on abortion, marriage and contraception narrow and said it was driving people away.

An official from the Diocese of Spokane said he could not comment.

The Archdiocese of Chicago serves 2.2 million parishioners and is the third-largest diocese in the country. Chicago archbishops are usually elevated to cardinal and are therefore eligible to vote for the next pope.

The Chicago church has long been considered a flagship of American Catholicism, sparking lay movements of national influence and producing archbishops who shape national debate. Before George, the head of the archdiocese was Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, a hero to Catholics who place equal importance on issues such as abortion and poverty.

Cupich, 65, is a native of Omaha, Nebraska, where he was ordained a priest. He holds degrees from the Pontifical Gregorian University and The Catholic University of America.

They call themselves “Seniors Riding with a Mission.”

Their mission is raising money – and awareness – for Haven of Rest Ministries in Akron.

“The idea of cycling for a cause is not mine. I have seen many events where people ride or race to raise money,” said Don Hutchison, 68. “A couple of years ago, there were four young guys who did a ride for a local charity and I thought if four young guys can do that, why can’t a group of old guys?”

Hutchison shared his idea with his Saturday bike riding group, which includes four other seniors from his home church, Community Church of Portage Lakes. His suggestion led to the first “Seniors Riding with a Mission” event last year that netted more than $16,000 for the private Christian social service agency that provides food, shelter, clothing and other services to the homeless.

On Wednesday, the five men (ranging in age from 68 to 70) set out on their second three-day, 150-mile bicycling excursion near the Lake Erie Shoreline at Geneva State Park in Ashtabula County. Their trek ended on Friday at Haven of Rest, where staff welcomed them and celebrated their accomplishment.

“The support and the turnout have been tremendous. We are very blessed with these guys and their heart for the ministry,” said the Rev. Jeffrey A. Kaiser, executive director. “It’s just exciting to see them take a hobby and use it to benefit others. I’m just thankful.”

One of the five cyclists, the Rev. Ben Walker, is the retired executive director of Haven of Rest. His presence in the cycling group is the primary reason the social service agency was selected to receive the proceeds from the sponsorships of each cyclist. Walker, of Canal Fulton, still serves as an ambassador for Haven of Rest. He said that in addition to raising money, the group has helped educate people in Northeast Ohio about the work done by Haven of Rest.

“As we’re riding, we always run into people who are asking questions about what we are doing. That gives us a chance to share what Haven of Rest does to help people who are in need,” said Walker, 70. “For us, it’s a great time of fellowship and a chance to do something meaningful. Even though we ride to keep in shape, this is different because we know that every mile that we rode is to help somebody else.”

Haven of Rest was founded in 1943 as a small storefront rescue mission in Akron. Today, it provides more than 315,000 free meals and more than 71,000 nights of free lodging annually and is one of the largest private social service agencies in the Summit, Portage, Medina, Stark, Tuscarawas, Wayne and Holmes county area.

Hutchison, who serves as chairman of the mission board at Community Church, said the bike ride – which is expected to bring in about $20,000 this year — is considered a short term mission trip.

“The bike ride ended up being a lot more successful than we ever thought it would be and we are thankful to all of the people who have contributed to help serve people meals and give them a place to sleep,” said Hutchison, of Coventry Township. “It’s not every day that five old guys can take something they like to do and turn it into such a wonderful thing. It’s a real blessing to us and a blessing to Haven of Rest.”

The other three cyclists are Jack Ford, of New Franklin; Bob Young, of Coventry Township and Paul Wright, of Barberton.

For more information or to make a donation, go to www.havenofrest.org or call 330-535-1563.

Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com.

As the leader of two American dioceses, Roman Catholic Bishop Blase Cupich has staked out a firm position in the middle of the road.

He has spoken out against same-sex marriage and against conservative hostility toward gay rights advocates. He has opposed abortion, while urging parishioners and priests to have patience, not disdain, for those who disagree. And he has criticized fellow U.S. bishops who threatened to shut down religious charities instead of pursuing a compromise with the White House over health care policies that go against Catholic teaching.

On Saturday, Pope Francis named Cupich as the next archbishop of Chicago, sending a strong signal about the direction that the pontiff is taking the church. Cupich will succeed Cardinal Francis George, 77, an aggressive defender of orthodoxy who once said he expected his successors in Chicago to be martyred in the face of hostility toward Christianity.

“I think what Francis is trying to do with his appointments in both the United States and around the world is to moderate the conversation and get us past the culture wars and the ideologues,” said Christopher Bellitto, a church historian at Kean University in New Jersey. “Francis is not trying to balance a lurch to the right with a lurch to the left. He’s trying to build up the big middle so we can have conversations and not arguments.”

The Chicago appointment is Francis’ first major mark on American Catholic leadership.

George is two years past the church’s retirement age and is suffering from cancer. The Chicago archdiocese is the nation’s third-largest and among its most important, serving more than 2.2 million parishioners. Chicago archbishops are usually elevated to cardinal and are therefore eligible to vote for the next pope. Both George, and his predecessor, Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, had served as presidents of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Cupich will be installed as archbishop in November.

A native of Omaha, Nebraska, and one of nine children, the 65-year-old Cupich has served in a wide range of roles within the church.

He has been a parish pastor, a high school instructor and president of a seminary. After earning degrees in the U.S. and in Rome, he worked at the papal embassy in Washington, and as a bishop, has led several committees for the U.S. bishops’ conference. For a few years, he led the bishops’ committee on the child protection reforms adopted amid the clergy sex abuse scandal.

As head of the Diocese of Spokane, Wash., Cupich inherited the fallout from a previous bishop’s decision to seek bankruptcy protection over sex abuse claims. He started a mediation effort that has drawn praise from local attorneys.

He cited his family’s immigrant history from Croatia in a call for immigration reform.

PITTSBURGH: A priest accused of traveling to Honduras to engage in sex with children while promoting missionary work with the poor there has been arrested by federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials.

The Rev. Joseph Maurizio Jr., 69, was arrested Thursday and will remain in custody until a hearing Monday before a federal magistrate in Pittsburgh. The judge must decide then whether the priest will remain jailed until he can stand trial.

The Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown said it was “profoundly disturbed by the allegations against Father Maurizio.” It said he has not functioned as pastor of Our Lady Queen of Angels Parish since federal authorities searched the parish rectory on Sept. 12.

ICE agents also searched the farm where Maurizio lived in Windber. Bishop Mark Bartchak announced four days later that Maurizio was placed on leave.

Maurizio also faces a child porn charge based on images of a prepubescent boy posing on a bed with his genitals exposed. The images were found on a computer hard drive seized during a search of the rectory, a criminal complaint said. Investigators were reviewing other pictures found on computer storage devices and a camera Maurizio used on his trips to Honduras, it said.

Maurizio has said abuse allegations against him were a bogus plot by the Honduran government to thwart his charity work.

The priest’s attorney, Steven Passarello, said the criminal complaint regurgitates allegations made five years ago after the priest’s charity had a falling out with a local charity. He said children were bribed or coerced into making abuse allegations.

According to the complaint, ICE’s Pittsburgh office of Homeland Security Investigations began investigating in February after a board member of a nonprofit that assists Honduran street children reported abuse allegations against Maurizio on a watchdog website that tracks such claims against Catholic priests.

“The board member reported the allegations of abuse to the website after growing dissatisfied with what he believed to be an apparent lack of progress in the four-year criminal investigation of Maurizio,” the complaint said.

Homeland Security agents learned that the FBI began investigating allegations that the priest abused Honduran children in 2009, it said. The FBI said it couldn’t comment on the delay in the investigation but said it was working with ICE.

Homeland Security agents, in reviewing the FBI reports, learned Maurizio made regular trips of two to three weeks each to the Central American country from 1999 to 2009.

Armed with the FBI information, the Homeland Security agents traveled to Honduras this year and interviewed several witnesses, including children, who accused the priest of fondling boys, photographing them naked and offering them chocolates or money to perform sex acts on one another or with him.

Maurizio would face up to 30 years in prison if convicted of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place. The pornography charge carries a 10-year maximum sentence upon conviction.

Here is a weekly listing of religious events and news in the Akron area.

Events

The Barberton Gallery of Fine Arts — 33 Third St. SE, Suite 103, Barberton. 2 to 10:30 p.m. Saturday. The Saint Pio Mission 5-Year Anniversary Celebration. A benefit spaghetti dinner for impoverished single mothers and their children. Area pastors are welcome to speak about their ministries or philanthropic projects. For information, call 330-328-7619.

Corpus Christi Church — 221 Main St., Belle Valley. 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Oct. 5. Annual hog roast. There will be a raffle, crafts and bake sale.

The First Friday Club — Quaker Station, 135 S. Broadway, Akron. 11:15 a.m. Friday. The Most Rev. Richard G. Lennon, bishop of the Diocese of Cleveland, will address the topic Religious Freedom, TODAY. Cost of the luncheon is $15. For reservations, call 330-535-7668 or go to www.firstfriday
clubofgreaterakron.org.

Friendship Baptist Church — 800 W. Maple St., Hartville. 11 a.m. Sunday. Evangelist Danny Long will be preaching that old time gospel with his wife, Pam, singing. There will be a covered dish dinner immediately following the services and all are welcome. Sunday School at 10 a.m. For more information, call Pastor Tom Graham at 330-956-4417.

Greater Galilee Baptist Church — 70 W. Huston St., Barberton. 4 p.m. Sunday. Third Pastoral Anniversary of Pastor Bishop Emmett J. Lee. Guest speaker will be Pastor William V. Green of Tabernacle of Glory Baptist Church of Nashville, Tenn.

Haven of Rest — 175 E. Market St., Akron. 1 p.m. Oct. 7. Women’s Auxiliary program will present Gwendolyn Walker, who will sing about the Faithfulness of God. Enjoy some bargain shopping that goes to support Haven of Rest at 10 a.m. A light luncheon will be served at noon. For more information, call Rose Rose at 330-535-1563 or email rrose@havenofrest.org.

Holy Trinity Anglican Church — 55 Atterbury Blvd., Hudson. 10 a.m. Sunday. The Rev. Peter Beckwith, the assisting bishop in the Anglican Diocese of the Great Lakes, will preach and celebrate Holy Eucharist at which he will welcome new members into the church and help commemorate the burning of the church mortgage. The celebration will continue after the Mass with a luncheon.

Journey Covenant Church — 2679 N. Haven Blvd., Cuyahoga Falls. 6-7 p.m. Tuesday. Free, hot dinner to local residents. Christ Kitchen Dinners are open to the public. For more information, call 330-923-8021 or go to www.journeycov.org.

The Malone University Center for Theology and Ministry — Brehme Conference Center, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. Noon to 2 p.m. Oct. 9. Pastors’ Luncheon. Guest speaker, the Rev. Joel Scandrett, assistant professor of historical theology and director of the Robert E. Webber Center of Trinity School for Ministry in Ambridge, Pa. The lecture and discussion will focus on the subject of catechesis and its necessity in forming disciples during our time. 330-471-8239.

Marlboro Christian Church — 9383 Edison St. NE, Alliance. 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday. Fifth annual Family Fun Fest. Guests will enjoy inflatables, carnival games, bungee bounce, video game truck, live entertainment, free hot dogs, cotton candy, popcorn, a cookie and drink. The event is free. For more information, call 330-935-2161.

Messiah Lutheran Church — 4700 S. Main St., Green. 2 p.m. Oct. 12. Pet Blessing in the field around the church. Have your pet blessed and enjoy God’s gift of animal companionship. If it rains the blessing will take place in the Family Life Center. For more information, call 330-644-5766.

Mount Carmel Baptist Church — 401 Robert St., Akron. 6 p.m. Oct. 10 and 9 a.m. Oct. 11. I am EDeN Ministries: The Faith Now Conference. Speakers are Missionary Teaira Mitchell, Prohetess Edlexus Henley, Pastor Kevin R. Smith, Apostle Lynnette Appling and Minister Eric D. Nevins Jr. Tickets are $20. For more information, call 330-714-5221.

New Life Episcopal — 13118 Church Ave., Lake Township. 10 a.m. Oct. 5. Blessing of the Animals. Personal Blessings of Pets and Owners. All pets are welcome, in cages and on leashes. For more information, go to www.cometonew
life.org/animal-blessing.

Queen of Heaven Church — 1800 Steese Road, Green. 11 a.m. Oct. 5. Bring Your Pets to Mass. An outdoor Mass with pet blessing, will commemorate the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi and his love of animals. Please have pets on leashes or caged. In case of rain, take your pets into the church for the 11 a.m. Mass. Also, on Oct. 6, a Rosary Rally/Crusade, a 50th Anniversary Event, will be held. A rosary prayer will be prayed every hour on the hour from 8 a.m. through 6 p.m. At 7 p.m., the Most Rev. Roger W. Gries, auxiliary bishop emeritus for the Diocese of Cleveland, will preside at the closing Mass on the vigil of the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. For more information, call 330-896-2345.

St. Bernard Catholic Church — 44 University Ave., Akron. 10:45 a.m. to noon Oct. 10. Witness for Life. A peaceful and prayerful “chain” will form as silent witnesses to the sanctity of life. Assemble on the front steps of the church.

St. Hilary Parish — 2750 W. Market St., Fairlawn. 7 to 9 p.m. Tuesday. The Feast of St. Francis. From St. Francis to Pope Francis to You! Creating a Climate for Solidarity. A 90-minute multimedia presentation and discussion. For more information, call Katie McCarthy at 330-867-1055, ext. 217, or email kmccarthy@sthilary
church.org.

St. John CME Church — 1233 S. Hawkins Ave., Akron. 10:45 a.m. Sunday. Annual Friends and Family Day. An outdoor community fellowship with lunch, games and door prizes will follow the service. Meet new pastor, the Rev. Reynard Monmouth. For more information, call 330-864-3060.

St. John Lutheran Church — 550 E. Wilbeth St., Akron. 3:30 to 6:30 p.m. Saturday. Annual Cabbage Roll Dinner. Please join us for a traditional sit-down dinner with all the fixings including beverages, mashed potatoes, green beans, bread and butter, apple sauce and assorted pies. Cost is $8.50 with carryout available. Cost for single rolls is $3.50 each. There will be a 50/50 raffle, gift tables and a bake sale. For reservations, call 330-773-4128.

Trinity UCC — 215 High St., Wadsworth. 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Farmers market. Fresh produce from local farms and gardens. Baked goods, fresh eggs, honey, herbs and more. 330-334-2536 or www.ucctrinity.com.

Uniontown Community Park — 3696 Apollo St. NW, Lake Township. 5:30 p.m. Oct. 4. Blessing of the Animals. Personal blessings of pets and owners. All pets are welcome in cages and on leashes. For more information, go to www.cometonewlife.org/animal-blessing.

Unitarian Universalist Church of Akron — 3300 Morewood Road, Fairlawn. Noon to 1:15 p.m. Saturday. Free monthly community meal program.

Performances

Christ Presbyterian Church — 530 Tuscarawas St. W., Canton. 7 p.m. Sunday. The 10th season of the Christ Church Music series will begin with the Cleveland Orchestra Piano Quintet performing on the recently purchased Bosendorfer grand piano.

First United Methodist Church — 245 Portage Trail, Cuyahoga Falls. 4 p.m. Sunday. A Chorus for a Cause will perform In His Own Words with orchestra. Tickets are $15, $5 of which goes to the nonprofit organization Life Is Good No Matter What, which plans escapes for adults with advanced stages of cancer through cherished experiences. For tickets, go to www.achorusforacause.org.

Malone University — Stewart Room of the Randall Campus Center, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. 7 p.m. Saturday. The Northeast Ohio Fellowship of Christian Athletes will host comedian John Branyan. Admission is $15. Tickets can only be purchased online at www.johnbranyan.com.

Shoreline Community Church — 790 Carnegie Ave., Akron. 4 to 9 p.m. Saturday. Fall Harvest Music Festival featuring Stevens Family Bluegrass, the McDougal Family, Grace Haydu, the Maxwells, Mike Radebaugh and Galen Oakes present The Elvis Gospel Show. Free. For more information, go to www.shoreline
churchakron.com.

Trinity United Church of Christ — 3909 Blackburn Road NW, Canton. 7 p.m. Sunday. The Trial of Job musical. A contemporary retelling of the biblical story of Job is set in a modern-day courtroom. A freewill offering will benefit the Canton Calvary Mission.

Westminster Presbyterian Church — 1250 W. Exchange St., Akron. 5 p.m. Sunday. Five at Five concert series will feature Philip Thomson on piano. For more information, go to www.westminster
akron.com.

The deadline for Religion Notes is noon Tuesday. Items must be in writing. Please fax information to 330-996-3033, email it to religion@thebeaconjournal.com or send it to Religion, Akron Beacon Journal, 44 E. Exchange St., Akron OH 44309.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has an intriguing evangelization tool — Gladys Knight, the legendary Grammy Award-winning soulful female vocalist.

“Sister Knight,” as she is affectionately called by members of the church, has traveled around the country for the past 12 years with the 100-voice Saints Unified Voices choir, which she created and directs, sharing the Gospel in song during what the church calls “firesides.”

“What you’re looking at here is the very best part of [me],” Knight, 70, told a capacity crowd of 1,100 earlier this month in the chapel at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Tallmadge. The choir presented four private programs in Tallmadge and Westlake on Sept. 19 and 20.

“Sister Knight is a powerful voice for sharing the restored Gospel and breaking down some of the misconceptions about the Mormon Church. Her very presence dispels the myth that we are a white church and gives us an opportunity to share that we are a diverse worldwide church,” said Douglas L. Talley, president of the Akron Stake. “She’s a tremendous ambassador and she has created an opportunity to further enlighten people about what we believe during these firesides.”

Tally said the gospel choir has proven successful in fulfilling its mission to build faith while breaking down cultural barriers and to help LDS members (commonly referred to as Mormons because of their belief in the Book of Mormon) embrace diversity.

Whenever the choir performs, the church sees an increase in its numbers of missionaries and baptisms — which is likely due to subsequent home visits from LDS missionaries to nonmembers who complete a form requesting a gift bag of a sample CD of the choir, a copy of the Book of Mormon and a Restoration DVD (which recounts the story of Joseph Smith, founder of the church).

The low-profile appearances of Knight and her all-volunteer, multicultural choir (which won the 2005 Grammy Award for Best Gospel Album) are by request of a local LDS church, and attendance is by invitation from church leaders and members. The concerts are free. No recordings, videos or photographs are permitted, and no interviews with Knight or choir members are granted.

Energy and passion filled the chapel in Tallmadge from the beginning to end of the concert. The evening included gospel music and modified church hymns including I Give Myself Away, Uphold Me, Please Don’t Pass Me By, I Smile and Blessed Assurance rendered by the choir and talks from church members, including Knight’s husband, William McDowell.

Before the choir sang one note, members of the audience were pushed to their feet and moved to clap to the beat of the rhythmic praise music coming from the accompanying three-piece band. As the music played, the choir — wearing black robes with red accents — entered the chapel from the rear, clapping and swaying to the beat as it made its way to the platform at the front.

Knight, the last choir member in the processional, beamed — flashing a bright smile and pointing her index fingers upward, signaling that this would be an evening to glorify and worship God.

“I love you guys. I do! And that’s not rhetoric,” Knight told her audience. “I’m in awe that [God] loves us so much — no matter how much we mess up.”

Knight shared that she has always been “a child of God” and that her journey into the LDS church began with her children, who became members before she did. She talked about the reaction she got from people in the African-American community: “Ooh! She done sold out!”

“I heard this was a cult, I heard this church didn’t like people of color. So, I started going to find out for myself,” said Knight, who joined the church in 1997 and was put to work “quilting, canning, cooking and feeding people,” to help fulfill the church’s mission to care for those in need.

The iconic singer added humor to handle the sensitive issue of race in a church that withheld the priesthood from men of black African descent from 1952 to 1978 and also barred black women from temple rites, saying the women of the church taught her some things about making macaroni salad and “green Jell-O, but I had to teach ’em how to make fried chicken. I can cook. They can cook too,” said Knight, whose business endeavors includes Gladys Knight’s Signature Chicken and Waffles in the Atlanta area.

Even her husband quipped that he hesitated to call his future wife because “it was well known in the African-American community that Gladys Knight had lost her mind — she had become a Mormon.”

When he called, he asked “Is it true? She answered: “What?” He asked: “That you are a Mormon?” She answered: “Do you have a problem with that?”

McDowell said he followed with three more questions: Do you believe in God? Do you believe in Jesus Christ? Do you believe in the Holy Spirit? She answered all in the affirmative and the conversation continued. The two married in 2001 and he was baptized into the church a year later.

Knight challenged those in attendance to do what Jesus would do — “love in spite of.” She thanked members of the audience for supporting her as an entertainer over the years and shared that she believes her God-given musical talent is a tool that she is to use to spread the Gospel.

Much like Knight, Virgie Shaw, of Copley, faced questions from family members and other African-Americans about why she became a Mormon. Both have the same answer — they felt called to the church, which welcomed them with open arms and a doctrine of inclusion.

For Shaw, who joined the church more than 10 years ago, it started with two LDS missionaries who visited her home.

“I was working in my yard and they showed up, in their white shirts, black pants and ties. I offered them water because it was so hot — it was in July,” said Shaw, 68. “To be honest, I didn’t want to hear anything they said, but it was what they did that impressed me — they volunteered to help me in my yard and they asked me if I knew anybody who needed help. That intrigued me, so I began to investigate the church.”

That investigation led to Shaw’s baptism in the LDS Church and her involvement in the Relief Society, a women’s organization in the LDS church that is charged with seeking out and helping the poor. It also brings the women of the church together to strengthen, support and teach each other.

Shaw said the fireside with Gladys Knight was an opportunity to invite people who wouldn’t otherwise enter an LDS church.

“I think they were pleasantly surprised to hear gospel music instead of hymns and actually feel the spirit in a LDS church. I’ll admit it was the first time I’ve seen that many people in the chapel and the first time I’ve seen people standing on their feet and clapping and saying Amen,” Shaw said. “It was truly a chance for LDS members to experience a part of our rich culture and a chance for people outside the LDS church to see that we are Christians, too.”

Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com. She can be followed at www.twitter.com/ColetteMJenkins.

Temple Israel has moved from Akron to its new home in Bath Township.

On Sunday, Temple members took a historic trek, by foot and by bus, carrying the temple’s nine Torah scrolls.

The ritual of carrying the Torah — the five books of Moses that are the fundamental teachings of Judaism — happens perhaps only once in a generation of worshippers, when a sanctuary closes or relocates.

It is modeled after the journey that the Jewish faithful made to the Promised Land with the Ark of the Covenant.

The local synagogue’s Torah Walk began at the Akron site, 133 Merriman Road, where about 70 people gathered to help carry the nine Torah scrolls to the parking lot of the Highland Square Branch of the Akron-Summit County Public Library.

From there, the nine scrolls, including a Holocaust Torah, were transported by bus to the Earth Fare parking lot in the Shops of Fairlawn Shopping Center, where about 225 people met for the final walk to the new building at 91 Springside Drive, where about 100 people waited.

“This is living history to be part of building a new temple and walking the Torahs to it. I’m honored and humbled to be president of this congregation,” said Ron Winer.“Our hope is that the new location will enable us to grow and be around for another 150 years because we want to preserve Reform Judaism in the Akron area.”

The congregation, which spent nearly 104 years in its building on Merriman, dialogued for several years about how to remain vibrant and relevant. The discussions included an exploration of moving to a new location.

In 2010, a group of Temple Israel members (with the unanimous support of the synagogue’s board) put together private funds and purchased a building at 91 Springside Drive in the Montrose area. The group anticipated a move westward primarily because demographics show a trend of members moving in that direction.

Last year, the temple’s board of trustees approved moving forward with the construction of a new spiritual home at the site. A “Raise the Roof” celebration to kickoff renovations at the former Masonic Temple took place last November. Construction, which began in January, included gutting of the interior, knocking down of two walls and replacing of the roof.

Transformation

Although the congregation had hoped to be in its new home before the start of the High Holidays, construction delays pushed the spiritual dedication of the building beyond Rosh Hashanah, the two-day celebration of the Jewish New Year (which began at sunset Sept. 24).

But Sunday’s move puts the congregation in its new home before Yom Kippur, which begins at sunset on Friday. Yom Kippur, also known as the Day of Atonement, is dedicated to fasting and thinking about how to become a better person in the coming year.

“We will be transformed in a profound way. We anticipate that being in our new home will make us even stronger,” Rabbi Robert Feinberg said. “We realize that Temple is much more than a physical structure — it’s the people.”

Feinberg and Winer said that in addition to being closer to where congregants live, the new location has better highway access. Everything in the new building will be located on one floor, while the aging congregation had to navigate four floors at the Akron site, which is for sale.

Celebrating 150 years

Temple Israel traces its roots to 1865 when 20 men organized the Akron Hebrew Association to meet the worship, education and social needs of the Jewish families that began arriving in the Akron area in 1854. The congregation will celebrate its 150th anniversary in April.

The dedication ceremony at the new location included the blessing and installation of the Torahs in the Holy Ark; the blessing of the mezuzah affixed on the front doorpost; and the blowing of the shofar by Feinberg and about 40 of Temple Israel’s religious school students.

The 32,000-square-foot building on Springside is marked by a 16-foot mezuzah — designed by Don Drumm, a nationally known Akron artist — that is mounted on the front of the building. Stained glass windows from the Akron site have been incorporated at the temple’s new site and a moveable wall between the sanctuary and social hall which allows flexibility to expand seating from 250 to 600.

For more information about Temple Israel, go to www.templeisraelakron.com or call 330-762-8617.

Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com. She can be followed at www.twitter.com/ColetteMJenkins.

It started with a casual invitation to play basketball at a local church gym.

“I just came with a friend to play basketball. When I got here, they just opened up to me. It was warm and homey,” said Na’Juan Lusane, 16. “Now, they’re like family. I know I can depend on them, if I ever need something — help with homework or just somebody to talk to when I’m feeling down.”

The family Na’Juan is talking about is the congregation at First Grace United Church of Christ at West Exchange Street and South Portage Path in Akron.

The church, known for its commitment to serving its neighbors via food and clothing ministries, a preschool, after-school programs and other outreach ministries, is transitioning into a church without a building.

On Sunday, the congregation unanimously voted to leave the church building it has called home and enter into a contract with Akron Public Schools to rent space at Crouse Community Learning Center for Sunday worship services. On Tuesday, church leaders signed a six-month contract to begin worshipping at the school at 1000 Diagonal Road on Nov. 30.

“We have known since 2008, when our foundation took a big hit during the recession, that we would reach a point where we would have to leave this building because the costs are just too enormous,” said the Rev. Robert Dreese, senior pastor. “The congregation is committed to staying together and continuing our mission in the community. We’re still not sure how all of that is going to look, but we’re moving forward.”

Moving forward, at this point, means identifying ministry partners to continue meeting the needs of people in the neighborhood.

Using Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank statistics, the congregation has provided more than 2 million meals since 1993. It provides breakfast to neighbors every Sunday morning before the 10:45 a.m. worship service.

“Sometimes they stay for service. Sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they eat and go to another church,” said Steve Arrington, director of community outreach. “We welcome everybody. I’m a perfect example — an openly gay African-American man, living with HIV. I can tell you, I haven’t been embraced by too many churches, but they welcomed me here with open arms.”

Open and affirming

First Grace is among the first in the Akron area to become an open and affirming congregation. Its population reflects a wide range of diversity in terms of sexual orientation, gender identification, age and race.

Along with its welcoming spirit, the congregation also has tried to be a good neighbor by offering its space to community organizations, including a King School A.A. group that traces its roots to “Dr. Bob” (Robert Holbrook Smith), who co-founded Alcoholics Anonymous. The building also has been home to BeatRoot, Akron Free Yoga and Zoomba programs.

The Akron AIDS Collaborative, which offers free testing for HIV and sexually transmitted infections three days a week, is housed at First Grace.

The church is also home to AMOS Child Care ministry, which provides day care for children ages 6 months to 12 years old. Its after-school program includes a meal and homework assistance. The half-court gym is open to middle- and high school students during the week and on weekends.

The Market Path — a Fair Trade store in Highland Square — is an off-site ministry of the church. The store has helped the congregation educate the community about Fair Trade, which supports the cottage industry work of artisans around the world.

The congregation plans to continue the Market Path ministry at its current location and AMOS at a new location.

“It’s really important to us that we meet the needs of our neighbors because our goal is to be God in action,” said Chuck Bell, who chairs the executive board. “We don’t want to just talk about who we are, we want our actions to show who we are. We’ve tried to do that at this building, and we plan to continue doing that.”

History of church

First Grace was established in 1993 when First UCC and Grace UCC reunited. The two congregations started as one and trace their roots to a group of German immigrants in 1837. A disagreement over whether to continue as a German-speaking congregation or become an English-speaking congregation resulted in a split in 1853.

First UCC opted to continue as a German-speaking church; Grace UCC became English-speaking.

In its heyday during the 1950s, the church attracted about 1,200 people. Today, about 60 people make up its faithful core.

The congregation established a $6 million foundation in 1999 with money from the sale of Chestnut Hill and Mount Peace cemeteries. Costs of operating and maintaining the building were paid using funds from the foundation, and all money collected from the congregation went directly into ministry.

“We have been faithful stewards of what was given to us. Our priority has always been ministry. Everything in the plate always went to missions, and we took good care of the building,” Dreese said. “What turned out to be the Great Recession eroded our base. We made adjustments, but it wasn’t enough. We have always viewed the building as our base of operation, but we fully understand that the church is the people.

“That won’t change. We’ll just operate from a different place,” he said.

The congregation will hold its last worship service in the building Nov. 23, but Na’Juan is confident that wherever the congregation ends up long term, it will continue to be mission-driven.

“I know they will figure out a way to keep helping people in this community because it’s who they are,” said Na’Juan, a junior at Buchtel High School. “They genuinely care about people, and I know they want to keep reaching out to give people a safe haven.”

Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com. She can be followed at www.twitter.com/ColetteMJenkins.

Here is a weekly listing of religious events and news in the Akron area.

Events

Bath United Church of Christ — 3980 W. Bath Road, Akron. 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Friday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Oct. 11. The Bath Church Country Fall Festival. The Festival includes holiday decorations and gifts, dried flower arrangements, pet shop, bake shop, book sale, silent auction, artisan vendors and entertainment for children. Free admission. Lunch served in the Fellowship Hall from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. both days. Dinner seating at 5, 6 and 7 p.m. Friday for $10, $5 for 10 and under. For dinner reservations, call 330-666-3520.

Calvary Temple — 3045 Albrecht Ave., Akron. Sunday. Homecoming Day with special guests the Singing Weavers. Following the gospel concert there will be a dinner in the fellowship hall. In the afternoon there will be games for the youth and the young at heart. 330-784-3453.

Canton Christian Women’s Connection — The Fairways, 1500 Rogwin Circle SW, North Canton. 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Oct. 16. Monthly Luncheon. Diana Grounds will present Great Expectations: What I Learned from My Children. Cost is $13. For reservations, call Sherry at 330-837-6552 or email cantoncwc@aol.com.

Celebration Church — 688 Dan St., Akron. 6 to 9 p.m. Oct. 31. Celebration of Life. Free candy, games, hayrides, Bible costume contest and more for kids of all ages. Activities for the entire family.

The Chapel — 135 Fir Hill, Akron. 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Life Chain at The Chapel. We will be at the East Market Street entrance to The Chapel. Please join us as we stand for the unborn. Also, 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Oct. 18. Women’s Conference And Life Comes Back. Keynote speaker: Tricia Lott Williford and worship leader: Sara Groves. $35 in advance, $40 at door. For more information, go to www.the-chapel.org/adults/womens.

Christ Episcopal Church — 118 S. Mantua St., Kent. 10 a.m. Sunday. Blessing of the Animals will be offered as part of the 10 a.m. service of Holy Communion. All kinds of animals and their owners are invited to attend. Pets should be in carriers or on leashes.

Corpus Christi Church — 221 Main St., Belle Valley. 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Sunday. Annual hog roast. There will be a raffle, crafts and bake sale.

Faith United Methodist Church (Brimfield) — 1235 Tallmadge Road, Brimfield. 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Oct. 11. Swiss steak dinner. $9 adults, $4 youth. Carry-out available.

First Church of the Brethren — 1812 Marigold Ave., Akron. 4 to 6 p.m. Saturday. All-you-can-eat soup supper plus desserts. $6 adults, $4 children 12 and under.

Green Valley United Methodist Church — 620 E. Turkeyfoot Lake Road, Green. 5 to 9 p.m. Oct. 18. Pumpkin Fest, featuring pumpkin decorating, Halloween costume parade, family games, bonfire and a movie. Event is free, but donations of nonperishable food and coats will be given to local needy families. For more information, call 330-896-4357.

Haven of Rest Ministries — Plan on attending one of Haven of Rest’s three fall banquets to learn how the ministry is helping those in need. The banquet will be held at 6:30 p.m. on the following dates: Tuesday at Memories Party and Conference Center, 2437-B Back Orville Road in Wooster; Oct. 14 at the Carlisle Inn, 4949 State Route 515 in Walnut Creek and Oct. 21 at the Hilton Garden Inn, 8971 Wilcox Drive in Twinsburg. Enjoy a delicious meal and hear the latest updates from the Rev. Jeff Kaiser, executive director. There is no cost to attend, however, reservations are required. Reservations are limited to those 18 and older, call 330-535-1563 or email rrose@havenofrest.org.

Home Missionary Baptist Church — 1922 Oakes Drive, Akron. 11 a.m. Oct. 12. During the service there will be gospel music featuring Tammy Jones Robinette.

The House of Prayer for All People Church — 69 S. Balch St., Akron. Appreciating eight years of ministry by Pastor R. Stacey and First Lady Lynnette Jenkins. 5 p.m. Saturday with Pastor Phillip Moorer of New Jerusalem Baptist Church and 5 p.m. Sunday with Pastor David Parker of Zion Apostolic Church.

The Malone University Center for Theology and Ministry — Brehme Conference Center, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. Noon to 2 p.m. Thursday. Pastors’ Luncheon. Guest speaker, the Rev. Joel Scandrett, assistant professor of historical theology and director of the Robert E. Webber Center of Trinity School for Ministry in Ambridge, Pa. The lecture and discussion will focus on the subject of catechesis and its necessity in forming disciples during our time. 330-471-8239.

Malone University — Johnson Center for Worship and the Fine Arts, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. Oct. 25. Equip Ministry Conference. Keynote speaker is Bishop Joey Johnson of House of the Lord. The conference is designed for people in leadership positions within church or para-church organizations, but is open to all. Cost is $40 and includes a boxed lunch and all conference materials. To register or for more information, contact Doug Gregory at 330-471-8643.

Messiah Lutheran Church — 4700 S. Main St., Green. 2 p.m. Oct. 12. Pet blessing in the field around the church. Have your pet blessed and enjoy God’s gift of animal companionship. If it rains the blessing will take place in the Family Life Center. For more information, call 330-644-5766.

Mount Zion Baptist Church — 327 Cuyahoga St., Akron. 10:45 a.m. Sunday. Family & Friends Month Starts. Everyone is welcome.

Mount Carmel Baptist Church — 401 Robert St., Akron. 6 p.m. Friday and 9 a.m. Oct. 11. I am EDeN Ministries: The Faith Now Conference. Speakers are Missionary Teaira Mitchell, Prophetess Edlexus Henley, Pastor Kevin R. Smith, Apostle Lynnette Appling and Minister Eric D. Nevins Jr. Tickets are $20. For more information, call 330-714-5221.

New Life Episcopal — 13118 Church Ave., Lake Township. 10 a.m. Sunday. Blessing of the animals. Personal blessings of pets and owners. All pets are welcome, in cages and on leashes. For more information, go to www.cometonew
life.org/animal-blessing.

Prince of Peace Catholic Church — 1263 Shannon Ave., Barberton. 4:15 p.m. Oct. 11. Ethnic Rosary. Please join us in praying a decade of the Rosary in Slovenian, Polish, Hungarian, Slovak and English.

Queen of Heaven Church — 1800 Steese Road, Green. 11 a.m. Sunday. Bring your pets to Mass. An outdoor Mass with pet blessing will commemorate the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi and his love of animals. Please have pets on leashes or caged. In case of rain, take your pets into the church for the 11 a.m. Mass. Also, on Monday, a Rosary Rally/Crusade, a 50th anniversary event, will be held. A rosary prayer will be prayed every hour on the hour from 8 a.m. through 6 p.m. At 7 p.m., the Most Rev. Roger W. Gries, auxiliary bishop emeritus for the Diocese of Cleveland, will preside at the closing Mass on the vigil of the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. For more information, call 330-896-2345.

Shaw Jewish Community Center — 750 White Pond Drive, Akron. 4 to 8 p.m. Oct. 13. 2014-15 Akron Holocaust Seminar Helpers and Bystanders: Rescue and Indifference, a seminar for teachers and other interested learners. Featuring Dr. Susan Bachrach, exhibit curator: Some Were Neighbors, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Registration fee: $18 (with box lunch), $12 seminar alone. For information, contact Sam Chestnut at schestnut@thelippmanschool.org.

St. Bernard Catholic Church — 44 University Ave., Akron. 10:45 a.m. to noon Friday. Witness for Life. A peaceful and prayerful “chain” will form as silent witnesses to the sanctity of life. Assemble on the front steps of the church.

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church — 515 48th St. NW, Canton. 5 to 9 p.m. Saturday. Octoberfest celebration. Traditional German food, homemade desserts, beverages, face painting, a 50/50 drawing, and dancing to the music of Johnnie Maier’s Band, “Visinata.” Tastings of craft beer made by St. Mark’s Brewmeisters will be available to those 21 and over.

Tickets are $12 for adults, $5 ages 7-12 and free for 6 and under.

St. Matthew Rectory — 2603 Benton St., Akron. 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Thursday. A Cancer Spirituality Group for those on the cancer journey, those who are facing the diagnosis of cancer or have faced the diagnosis in the past or are interested in exploring and talking about the cancer experience in the context of spirituality. 330-628-5725.

St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Mogadore — 755 S. Cleveland Ave., Mogadore. 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday. Annual Something Russian Festival. The two-day event celebrates Russian food, music, dance and art. Ethnic lunches and dinners are available to eat at the church social hall or for take-out. The St. Nicholas Balalaika Orchestra and the St. Nicholas Russian Youth Dancers will give several live performances in the evenings each day. For more information, go to www.somethingrussian.com.

Suffield United Church of Christ — 1115 State Rout 43, Suffield. 5 to 7 p.m. Saturday. Shirley and Sam Bryan Memorial Pig Roast.

Tallmadge Church of the Nazarene — 191 S. Munroe Road, Tallmadge. 5:30 to 7 p.m. Oct. 30. Trunks, Treats & Truths. A safe trick or treat opportunity for all kids in Tallmadge. In addition to sweet treats there will be fun activities offered including face painting and apple bobbing.

Tower of Prayer Church of God in Christ Worship Center — 1334 Diagonal Road, Akron. 7 p.m. Saturday and 11:15 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. Sunday. Celebrating Pastor Burton D. and Mother Gene Clemons Anniversary. Please come and worship with us as we celebrate another year.

Trinity UCC — 215 High St., Wadsworth. 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Farmers market. Fresh produce from local farms and gardens. Baked goods, fresh eggs, honey, herbs and more. 330-334-2536 or www.ucctrinity.com.

Uniontown Community Park — 3696 Apollo St. NW, Lake Township. 5:30 p.m. Saturday. Blessing of the Animals. Personal blessings of pets and owners. All pets are welcome in cages and on leashes. For more information, go to www.cometonewlife.org/animal-blessing.

Westminster Presbyterian Church — 1250 W. Exchange St., Akron. 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday. Annual Blessing of the Pets. Blessings will be done by interim pastor, the Rev. Conley Zomermaand. Pets should be on leashes or in cages. All animals are welcome. 330-836-2226.

Performances

Brecksville United Church of Christ — 23 Public Square, Brecksville. 4 p.m. Oct. 19. Case Concert Choir will present A Life in Music. The program follows our life journey from birth through adulthood, and features works by several contemporary composers, as well as two traditional songs from Africa. A free-will offering will be received and a light meal will be served following the concert.

Cornerstone Church — 578 Killian Road, Akron. 7 p.m. Oct. 25. Crowns 4 Christ — The Unbroken Tour 2014. Presented by amazing speakers on fire for Christ, along with music, videos, and fun you can share in the storms that turned into stories, the challenges that turned broken into beauty. Tickets are $16 in advance and $18 at the door. Call 330-703-1183 for ticket information.

First Baptist Church — 775 W. Main St., Wilmot. 4 to 6 p.m. Oct. 11. The Saturday Sing featuring the Victory Trio and Four By Grace. Love offering accepted.

Malone University — 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. 7:30 p.m. Oct. 20. The College of Theology, Arts, and Sciences — Department of Music will present Summit Bells, a community handbell ensemble from Akron. The event is free and open to the public.

St. Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church — 3295 S. Union Ave., Alliance. 4 p.m. Oct. 12. Organ Duets! Mark Thewes, organist and director of music at Westbrook Park United Methodist Church in Canton and Chad Pittman, subdean of the Canton Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, will perform.

Zion Temple Baptist Church — 515 Ardella Ave., Akron. 6:15 p.m. Saturday. Birthday Musical Concert, with Pastor Mark Ward.

Speakers

St. Joseph Parish in Mantua — 11045 St. Joseph Blvd., Mantua. 7 to 8 p.m. Oct. 22. Speaker Series — Discover God: Turn on the Light, Adult Men’s Spirituality Night: Father Robert Kraig Up and Down the Ladder of Life. For more information, call 330-274-2253 or go to www.stjosephmantua.com.

The deadline for Religion Notes is noon Tuesday. Items must be in writing. Please fax information to 330-996-3033, email it to religion@thebeaconjournal.com or send it to Religion, Akron Beacon Journal, 44 E. Exchange St., Akron OH 44309

NEWARK, N.J.: A half-century ago, a young boy’s eye disease mysteriously vanished and on Saturday, the New Jersey nun credited with curing the boy will be beatified.

Sister Miriam Teresa Demjanovich, who died in 1927 at age 26, is scheduled to be beatified in a ceremony led by Cardinal Angelo Amato at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark. The ceremony is the third in the four-step process to sainthood.

Sister Miriam Teresa is credited with curing a boy’s macular degeneration in the 1960s, according to the Archdiocese of Newark. The boy, Michael Mencer, was given a lock of the sister’s hair and prayed to her. The effects of the eye disease soon began to fade, church officials say.

“Within a period of six weeks, it was totally reversed,” said Sister Mary Canavan, of the Sisters of Charity.

Mencer told NBC News that his teacher gave him the lock of hair in a plastic container along with a prayer card. On a walk home later that day, he recalled noticing changes in his sight.

“I was about two blocks from the house when I think it happened,” he told NBC. “I looked up at what I thought was the sun, and it didn’t hurt my eyes, but I could see an orb, a bright light. And when I looked back down I could see the hair in the memento.”

Mencer did not return calls for comment from the Associated Press.

The beatification comes less than a year after the event was certified as a miracle by Pope Francis, though church officials started the process in 1945 when the bishop of Paterson began studying Sister Miriam Teresa’s life and virtues, according to the Sisters of Charity.

Sister Miriam Teresa, who was born in Bayonne, was a nun for two years before succumbing to complications of appendicitis. During her short time in the Sisters of Charity, she was best known for her good virtue and her writing, which Sister Diane Collesano said was well beyond her years. At the time, students noted that whatever was said in confidence to Sister Miriam Teresa was not spoken to anyone else, Collesano said.

“The sisters saw in her that a person who had insights far beyond the average 20-some-year-old person,” Collesano said.

The archdiocese expects more than 1,500 people, including members of the sister’s family and Mencer, to be on hand for the beatification Mass.

Attendees also will include a “whole slew of nuns,” priests and more than 20 bishops, including one from Poland, said Jim Goodness, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Newark. During the ceremony, a procession will be held carrying a relic from Sister Miriam Teresa and a portrait of her, Goodness said.

Beatification requires evidence of one miracle that happened after the candidate has died and as a result of a specific plea to the candidate. Sainthood requires a second miracle, though candidates deemed martyrs need only one for canonization.

Major holidays for both Muslims and Jews were both being marked Saturday across the Middle East, the first time this has happened since 1981.

The Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha and the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur coincide once every 33 years, as Judaism and Islam rely on lunar calendars.

Yom Kippur is Judaism’s Day of Atonement, when devout Jews ask God to forgive them for their transgressions and refrain from eating and drinking, attending intense prayer services in synagogues.

Businesses and airports in Israel shut down as television and radio stations went silent and highways stood empty.

That holiday began at sunset Friday and ended Saturday night.

Muslims are marking Eid al-Adha, a three-day holiday that started Saturday across much of the Middle East.

It commemorates the willingness of the prophet Ibrahim — or Abraham as he is known in the Bible — to sacrifice his son in accordance with God’s will, though in the end God provides him a sheep to sacrifice instead.

On the start of Eid al-Adha, Muslims slaughter sheep, cattle and other livestock, and give part of the meat to the poor.

Parents often buy new clothes for their children for the holiday.

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador: It’s been dubbed the “Francis effect.”

In ways large and small, Pope Francis is having an impact on Roman Catholics in Latin America. He’s pushing ahead with sainthood for a controversial martyred prelate in El Salvador. He’s mending fences with proponents of a theology that the Vatican once shunned for its Marxist whiff. And he’s cautiously embraced new, livelier styles of worship that his predecessors had discouraged.

The changes have won Pope Francis grassroots support, even as they have rattled the church’s bishops, most of whom were installed during the tenures of his more conservative predecessors.

Nowhere is that conflict more evident than in this small Central American country, where a generation ago the church was at the center of what would become a civil war that would claim tens of thousands of lives.

It was aboard an Alitalia charter in mid-August that the pontiff announced that he was pressing the Vatican bureaucracy to hurry with the beatification of Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero, an advocate for the poor and a critic of the Salvadoran military who was slain by a right-wing assassin in 1980.

“It’s very important to move in haste,” Francis told reporters aboard the airliner. “For me, Romero is a man of God.”

El Salvador’s bishops reacted with public delight, but longtime observers said there was anything but glee behind closed doors among those who still view Monsignor Romero as a sympathizer of the political left.

“The beatification of Monsignor Romero will be like a bucket of cold water for them. They neither agreed with him in his life nor after his death,” said Carlos Ayala Ramirez, the director of the radio station at the Jesuit Central American University in San Salvador.

A rifleman in a red Volkswagen shot Romero in the chest as he celebrated Mass in a chapel on March 24, 1980. At his massive funeral six days later, explosions and gunshots roiled the huge crowd, which stampeded, leaving some 30 people dead.

Romero became a hero to the poor as the nation careened toward a civil war that took 70,000 lives over the next 12 years.

“When Romero died, there was silence in the Vatican,” said the Rev. Jon Sobrino, a Spanish Jesuit who teaches theology at Central American University. Under then-Pope John Paul II, the Vatican slowed any move to make the slain archbishop a saint.

“The word was, ‘It’s not an opportune time,’ ” Sobrino said. “Powerful cardinals were enemies of Romero, and the canonization didn’t move forward. Why not? Because it is not easy to canonize Jesus of Nazareth. He was against so many people, the high priests, the wealthy.”

Today, Romero’s image is painted on schools across the country, and the former guerrilla movement known as the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front, or FMLN, in power since 2009, has renamed the national airport and a highway for Romero.

He’s also taken the stigma away from Liberation Theology, the current that originated in Latin America in the 1950s and 1960s.

It adopted the use of Christianity to fight social injustice, sometimes calling it class struggle.

Detractors viewed the doctrine as Christianized Marxism, and during the 27-year papacy of John Paul II, who rose to prominence battling communists in his native Poland, its proponents were largely silenced. Francis has taken steps to reverse that.

He met with Gustavo Gutierrez, a Peruvian priest who coined the term Liberation Theology.

In a little noticed action in August, Pope Francis lifted a nearly three-decade ban on the priestly functions of Miguel D’Escoto Brockmann, a Nicaraguan who became foreign minister in the Sandinista government, earning John Paul’s enmity.

VATICAN CITY: The Vatican’s top lawyer favors a radical change in how the Catholic Church handles marriage annulments to speed them up and reduce costs and red tape.

Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio is a key member of a commission of experts Pope Francis appointed in August to study ways to streamline the process.

Catholics have long complained that it can take years to get an annulment, if they can get one at all. Some dioceses in the developing world don’t even have a tribunal.

Catholic doctrine holds that a church marriage is indissoluble. An annulment is a judgment by a church tribunal that the marriage had some inherent defect from the start and can be declared null. Reasons can vary, including that the couple never intended for their marriage to last or that one of the spouses didn’t want children.

Coccopalmerio said Thursday he favors letting individual bishops make decisions in certain cases, changing what has been an exclusively judicial process to an administrative one. He also said removing an automatic appeal for all annulment cases, or reducing the number of judges from one to three on the tribunal, could help.

He spoke to reporters on the sidelines of a two-week meeting of bishops from around the world debating how church teaching on marriage, divorce, gays and sex can be more relevant to today’s Catholics.

Breaking with tradition, the Vatican decided to withhold printed summaries of bishops’ remarks to the synod in a bid to encourage freer debate. The change, however, has prompted protests by journalists shut out of the proceedings.

The Vatican’s doctrine czar, Cardinal Gerhard Mueller, told one of the two Catholic television broadcasters allowed inside the synod hall that the speeches should be made public.

“All Christians have the right to be informed about the intervention of their bishops,” he said.

Vatican spokesmen have staged daily briefings summarizing the debate, but without saying who said what.

At what point does trash talk by sports rivals cross the line of decency?

Apparently, when someone is offended — at least that is what several local high schools have discovered as recently as Wednesday, when administrators at Archbishop Hoban were prompted to remove controversial videos from YouTube and Twitter feeds.

“When questions are raised about the sensitivity of what is being done or said, it is time to step back and evaluate,” said Todd Sweda, Hoban president. “While there was no ill will or intent to be insensitive by our students, out of respect for St. Vincent-St. Mary and anyone else who was offended, we removed the videos from the public domain.”

The videos in question are movie parodies — mainly of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds and a portion of Forrest Gump. They appear to be in the pattern of previous “Mum Day” week videos produced by Hoban students, leading up to the annual football game against St. V-M. The 2013 video, on YouTube, is a The Walking Dead variation called The Walking Irish.

The group responsible for both Walking Irish and the 2014 video is Hoban Vids, which is on Twitter as @KnightsVideos and identifies itself as “Hoban approved and Student Council supported! Our motto is simple: Get the shot that no one sees.”

According to the Hoban Vids tweets, the video was based on a 25-page script and shot in pieces at locations including InfoCision Stadium and Hoban itself in July, August and September. The tweets say there were 43 cast members and 32 people on the crew.

Several St. V-M parents complained that elements of the videos were in poor or questionable taste. One of the points of contention was the idea of St.V-M hunting down Hoban Knights in a manner resembling Inglourious’s portrayal of Nazis hunting down Jews. Adding insult to injury was the fact that the videos premiered during the same week of Rosh Hashana, the Jewish new year (which began at sundown Sept. 24 and ended at sundown Sept. 26).

Another questionable scene is in the presentation of two actors playing St. V-M male students. The students emerge from a women’s bathroom in the InfoCision Stadium while dancing flamboyantly to Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up. (Not all St. V–M students in the five–chapter video are presented that way.)

St. V-M President Tom Carone is convinced that there was no harm intended when the videos were produced. He said he was satisfied with Hoban’s decision to remove the videos. Administrators at Hoban thought they had removed the videos on game day (Sept. 26); but after discovering on Wednesday that they had only restricted access, the videos were removed.

“It’s unfortunate, but it’s behind us,” Carone said. “We have a friendly rivalry and the last several years it’s become a battle of who can produce the best video, leading up to the big game. Hoban acted quickly and took care of the problem, when a few people raised questions about the videos being insensitive. We all work well together and this by no means changes our relationship.”

Much like Hoban, Walsh Jesuit found itself on the receiving end of criticism last week when it fielded a complaint that its students were engaging in unsportsmanlike conduct when they marked trash cans “Hoban” and made signs saying “God Made Hoban — God Makes Mistakes.”

By the time the complaint reached administrators, the signs and wording had already been removed.

“They’re teens and they sometimes do things that they think are clever or funny, or they think they have to ‘one up’ the rival team. Then, we see it and think something different, so we turn it into a teaching moment and remove it,” said Karl Ertle, president at Walsh. “All of the Catholic high schools in this area have a spectacular relationship. We’re educational partners committed to teaching our students that our Christian values cannot be compromised, even if you’re trying to be funny.”

All three schools said they have a process in place that requires all videos to be reviewed by adults before they are released for public consumption.

“The administrators at all of the schools are working very hard at good communication and at helping students make good decisions,” Sweda said. “This situation has raised the bar on the extent of time we will spend with the young people in the future when they are creating videos to try to ensure that their meaning won’t be misinterpreted or misunderstood.”

By the way, Hoban lost both grudge matches — 33-14 on Walsh’s home field and 33-27 in triple overtime against St. V-M in front of nearly 7,000 people at the University of Akron’s InfoCision Stadium.

Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com. She can be followed at www.twitter.com/ColetteMJenkins. Rich Heldenfels can be reached at 330-996-3582 or rheldenfels@thebeaconjournal.com.

The 100th anniversary of The Presentation of Our Lord Orthodox Church represents 100 years of Orthodoxy in the Akron area.

The church, at 3365 Ridgewood Road in Fairlawn, was the first Orthodox Christian parish founded in Akron and is the oldest, continuing Orthodox presence in Summit County. It was established in 1914 by 48 immigrants from present-day Romania on Akron’s south side. The congregation constructed its first church building on Getz Street and moved to its current location in 1972.

The celebration of the centennial began in September 2013, including a special celebration in February to mark the feast day of the Presentation of the Lord. It will conclude next weekend with a formal greeting of Bishop Irineu Duvlea, auxiliary bishop of the Jackson, Mich.-based Romanian Orthodox Episcopate of America at 4:30 p.m. Vespers will begin after the greeting and a semiformal dance is from 7 to 10 p.m. on Oct. 18.

On Oct. 19., a special morning service (called Matins) begins at 9 a.m., with a Hierarchical Divine Liturgy at 10 a.m. The day will end with an anniversary banquet.

Tickets for the dance are $10 and are available at the door. For more information about the local church, go to http://presentationchurch.org or call 330-666-8055.

In other religion news:

Events

Basilica of St. John the Baptist — 627 McKinley Ave. NW, Canton. 2 p.m. Oct. 19. Wedding Anniversary Celebration to honor couples who are observing their 25th, 40th, 50th or over anniversaries in 2014. The celebration will include Mass with Bishop George V. Murry, renewal of marriage vows, a personalized certificate for each couple and a reception for the couples and their families.

Bath United Church of Christ — 3980 W. Bath Road, Akron. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. The Bath Church Country Fall Festival. The festival includes holiday decorations and gifts, dried flower arrangements, pet shop, bake shop, book sale, silent auction, artisan vendors, and entertainment for children. Free admission. Lunch served in the Fellowship Hall from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. both days. Dinner seating at 5, 6 and 7 p.m. Friday for $10, $5 for age 10 and under. For dinner reservations, call 330-666-3520.

Canton Christian Women’s Connection — The Fairways, 1500 Rogwin Circle SW, North Canton. 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Thursday. Monthly luncheon. Diana Grounds will present “Great Expectations: What I Learned from My Children.” Cost is $13. For reservations, call Sherry at 330-837-6552 or email cantoncwc@aol.com.

Celebration Church — 688 Dan St., Akron. 6-9 p.m. Oct. 31. Celebration of Life. Free candy, games, hayrides, Bible costume contest and more for kids of all ages. Activities for the entire family.

Centenary United Methodist Church — 1310 Superior Ave., Akron. 4 p.m., Sunday. Rainbow Tea. $10 adults, $5 children 4-10 years old. 330-376-9648

The Chapel — 135 Fir Hill, Akron. 7 p.m. Tuesday. Parents of Prodigals present the “Don’t Be Blind-Sided: Heroin” seminar. Open to all concerned parents and family members that want to know the signs of heroin use, information on the moods, behavior, the drug language and culture. For more information, call 330-376-6400 or 330-620-5668. Also, 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Oct. 18. Women’s Conference “And Life Comes Back.” Keynote speaker Tricia Lott Williford and worship leader Sara Groves. $35 in advance, $40 at door. For more information, go to www.the-chapel.org/adults/womens.

Christ is the Answer Ministries — 379 E. South St., Akron 7 p.m. Wednesday. Road to Glory On the Road radio broadcast celebration with special guest, the Rev. Melvin Brown and Gospel Temple Baptist Church, Campbell. 330-376-1869.

Columbia United Church of Christ — 978 Wooster Road West, Barberton. 4 to 6 p.m. Saturday. Swiss steak dinner. $9 adults, $3 children 4 to 12 years old, $27 families. 2 to 3 p.m. Sunday. Third annual Trunk or Treat. 330-825-9946.

Crown Point Ecology Center — 3220 Ira Road, Bath Township. 10 a.m. Wednesday. Monthly Spiritual Ecology Conversation Cafe to discuss the spiritual aspects of the ecological issue. 330-806-0311 or www.crownpt.org.

Dominican Sisters of Peace — Our Lady of the Elms, 1230 W. Market St., Akron. 3 to 5 p.m. Oct. 19. Associates Fall Festival Fundraiser Soup, Salad and Silent Auction. 330-835-5690.

Dominion Family Church — 90 W. Thornton St., Akron. Celebrates 30 years of ministry and 24-year pastoral anniversary with special speakers throughout the week: 7 p.m. Wednesday, Pastor Benny Williams; 7 p.m. Friday, Bishop Darren Gay; 10:30 a.m. Oct. 19, minister Marrissa Neal; 5 p.m. Oct. 19, Bishop Kenneth Paramore; and 10:30 a.m. Oct. 26, Pastor Sherry Travis. For more information, call 330-252-2277.

Faith Family Church — 8200 Freedom Ave. NW, North Canton. 10 a.m. Wednesday. Leader’s Edge A+ Leadership Seminar presents authors John Maxwell and Rory Vaden. Tickets are $15. For tickets, go to http://theleadersedge.org/seminar/.

Faith United Methodist Church (Brimfield) — 1235 Tallmadge Road, Brimfield. 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Saturday. Swiss steak dinner. $9 adults, $4 youth. Carry-out available.

Green Valley United Methodist Church — 620 E. Turkeyfoot Lake Road, Green. 5 to 9 p.m. Oct. 18. Pumpkin Fest, featuring pumpkin decorating, Halloween costume parade, family games, bonfire and a movie. Event is free, but donations of nonperishable food and coats will be given to local needy families. For more information, call 330-896-4357.

Home Missionary Baptist Church — 1922 Oakes Drive, Akron. 11 a.m. Sunday. During the service there will be Gospel music featuring Tammy Jones Robinette.

Johnson United Methodist Church — 3409 Johnson Road, Norton. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. Fall Festival with crafts, food and games. Free parking. 330-825-7886 or www.johnsonumc.org.

Malone University — Johnson Center for Worship and the Fine Arts, 2600 Cleveland Ave. NW, Canton. Oct. 25. Equip Ministry Conference. Keynote speaker is Bishop Joey Johnson of House of the Lord. The conference is designed for persons in leadership positions within church or para-church organizations, but is open to all. Cost is $40 and includes a boxed lunch and all conference materials. To register or for more information, contact Doug Gregory at 330-471-8643.

Manchester United Methodist Church — 5625 Manchester Road, Akron. 7:30 to 11 a.m. Oct. 18. Boy Scout Troop 118’s semi-
annual “All-You-Can-Eat” breakfast buffet. Breakfast includes pancakes, eggs, sausage, hash browns, sausage gravy and biscuits, coffee and juice. $6.50 for adults and $6 for seniors and children under 12.

Messiah Lutheran Church — 4700 S. Main St., Green. 2 p.m. Sunday. Pet blessing in the field around the church. Have your pet blessed and enjoy God’s gift of animal companionship. If it rains the blessing will take place in the Family Life Center. For more information, call 330-644-5766.

Mount Calvary Baptist Church — 442 Bell St., Akron. 9 a.m. to noon Oct. 18. FirstMerit Bank Free Mortgage Seminar. Free credit counseling; refreshments will be served; child care is available. Pre-registration is required, call 330-253-3711.

Mt. Lebanon Baptist Church — 180 Edward Ave., Akron. 10 a.m. to noon Oct. 18. Annual Esther Circle Prayer Breakfast. The speaker will be Celina Flunoy, director of Love INC of Greater Akron. Musical selections by Mijoi Rogers of Akron’s National Inventors Hall of Fame STEM School. $7 donation.

Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church —1225 Vernon Odom Blvd., Akron. 10 a.m., Sunday. Celebration of the 57th annual Women’s Day with the Rev. Falon Lidge of Mt. Haven Missionary Baptist Church, Akron. 330-864-6635.

New Mission Missionary Baptist Church — 150 Wayne Ave., Akron. 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Oct. 18. Sixth annual Women’s Conference: “Christian Women Living in the Beauty of Holiness.” Guest speaker is Cynthia Taylor, Faith & Prayer Outreach Ministries. $10 donation.

North Springfield Presbyterian Church — 671 Canton Road, Akron. 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Oct. 18. 60th Anniversary Blood Drive. The American Red Cross will help North Springfield Presbyterian Church celebrate 60 years with a blood drive, special recognition will be made to Jerry Schrop for reaching his 25-gallon milestone and for his 35 years of service to the Red Cross. To schedule an appointment to donate blood, call 800-448-3543 or go to www.redcrossblood.org.

Our Lady of the Cedars — 507 S. Cleveland-Massillon Road, Fairlawn. 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Oct. 18. Flea market. 330-666-3598.

Prince of Peace Catholic Church — 1263 Shannon Ave., Barberton. 4:15 p.m. Saturday. Ethnic Rosary. Please join us in praying a decade of the Rosary in Slovenian, Polish, Hungarian, Slovak and English.

St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church — 583 W. Hopocan Ave., Barberton. 3 p.m. Sunday. Pet blessing in church parking lot.

St. Anthony Church — 83 Mosser Place, Akron. 11:30 a.m. to 6 p.m., Oct. 19. Spaghetti dinner. $7 adults, $5 children 12 and younger. Carryout available, 330-805-0631.

St. Paul Catholic Church Parish Activity Center — 1580 Brown St., Akron. 7 p.m. Tuesday. The Serra Club of Akron presents “The Catholic Church in Ukraine: The History and Current Crisis.” An evening of lecture and discussion. Admission is free and open to the public. Please RSVP to Tom Giffels at 330-666-0255 or giffel@earthlink.net or Ron McAvoy at 330-773-7389 or rmcavoy@aol.com.

Shaw Jewish Community Center — 750 White Pond Drive, Akron. 4-8 p.m. Monday. 2014-15 Akron Holocaust seminar “Helpers & Bystanders: Rescue & Indifference.” Seminar is for teachers and other interested learners. Featuring Dr. Susan Bachrach, exhibit curator for “Some Were Neighbors,” at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Registration fee: $18 (with box lunch), $12 seminar alone. For information, contact Sam Chestnut at schestnut@thelippmanschool.org.

Suffield United Church of Christ — 1115 state Route 43, Suffield. 7:30 a.m. Oct. 19. Stewardship Sunday Men’s Fellowship Breakfast.

Trinity Lutheran Church — 600 S. Water St., Kent. 4:30 to 7 p.m. Friday. Spaghetti dinner to benefit outreach ministries. Takeout available, 330-673-5446.

Trinity UCC — 215 High St., Wadsworth. 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Farmers market. Fresh produce from local farms and gardens. Baked goods, fresh eggs, honey, herbs and more. 330-334-2536 or www.ucctrinity.com.

Performances

Brecksville United Church of Christ — 23 Public Square, Brecksville. 4 p.m. Oct. 19. Case Concert Choir will present “A Life in Music.” The program follows our life journey from birth through adulthood, and features works by several contemporary composers, as well as two traditional songs from Africa. A free-will offering will be received, and a light meal will be served following the concert.

Christ is the Answer Ministries — 379 E. South St., Akron. 4 p.m. Sunday. . Deliverance Through Dance program. 330-376-1869.

Fairlawn Lutheran Church — 3415 W. Market St., Akron. 4 p.m. Oct. 19. Singers Companye in concert. The program will include Magnificat by Francesco Durante, Jubilate Deo by Leo Hassler, Heilig by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Abendlied, Op. 69, No. 3 by Josef Rheinberger, Der 43 Psalm: Richte mich, Gott Felix, by Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, From The Sunrise Mass by Ola Gjeilo, Ave verum corpus (14th century text) by Colin Mawby, and A Little Jazz Mass by Bob Chilcott.

First Baptist Church — 775 W. Main St., Wilmot. 4-6 p.m. Saturday. The Saturday Sing features the Victory Trio and Four By Grace. Love offering accepted.

Grace United Methodist Church — 1720 Schneider St. NW, North Canton. 7 p.m. Wednesday. Spirited will perform “567: go tell it from the Mount.” The musical is a meshing of the great thoughts, feelings and heart from the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5, 6 and 7. A free-will offering will be accepted. For more information, call 330-499-2330 or go to www.northcantongrace.org.

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church — 146 College St., Wadsworth. 3 to 5 p.m. Saturday. Christopher Milo will share his personal testimony and music. Free-will offering. 330-3360212.

St. Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church — 3295 S. Union Ave., Alliance. 4 p.m. Sunday. Organ Duets! Mark Thewes, organist and director of music at Westbrook Park United Methodist Church in Canton, and Chad Pittman, sub-dean of the Canton Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, will perform.

Speakers

St. Joseph Parish in Mantua — 11045 St. Joseph Blvd., Mantua. 7 to 8 p.m. Oct. 22. Speaker Series: “Discover God: Turn on the Light”; Adult Men’s Spirituality Night: Father Robert Kraig “Up and Down the Ladder of Life.” For more information, call 330-274-2253 or go to www.stjosephmantua.com.

The deadline for Religion Notes is noon Tuesday. Items must be in writing. Please fax information to 330-996-3033, email it to religion@thebeaconjournal.com or send it to Religion, Akron Beacon Journal, 44 E. Exchange St., Akron OH 44309.