Rosa Parks: RIP

Washington Prepares To Pay Rosa Parks Rare Tribute at Capitol [WPOST]

"The nation's capital began preparations yesterday for a historic weekend, when civil rights matriarch Rosa Parks will become one of only 30 Americans ever honored with the pomp and ritual of a Capitol Rotunda viewing."

Rosa Parks, mother of the civil rights movement in the U.S., died Monday Oct. 24, 2005 at the age of 92. In 1955 she made headlines for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus to a white man in defiance of segration laws then in force.

City buses are reportedly leaving the front seat open in tribute to her.

People Get Ready!
Rosa, your ride is free.

Monika Hellwig dies Sep. 30, 2005.

Hellwig, noted theologian and author, dies after suffering stroke
(CNS NEWS BRIEFS Sep-30-2005)

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Noted theologian and author Monika Hellwig died at Washington Hospital Center Sept. 30 after suffering a severe stroke. She was 74 years old. She had just recently retired as president and executive director of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities. Hellwig taught theology for more than 30 years at Georgetown University before taking up the ACCU post. Just days before her death she had taken up a new position as a research fellow at the university's Woodstock Theological Center. A former president of the Catholic Theological Society of America, she received numerous honors and awards for her work, including more than 30 honorary degrees.

A Woodstock Forum held at Georgetown University just this past Monday marking the 30th Anniversary of the Forum, listed her as the moderator for "Re-envisioning the Papacy", a panel presentation which looked at the papal invitation of Ut Unum Sint and the Johanine call "that all may be one."

May you join with Pope JPII at the banquet that has been prepared and look kindly on us as we endeavor to continue in the ministry of God's invitation to gather us in.