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Bishop David M. O’Connell, C.M., will celebrate a Mass of Thanksgiving Nov. 14 at 10:30 a.m. in St. Robert Bellarmine Co-Cathedral, Freehold, in commemoration of the Beatification of Father Michael J. McGivney.  Now named Blessed Michael McGivney, the priest was beatified in Hartford, Connecticut Oct. 31. The Mass in the Diocese of Trenton is by invitation only due to COVID restrictions but will be accessible to the public through a livestream video. 

As Bishop of the Diocese of Trenton, I invite and encourage all the clergy, consecrated religious and lay faithful to join together with me in praying this “Novena for the United States of America” from Monday, October 26 through Election Day, November 3, 2020.

The COVID pandemic will not take away Christmas 2020!  It will, however, change the way we celebrate it, especially in our churches and parishes, if current circumstances continue as they are or worsen.  Because COVID is a highly contagious airborne virus, the prospect of large (or larger than usual) crowds gathering  indoors this winter for long periods of time without ample ventilation and proper social distancing, as well as the necessity to sanitize churches between Masses, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day Mass schedules will be affected, especially in parishes where there is only a single pastor or priest assigned.  The COVID pandemic’s maximum one-third occupancy restrictions in churches coupled with the need for social distancing will limit the space available for parishioners to attend Christmas Mass as usual.  Church schedules will also have to accommodate required cleaning.

When the dispensation from the obligation to attend Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation issued by bishops for their dioceses during the COVID pandemic is finally lifted – and it will be – Catholics will be required again to “return to church.”  Canon law defines “dispensation” as a “relaxation of a merely ecclesiastical law in a particular case” that “can be granted by those who possess executive power (canon 85).”  The Mass obligation referred to above is an “ecclesiastical law” presented in the 1983 Code of Canon Law: “On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are obliged to participate in Mass (canon 1247).”  Its history is much older than that.

The Catholic Church believes and teaches that all human life is sacred from conception to natural death. For that reason, we, the Bishops of each of the dioceses in New Jersey, join in voicing the strongest possible opposition to the “Reproductive Freedom Act.”

We have been informed of an equipment breakdown at Evergreen Printing, which has resulted in a printing and mailing delay of The Monitor Magazine’s September issue.

The Catholic Campaign for Human Development, the domestic anti-poverty program of the United States Catholic Bishops, works to break the cycle of poverty in America by helping low-income people participate in decisions that affect their lives, families and communities, on local and national levels.

Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, issued the annual Labor Day statement on rebuilding after the devastation of the global pandemic caused by the novel coronavirus.

Church leaders have called upon the faithful to remember in prayer several crises that continue to bring suffering to individuals and nations. The Diocese of Trenton echoes this call and encourages its community to pray the Rosary in support of the need for solidarity and racial justice and in response to Bishop David M. O’Connell’s Aug. 17 invitation to his flock to pray the Rosary with him daily for the needs of the nation.

Bishop David M. O’Connell, C.M., issued this appeal to his flock Sept. 1:  Hurricane Laura has wreaked havoc in Louisiana and Texas, and devastating families, damaging and destroying homes and churches.  Here in New Jersey we are quite familiar with such experiences.  I invite you to consider contributing a gift to help rebuild and restore the lives of our affected sisters and brothers and their families through these dioceses or their Catholic Charities agencies.

The weekend of Sept. 5-6 has been designated by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops for the annual national second collection taken for The Catholic University of America (CUA) in Washington, D.C. The faithful of the Diocese of Trenton are asked to generously support the collection as they are able when it is taken in all parishes this weekend.

When Bishop David M. O'Connell, C.M., made the difficult, but inevitable decision in late March that the churches would need to temporarily close because of the coronavirus pandemic, he knew that the shutdown would exact a profound toll on the parish communities, both spiritually and financially.

As guidance from public health authorities continues to be refined about the return in in-person learning during concerns of COVID-19, the Diocese’s Department of Catholic Schools has issued an updated and detailed list of requirements for diocesan and parish Catholic schools in Burlington, Mercer, Monmouth and Ocean Counties.

Since it became clear this past spring that the coronavirus risk would still be a factor as our Catholic schools prepare to return to the classroom,

On July 16, 2020, the Diocese’s third-party software and cloud hosting vendor, Blackbaud, informed us that they had suffered a cybersecurity incident in May 2020 which initially raised concerns regarding potential unauthorized access to certain information they maintained. Blackbaud is a vendor providing customer relationship management and financial services tools, focusing on the non-profit sector.  Along with universities, other dioceses and charitable organizations, the Diocese of Trenton has used Blackbaud primarily for these services for more than 20 years. 

Retired Bishop Edward U. Kmiec, a native son and former auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Trenton, died July 11 at age 84, it was announced by the Diocese of Buffalo. Bishop Kmiec was born and raised in Trenton, growing up in the city’s St. Hedwig Parish. He was appointed auxiliary bishop of Trenton in August 1982 and served the Diocese under then-Bishop John C. Reiss until he was named 10th bishop of Nashville in October 1992. He served in Nashville for 12 years until he was appointed Bishop of Buffalo in October 2004, retiring from there in May 2012.

WASHINGTON – Following the publication of a national news story on Catholic churches receiving loans through the Paycheck Protection Program, Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, issued the following statement in response:

An article written by the Associated Press and published by multiple media outlets July 10 seems to call into question the legitimacy of the Church’s request for COVID relief funding made available through the U.S. government.  The Diocese of Trenton has responded to this article with the following statement:

Every man’s journey in becoming a priest is unique and inspiring in its own way. But few men have followed the extraordinary path that Deacon Stephen Sansevere has taken on the way to his priestly ordination.

WASHINGTON — Archbishop Thomas G. Wenski of Miami, the acting chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Committee for Religious Liberty has encouraged Catholics to pray and uphold religious liberty at home and abroad during Religious Freedom Week 2020. Commencing on June 22, the Feast of Sts. Thomas More and John Fisher, Religious Freedom Week runs through June 29, the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul. The theme chosen for this year is “For the Good of All.”