When Dr. Paul Rao taught for a year at St. Thomas the Apostle School in Washington four decades ago, he struggled to understand one of his students. The girl was born with a cleft palate, and had difficulty forming her words.

On the second day of the new semester at the Pontifical North American College in Rome, Father Michael DeAscanis and fellow seminarians were taking a mid-afternoon walk in the courtyard.

Father Leo Patalinghug was all set to make a pilgrimage to Lourdes, France, beginning Sept. 13, 2001, when the terrorist attacks of two days earlier abruptly ended his plans. International flights were canceled as the world fixed its attention on New York and Washington.

Friends of Mercy (FOM), an all-volunteer nondenominational membership support group for those dealing with broken relationships, separation, divorce or widowhood, is dissolving.

The Howard Park Community’s collective voice has been heard, and their prayers are on the verge of being answered.

Putting Ray Herrmann on stage is like uncorking a bottle of champagne.

When it was first announced in February that St. Michael Parish in Fells Point was closing and joining an expanding bilingual community at Sacred Heart of Jesus a mile away in Highlandtown, longtime parishioner Pamela Perc wasn’t sure what to do.

Archbishop Edwin F. O’Brien issued a July 18 decree establishing Ss. Peter and Paul in Cumberland as an archdiocesan shrine. The shrine was established as a place of pilgrimage and to “foster the unique Catholic history of the Cumberland area,” the archbishop said.

Despite Deacon Richard Novak’s familiar injunction to “go in peace to love and serve the Lord,” few parishioners seemed eager to leave following the July 31 morning Mass at St. Michael in Fells Point.

Father Edward B. Hemler, longtime pastor of St. Mark in Fallston and a former leader in Catholic education, died July 24 after suffering years of declining health.