St. John's Seminary
St. John's Seminary
opened in September 1939 on land in Camarillo, California, that was
donated to the archdiocese by Don Juan Camarillo. The seminary offers a
post-college, fully accredited theological academic program for men from
the archdiocese and from other dioceses that do not have their own
seminary. The seminary will celebrate its 75th anniversary during the
2014–2015 academic year. It continues to serve the needs of the Church
through the education and continued formation of seminarians, priests,
deacons, and lay ecclesial ministers.
In 1962 St. John's College
opened, adding a four-year undergraduate degree for men considering the
priesthood and seeking a seminary-based college experience. The college
continued until 2003.
Men who aspire to the priesthood in the
archdiocese now participate in the formation program offered to college-level men at the Juan Diego House of Formation in Gardena as well as in the programs offered at St. John's Seminary.
In
addition to the archdiocesan formation programs, several religious
orders have houses of formation within the archdiocese that are listed
in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles Catholic Directory.
Catholic Charities of Los Angeles Inc.
Catholic Charities of Los Angeles Inc.
is the social service arm of the archdiocese. Its roots are in the
early days of Los Angeles when Catholic women organized to provide
immediate care for the homeless and poor through soup kitchens and food
pantries. These groups were formally organized in 1919 and became the
archdiocesan entity focused on meeting the immediate needs of families
and initiating new service programs as required. Now Catholic Charities
strives to find permanent solutions to crisis situations by offering
clients the tools and resources they need to achieve greater
self-reliance and stability in their lives. Services are provided to
anyone who comes to the agency in need, regardless of race, ethnicity,
gender, age, or religious belief.
Catholic Charities operates
community centers and homeless shelters, as well as programs serving the
poor that include food pantries, thrift stores, in-home services for
homebound seniors, refugee resettlement, youth employment services,
counseling, affordable before- and after-school child care, immigration
assistance, preschool for children of low-income families, and temporary
worker centers.
In addition, the agency oversees the Catholic Youth Organization, which coordinates interscholastic athletics for
elementary schools of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.
Catholic
Charities' operations are divided into five service areas that coincide
with the pastoral regions of the archdiocese. This structure enables the
agency to maintain a presence in communities with the greatest needs,
while sharing common resources and administrative overhead.
Charitable
gifts and donor support are critical components of funding. Annually,
nearly half of the funding needs are met from donations or earnings on
donations; about one-third of the funding is from government support or
contracts and the balance is from services, sales, and other revenues.
Catholic Cemeteries
The archdiocese operates 11 cemeteries
that are owned by, overseen by, and subject to the canonical authority
of the archbishop of Los Angeles and operated through separate units
under the Archdiocesan Catholic Center. The cemeteries are an important
ministry of the archdiocese and an extension of our church community
that serve parishes and the faithful as an ongoing sacred testament to
the Church's belief in the resurrection of the body and as a holy place
for prayer and consolation. Disposition rights may be purchased by
Catholics and members of their families for burial in a grave (interment), crypt (entombment), or niche (inurnment). Ownership of the
real property associated with the purchased disposition rights is
retained by the archdiocese and each cemetery has various policies
concerning visiting, interment, and services. The cemetery operations
offer both pre-need arrangements for the purchase of disposition rights
to graves, crypts, or niches while the faithful are alive and at-need
arrangements at the time of death or burial.
Together in Mission
Together
in Mission is an annual appeal program established in 1992 to reach out
to the entire Catholic community of the archdiocese to raise money to
preserve and support Catholic schools and parishes that would not
survive economically without outside support. The appeal supports the
work of the Church in providing the sacraments, ministries, Catholic
education, and service programs throughout the archdiocese and allows
parishes and schools to assist one another through the generosity and
commitment of their parishioners. The program is governed by an advisory
board of clergy and laity that allocates the available funds among the
regions of the archdiocese; in turn, funds are then allocated within the
region to benefit schools and parishes with the most need.
All
funds collected through the Together in Mission program are restricted
for use as subsidies for the designated parishes and schools. Annually
each parish is given a fund-raising goal equal to 10 percent of parish
offertory income for the prior fiscal year and that amount is used to
plan for the annual gifts from Together in Mission. If the annual
targets are surpassed, the excess is available for emergency grants. To
encourage the parishes in their fund-raising efforts, when a parish
exceeds its fund-raising goal, 100 percent of the excess is returned to
it for its use. For more information, visit Together in Mission (English website and Spanish website).
Catholic Education Foundation
The Catholic Education Foundation
(CEF) was founded in 1986 by Cardinal (then Archbishop) Roger Mahony.
Mindful of the great tradition of Catholic schools as well as their
escalating cost, he sought and received the support of leading members
of the Los Angeles business and philanthropic leadership. The result is CEF, formed as a revocable trust under the incumbent archbishop with
a board of clergy and business and philanthropic laity.
The
purpose of CEF when it was founded was to preserve quality education in
the Catholic schools, make schools as affordable as possible, and ensure
that the schools were available to those who could not afford the cost,
particularly inner-city children who were supported regardless of
religious affiliation. Through the years, raising funds to sustain a
tuition assistance program (TAP) has been the cornerstone of CEF's
efforts. The majority of all tuition awards continues to be made to
children attending the poorest subsidized schools of the archdiocese. In
more recent years CEF also has engaged in follow-up studies of the
recipients of funding to confirm the positive benefits of CEF
efforts and has, on a selected basis, provided some funding for graduate
studies for faculty in selected Catholic schools.
CEF has
detailed protocols for applications and the review and administration of
its TAP and other programs that are available annually and directly to
schools and through the CEF website.
Pontifical Mission Societies: Society for the Propagation of the Faith
The Holy See has established four Pontifical Mission Societies: the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, the Society of St. Peter Apostle, the Missionary Union of Priests and Religious, and the Missionary Childhood Association. The principle aim of
the Pontifical Mission Societies, which are international in scope
and orientation, is "the promotion of a universal missionary spirit in
the hearts of the People of God."
In the archdiocese, the Mission Office oversees the efforts related to the societies, including the
Society for the Propagation of the Faith, as one of the four Pontifical
Mission Societies. It is broadly supported by the faithful of the
archdiocese. Under the direction of the Congregation for the
Evangelization of Peoples (in Rome) and the bishops, the Society for the
Propagation of the Faith seeks to foster an ever-deeper spirit of
universal mission, inform Catholics of the life and needs of the
Catholic Church in the missions, and encourage prayer and financial help
for those mission churches.
Through the offerings from Catholics
worldwide, the Society for the Propagation of the Faith provides ongoing
support for the pastoral and evangelization programs of the Catholic
Church in Africa, Asia, the Pacific Islands, and remote regions of Latin
America. This includes aid for the education and support of seminarians,
religious novices, and lay catechists; for the work of religious
communities in education, health care, and social services; for
communication and transportation needs; and for disaster and emergency
relief when necessary.