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Pope likens world to latter-day Babel, announces new doctors of church 
VATICAN CITY (CNS) --- The modern world is a latter-day Babel, where arrogance inspired by technological progress leads people to play God and sets them against each other, a predicament from which people can escape only through divinely inspired humility and love, said Pope Benedict XVI. The pope made his remarks during his homily May 27, Pentecost Sunday, during Mass in St. Peter's Basilica. Acknowledging that communications media and modern transportation have brought the world's people "closer to one another than ever before," Pope Benedict lamented that true "understanding and communion" is "often superficial and difficult. Imbalances remain and not infrequently lead to conflict, (and) dialogue among generations is problematic," he said. "We daily witness events which seem to show that mankind is becoming more aggressive and quarrelsome; understanding one another seems too arduous an undertaking, and we prefer to remain within ourselves and focus on our own our interests. ... Men are nursing a sense of diffidence, suspicion and reciprocal fear, to the extent that they have even become a danger to one another." The pope observed that these social pathologies come amid unprecedented advances in human knowledge. "Thanks to scientific and technological progress, we have acquired the power to dominate the forces of nature, to manipulate the elements, to fabricate living beings, almost going so far as to fabricate human beings," he said. "In such a situation, praying to God seems outmoded and useless, because we ourselves can construct and achieve anything we want." 

17 former Anglicans ordained Catholic deacons in Britain 
MANCHESTER, England (CNS) --- Seventeen former Anglican priests were made deacons in one of the largest group ordinations in the modern history of the Catholic Church in Britain. All the deacons will serve in the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, which in January 2011 became the first ordinariate to be set up under "Anglicanorum coetibus," the apostolic constitution issued by Pope Benedict XVI in November 2009 to allow the group reception of Anglicans. Father James Bradley, spokesman for the ordinariate, told Catholic News Service in a May 29 telephone interview that he had carried out some research of diocesan records in England and Wales and found no ordinations of a comparable size in the recent history of the church. He said he expected that all the deacons, about half of whom are married, would be ordained to the Catholic priesthood over the summer months. "They are going to be ordained separately," he added. "They will be ordained by the local diocesan bishop where they are resident." Father Bradley added: "The ordinations (to the diaconate) represent a really significant moment in the life of the ordinariate because it is the first time that the process has been controlled and implemented by the ordinary and the ordinariate itself. We are working from within in that sense and are not relying on other factors," he said. "We are standing on our own two feet more than we were before." 

Dominican sister named to head USCCB education secretariat 
WASHINGTON (CNS) --- A Dominican sister from Nashville, Tenn., has been named executive director of the Secretariat of Catholic Education of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Dominican Sister John Mary Fleming, a member of her religious community's St. Cecilia Congregation, will succeed Marie Powell, who earlier this year announced she will be retiring. Powell has been executive director since July 2007. Sister Fleming currently is principal of St. Dominic School in Bolingbrook, Ill., which is in the Diocese of Joliet. Msgr. Ronny Jenkins, USCCB general secretary, announced her appointment May 29. He said in a statement that both Sister Fleming and her community "have shown a commitment to Catholic education" that resonates with "our conference and which has been a hallmark of the Catholic Church in this country." He also praised Powell for her many years of service with the USCCB and the secretariat and for her long career as an educational leader. "Marie served well for many years as a strong advocate for Catholic schools and as a leader in the education community," Msgr. Jenkins said. "She can be proud of her contributions, as we are proud of her."