Farmington church invites you to Fall Fest
Cross Roads Community Church, 2400 N. Butler Ave. in Farmington, will host its annual Fall Fest from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Oct. 31.
The event will feature games, food, treats and more.
For more information, call (505) 325-2600.
St. Columba offers program to returning Catholics
St. Columba Parish invites Catholics to come back to church.
One way to further explore faith and spirituality is through Landings program. During several sessions, a small group of active parishioners who are exploring their faith meet with a small group of inactive or returning Catholics to share and explore their faith together.
For more information, call 247-0044 or email landings@stcolumbacatholic.org.
Christian writers to host conference in Durango
The Southwest Christian Writers Association will present its 36th annual Write for His Glory Conference on Friday and Oct. 17 at First Baptist Church, 332 E. 11th St.
Jeff Gerke will be the keynote speaker and will discuss the power of description in fiction, the top three mistakes that will kill a novel, the power of plot and how to make a scene. The conference will also feature regional speakers.
Registration will begin at 2 p.m. Friday and 8 a.m. Saturday. The cost is $135 for nonmembers and $100 for members. There also will be book tables, door prizes and fellowship.
For more information and registration forms, visit www.southwestchristianwriters.org or call 749-0796.
Francis turns attention to family crises in Mideast
VATICAN CITY – Pope Francis directed the attention of the world’s bishops to real-world crises Friday by denouncing the escalation of conflicts in Syria and Iraq and urging greater diplomacy to end the “humanitarian crisis of enormous proportions.”
Francis issued the appeal at Friday’s meeting of about 270 bishops, Mideast prelates and patriarchs among them, who are in Rome for three weeks to hash out better ways to provide pastoral care to Catholic families.
“War brings destruction and multiplies the suffering of people,” Francis said. “Hope and progress only come from choices of peace.”
The bishops’ meeting is discussing how to better minister to families facing issues big and small: those torn by divorce, raising gay children or forced to flee war or poverty. The Vatican is particularly concerned about the flight of Christians from the Mideast, given it is the land of Christ’s birth.
Mormons select three new leaders
SALT LAKE CITY – The Mormon church has chosen three new members for a top governing body that sets policy and runs the faith’s business operations – all are from Utah.
The new members of the religion’s Quorum of the Twelve Apostles were all serving in lower-level church leadership positions and had held executive posts previously in the private sector.
Ronald A. Rasband is a former CEO of a chemical corporation. Gary E. Stevenson was the co-founder and president of an exercise equipment manufacturing company. Dale G. Renlund was a cardiologist and directed a cardiac transplant program.
Their selections were announced Oct. 3 during The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ conference in Salt Lake City by Henry B. Eyring, a member of the quorum.
The selections prove outside church scholars wrong who speculated that one of the selections would be a person from outside North America and from a country never before represented on the governing body. The one member of the current board from outside the United States remains Dieter F. Uchtdorf, who was born in Czechoslovakia and raised in Germany.
Herald Staff & Associated Press
