the faithful and keep them out of Nassau OTB on holy days, Easter Sunday and Palm Sunday.
His humble beginnings show that the beliefs of people are not all the same.
NY PML Sec 109 violates the rights secured by NY Const. Art. 1, Sec 3 but a communication from the Vatican to the faithful and Governor Andrew Cuomo might point them in the right direction?
A Humble Beginning: Signs From a Papacy's First Days
By GORDON FAIRCLOUGH and STACY MEICHTRY
![[image]](http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/WO-AN212_POPEjp_F_20130329180850.jpg)
Associated Press
Pope Francis prays during the Celebration of the Lord's Passion in Saint Peter's Basilica on Friday.
At a juvenile detention center on the outskirts of the Italian capital, the leader of the Roman Catholic faithful knelt before 12 young inmates—including women and Muslims—before bathing and kissing their feet in a Holy Thursday ritual.
"It is the example of our Lord," the 76-year-old pope said in a homily for the prisoners he met on a day that commemorates the last supper Jesus shared with his twelve apostles. "The one who is highest up must be at the service of others."
Andrew Medichini/Associated Press
Pope Francis kisses a baby at the Vatican.
Observers have noted, for example, that Pope Francis, the first pontiff from the Americas, still wears the cross he wore as archbishop of Buenos Aires, rather than the golden one customary for popes, and that he has declined to wear the papal red shoes and other fancy vestments favored by past pontiffs.
Earlier this week, the pope indicated he wouldn't move into the pontiff's gilded official quarters in the Apostolic Palace any time soon, instead planning to stay at a modest Vatican guesthouse.
"The way he is doing things is making a huge impression here in Rome," said the Rev. John Wauck, a priest who teaches at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross. "The reaction is enthusiasm mixed with apprehension."
After Easter, the pope is expected to start naming top officials of the Roman Curia, the Vatican's administration, and take other concrete steps to guide a church dealing with both a sex-abuse crisis and a loss of believers in its one-time stronghold of Western Europe.
Much of what the pope has done since his selection earlier this month has been symbolic, but some see it as signaling change in an institution that has long emphasized continuity. He has urged the church to engage with people far from its teachings.
![[image]](http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/P1-BK897_pope_DV_20130329181441.jpg)
ZUMAPRESS.com
Pope Francis in St. Peter's Square
That contrasted with his predecessor, who viewed the church's relationship with the secular world as largely adversarial, and responded by defending the church's fundamental beliefs and rituals.
"This is making a real shift," said Alberto Melloni, a professor of church history at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia. "He's imposing a style of pastoral proximity to the people."
Pope Francis is expected to uphold church doctrines that oppose abortion, contraception and same-sex marriage—issues at the forefront of Pope Benedict's battle to stem secularism. However, Francis is likely to shift the church's emphasis to outreach, tending to the world's poor and evangelizing the global south.
Progressives are embracing that shift, saying he could fulfill what they consider one of the aims of the Second Vatican Council and make the church more open and engaged with the world. Others warn such an approach risks alienating believers who championed the restoration of centuries-old practices by Francis' predecessor.
At a news conference Friday, Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi was asked: Does the inclusion of women in the foot-washing ceremony mean the pope is open to ordaining female priests? Why did he decide to include two Muslims in the Christian ceremony?
Associated Press
A crowd gathers in the shadow
of the Roman Colosseum on Good Friday for the Way of the Cross,
commemorating Jesus' journey to crucifixion.
Until Pope Francis, no pontiff had ever washed the feet of a woman or a Muslim on Holy Thursday, which marks two of the most important institutions in Roman Catholicism, the Eucharist and the priesthood.
Jesus' final meal with his apostles established the ritual that anchors Catholic Mass, instructing the men—who served as models for an all-male priesthood—to commune with him by eating bread and drinking wine. He washed their feet to show that service was at the center of their mission.
Pope Francis has marked Holy Thursday by washing the feet of a dozen young inmates at a juvenile detention center.
"I don't know what to say. All these things are breaking down," said Rev. Joseph Kramer who oversees a church in Rome that celebrates the Mass in Latin, part of an initiative by Pope Benedict XVI to revive one of Catholicism's oldest traditions. "We're stretching tradition. Things are mutating."
A news website for Catholic traditionalists, Rorate Caeli, headlined its story on the foot-washing ritual: "The Official End of the Reform of the Reform—by example." The "reform of the reform" refers to an effort within the church to reverse the liberalization of Vatican II in the 1960s.
Andrew Medichini/Associated Press
Pope Francis in St. Peter's Square.
"The great challenge confronting the church is whether it's going to be perceived as the church of privilege and wealth, or whether it can align itself—in a true, authentic way—in solidarity with the poor," said Carl Anderson, head of the Catholic fraternal organization, the Knights of Columbus.
Pope Francis stood apart from extreme versions of liberation theology as a young Jesuit in Argentina. Later in his career, as Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, he became known for calling the church to minister to the poor in the slums of Buenos Aires.
Now, in Rome, he "will be pricking at the consciences of the wealthy of the world," predicted one senior Vatican official.
When in Buenos Aires, Francis declined to live in the archbishop's official residence. And, so far, he has refused to move in to the papal apartments of the Apostolic Palace, staying instead in a more modest guesthouse.
For the Curia, that is a loud message. The Apostolic Palace is the nerve center of the Vatican administration and the seat of a papal court. By staying outside the papal palace, Vatican watchers say, the new pope is able keep his ear close to the ground and more likely to learn what went wrong in the previous papacy.
"It's like the CEO moving out of the corner office, away from his gatekeepers. You're going to hear a lot more," said Francis X. Rocca, Rome bureau chief of Catholic News Service.
Write to Gordon Fairclough at gordon.fairclough@wsj.com and Stacy Meichtry at stacy.meichtry@wsj.com
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LI Confidential
> Stop scratching on holidays
Stop scratching on holidays
Published: June 1, 2012
Off Track Betting in New York State has been racing into a crisis called shrinking revenue. Some people have spitballed a solution: Don’t close on holidays.
New York State Racing Law bars racing on Christmas, Easter and Palm Sunday, and the state has ruled OTBs can’t handle action on those days, even though they could easily broadcast races from out of state.
“You should be able to bet whenever you want,” said Jackson Leeds, a Nassau OTB employee who makes an occasional bet. He added some irrefutable logic: “How is the business going to make money if you’re not open to take people’s bets?”
Elias Tsekerides, president of the Federation of Hellenic Societies of Greater New York, said OTB is open on Greek Orthodox Easter and Palm Sunday.
“I don’t want discrimination,” Tsekerides said. “They close for the Catholics, but open for the Greek Orthodox? It’s either open for all or not open.”
OTB officials have said they lose millions by closing on Palm Sunday alone, with tracks such as Gulfstream, Santa Anita, Turf Paradise and Hawthorne running.
One option: OTBs could just stay open and face the consequences. New York City OTB did just that back in 2003. The handle was about $1.5 million – and OTB was fined $5,000.
Easy money.
Dear Pope Francis:
Please tell your believers in New York State including Governor Andrew Cuomo that the Church does not need the help of the State of New York to keep the faithful out of Nassau OTB including on the Sundays that you observe Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday. People of many beliefs or no beliefs at all bet and/or work at Nassau OTB and should be free to do so whenever tracks are running anywhere in the US. There are significant tracks running on your Easter Sunday. Please help.
March 24, 2013, 8:38 a.m. ET
NY betting parlor closing prompts bill
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Associated Press
ALBANY, N.Y. ? Today is Palm Sunday for most Christian denominations in the U.S.
In New York that means Off-Track Betting parlors are closed.
It's one of three dark days at OTB. The others are Christmas and Easter from the same calendar.
This has at least one cashier arguing it denies the right to work based on an old statute and fails to abide by the constitutionally required separation of church and state.
Jackson Leeds, also an attorney, has been writing to state officials since he took the part-time OTB job in 2003 at Nassau OTB.
Some agree with him, also noting lost business.
State Sen. Eric Adams, ranking Democrat on the Senate's Racing, Gaming and Wagering Committee, has introduced a bill to allow pari-mutuel wagering and horse racing on Palm Sunday.
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