VOLUME 1, ISSUE 20  •  MAY 16, 2015

Table of Contents

Copyright Notice

VATICAN NEWS

Synod will endorse Church teaching on family – Cardinal Pell

Pope Francis sends a hug to moms worldwide for Mother’s Day

Raul Castro to Pope: Thanks to you, I may come back to the Church

Pope Francis: Get ready to be martyrs – even in the little things

Dates of Pope’s Cuba trip announced: Sept. 19-22

On Monday, a little boy asked Pope Francis: ‘What is peace?’

Martyrdom serves Christian unity, Pope Francis tells Coptic Orthodox patriarch

Pope Francis: Spare no effort in defending life, family

In rare new letter, Benedict XVI seeks shepherds for the whole world

You are not just aid workers – you are witnesses to Christ, Pope tells Caritas

When was the last time you said ‘thank you’ and ‘I’m sorry?’ Pope asks

Christian marriage – it’s ‘demanding but magnificent,’ Pope says

Vatican and ‘State of Palestine’ agree to treaty safeguarding religious liberty

Cardinal Tagle, the first Caritas Internationalis president from Asia

Pope Francis: Fear and joylessness are signs of bad spiritual health

Justice and truth are the keys to peace in Central African Republic, Pope says

Population control won’t solve climate change, Caritas official says

WORLD NEWS

From Europe’s Christians, a call for a vision of freedom with and for others

March for Life in Rome draws 40,000 participants

Despite changes, ‘genocide’ of China’s one-child policy endures, activists say

German bishops change labor laws to allow divorced and remarried, gay civil unions

After theft, Argentines donate prized possessions, wedding rings for new monstrance

For Cardinal Mamberti, dialogue with Muslims is a must

Cyprus archbishop, Caritas presidential prospect: caring for creation means putting people first

Mindful of God’s mercy, pastor accepts new role as Bishop of Nottingham

A modern-day St Francis? Archbishop works to rebuild Syrian Church amid destruction

They lived Christianity: Italy’s saints of social action

U.S. NEWS

Virginia bishops on the death penalty: We’re having the wrong debate

Hopelessness and heroin – what fueled the Baltimore riots and what now?

Nun asks jury for mercy, to spare Boston bomber’s life

EWTN named religious television station of the year

Iraqi Christians have lost everything – except their faith, nun tells Congress

U.S. House overcomes initial setback to pass 20-week abortion ban

When detention denies dignity: bishops offer look inside U.S. migrant, refugee policy

Philadelphia archbishop voices ‘deep sadness’, prays for train derailment victims

Don’t let armed drones ease the path to conflict, US bishops warn

Is the pill shrinking parts of women’s brains? New report suggests yes

FEATURES

Celebrating Our Lady of Chartres

On Ascension Day the Whole Church Ascends to Heaven

‘Pitch Perfect 2’ delivers astounding fun this weekend

SCRIPTURE READINGS

Sunday • May 17, 2015

Monday • May 18, 2015

Tuesday • May 19, 2015

Wednesday • May 20, 2015

Thursday • May 21, 2015

Friday • May 22, 2015

Saturday • May 23, 2015

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Volume 1, Issue 20 • May 16, 2015

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VATICAN NEWS

Synod will endorse Church teaching on family – Cardinal Pell

by Elise Harris (CNA/EWTN News) • May 9, 2015

Cardinal Pell speaks at the Voice of the Family’s Rome Life Forum, May 9, 2015. (Bohumil Petrik/CNA)

Vatican City — Cardinal George Pell, prefect of the Vatican’s Secretariat for the Economy, spoke this weekend on issues surrounding the family and the upcoming Synod of Bishops, saying the synod is unable to change Church teaching.

Church teaching, he said, referencing papal documents such as those of St. John Paul II on marriage and family, can’t be “abdicated, (because) it’s based on the teachings of Christ.”

“Christ is very clear about divorce, very clear about adultery; and not quite as important, but still very important, St. Paul is explicit about the conditions that are required for proper reception of communion.”

When it comes to October’s Synod of Bishops on the Family, the cardinal said he expects “the synod will massively endorse the tradition” of the Church’s teachings on these issues.

There is a great desire to help people and to be compassionate, and these are things everyone wants, he noted, saying he believes synod delegates “will recognize that the Christian tradition of St. John Paul the Great, Benedict, the Council of Trent, is well established … and I don’t anticipate any deviation of that.”

Cardinal Pell was answering questions after addressing participants of the May 9 Voice of the Family’s Rome Life Forum.

The event was sponsored by Lifesite News, Human Life International, Associazione Famiglia Domani, Family Life International New Zealand and the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children.

When asked if a merciful response to divorced and remarried Catholics would mean a return to strict practices of the early Christian community – which included keeping an adulterer away from the rest of the community even after making an act of repentance – Cardinal Pell said going back to “these very stiff disciplines” isn’t the answer.

However, he also stressed the importance of defending the values we hold dear.

If there are no consequences for doing something wrong, then “we send the wrong message, and that’s not merciful in the long run.”

Using the example of a ship stranded at sea, the cardinal noted how “some people have been saying the role of the Church is to help those people who are in the life boats.”

Although reaching them is important, a bigger concern for the Church now “is to guide the big ships, the liners, so that they’re not shipwrecked, so that they don’t need to get into the lifeboats.”

“We defend through the law that which we value; and to deny that will increase the decline and the slide in the wrong direction.”

In his speech for the event, the cardinal focused on the role of parents as the primary educators of their children. He highlighted various current sociological and moral challenges which frequently prevent parents from effectively educating their children in the faith.

Among the sociological changes Cardinal Pell mentioned were increased use of technology, television, radio and the internet, which provides easy access to immoral content such as pornography.

He noted how fewer people are getting married, and that many marriages have been “destroyed” by the use of pornography. He also pointed to the phenomenon of “sexting” – the sending of sexually explicit images or messages via cell phones – as particularly damaging to adolescents.

Changes in moral thinking have been the cause of many of the sociological changes the world has seen, the cardinal said, pointing to what Benedict VXI described as the “dictatorship of relativism” lies at the root of these moral changes.

Tolerance of others’ views and opinions is good, he said, but when tolerance is based on the belief that there is no objective truth and that each “unprovable moral conviction” is just as valid as all the rest, “we deprive ourselves not only of the legitimation of human rights, we deprive ourselves also of the foundations of much of our sexual legislation.”

When parents themselves become moral relativists, they lose the authority and foundation needed in order to instill moral and religious convictions into their children, the cardinal explained.

“No parent should forget to show and teach their children that the way to growth, both personal and community, is through fidelity to the core teachings of Christ and the Church,” he said.

Those who downplay the demands of the faith and family that Christ himself enjoyed as a child are only “increasing and hastening the exodus.”

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VATICAN NEWS

Pope Francis sends a hug to moms worldwide for Mother’s Day

by Ann Schneible (CNA/EWTN News) • May 10, 2015

Pope Francis greets pilgrims at St. Peter’s Square, Jan. 8, 2014. (Kyle Burkhart/CNA)

Vatican City — On Sunday, Pope Francis extended a special greeting to all those around the world who are celebrating Mother’s Day, after offering advice on loving to the point of laying down one’s life.

“We remember all mothers with gratitude and affection,” the Pope said to the crowds gathered in Saint Peter’s Square under the hot sun for the recitation of the Regina Caeli prayer May 10.

Speaking to the mothers after granting the apostolic blessing to those present, he noted that the applause from the crowd embraced all mothers: “those who live with us physically, but also those who live with us spiritually.”

The Pope also greeted those who were beginning to gather around the Vatican to take part in the March for Life. “It is important to collaborate together in order to defend and promote life,” he said.

In his address before the Regina Caeli, Pope Francis recounted Christ’s words during the Last Supper: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Christ says he loves us even though we have not merited this love, the Pope said. “In this way, Jesus shows us the path for following him, the path of love.”

Pope Francis explained that Christ’s command to love and to lay down one’s life for friends is new, insofar as it was he who first fulfilled it.

“The law of love is written once and for all in the heart of man” he said, “written with the fire of the Holy Spirit.”

“And with this same Spirit, which Jesus gives us, we too can walk along this path!”

Pope Francis’ reflection comes two weeks before Pentecost, on which the Church celebrates the Holy Spirit coming down upon the Apostles 50 days after Christ’s resurrection.

The path which leads us out of ourselves toward others is concrete, the Pope said.

“Jesus showed us that love for God puts into effect the love for others,” he added, explaining that these two loves go together.

There are many examples of this love throughout the Gospels: “adults and children, educated and ignorant, rich and poor, righteous and sinners, were welcomed in the heart of Christ.”

Pope Francis stressed this call to love one another, even when we don’t understand each other, or when we don’t get along: “It is here that one sees Christian love.”

This love is greater than differences of opinion or disposition, the Roman Pontiff said.

A love which has been “freed from selfishness,” it gives joy to our hearts.

Pope Francis spoke of the small gestures of closeness shown every day: given to an elderly person, a child, one who is sick, a person alone and in difficulty, without home or job, an immigrant, a refugee.

“The love which Christ has taught us is made manifest in these gestures,” he said.

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VATICAN NEWS

Raul Castro to Pope: Thanks to you, I may come back to the Church

by Alvaro de Juana (CNA/EWTN News) • May 10, 2015

Pope Francis meets with Raul Castro, president of Cuba, at the Vatican, May 10, 2015. (L’Osservatore Romano)

Vatican City — Following a private meeting at the Vatican with Pope Francis, who has helped to broker improved relations between Cuba and the United States, the president of the Caribbean nation suggested he could return to the Church in the future.

“I will start praying again and return to the Church” if the Pope continues what he has been doing, Raul Castro said on Sunday.

Castro is president of Cuba and the younger brother of Fidel, the leader of Cuba’s communist revolution. He spoke to the press a few hours after his meeting with Pope Francis.

The Cuban leader also said he was impressed with the Pope’s “wisdom and modesty,” adding that he reads all of his speeches.

The May 10 meeting was the first between the two leaders, ahead of Pope Francis’ upcoming visit to the island nation.

According to a statement released by the Holy See press office after the meeting, Castro “wished to say ‘Thank you’ to the Holy Father for his active role in the development of the improvement of relations between Cuba and the United States of America.”

Castro also “presented the sentiments of the Cuban people to the Pope as they await in preparation for the coming visit to the island in the month of September,” the statement reads.

While the Vatican qualified today’s visit as a “strictly private”, the Holy See press office released some details of the meeting in a statement shortly afterward.

Castro arrived at the Vatican at 9:30am from Russia, where he had participated in a commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War in Europe.

The two leaders met for about 50 minutes and spoke of the Pope’s work in bettering relations between Cuba and the United States. They also spoke of the Roman Pontiff’s upcoming visit of Cuba ahead of his week-long trip to the United States, which will include the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia, and the canonization of Blessed Junipero Serra in Washington, DC.

The Vatican announced Pope Francis’ September trip to Cuba on April 22.

Castro was accompanied by a 10-person delegation, including the president of Cuba’s Council of Ministers, his exterior minister, and the Cuban ambassador to the Holy See.

As is customary, the Pope and the president exchanged gifts. Castro gave Pope Francis a silver medal commemorating the 200 years since the Cathedral of Havana was built. It is one of only 25 of the medals in existence.

Castro also gave the Pope a work of contemporary art by the Cuban artist Kcho, who was part of the delegation. The piece is a large cross composed of pieces from shipwrecked boats, with the image of an immigrant praying in front of it.

Kcho explained to the Pope that the work “was inspired by his commitment to calling the world’s attention to the problems of migrants and those who are forced to flee their homes, starting with his famous trip to Lampedusa” in July 2013.

In return, Pope Francis gave Castro a copy of his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium and a large medallion which shows St. Martin of Tours sharing his cloak with a poor person.

He told Castro the gift “is an intuition of that which we must do: cover the misery of our people and then promote the people.”

The Holy Father added that he “wanted to give it to him because it is a sign of goodwill.”

After the audience with Pope Francis, Castro met with the Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi, after which he spoke to the press about the meeting.

Last December, Castro and U.S. President Barack Obama announced to the world that they would be taking steps to normalize their diplomatic relations, and surprised many in thanking and praising the work of Pope Francis.

Castro had also met with Benedict XVI on March 27, 2012 during his trip to the Caribbean nation, and St. John Paul II was the first Pope to receive then-Cuban president Fidel Castro in 1996. Two years later, he made his own historic visit to Cuba.

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VATICAN NEWS

Pope Francis: Get ready to be martyrs – even in the little things

by Ann Schneible (CNA/EWTN News) • May 11, 2015

Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square before the Wednesday general audience on April 22, 2015. (Bohumil Petrik/CNA)

Vatican City — Pope Francis centered his homily for Monday’s daily Mass on the “scandal of the cross,” saying Christians should turn to the Holy Spirit in preparing for martyrdom – great or small.

“A Christian who does not take the dimension of martyrdom seriously in life does not understand the road that Jesus has indicated,” the Pope said May 11, according to Vatican Radio’s translation.

Addressing the congregation at the Santa Marta residence chapel, Pope Francis said the road indicated by Jesus invites “us to bear witness every day, defending the rights of others; defending our children; mothers and fathers who defend their family; so many sick people who bear witness and suffer for the love of Jesus.”

He encouraged Christians to turn to the Holy Spirit to remind them of Jesus’ words, and guide them in preparing to be witnesses “with small every day martyrdoms, or with a great martyrdom, according to God’s will.”

All Christians are capable of “bearing witness” of the Easter message “without being scandalized,” the Pope said.

According to Vatican Radio, Pope Francis recalled in his homily a phone conversation with Tawadros II, head of the Coptic Orthodox Church on Sunday, during which he spoke of the Egyptian Christians recently martyred on the beach.

The pontiff was making reference here to an ISIS video, released last February, which shows the beheading of 21 Coptic Christians.

“Thanks to the strength given them by the Holy Spirit they were not scandalized. They died with the name of Jesus on their lips,” the Pope said.

“This is the strength of the Spirit. The testimony. Martyrdom is the supreme testimony.”

Monday’s homily was centered on the day’s Mass readings, specifically the Gospel of John in which Jesus speaks of the Holy Spirit descending:

“When the Advocate comes whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, he will testify to me. And you will also testify” (John 15:26-27).

The Church is guided along a journey by the Holy Spirit, the Pope said, who serves as our companion, while defending us from “the scandal of the cross.”

The cross is a scandal for the Jews who “ask for signs,” the pontiff observed. On the other hand, for the pagan Greeks “who ask for knowledge and new ideas,” the cross is foolishness.

The Holy Father also spoke of the “scandal of persecution” in reference to those who preach the Gospel.

“They will expel you from the synagogues: in fact, the hour is coming when everyone who kills you will think he is offering worship to God.”

Pope Francis spoke of those who kill Christians in God’s name. “This is Christ’s cross: ‘They will do this because they have not known either the Father or me.’”

“This happened to me – Jesus says – it will happen to you too – the persecutions, the tribulations – but do not be scandalized: the Holy Spirit will guide us and help us understand.”

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VATICAN NEWS

Dates of Pope’s Cuba trip announced: Sept. 19-22

by CNA/EWTN News • May 11, 2015

Cuban Flag. (Steward Cutler via Flickr CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Vatican City — Pope Francis’ historic trip to Cuba will take place Sept. 19-22, the Catholic Bishops Conference of Cuba has announced.

The dates of the trip were released in a May 11 statement from the Cuban bishops.

The announcement came one day after Pope Francis met privately with Cuban president Raul Castro at the Vatican. Castro said after the meeting that he “will start praying again and return to the Church” if the Pope continues what he has been doing.

News of the Pope’s visit to Cuba – which will take place directly before he travels to the United States – had been confirmed by Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi S.J. April 22.

Pope Francis will be the third consecutive Pope to visit the Caribbean island: St. John Paul II did so in 1998, and Pope Benedict XVI in 2012.

The visit comes at a historic time, as Cuba and the United States work to re-establish diplomatic relations for the first time in decades. The Vatican was instrumental in the buildup to last December’s announcement of the effort to normalize relations between the two nations.

From Cuba, Pope Francis will travel to the United States, where he will address Congress and the United Nations General Assembly, visit the White House and attend the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia.

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VATICAN NEWS

On Monday, a little boy asked Pope Francis: ‘What is peace?’

by Ann Schneible (CNA/EWTN News) • May 11, 2015

Pope Francis meets with children at the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall on May 11, 2015. (Daniel Ibàñez/CNA)

Vatican City — This question was part of a special question and answer session with the Bishop of Rome touching on a wide range of themes – from the link between greed and war, to arguments with siblings, and the role of religion in promoting peace in the world.

“Religion helps us because it makes us walk in God’s presence,” the Pope said: “it helps us because it gives us the Commandments, the Beatitudes.”

Above all, religion helps us learn “to love our neighbor” – and this is a commandment that all religions have in common, he said.

It is this “love of neighbor” which helps everyone make peace, and “to go forward in peace.”

Pope Francis made these remarks on May 11 during during a encounter with 7,000 children in the Vatican’s Paul VI hall. The meeting was sponsored by the Fabbrica della Pace – the Peace Factory – an initiative which uses education to promote integration, cross-cultural and multi-ethnic understanding.

In prepared remarks, the Pope lauded Peace Factory for its work in building “a society without injustice and violence, in which every child and youth may be welcomed and grow in love.”

Saying there is need for more “peace factories,” the Pope lamented the number of “war factories” in existence.

“War is the fruit of hate, of selfishness, of the desire to possess more and more, and to dominate others.”

In contrast, members of the Peace Factory are committed to “defending the culture of inclusion, of reconciliation and of encounter.”

During the Q&A with the children, the Pope touched on a wide range of subjects, from personal and individual to global.

One little girl asked if the Pope argues with his family like she argues with her sister: He replied that we all argue, but said we should never conclude the day without making peace.

Another asked: “If a person does not want peace with you, what would you do?”

The Pope responded by saying he would respect that person’s freedom, never seeking revenge against him. In fostering peace, he said: “respect for persons is always, always first.”

Pope Francis also spoke about peace in more serious contexts, touching on themes such as greed in countries torn by war and conflict.

“Why do many powerful people not want peace?” the Pope asked, responding to a question posed by an Egyptian child as to why the powerful do not support schools. “Because they live on war!”

Such persons benefit from the sale of weapons – which he described as “the industry of death” – and decried the evil brought about by the greed for more and more money.

“And it is for this reason that many people do not want peace,” he said: “They benefit more from war!”

Pope Francis then touched on the theme of equality, having been asked if everyone is equal today.

“We are all equal – everyone!” he said, but there are those who do not recognize this equality, and that we all have the same rights. A society which does not see this, he said, “that society is unjust … and where there is no justice, there is no peace.”

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VATICAN NEWS

Martyrdom serves Christian unity, Pope Francis tells Coptic Orthodox patriarch

by Ann Schneible (CNA/EWTN News) • May 12, 2015

Pope Tawadros II of Alexandria, head of the Coptic Orthodox Church. (CNA)

Vatican City — In a message sent Sunday to the leader of the Coptic Orthodox Church, Pope Francis said advances toward reconciliation are strengthened by the martyrs and that Christians must unite to confront shared global challenges.

“Today more than ever we are united by the ecumenism of blood, which further encourages us on the path towards peace and reconciliation,” Pope Francis wrote May 10 to Pope Tawadros II of Alexandria.

Like the Bishop of Rome, the Coptic Orthodox Patriarch of Alexandria is known as “Pope” to his followers.

Pope Francis’ message marked the second anniversary of his meeting with Tawadros in Rome; the day has become an annual celebration of fraternal love between the Catholic and Coptic Orthodox Churches.

The Coptic Orthdox Church is an Oriental Orthodox Church, meaning it rejected the 451 Council of Chalcedon, and its followers were historically considered monophysites – those who believe Christ has only one nature – by Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox.

“With thanksgiving to the Lord, I recall our advances along the path of friendship, united as we are by one baptism,” Pope Francis wrote. “Though our communion is yet imperfect, what we have in common is greater than what divides us. May we persevere on our journey to full communion, and grow in love and understanding.”

More than 90 percent of the Christians in Egypt are Coptic Orthodox, and 21 Coptic men working in Libya were beheaded by the Islamic State in February. Soon afterwards, the 21 were recognized as martyrs by Tawadros.

“I assure you and the Christian community in Egypt and throughout the Middle East of my unceasing prayer,” Pope Francis wrote to Tawadros, “and I remember in particular the Coptic faithful recently martyred for their Christian faith. May the Lord welcome them into his Kingdom.”

Pope Francis also made mention of the document recently produced by members of the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Oriental Orthodox Churches.

Entitled “The Exercise of Communion in the Life of the Early Church and its Implications for our Search for Communion Today”, the document was finalized during the commission’s twelfth annual plenary meeting, held in Rome this past January.

“I am certain that Your Holiness shares my hope that this vital dialogue will carry on and bear abundant fruit,” Pope Francis said.

The commission’s next plenary meeting is set to take place in Cairo, hosted by the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate.

Pope Francis’ letter took note of the common challenges facing Christians of separated Churches, particularly in terms of family life, “which require us to work together in confronting these issues.”

The Bishop of Rome told Tawadros, “I appreciate your appointment last year of a delegate to participate in the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops dedicated to the family. It is my hope that our cooperation in this area may continue, especially in addressing matters related to mixed marriages.”

The May 2013 meeting between Pope Francis and Tawadros marked the first visit of a Coptic Orthodox patriarch to Rome in 40 years. Shenouda III, Tawadros’ predecessor, visited Bl. Paul VI in 1973, and St. John Paul II returned the visit to Egypt in 2000.

Pope Francis concluded his message saying that “with these sentiments, and recalling what has rightly become known as the day of friendship between the Coptic Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church, I exchange with Your Holiness a fraternal embrace in Christ the Lord.”

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VATICAN NEWS

Pope Francis: Spare no effort in defending life, family

by CNA/EWTN News • May 12, 2015

audience with Pope Francis on March 18, 2015. (Daniel Ibanez/CNA)

Vatican City — In his meeting on Saturday with the bishops from Mozambique, a southeast African nation, Pope Francis urged support for public policies that promote the family and protect human life.

“Spare no efforts in supporting the family and in the defense of life from conception to natural death,” he said May 9 in the Vatican. “In this sense, remember the options appropriate to one of Christ’s disciples and the beauty of being a mother, accompanied by the support of the family and the local community.”

“The family must always be defended as the main source of fraternity, respect for others and the primary path of peace.”

The Mozambican bishops – whose country borders Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Swaziland, South Africa, and the Indian Ocean – were in Rome for their five-yearly ad limina visit, a meeting with the Pope.

The Bishop of Rome cautioned his brother bishops against a worldly sense of success, saying, “the fecundity of our mission … is not measured by the number of collaborators, nor by the prestige of the institution, nor even by the quantity of available resources.”

“What counts is being permeated with Christ’s love, allowing oneself to be led by the Holy Spirit, and grafting one’s own existence onto the tree of life, which is the Cross of the Lord,” he said, adding that “from St. Paul, the insuperable model of the Christian missionary, we know that this means trying to conform to Jesus in his death so as to participate in his resurrection … the paschal mystery is the beating heart of the mission of the Church.”

“If you abide in this mystery, you will be protected both from a worldly and triumphalist vision of the mission, and the disappointment that may arise when faced with trials and failures.”

Pope Francis encouraged the bishops to be particularly solicitous for their priests as well as for the religious communities in their dioceses, and to live among their faithful in the “‘existential peripheries’ where there is suffering, loneliness, and human degradation.”

Reflecting on the nature and role of a bishop, he said: “you are spouses of your diocesan community, profoundly tied to it.”

The Pope stated that “the pastors and the faithful of Mozambique need to further develop a culture of encounter,” saying Christ’s only request is “that you go out in search of the neediest.” He mentioned those who suffer from natural disasters, as well as displaced persons and refugees.

“These people need us to share in their suffering, their worries, their problems,” he told the bishops. “They need us to look upon them with love and you must reach out to them, as did Jesus.”

Turning to the challenges facing Mozambique, Pope Francis encouraged investment in education, so as to oppose inequality and social division. He said education “teaches the young to think critically, and offers a path towards maturity in values. In this sense, it is appropriate to raise awareness among leaders in society and to revive pastoral ministry in universities and schools, combining the task of education with the proclamation of the Gospel.”

“The needs are so great that they cannot be satisfied simply through individual initiatives or by a union of individuals educated in individualism. Community networks are needed to respond to social problems.”

He concluded by encouraging the bishops in going to the peripheries, saying, “When we go out to take the Gospel with true apostolic spirit, [Jesus] walks with us. He precedes us, and for us this is fundamental: God always goes before us.”

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VATICAN NEWS

In rare new letter, Benedict XVI seeks shepherds for the whole world

by Andrea Gagliarducci (CNA/EWTN News) • May 12, 2015

Benedict XVI, Pope Emeritus, whose letter serves as an introduction to a newly published book authored by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone. (Mazur/catholicnews.org.uk)

Vatican City — Speaking from retirement, Benedict XVI has underscored the need for the Church to extend its pastoral care to non-believers and to share “the questions of the times” in its continuing efforts to announce the gospel to the world.

Benedict XVI’s new reflections came in an April 21 letter to Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who served as his Secretary of State from 2006 to 2013. A summary of the letter was published in the May 10 edition of the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano.

The Pope emeritus wrote that “the service of a shepherd cannot be only limited only to the Church,” even though “in the first place, we are entrusted with the care of the faithful and of those who are directly seeking faith.”

The Church, he maintained, “is part of the world, and therefore it can properly play its service only if it takes care of the world in its entirety.”

According to Benedict XVI, the “Word of God concerns the totality of reality, and this actuality places on the Church a general responsibility.” This is the reason why the Church “must be involved in the efforts that humanity and society put into action” for a path toward justice and why the Church must “find a way of reasoning” that would also include non-believers.

The full letter was published in the German original and in an Italian-language translation as an introduction to Cardinal Bertone’s new book, “La fede e il bene comune. Offerta cristiana alla società contemporanea” (Faith and the Common Good: The Christian Proposal to Contemporary Society).

Benedict XVI’s letter stressed that the cardinal’s book reflects a multilayered approach to faith. He said this approach “will be food for thought also for readers who are not part of the Church.”

The book, published by Vatican Publishing House, collects Cardinal Bertone’s speeches and remarks on Catholic social teaching.

In his letter, the Pope emeritus said the book reminded him of “the years of work together” and showed him once again that there are multiple dimensions in being a “shepherd of the Church.”

“Pastoral care does not just deal with the fact that we in the Church provide to the faithful the service of the Sacraments and of the announcement of the Gospel,” Benedict XVI wrote.

Pastoral care, he explained, “definitely includes the intellectual dimension.” That means that “only if we share the perspective and questions of our times we will be able to understand the Word of God in present times.”

Benedict XVI added that “only if we (shepherds) take part in the opportunity and needs of our times, will the Sacraments reach out to men with their actual strength.”

The Pope emeritus reflected on the mutual collaboration between him and Cardinal Bertone, saying this “could not be merely limited to concrete acts of governing.” Rather, their partnership went more deeply, “even to the commitment to serve today, in the right way, the Word of God, the Logos.”

The letter is the second original work of Benedict XVI made public since his resignation in February 2013. Previously, he had written a message to the Pontifical Urban University on the occasion of the dedication of the university’s main hall to him.

Archbishop Georg Ganswein, Benedict XVI’s personal secretary and Prefect of the Pontifical Household, read that message on Oct. 21, 2014.

Benedict XVI is now living in the Mater Ecclesiae monastery, located within the Vatican City walls. He has not made a public speech since his resignation took effect.

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You are not just aid workers – you are witnesses to Christ, Pope tells Caritas

by Elise Harris (CNA/EWTN News) • May 12, 2015

Pope Francis celebrates Mass for Caritas Internationalis in St. Peter’s Basilica on May 12, 2015. (Daniel Ibanez/CNA)

Vatican City — On Tuesday Pope Francis told global representatives of Caritas International that true service is about welcoming God and others, and called them to continue their mission by going out to the peripheries.

“The Gospel, proclaimed and believed, urges us to wash the feet and the wounds of the suffering and to prepare the table for them,” the Pope said May 12.

The simplicity of these gestures can be summed up in a single action, he said: “to welcome God and to welcome others; to welcome others with the grace of God; to welcome God and express this act in the service to our brothers and sisters.”

Pope Francis offered his reflections during a May 12 opening Mass for Caritas International’s 20th general assembly, being held May 12-17 in Rome to discuss the theme “One Human Family, Caring for Creation.”

The assembly will also provide a strategic framework to anchor Caritas’ work over the next four years.

In his homily for the Mass, Francis noted how the source of the organizations’ global work “lies in the simple and docile welcome of God and neighbor … This is the root. If you cut this root, Caritas dies.”

He encouraged them to bring Christ to each person they meet, and cautioned against the temptation to compare the size and reach of their various offices throughout the world.

“The Caritas of each particular church, even the smallest, is the same. There is no big Caritas or small Caritas, all are the same,” he said.

“Let’s ask the Lord for the grace to understand the true dimension of Caritas, for the grace not fall into the deception of believing that well-organized centralization is the way, for the grace to understand that Caritas is always on the periphery, in every particular church.”

Francis also prayed for the grace to recognize that the mission of Caritas is simply to help, to serve and to provide the experience of communion, but that “it’s not the boss of everyone.”

Whoever lives this mission is not just a mere aid worker but is a true witness of Christ who is able to receive and spread his love, the Pope said.

He then drew attention to the fact that in many areas of the world people still suffer due to hunger, and lauded the organization for their campaign “One human family, food for all,” which was launched in December 2013, with the aim of eradicating global hunger.

“There are still so many people today who do not have enough to eat. The planet has enough food for all, but it seems that there is a lack of willingness to share it with everyone,” he said.

“We ought to set the table for all, and ask that there be a table for all. We must do what we can so that everyone has something to eat.”

Francis also reminded those in power that “God will call them to judgment one day.” On that day they will be asked whether or not they really tried to provide food for everyone, and if they preserved the environment so that it could produce enough food, he said.

Caritas “sets many tables for the hungry,” Francis noted, and urged attendees not to forget the Christians who have been “violently deprived” of food for both the body and soul.

These Christians, he said, “have been driven from their homes and their churches – at times destroyed. I renew the appeal not to forget these people and these intolerable injustices.”

Guest speakers at this year’s assembly include Fr. Gustavo Gutierrez, considered to be the father of liberation theology, and Jeffrey Sachs, an economist at Columbia University who is an adviser to Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary-general.

The current president of Caritas is Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga of Tegucigalpa, and its secretary-general is Michel Roy, who was formerly head of Secours Catholique, Caritas’ French branch.

Roy is the sole candidate for the post of secretary-general on this year’s ballot for new leadership. He has held the position since 2011, and is certain to be confirmed.

Cardinal Rodriguez will step down as president, having served two mandates, from 2007-2011, and 2011-2015. It is expected that Cardinal Antonio Tagle, archbishop of Manila, will be selected as the new president.

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When was the last time you said ‘thank you’ and ‘I’m sorry?’ Pope asks

by Elise Harris (CNA/EWTN News) • May 13, 2015

Grazia, a girl with Down syndrome, hugs Pope Francis at General Audience on May 13, 2015. (Daniel Ibanez/CNA)

Vatican City — In his general audience Pope Francis focused on the concrete challenges families face in daily life, and said that simply remembering to be grateful and to apologize can go a long way in avoiding conflict.

“Dear brothers and sisters, today’s catechesis is the opening of the door to a series of reflections on family life, real life, daily life,” the Pope told pilgrims present in St. Peter’s Square May 13.

“Above this door are written three words that we have already used other times: May I, thank you, and I’m sorry. They are words linked to good manners, (and) in their genuine sense of respect and desire for good, (they are) far away from any hypocrisy and duplicity,” he said.

Francis’ address was a continuation of his ongoing catechesis on the family, which he began at the end of last year as part of the lead-up to the World Day of Families in September, as well as October’s Synod of Bishops on the Family.

Although the words ‘May I,’ ‘thank you’ and ‘I’m sorry’ can be hard to say or put into practice, their absence “can cause cracks in the foundation of the family, which can lead to its collapse,” the Pope said.

However, if families make a habit of including the phrases in their daily lives as a sign of love for one another rather than just a formal expression of good manners, they can strengthen a happy family life, he continued.

The word ‘May I’ is a reminder that we should be “delicate, respectful and patient with others,” he said. Even if we feel like we have the right to something, “when we speak to our spouse or family member with kindness we create space for a true spirit of marital and familial common life.”

Kindness helps to renew trust and respect, and reveals the love we have for others, the Pope noted, saying that we should always imitate Jesus, who stands at the door of our hearts and knocks, waiting for us to open it to him.

He then turned to the second word, noting that to say ‘thank you’ can seem like a contradiction in a distrustful society, which tends to view this attitude as weakness.

Despite this perception, it is through an “education in gratitude” that that social justice and the dignity of persons are upheld, he said.

Gratitude Francis continued, ”is a virtue that for believers is born from the same heart of their faith … (it) is also the language of God, to whom above all we must express our gratitude.”

Pope Francis then turned to the words “I’m sorry,” or “Forgive me,” and said that without these words, hurt feelings can develop in relationships and weaken life as a family.

“But when we ask forgiveness, we show our desire to restore what was lost – respect, honesty, love – and healing between family members is made possible,” he said, noting how the Our Father prayer teaches us that to accept our mistakes and to commit to correcting them is the first step of healing.

The Pope then spoke directly to spouses, telling them that if they ever fight or have an argument, they should never end the day without reconciling and making peace with each other.

Francis concluded his address by praying that families would be a sign of God’s love and mercy in the middle of the world. He asked that the words ‘May I’, ‘Thank you,’ and ‘I’m Sorry’ would always remain “in our hearts, in our homes and in our communities.”

After concluding his speech, the Pope greeted pilgrims present from various countries around the world, including Spain, Mexico, Honduras, Argentina, England, Sweden, Taiwan, Cameroon and the United States.

He also noted how the day marked the feast of Our Lady of Fatima, who appeared to three shepherd children – Lucia Santos and Francisco and Jacinta Marto – May 13, 1917.

Since the apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary to the children was approved in 1930, a sanctuary has been built at the site of her appearance, where millions continue to flock every year to pray and ask for Mary’s intercession.

St. John Paul II nearly died after being shot by Mehmet Ali Agca on the feast of Our Lady of Fatima in 1981. He credited her for saving his life, and maintained a strong devotion to her until his death in 2005.

In his audience, Pope Francis told youth to learn how to cultivate their devotion to Mary by praying the rosary daily, and asked that all those who are ill would “feel the presence of Mary in the hour of the Cross.”

He spoke to newlyweds present, and encouraged them as husbands and wives to pray to Mary so that “love and mutual respect will never be lacking in your homes.”

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VATICAN NEWS

Christian marriage – it’s ‘demanding but magnificent,’ Pope says

by CNA/EWTN News • May 13, 2015

(Khánh Hmoong via Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0)

Vatican City — In his audience closing out the Togolese bishops’ ad Limina visit to Rome, Pope Francis on Monday encouraged solid faith formation for the young, especially those preparing for marriage.

“I encourage you to persevere in your effort to support families in difficulty … and to prepare couples for the commitments, demanding but magnificent, of Christian marriage,” he said, according to a Vatican report.

Even with many different religions making up Togolese society, marriage remains “a pastoral reality that is well accepted in your country,” the Pope said, though some “ideological and media attacks” increasingly seek to present family models that are “incompatible with Christian faith.”

African family life, especially the reverence and care shown for the elderly, serves as an example to the rest of the world, the Holy Father told the bishops from the small West African nation.

“In particular the African family welcomes life, and respects and takes into consideration the elderly. This heritage must be preserved, and serves as an example and impetus for others,” he said.

While Christians and Muslims make up nearly equal parts of the population, over half of the Togolese people practice indigenous religions.

Pope Francis praised the “peaceful co-existence” among different religions, especially with Islam in light of “the current situation in Western Africa,” where the radical Islamist group Boko Haram has been carrying out violent attacks on Christian communities.

As vocations to the priesthood grow in Togo, the Holy Father said the formation that seminarians receive now is key to helping them later “in their battle against ambition, careerism, jealousy, worldliness, the seduction of money and worldly goods, and in living a sincere and joyful celibacy.”

With about 60 percent of the population under the age of 25, formation of the young is an important part of the answer to many societal challenges that Togo faces, Pope Francis emphasized.

“It is crucial that the young learn to live their faith with coherence, in order to bear witness to it with authenticity and to contribute to a more just and fraternal society,” he said.

The Pope encouraged men and women religious of Togo to “always show paternal care” in their endeavors with the young, as they “play an indispensable role in the proclamation and transmission of the faith.”

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VATICAN NEWS

Vatican and ‘State of Palestine’ agree to treaty safeguarding religious liberty

by Andrea Gagliarducci (CNA/EWTN News) • May 13, 2015

(L-R) Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Pope Francis, Israeli President Shimon Peres, and Patriarch of Constantinople Bartholomew meet in the Vatican, June 8, 2014. (Alan Holdren/CNA)

Vatican City — The Holy See and the State of Palestine have agreed on the text of a treaty regarding the life and activity of the Church in Palestine, which is expected to be signed soon by both parties.

Much attention has been given to the fact that in its May 13 announcement, the Holy See referred to its agreement with “the State of Palestine” rather than the Palestinian Liberation Authority, or some other title.

It is hoped that the agreement will encourage the international community to acknowledge an independent State of Palestine, alongside Israel.

A senior official at Israel’s foreign ministry stated that Israel “was disappointed to hear about the Holy See’s decision to agree on a final text of an agreement … with the Palestinians, that includes the term ‘the state of Palestine’. This move does not advance the peace process and further distances the Palestinian leadership from returning to direct and bilateral negotiations. Israel will examine the agreement and weigh its actions accordingly.”

And Fr. Federico Lombardi, the Holy See press officer, told journalists: “yes, it’s a recognition that the state exists.”

However, the Vatican has been referring to the “State of Palestine” at least since January 2013, and the Annuario Pontificio, the Vatican’s official yearbook, lists a diplomatic relationship with the “State of Palestine.”

So the initial use of “State of Palestine” in an official Vatican text is entirely in line with its longstanding support for the establishment of a Palestinian state as part of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The leader of the Vatican delegation to the bilateral commission is Msgr. Antoine Camilleri, under-secretary for the Holy See’s Relations with States; the Palestinian side was led by Ambassador Rawan Sulaiman, assistant minister of foreign affairs for multilateral affairs.

Msgr. Camilleri was interviewed by L’Osservatore Romano about the terms of the agreement, and noted that the Holy See “welcomed the outcome” of the November 2012 United Nations vote which recognized Palestine as a non-member Observer State.

“The reference to the State of Palestine and the affirmations in the accord are therefore in continuity with what has been the position of the Holy See,” Msgr. Camilleri said.

The Vatican-Palestinian agreement recognizes freedom of religion in Palestine, and outlines the rights and obligations of the Church, its agencies, and its personnel in the territory. The comprehensive agreement follows upon a “basic agreement” which was signed in February 2000.

The bilateral commission was established after the Holy See and the Palestine Liberation Organization strengthened official relations. After the 2000 agreement, negotiations between the parties picked up again in 2010, with the aim of completing the basic agreement.

The treaty, Msgr. Camilleri said, “backs a resolution of the Palestinian issue and of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians within the Two-State Solution and the resolution of the international community.”

But the bulk of the agreement regards freedom of religion and conscience, as well as the Church’s freedom of action, its staff and jurisdiction, legal status, places of worship, social and charitable activity, and use of communications media.

Msgr. Camilleri added that a final chapter of the agreement regards issues of a fiscal and proprietary nature.

As the vast majority of the Palestinian population is Muslim, Msgr. Camilleri underscored that “the fact that the agreement clearly recognizes the Church’s status, as well as religious freedom and freedom of conscience, shows it may be followed by other countries, even from those with a Muslim majority, and proves that this recognition is not incompatible with the fact that the majority of the population of a country belongs to another religion.”

The official of the Secretariat of State added that “although in an indirect way,” the Holy See-Palestinian accord could hopefully “help Palestinians see and established and recognized independent State of Palestine, sovereign and democratic, living in peace and safety with Israel and its neighbors.”

Msgr. Camilleri also discussed the status of negotiations between Israel and the Holy See; they have yet to agree to issues of the Church’s property rights and tax status in Israel. He noted that the Vatican’s bilateral relations with Israel and with Palestine are separate issues, and added that an economic agreement with Israel “is almost ready. and I hope it will be signed soon.”

The agreement on the text of the Vatican-Palestinian accord comes days before Pope Francis will canonize two Palestinian saints.

He will say Mass on Sunday, May 17, at the Vatican for the canonization of Bl. Marie-Alphonsine Ghattas and Bl. Mariam Baouardy. They were both Palestinians born in the 19th century, and foundresses of religious orders.

Mahmoud Abbas, president of Palestine, is scheduled to meet with Pope Francis on Saturday, and to attend the canonization Mass the following day.

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VATICAN NEWS

Cardinal Tagle, the first Caritas Internationalis president from Asia

by CNA’s Vatican Observer Andrea Gagliarducci (CNA/EWTN News) • May 14, 2015

Cardinal Luis Tagle takes part in a conference at the Pontifical Council For Laity in Rome on Feb. 6, 2015. (Bohumil Petrik/CNA)

Vatican City — Cardinal Luis Tagle, Archbishop of Manila, is the new president of Caritas Internationalis. The general assembly of the umbrella organization of Catholic charities elected the Filipino cardinal with 91 votes out of 133.

“Thank you for your trust. I am limited in my capacities, but with all of you, with the love that Jesus has poured into our hearts and in the name of all the poor people in the world, I accept this election,” said Cardinal Tagle, speaking May 14 on the phone to delegates from over 130 member organizations of Caritas Internationalis.

Cardinal Tagle will replace Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga as president of Caritas Internationalis. Cardinal Rodriguez, who offered his congratulations and warm support to the new president, stepped down after serving two terms.

Caritas Internationalis’ general assembly (May 12-17) is outlining and designing the goals for the next quadriennal term during this general assembly, whose theme is “One human family, care for creation.”

Cardinal Tagle will work in the framework of the guidelines provided by the general assembly, whogranted him a wide margin over the other candidate for the presidency, Maronite Archbishop Joseph Soueif of Cyprus.

Archbishop Soueif counted on the support of the European agencies, and – according to a source within Caritas Internationalis who spoke with CNA May 14 – he proposed a program based on the spirit of Caritas Internationalis’s new statutes, issued via motu proprio in 2012.

Supporters of Archbishop Soueif noted that he is well aware of the difficult situation of Christians, as he comes from Lebanon, and administers Cyprus, an island divided in two parts with an ongoing persecution of Christians. At the same time, Archbishop Soueif – supporters said - also knows European issues, as he is also a member of the Commission of the Bishops of the European Union.

On the other hand, Cardinal Tagle’s program zeroed in on advocacy for poor and the wish to reach out to the peripheries.

Fr. Edu Gariguez, Caritas Philippines’ executive secretary, commented to CBPB News that Cardinal Tagle “has the qualities of a good leader for the organization” and recounted that the clamor for the cardinal to be nominated was led by Caritas Asia when the process started early this year.

The campaign mostly focused on the fact that Cardinal Tagle has played major roles in raising with the government various issues affecting the marginalized sector, and showed his effort in helping Filipino population, which is continuously stricken by an average of 20 typhoons per year.

Born in Manila in 1977 and ordained a priest in 1982, Cardinal Tagle was appointed bishop of Imus in 2001. In 2011, Benedict XVI appointed him Archbishop of Manila, and created him cardinal in Nov. 2012, during his last consistory.

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Pope Francis: Fear and joylessness are signs of bad spiritual health

by Ann Schneible (CNA/EWTN News) • May 15, 2015

Pope Francis at the papal ordination of priests in St. Peter’s Basilica on April 26, 2015. (Bohumil Petrik/CNA)

Vatican City — In his daily homily on Friday Pope Francis said that Christian communities become “sick” when they live in fear and fail to be joyful – even when times are difficult.

“When the Church is fearful and when the Church does not receive the joy of the Holy Spirit, the Church is sick, the communities are sick, the faithful are sick,” the Pope said during Mass at the Santa Marta residence May 15.

He added that the Christian community grows “sick with worldliness” when “it does not have the joy of Christ.”

“A Christian without joy is not Christian. A Christian who continually lives in sadness is not Christian. And a Christian who, in the moment of trial, of illness, of so many difficulties, loses peace – something is lacking in him.”

These two words – “fear” and “joy” – and what each means for the Christian community, were at the center of the Holy Father’s homily.

Speaking first on fear, Pope Francis explained: “A fearful Christian is a person who has not understood the message of Jesus.”

This kind of fear provokes a self-centered selfishness which leads to a sort of paralysis. It “harms us. It weakens us, it diminishes us. It even paralyzes us,” the Pope said.

Recalling how Jesus told Saint Paul to speak and not be afraid, he said: “Fear is not a Christian attitude.”

Rather, it is an attitude of a “caged animal” who lacks the freedom to look forward, create, and do good, being prevented by a sense of danger.

“This fear is a vice,” he added.

Pope Francis said this fear and lack of courage jeopardizes the health of those communities which to forbid everything in an effort to always be safe.

“It seems they have written on the gateway: ‘Forbidden,’” he said. “And you enter into this community and the air is stale, because it is a sick community.”

“Fear makes a community sick. The lack of courage makes a community sick.”

Pope Francis encouraged the faithful to ask God to overcome this fear: “Do not be afraid, and ask for the grace of courage, the courage of the Holy Spirit that He sends us.”

The Pope clarified that fear as a vice should not be confused with what is referred to as “fear of the Lord,” which is a virtue that helps Christians in their mission.

Pope Francis then turned his reflection to “joy,” which he said is not simply an emotion. “Christian joy is not simply enjoyment, is not a fleeting cheerfulness,” but “a gift of the Holy Spirit.”

A Christian who lives in joy does so because “the Lord reigns, the Lord is at the right hand of the Father,” the pontiff said.

“The Lord has looked upon me and called me and has given me His grace, and has made me a Son of the Father … That is Christian joy.”

“No one can take away your joy,” he said, which brings peace in “the saddest moments, in moments of sorrow.”

Pope Francis concluded his homily, praying: “Lift us up, O Lord, to Christ seated at the right hand of the Father … raise our spirit. Take away our every fear, and grant us joy and peace.”

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Justice and truth are the keys to peace in Central African Republic, Pope says

by CNA/EWTN News • May 15, 2015

Archbishop Dieudonné Nzapalainga of Bangui, the Central African capital, blesses an ex-Seleka figher at Camp Beal. (Archdiocese of Bangui/Aid to the Church in Need)

Vatican City — Pope Francis’ address to the bishops of the Central African Republic on Friday focused on the Church’s role in fostering reconciliation in the war-torn country, urging a deeper adhesion to the Gospel and the importance of honesty and justice in the process.

Armed conflict broke out in CAR in December 2012, and it has has since been gripped by violence between the mostly Muslim and foreign Seleka, and the largely Christian anti-balaka. The conflict has died down since the presence of international peacekeepers was enlarged in late 2014, but the nation remains unstable.

The Pope told the CAR bishops May 15 at the Vatican: “You, brothers in the episcopate, must play an indispensable prophetic role during the current institutional transition, recalling and reflecting the witness of the fundamental values of justice, truth and honesty, which are the foundation of any renewal, promoting dialogue and peaceful coexistence between members of different societies and ethnicities, thus encouraging reconciliation and social cohesion, which is the key to the future.”

The country’s conflict began when Seleka rebels, loosely organized groups that drew primarily Muslim fighters from other countries, ousted the president and installed their own leader in a March 2013 coup.

In September 2013, after 10 months of terrorism at the hands of the Seleka, anti-balaka self-defense groups began to form. The conflict in the nation took on a sectarian character, as some anti-balaka, many of whom are Christian, began attacking Muslims out of revenge for the Seleka’s acts.

“Your task is difficult,” Pope Francis reflected with the bishops, “but it touches the very mystery of Jesus Christ, who died and rose again. It is when evil and death seem to triumph that the hope of renewal in Christ emerges.”

“It is when hatred and violence are unleashed that we are called upon – and find the strength through the power of the Cross and the grace of Baptism – to respond with forgiveness and love. If, sadly, this has not always been the case in the recent events that you have experienced, it is a sign that the Gospel has not yet deeply penetrated the heart of the People of God, to the point of changing their reflexes and their behaviour.”

Since the Churches of the CAR are the result of recent evangelization – the first was founded in 1909 – “your primary mission is to continue the work recently begun,” Pope Francis told the bishops. “You must not be discouraged by the storm you are passing through, but on the contrary must find, in faith and hope, a source of renewed enthusiasm and dynamism.”

The Pope also referred to “the countless testimonies of faith and fidelity Christians have rendered to the risen Christ on numerous occasions. I am particularly aware of all that your communities have done to for victims of violence and for refugees,” he said.

The fighting between the Seleka and anti-balaka killed thousands and displaced some 1 million from their homes. Since December 2013, Catholic churches have been sheltering the displaced – both Christians and Muslims – and protecting them from attack by both forces. These include St. Peter’s parish in Boali, a parish in Carnot, and Bangui’s Carmelite monastery. Catholic Relief Services has also fostered reconciliation workshops in the country, led by Rwandans who lived through their own country’s 1994 genocide.

In the face of the violence, Pope Francis told the bishops their priority must be “Christian formation and a deepening of the faith … so that the Gospel permeates the life of the baptised, for the good not only of the Christian communities, but also the whole of Central African society.”

He welcomed the contribution to Christian formation made by catechists and by “fidei donum” priests, who are on loan to Central African dioceses from their local Churches in other countries: “they are to be warmly thanked for coming to share the ministry in such difficult conditions,” he said.

The Central African bishops “are called upon to form the conscience of the faithful, and indeed that of all the people, as your voice is heard and respected by all,” he told them. “It is in this way that you should take your rightful place in current developments, avoiding direct involvement in political quarrels.”

“However, by forming and encouraging the laity so they are steadfast in their faith and solidly trained in the social doctrine of the Church, able to engage in political debate and to take responsibility – and it is their role – you are able to gradually transform society according to the Gospel and to prepare a happy future for your people.”

To be able to do this, Pope Francis said, the bishops must be attentive fathers to their priests. He also reflected on seminary formation, stressing the importance of “human and affective formation” in seminaries “so that future priests may be capable of living their commitment to celibacy; on this no compromise can be accepted.”

The Pope also devoted time to speaking about families, saying they are “the first victims of violence and who are too often destabilised or destroyed” in the armed conflict which CAR has experienced. He added that families are “the privileged location for the proclamation of the faith and the practice of Christian virtues, the cradle of many priestly and religious vocations,” and the ideal setting for learning the culture of forgiveness, peace, and reconciliation, “which your country so needs.”

Pope Francis remind the bishops “it is essential that the family be protected and defended ‘so that it may offer society the service expected of it, that of providing men and women capable of building a social fabric of peace and harmony,’” quoting Africae Munus, Benedict XVI’s 2011 apostolic exhortation on the Church in Africa in service to reconciliation, justice and peace.

“I can therefore only encourage you to accord to the pastoral care of marriage the attention that it deserves, and not to be discouraged by resistance due to cultural traditions, human weakness, or the new forms of ideological colonisation that are spreading everywhere,” Pope Francis stated, thanking them for their participation at the upcoming Synod on the Family, and asking their prayers for the synod.

Since the Central African bishops were in Rome for their five-yearly visit ad limina apostolorum – to the tombs of Saints Peter and Paul – and to St. Peter’s successor, Pope Francis told them, “I sincerely hope that this pilgrimage to the sources of the faith gives you comfort and encouragement for the continuation of your pastoral ministry. May the intercession of St. Peter and St. Paul obtain for you the graces necessary to gather and to lead the flock that the Lord has entrusted to you.”

Pope Francis has also considered himself visiting CAR. He expressed desire to do so during his January flight back to Rome from the Philippines, and Archbishop Dieudonne Nzapalainga of Bangui told Aid to the Church in Need in March that Pope Francis will visit CAR this November, saying, “The papal visit is a sign of the goodness of God and a consolation. He is coming to us as a father – and precisely at a moment when we have just been through a long crisis that has left deep scars.”

The Pope concluded his address to the Central African bishops saying, “I entrust all of you, as well as the priests, consecrated persons, catechists, and lay faithful of your dioceses, to the protection of the Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church and Queen of Peace.”

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VATICAN NEWS

Population control won’t solve climate change, Caritas official says

by Ann Schneible (CNA/EWTN News) • May 16, 2015

(CC0 1.0)

Vatican City — Controlling populations is not the answer in fighting poverty and protecting the environment, says a leading official for the Catholic aid federation, Caritas Internationalis.

“We do not see that population control, the way it is being thought by many, is the right way to go forward,” Caritas secretary general Michel Roy said in an interview with CNA.

The question of sustaining the planet is not approached “by suppressing people,” he said.

Roy has been in Rome for Caritas International’s 20th general assembly which has been running from May 12-17 on the theme: “One human family, care for creation.”

While the protection of the environment is being addressed over the course of this week’s meetings, Roy said caring for the poor lies at the heart of this year’s gathering.

“We really need to rethink our ways of living, always starting from the poor,” he said: “to listen to them, to learn from them, and to ask them to lead, to think of the society they want to live in.”

Roy said what really creates problems in the area of poverty for today’s secularized world is consumerism.

“When people become too individualistic, when there is no solidarity in the family, in the community, when you fall into poverty, it’s a real tragedy.”

In contrast: “The answer to poverty lies in relationship, and lies in solidarity.”

Roy spoke about collaborating with the international community in helping to protect the environment and combat hunger. He cited the United Nations General Assembly’s upcoming adoption of sustainable laws on Sept. 25, and the upcoming climate summit in Paris in late November which will center on reducing the impact of climate change.

Critics have raised concerns about the Vatican’s collaboration with the U.N. on environmental protection, taking into account that the U.N. promotes population control as a means of combating climate change. Pope Francis met with U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon at the Vatican late April, during which they discussed the pontiff’s upcoming encyclical on protecting the environment.

Addressing the criticism, Roy said: “We are who we are. They (the U.N.) know who we are. If they want to work with us, they have to accept the values that we are promoting.”

Saying it is necessary to work with the U.N., since is a “community of nations,” the Caritas official said: “we have to challenge them as well.”

“They are calling on us because they know what we do at the grassroots is probably the best work against poverty that is being done.”

Held once every four years, the aim of the 2015 assembly is to outline and design the goals for the next quadriennal term, as well as to elect new leadership.

On Thursday, the delegates elected Cardinal Luis Tagle as the federation’s newest president, and first to hail from Asia.

Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga stepped down from the role as Caritas president, having served two mandates from 2007-2011, and 2011-2015.

This year’s Caritas assembly comes just ahead of Pope Francis’ anticipated encyclical on environmental degradation and the global effects of climate change on the poor.

Expected to be published in mid-late June, the document has already been written and is currently being translated.

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From Europe’s Christians, a call for a vision of freedom with and for others

by Andrea Gagliarducci (CNA/EWTN News) • May 10, 2015

Pope Francis carries the Cross during the Good Friday Liturgy at St. Peter’s Basilica, April 3, 2015. (M. IMPROVED CPP)

Rome, Italy — True freedom rejects mere consumption and satisfaction and embraces a duty to rescue the migrant, to save women from violence, and to help young people struggling to work and care for their families. In short, freedom includes responsibility towards God and neighbor, Europe’s Christian leaders have said.

“Our Christian freedom is God-given, rooted in Christ, and calls us into a life of service of one another. Christ challenges us to use our freedom to bring about the Kingdom of God in the here and now,” said the joint message from the Council of the European Bishops Conferences and the Conference of European Churches.

“There is no freedom unless this freedom is with and for others,” it added.

The May 8 message came at the conclusion of a Rome meeting of the Joint Committee of the Conference of European Churches and the Council of the European Bishops Conferences. The meeting focused on the theme “For a Europe of Freedom and Liberties: a Christian Approach.”

The Conference of European Churches includes 125 members that are generally the most prominent Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican and Old Catholic Churches and communities.

The Council of the European Bishops Conferences represents 33 Catholic bishops’ conferences of the European Community plus the archbishops of Luxembourg and of Monaco, as well as the Bishop of Chisinau, Moldova.

During the May 6-8 meeting sessions, members of the two bodies reflected on the role of freedom.

The resulting joint message marked the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. The anniversary is a reminder of the “sacrifices made in a violent battle against deadly ideologies,” the joint message said.

The Christian leaders stressed their conviction that “a Christian vision of human freedom” is needed in a pluralist Europe, since “this freedom is part of us, as God created us free.”

A freedom “rooted in truth” often conflicts with other freedoms, the statement said.

“Notions of freedom that support individualistic satisfaction and meaningless consumption at the expense of others are all too common.” the message said. It emphasized aspects of freedom “oriented to responsibility to God and to neighbor.”

“We call for a freedom that denounces oppression and violence against women in the name of any religion,” the Christian leaders said. “We call for a freedom that rescues migrants in the Mediterranean, and works for an end to the causes of desperate migration and allows for all to live peacefully in their homelands.”

The Christian leaders called for “a freedom that speaks words of solidarity in the face of anti-Roma prejudice.” The statement sought an end to human trafficking and called for “the end of worldwide modern day slavery.”

Regarding the environment, the joint statement called for a freedom “that names creation as a sacred gift.” It cited the upcoming United Nations Climate Change Conference to be held in Paris in December.

Finally, the statement called for “a freedom that chooses hope over despair, and lives in solidarity with young people in their struggles to build careers and raise families.”

The joint committee meetings included prayers and a May 7 audience with Pope Francis, who stressed the need for churches to “find common answers to the questions which contemporary society puts to us Christians.”

The Council of the European Bishops Conferences and the Conference of European Churches established their joint committee in 1971 in order to foster collaboration between the Catholic Church and other Christian confessions in Europe.

The groups’ membership reaches beyond Europe. Cardinal Peter Erdo, Archbishop of Budapest and president of the Council of the European Bishops Conferences, stressed that they represent “Christian churches from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean.”

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March for Life in Rome draws 40,000 participants

by Ann Schneible (CNA/EWTN News) • May 10, 2015

Mary Rathke (right) speaks at Rome’s March for Life, May 10, 2015. (Martha Calderon/CNA)

Rome, Italy — One of tens of thousands of people to take to the streets of Rome for this year’s March for Life, Mary Rathke is living proof that those conceived in rape deserve life, and not abortion.

“Many people use the reason for rape to accept abortions,” said the Michigan native in a May 10 interview with CNA.

Rathke, 35, was conceived when her mother was raped on her way home from work.

“They say that it is the rapist’s baby, that it is a monster’s baby, and that no one would want this child,” she said.

“I am not a monster’s baby. I am not the rapist’s baby. I am my mother’s child, and I’m a child of the most High God, and I am made in His image.”

Rathke, now a pro-life advocate, was one of an estimated 40,000 people to take part in Rome’s fourth – and Italy’s fifth – annual March for Life.

This year’s march, which took place on Mother’s Day, centered on the theme “For life, no compromise.”

During his weekly Regina Caeli address earlier in the day, Pope Francis greeted the pilgrims who were in Rome for the event, saying: “It is important to collaborate together to promote and defend life.”

Married with four children, Rathke is currently vice-president of Beacon of Hope Pregnancy Care Center’s Board of Directors, and president of HELPeople, Inc.

Having been adopted at the age of five when her mother, who suffers from schizophrenia, was unable to continue caring for her, Rathke had already become open with her faith, and an advocate for the homeless.

She discovered the origins of her conception just three years ago when her mother’s husband passed away, leading to the discovery that he had been covering for his wife’s rape.

In response, Rathke began traveling the world to defend babies born of rape from laws which would allow them to be aborted as an “exception.”

“We deserve life as well,” she said.

The pro-life advocate said many women are forced into abortions after their rape, and later are unable to live with the guilt.

“I come to represent all of the women who are suffering silently because they were raped,” she said. “When they see my sign, and when they hear my story, they come and they thank me, and they say that they’re not going to be ashamed anymore, that they are also made in God’s image.”

As a child conceived in rape, her advice for women who have found themselves pregnant after such an assault is that abortion will not heal the pain of their ordeal.

“An abortion will not make the memories of the rape go away,” Rathke said.

“An abortion will only end your baby’s life. Your baby’s a victim, just like you are. Give that baby life.”

“That baby’s life is beautiful, and wonderful, and is not an ugly reminder of a bad thing … God is giving you something good to hang onto after such a horrible encounter.”

Abortion has been legal in Italy since 1978. Since then, more than 6 million Italian babies have been aborted.

While Italian women who have had abortions have largely remained publicly silent, some are starting to speak out – and the March for Life is seen as a reason. At the 2015 event, for instance, two post-abortive women gave their testimony if their experiences of having abortions.

March for Life spokesperson Virginia Nunziante told CNA ahead of the event that while it is highly unusual for post-abortive women to speak out, these witnesses “understand now how important it is to have this message, also to help other young women.”

The annual event, which has been modeled from the US March for Life held each year in Washington DC, has drawn thousands of people from around the world to the streets of Rome. An estimated 50,000 people attended the march in 2015.

Nunziante explained that the focus of this year’s March for Life is not only in defense of the unborn, but also intended as a witness against euthanasia, explaining that Italy is attempting to advance legislation on this issue.

In 2009, Italy became embroiled in a legal battle when the father of Eluana Englaro, an Italian woman who had been in a vegetative state for 17 years, sought to have her feeding tube removed.

Nunziante explained that the March for Life it is important event not only for Italians, but also on an international level.

“The Holy See is seen as an important worldwide voice,” she said. “The Pope is seen as such. And this is the reason why they all come to Rome.”

This year’s March for Life saw the gathering of even more international pro-life representatives than previously, she said. “They understand that we have to give a worldwide message, and from Rome, the word is getting wider and wider.”

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Despite changes, ‘genocide’ of China’s one-child policy endures, activists say

by CNA/EWTN News • May 11, 2015

(XI via Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

Washington, D.C. — Human rights advocates told a congressional commission of the “terrifying” practices of China’s coercive one-child policy and lamented forced abortion as a crime against humanity.

“Regardless of the number of children allowed, women who get pregnant without permission will still be dragged out of their homes, strapped down to tables, and forced to abort babies that they want,” Reggie Littlejohn, founder of Women’s Rights Without Frontiers, said April 30.

Littlejohn addressed the Congressional-Executive Commission on China’s hearing on population control in the Asian country. The commission is co-chaired by Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Florida).

Although China has relaxed its one-child policy to permit couples to have a second child in some cases, Littlejohn insisted that the policy change has not solved the problem.

“These minor modifications are routinely exaggerated,” she said.

“The problem with the one-child policy is not the number of children ‘allowed.’ Rather, it is the fact that the Chinese Communist Party is telling women how many children they can have and then enforcing that limit through forced abortion and forced sterilization.”

Others who testified at the congressional hearing included Chinese activist and lawyer Chen Guangcheng, who was imprisoned for four years in China because of his work against the one-child policy and other human rights concerns; and Chai Ling, founder of the group All Girls Allowed.

Chen, who is now a senior fellow at The Catholic University of America and The Witherspoon Institute in Washington, D.C., criticized the “the bloody and brutal violence” of China’s coercive birth control policy. He characterized the policy as a “contemporary genocide” and a “horrific crime against humanity.”

“Over the past 35 years, China has killed a total of 360 to 400 million young lives as a result of its inhumane and violent birth control policies,” he said.

“This inhumane brutality has resulted in society becoming indifferent to life and has diminished the dignity of the human being, thus breaking down the traditional morality of Chinese society on life-and-death matters and leading to social decay,” he added.

Chen said married couples must seek a permit from a local birth control committee before conceiving a child. A woman pregnant without a permit can be summoned before a local birth control office. There, a party official would “force her to sign a form of acknowledgment prior to a forced abortion, purporting that such a procedure (including sterilization) was done with her consent.”

When women resist signing such forms, their relatives and neighbors are sometimes detained, the activist said.

In Chen’s home village and neighboring villages, local party chiefs would lead small or large groups that would “act like bandits” in beating non-compliant villagers and holding them captive against the law, he reported.

“I volunteered to help the villagers with my legal knowledge in the hope of stopping and preventing such brutal actions,” he said. “Yet, I found out the law was useless in trying to stop these violent birth control practices.”

Chai Ling, the founder and president of the organization All Girls Allowed, said the one-child policy is “brutal.” She said that the goal of one child per family had once sounded “so benign and perfect” to her until she realized that it meant that “all other children must die.”

Ling, who was a student leader in the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, told the hearing that her Christian faith “motivates me and my team to be the arms that hold the mothers and children who would be killed by this policy and offer them love and peace.”

Littlejohn also spoke further about the policy’s victims.

“Some of these forced abortions have been so violent that the women themselves sometimes die along with their full-term babies,” she said.

The “terrifying” nature of forced abortions contributes to mental illness and suicide among the victimized women, she added. For their part, men whose wives have been victimized have sometimes lost control and murdered family planning officials or committed suicide in protests of the massive fines for violating the one-child policy.

Littlejohn said that the fines for policy violations are “an important source of revenue” for the party. They are “inconsistently applied” but can be 10 times a person’s annual salary. She believes the population control policy is in fact “social control,” as the policy also supports an “infrastructure of coercion that can be used to crush dissent of any sort.”

Furthering problems is a cultural preference for baby boys – as a result, unborn baby girls in China are more likely to be victims of sex-selected voluntary abortion. The sex ratio imbalance means that 37 million men will not find wives, causing social instability and worsening sex trafficking.

Littlejohn said China’s population control policy risks causing a “demographic disaster” for many reasons. Its working-age population is shrinking and faces increasing difficulty supporting elderly.

Chen added that there are more than 1 million families whose only child has died, leaving the parents without support as they age.

Several of the human rights advocates at the hearing made recommendations on U.S. policy.

Littlejohn said the U.S. government should urge China to abolish all forms of coercive population control, offer incentives for couples to have girls and offer pensions to couples who do not have sons.

She suggested that the U.S. government establish principles to ensure that U.S. corporations do not allow coercive population control measures against their employees and that the U.S. defund the United Nations Population Fund until it stops support or participation in programs of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization in China.

Chen urged the U.S. and the international community to stop the “inhumane cruelty of the Communist Party” and call for an international tribunal to investigate the crimes. He said the U.S. should bar the responsible Chinese officials’ entry to the U.S. and confiscate their property.

“These human rights violators who act against humanity must be made accountable,” he said.

Rep. Smith characterized China’s policy as “state sponsored violence against women and children.” He charged that the Obama Administration has shown a “gross failure” to enforce existing laws intended to penalize Chinese officials for the coercive policy.

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German bishops change labor laws to allow divorced and remarried, gay civil unions

by Carl Bunderson (CNA/EWTN News) • May 12, 2015

Cardinal Reinhard Marx at the Vatican Press Office on Oct. 17, 2014. (Daniel Ibáñez/CNA)

Munich, Germany — Last week, the German bishops’ conference announced it is changing its labor laws such that contracting a civil marriage after divorce or entering a same-sex civil union cannot result in termination of employment except in “exceptional cases.”

“Only in special circumstances and therefore only in exceptional cases can these forms of conduct lead to a termination of contract,” read a May 5 statement released by the German bishops’ conference. The statement was translated into English at Rorate Caeli.

The move, which the German bishops say is an adaptation to changes in “legislation and society,” follows on the heels of their synthesis of responses to a questionnaire sent in preparation for the Synod on the Family being held in October, which noted the “considerable expectations among many faithful” of a “further development of the Church’s teaching and pastoral care in questions related to marriage and family.”

Questions of marriage and family have taken the spotlight amid the Synod on the Family that took place last year in the Rome, and the one that will take place there this fall.

Several dioceses in the U.S. – including those of Columbus, Cincinnati, and San Francisco – have in recent years upheld or adopted employment policies which strengthen expectations that Church employees will not contradict Church teaching in their professional and public lives.

The German bishops’ statement noted that the Plenary Assembly of the Association of German Dioceses revised the labor law on April 27. Two changes regarded the collective labor law, bolstering the right to organize unions and the right of unions to operate in ecclesial institutions.

“In the area of the individual Labor Law, certain demands,” the bishops continued, “have been adapted according to changes in jurisdiction, legislation, and society.”

The adaptations regard “demands of loyalty.” The statement begins by emphasizing that “termination of contract is only the last and final resort” with regard to violations of loyalty; it must have been preceded by rebuke, warnings, transfer, etc.

Violations against loyalty, according to the German bishops, include “public engagement against fundamental principles of the Catholic Church (e.g., the propagation of abortion or of xenophobia), the leaving of the Catholic Church, or conduct that is hostile toward the Church.”

However, entering a second, civil marriage following divorce, or entering a homosexual civil union, is not in itself a violation against the demand of loyalty, according to the German bishops.

Contracting a second civil marriage without an annulment or contracting a gay civil union “is generally to be regarded as a grave violation against loyalty,” the bishops said, “if such conduct according to the concrete circumstances is objectively prone to cause an enormous disturbance within the service community or within the professional sphere of influence and to affect the credibility of the Church in a negative way.”

As an example of under which circumstances a second marriage could disturb a service community, the bishops offer that the remarried partner would have to shirk the legal duties of his first marriage.

“The Church’s Labor Law does not know any form of automatic termination of contract,” the bishops emphasized. “Whether it is possible to continue an employment, after a violation against the duties stemming from the employment contract, always depends upon the conditions of the individual case.”

The German bishops said that “certain professional groups” have a higher expectation of loyalty than others, and that the newly adopted norms do not apply. These groups include those in the fields of pastoral care, catechesis, or those who have a canonical mandate from their bishop to teach in a Catholic school.

The statement concludes saying that each German diocese will establish “a central office that shall be consulted before sentencing a termination of contract because of a violation of loyalty.”

Moreover, another committee “will examine the question as to whether the Church’s Labor Law can be further strengthened institutionally.”

The German bishops’ statement began by noting that the adaptations were the fruit of considerable time and consultation: “During the recent years, this current decision was prepared for by an episcopal working group and already discussed several times by the bishops themselves.”

According to Reuters, a spokesman for the Church in Germany said more than two-thirds of Germany’s dioceses voted in favor of the adaptation, “indicating some opposition.”

The synod questionnaire synthesis in Germany similarly maintained that admitting the divorced and remarried to the sacraments “remains a pivotal issue for the credibility of the Church.”

Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes, who is president emeritus of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum, has called similar statements from Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich and Freising – president of the German bishops conference – “the result of an ‘obedience that goes ahead’, a deeply political strategy which creates ‘facts’ in order to dominate the process of decision-making and to put pressure on their colleagues” at October’s Synod on the Family.

Some commentators have also voiced fear that the large income the Church in Germany receives from the state may serve to neuter its voice of Christian witness in the public sphere.

“Because of the decades-long connection of Church and State taxation system, financial offices etc. there is dependence,” Martin Lohmann, a Catholic author and spokesman of the advocacy group Christian Action in Germany, told CNA in February. “The last years and decades there is a fear from the side of the bishops to proclaim the truth in social-political topics since they want to avoid a hostile reaction from the parties.”

Lohmann added that the Church loses financially if it upholds less popular teachings on divorce and contraception. Preaching about that means losing “paying customers,” he said; and “softening” these teachings means more money for the Church.

As long as this is the case, the Church, in Lohmann’s view, “will remain limited and not-free, darkened, and in a state without courage to proclaim the truth.”

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After theft, Argentines donate prized possessions, wedding rings for new monstrance

by CNA/EWTN News • May 13, 2015

Eucharistic Adoration. (Elisa Pires via JMJ Rio 2013/Flickr CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Buenos Aires, Argentina — Large numbers of the faithful are donating gold and silver belongings to forge a new monstrance after a theft in Tucuman, Argentina.

Located in northwest Argentina, Tucuman is Argentina’s smallest province, but second only to Buenos Aires in population density.

In 2011, two costly monstrances were stolen from the Museum of Sacred Art. To replace them, a new monstrance will be made. It will be used at the 2016 National Eucharistic Congress.

A monstrance is the vessel that holds the Eucharist for adoration and benediction.

To create the new vessel, the local faithful are donating their prized possessions – even their wedding rings.

According to La Gaceta newspaper, one elderly woman donated three small gold rings, saying, “It’s all I have.”

Another woman donated her deceased husband’s wedding ring. “I was married for 65 years, I want this ring to be close to Jesus,” she said.

Offering a gold and silver crucifix from 1914, one donor commented that “it belonged to my family, now I want it to be with the Blessed Sacrament.”

“Our great desire is that our people can give a new monstrance to Tucuman … ,” explained Marcelo Lobo Viaña, president of the Administrative Council of the Museum of Sacred Art, and Maria Arias de Fria Silva, who runs the Friends of the Museum Foundation.

The stolen monstrances were extremely valuable. The older one was of Jesuit origin, while the newer one was commissioned by the late Bishop Bernabé Piedrabuena in 1924. It contained several precious stones and, like its replacement, had also been made from donations of silver and gold from the people of Tucuman.

The stolen jeweled monstrance was forged by José Pallarols Torras, grandfather of Juan Carlos Pallarols, the goldsmith who has been given the job of fabricating the new vessel.

Pallarols has already done important work for Tucuman, including repairing the scepter of the statue of the Virgin of Mercy. The artisan, who is offering his work on the monstrance free of charge, noted that “all the donated material will be melted down so that we can all be one.”

Introducing the fundraising campaign, which has as its theme “The Best for Christ,” Tucuman’s Archbishop Alberto Zecca recalled that his own pectoral cross and episcopal ring were made by the well-known goldsmith.

For the prelate, the donations of the people of Tucuman for this new monstrance are like the woman in the Gospel who only gave a few coins, while the rich people were depositing much more. Jesus, upon seeing this, commented that the widow had given more than all the others, because they gave from their surplus, but she, from her poverty, offered her whole livelihood.

Archbishop Zecca said that the spirit of the National Eucharistic Congress has begun to be lived out with that type of generosity. “The new monstrance,” he said, “is an offering of the people of Tucuman.”

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For Cardinal Mamberti, dialogue with Muslims is a must

by Andrea Gagliarducci (CNA/EWTN News) • May 13, 2015

Muslim woman walking on the roof of Ibn Tulum Mosque. (Hector de Pereda via Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0)

Rome, Italy — Among all the difficult situations in the world, the Middle East situation – including the plight of the region’s Christians – is one of the most compelling, says a former top Vatican diplomat who adds that dialogue with Islam must be fostered.

Cardinal Dominique Mamberti, currently the Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, served as the Holy See’s Secretary for Relations with States – the Vatican’s ‘foreign Minister’ – from 2006 to 2014.

He granted an interview before the presentation of second-level master degrees in International Relations awarded by the Catholic-oriented university LUMSA of Rome. In his lecture, Cardinal Mamberti stressed the importance of the Holy See in the international arena. He underscored that “Church law and international law are intertwined, as international law is rooted in the universal vision of the Church.”

Cardinal Mamberti told CNA May 12 that “there are many compelling challenges for Holy See diplomacy nowadays … but I think that the Middle East is for us an open wound, in particular due to the plight of Christians and because of the risks this plight bears for the stability not only of the geographical region, but for the stability of the whole world.”

During this last year, the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue issued two statements to urge Muslim leaders to a strong condemnation of the self-proclaimed Islamic State and to stress the need for a dialogue with Islam.

Cardinal Mamberti, a French citizen born in Marrakesh, Morocco, has served as papal nuncio to Somalia, Sudan and Eritrea. He has often worked in dialogue with Islam.

Asked if there is still the opportunity for a dialogue with Islam, he stressed that “certainly, a dialogue with Islam may be pursued and must be pursued.” However, he added that “speaking about a dialogue with Islam is something abstract … we must rather pursue a dialogue with Islamic representatives, believers in Islam, and develop with them, as much as possible, common actions with them in favor of peace and development.”

This is the Holy See’s diplomatic commitment, whose foundation is “the defense of human dignity, together with the building of the common good of human society,” stressed Cardinal Mamberti.

Speaking about the difficult migrant crisis and other problems in the Mediterranean region, Cardinal Mamberti underscored that “diplomacy must explore all the possible ways so that the human person is respected. Obviously, any initiative must be fostered under international law, and with the major goal to keep peace, as the Holy Father often reiterated: ‘Only with peace, can we build the future’.”

Reflecting on the coming papal trip to Cuba and the restoration of diplomatic ties between the United States and Cuba, Cardinal Mamberti underscored that “Holy See diplomatic representatives have always been present in Cuba, and their never-ending commitment is at the basis of these recent outcomes.”

“I was in Cuba some years ago, to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the uninterrupted diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Cuba. During the years, through thick and thin, the Holy See has built a relation of mutual trust with Cuba, and today we can harvest the fruit of this commitment.”

“On the other hand, I think that the Holy Father’s personal commitment has been very important, and all of us must be grateful to him for this,” the cardinal added.

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Cyprus archbishop, Caritas presidential prospect: caring for creation means putting people first

by Elise Harris (CNA/EWTN News) • May 13, 2015

(CC0 1.0)

Rome, Italy — Maronite Archbishop Joseph Soueif of Cyprus, one of two candidates to be the next president of Caritas International, has said that caring for creation means putting the human being first.

“The motto of this conference is ‘One human family, care for creation.’ One human family means all of us, diverse cultures and societies, we are one,” the archbishop told CNA May 13.

“This is the purpose of this conference. We are one to care for creation, it means to care for the human being first, the poor (and) the marginalized, and for nature, creation, which God did for us, and what God did for us is good,” he said.

Archbishop Soueif not only oversees Cyprus’ Catholic population, but is also the president of the country’s Caritas branch.

He is in Rome for Caritas International’s 20th general assembly, which is taking place May 12-17.

In addition to providing a strategic framework to anchor Caritas’ work over the next four years, delegates will also elect the organization’s new leadership.

According to the organization’s statutes, delegates of Caritas International can select a set of candidates for the top posts of president, secretary and treasurer, which must then be submitted to the Pope, who will eventually approve them.

The current president of Caritas is Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga of Tegucigalpa, and its secretary-general is Michel Roy, who was formerly head of Caritas’ French branch.

Roy is the sole candidate for the post of secretary-general on this year’s ballot for new leadership. He has held the position since 2011, and is certain to be confirmed.

Cardinal Maradiaga will step down as president, having served two mandates, from 2007-2011, and 2011-2015.

Both Archbishop Soueif and Cardinal Antonio Tagle of Manila have been identified as candidates to assume the role of president. Voting is set to take place on Thursday.

Archbishop Soueif is prominent in Caritas Europe, and has also received the implicit endorsement of the Council of European Bishops Conference.

Supporters of Archbishop Soueif note that he is well aware of the difficult situation Christians face worldwide, since he is both a native of Lebanon and the sole Catholic bishop of an island divided in two, where Christians suffer numerous persecutions.

The archbishop is also aware of European issues, since he is a member of the Commission of the Bishops of the European Union.

The next Caritas president is expected to foster Caritas International’s new statutes, which were issued by Benedict XVI in 2012. The new statutes put the organization under the umbrella of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum, and stress the need for a unique identity among each of the various Caritas branches.

In his comments to CNA, Archbishop Soueif said that Pope Francis’ frequent call to have “a poor Church for the poor” is not just a theory, but an initiative that requires daily commitment.

He referred to the Pope’s commission for Caritas workers to go out and meet those on the peripheries of society during his May 12 opening Mass for the assembly, saying, “we are all the peripheries.”

Each person and local Caritas can be considered on the periphery in the sense that “we are called to live in solidarity with people who unfortunately society, and … social structures, are abandoning.”

Current needs in Cyprus center on the reunification of the island, which was effectively partitioned in 1974 when the Turkish-controlled north broke away following a brief Greek-inspired coup.

The northern third of the island is currently inhabited by Turkish Cypriots, while Greek Cypriots make up the southern two-thirds. The self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is diplomatically isolated, and is only recognized by Turkey.

Compensation for those displaced in the conflict continues to be one of the most contentious issues in ongoing peace talks, which are set to continue Friday after they broke off last year following a Monday meeting negotiated by the U.N. in Nicosia, BBC News reports.

With a Greek Orthodox majority in the south and a Turkish Muslim majority in the north, Cyprus has also been religiously divided. Catholics account for only about two percent of the population. Christians on the island have faced ongoing difficulty and persecution, and churches are frequently vandalized or broken into.

One of society’s biggest challenges, particularly in Cyprus, the archbishop said, “is that the other is not well-accepted. Differences are not accepted.”

“We need to strengthen the culture of acceptance of others, of the differences, so diversity but in unity.”

Caritas, the Church, and all religious groups need to work for the reunification of the island “based on the reconciliation of hearts, on peace (and) on justice, because Cyprus has an important role as a bridge between the Middle East, the Arab countries, Europe, and also Africa.”

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Mindful of God’s mercy, pastor accepts new role as Bishop of Nottingham

by CNA/EWTN News • May 15, 2015

Patrick McKinney, who was appointed Bishop of Nottingham on May 14, 2015. (Rev. Andrew Cole/Nottingham Roman Catholic Diocese)

Nottingham, England — On the news of his being appointed the Bishop of Nottingham by Pope Francis, Monsignor Patrick McKinney said that in his nearly four decades as a priest he has been conscious of God’s great mercy in his life.

“Throughout my priestly ministry, now almost 37 years, I have always tried to do my best in whatever has been asked of me,” he said in a May 14 statement.

“In this I have been deeply conscious of God’s abundant grace and mercy,” Msgr. McKinney continued, “and I have been greatly sustained by the prayerful support of my brother priests, the deacons and religious in the Archdiocese of Birmingham, and by the prayers of the parishioners whom I have been privileged to serve.”

“I have much to learn as I prepare to take up my new ministry within the Diocese of Nottingham, but am greatly looking forward to it,” he said.

Msgr. McKinney said he is “deeply conscious” of his predecessor, the current Archbishop of Liverpool Malcolm McMahon’s “rich legacy” and said he will continue the parish renewal work that was started with the “You are Living Stones” program.

He also thanked Msgr. Thomas McGovern, who for the last year has served as administrator of the Diocese of Nottingham.

Msgr. McGovern said he was “very pleased” to learn of the news and that Msgr. McKinney will “bring many fine qualities” to the Nottingham diocese.

“He will find a warm and friendly welcome here in this Diocese, and I speak on behalf of all the priests, deacons, religious and people when I say how much we are looking forwarding to working with him to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ to the people of the towns, cities and beautiful countryside of the East Midlands,” he said.

Msgr. McKinney will be ordained to the episcopate by Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster, on July 3 at St. Barnabas’ Cathedral in Nottingham.

As a parish priest for the Church of Our Lady and All Saints, both in the Archdiocese of Birmingham since 2006, Msgr. McKinney said that he will miss all those he served very much, but he is hopeful about his work as Bishop of Nottingham.

“I look forward to getting to know all the priests, the deacons, religious, and lay men and women of the Diocese, and also working alongside other Christians and those involved in interreligious work and dialogue in service of the wider community,” he said.

The 61 year-old was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Birmingham in 1978 after studying at St. Mary’s College in Oscott. His first assignment was as assistant priest at Our Lady of Lourdes and as chaplain for the St. Thomas Aquinas Secondary School, both in Birmingham.

Msgr. McKinney earned his Licence in Sacred Theology from the Gregorian Pontifical University in Rome in 1984. From there he returned to his alma mater in Birmingham where he taught fundamental theology, served as rector and was a lecturer in theology. In 1990 he was made a monsignor and in 1992 he became a member of the Metropolitan Chapter of St. Chad. He also served as Chair of the Birmingham Archdiocesan Ecumenical Commission for a time.

Msgr. McKinney was parish priest of St. John’s in Great Haywood and Episcopal Vicar for the north of the Archdiocese of Birmingham after he left St. Mary’s College in 1998. In 2001 he left his parish, but remained Episcopal Vicar until 2006 when he became parish priest of Our Lady of All Saints in Stourbridge and Dean of the Dudley Deanery.

The Diocese of Nottingham is made up of 108 parishes and is home to some 155,000 Catholics.

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WORLD NEWS

A modern-day St Francis? Archbishop works to rebuild Syrian Church amid destruction

by Matt Hadro and Adelaide Mena (CNA/EWTN News) • May 15, 2015

Interior of a damaged church building in Aleppo, April 2015. (Melkite Archdiocese of Aleppo/Aid to the Church in Need)

Aleppo, Syria — A four-year civil war in Syria has left a mounting death toll and displaced millions of persons, but one bishop is staying to rebuild the Church in Aleppo, in the northwest corner of the country.

“The Church is living,” Melkite Archbishop Jean-Clement Jeanbart of Aleppo told CNA earlier this month. “Here, I am building, I am restoring, I am maintaining a lively Church in which every stone is a human being and who can be a witness, a testimony to the world.”

“I wondered if I am not copying St. Francis when he was working to rebuild the Church. It was crazy, nobody thought that he would succeed,” the archbishop noted. “And he succeeded because the Lord was with him.”

The four-year Syrian conflict being fought among the Assad regime and various rebel factions has devastated the country. More than 3.9 million refugees have fled to surrounding countries, and around 8 million Syrians are believed to have been internally displaced. The war’s death toll is currently around 220,000.

Outside countries and entities have taken advantage of the civil war, profiting from it through the arms trade or waiting for Syria to collapse so to move in and take power in the vacuum. Pope Francis has spoken out against the arms trade here and has been criticized for it, Archbishop Jeanbart noted.

Aleppo endured a terrible two-month siege by rebel forces last year. Its infrastructure has been devastated, and its residents endure great poverty.

Those who chose to stay face a myriad of challenges. Houses, businesses, schools, and hospitals have been damaged or destroyed in the war, leaving fathers without work, families without shelter, the sick without medical care, and children without education.

Thus it is an uphill battle to convince residents to stay and not re-settle elsewhere, Archbishop Jeanbart admitted. Syrians see the U.S. on television and think it a “paradise,” and want to move there. He has to convince them of the unseen difficulties that such a move might bring.

Words are not enough to convince people, however. The Church must act to help Christians who stay so once peace comes – and it will, the archbishop maintains – a stable Christian community is in place and Christians can have a seat at the peace negotiations.

“We want that we may have our rights,” he said. “We want that everybody may feel comfortable in the country.”

“What we want to do, and what I am looking for,” Archbishop Jeanbart said, “is to go to another position, a position looking positively to the future, trying to give them hope that the future of their country may be good, and will be better if they work and if they prepare themselves.”

The Church in Aleppo is working to meet the local needs. It provides thousands of baskets of food to needy families, 1,000 scholarships for students to attend Catholic schools, stipends to almost 500 fathers who have lost their business in the war, heating to houses in the wintertime, rebuilding homes damaged in the war and medical care for the needy since many government hospitals were destroyed in the fighting.

It’s a daunting task for an archbishop in his seventies. He admitted to initially wondering how he could do it.

“But when I began working on it, I felt that I was 50. Like if the Lord is pushing me to go ahead and helping me to realize this mission,” he said.

“I invest myself entirely. I have decided the consecrate the rest of my life to do that.”

Archbishop Jeanbart has been assisted in his efforts to serve the people of Aleppo by the international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need. The charity has ensured a six month supply of medical goods for the city, and paid for repairs and fuel costs at the city’s schools, in addition to the rest of its work throughout Syria.

Archbishop Jeanbart maintained that another reason Christians need to stay in Syria is to be a light to people of other religions, especially Muslims. If the Christians leave, no one will be left to preach the Gospel in Syria.

“Perhaps the time has come to tell these people ‘Come, Christ is waiting for you.’ And many Muslims now, I must say, are wondering where should be their place? Are they in the right place? Are they perhaps supposed to rethink and review their choices? It will be wonderful if I told them we may have the freedom and the freedom of faith which would allow anyone to make his own choice freely.”

Critics of the Church in Syria have accused it of not immediately supporting the rebels in the name of freedom and democracy, the archbishop noted, and this is a false mischaracterization.

Christians are wary of regime change because they have seen what has happened in surrounding countries where fundamentalists took power in the Arab Spring and religious pluralism suffered as a result: there is “a feeling among Christians that they are afraid that the government may change and with the change of the government, they may lose their freedom … they are afraid to lose their freedom to express and to live their Christian life.”

He cited the success of the Islamic State, which in the power vacuum caused by the Syrian civil war has established a caliphate in eastern Syria and western Iraq where “many Christians were killed because they were Christian.”

Christians in Syria are, in fact, supportive of freedom and democracy, he said.

“They want to have a democratic regime where they may have all their freedom and where they may live tranquil but at the same time happy in the country,” he said.

“In any settlement,” he maintained, “the Christian must have the rights to be Christian in this country. And they should not become Muslims because the regime will be Muslim.”

“We want to have our rights and to live as free Christians in our country,” he said.

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WORLD NEWS

They lived Christianity: Italy’s saints of social action

by Andrea Gagliarducci (CNA/EWTN News) • May 15, 2015

Above St. John Bosco’s initial tomb at the Salesian Institute in Turin. (Bohumil Petrik/CNA)

Turin, Italy — Pope Francis’ upcoming visit to Turin is an opportunity to reflect on the outstanding group of saints whose lives embodied Catholic social teaching in 19th century Turin, when the Piedmont region underwent an industrial revolution and secularizing trends amid struggles to build a unified Italian state.

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Holy See’s emeritus Secretary of State, stressed the importance of these “social action saints” ahead of the June papal visit to Turin, the Piedmont regional capital.

Cardinal Bertone spoke to CNA from the Turin International Book Fair, where he was presenting his book “Faith and the Common Good: Christian Proposals for Contemporary Society,” published by Vatican Publishing House. The work is a collection of his writings and speeches about Catholic social teaching.

The cardinal is from Piedmont and is a member of the Salesian congregation, founded by St. John Bosco. This saint dedicated himself to the betterment of Torinese youth in the 19th century. He founded the Salesians to educate the impoverished young and to prepare them for occupations.

Cardinal Bertone stressed that the social action saints “contributed in shaping the society with a multiplicity of charitable works, social and educational initiatives, thus bringing the name of Piedmont to the farthest lands.”

These saints helped Italian immigrants and indigenous peoples who needed assistance and education “to achieve an integral development.”

Pope Francis will be in Turin June 21-22 in the midst of the celebrations of the 200th anniversary of St. John Bosco’s birth, thus paying homage to one of the most prominent social action saints from Piedmont. During his trip, the Pope on June 21 will visit the St. Joseph Cottolengo institute, named for another of these social action saints, to meet with sick people.

According to Cardinal Bertone, the presence of the “social saints” prove that Italian society was shaped by Christian values despite the fact that the movement towards the establishment of the Italian state appeared to take a path far from Christian values.

The social action saints flourished in mid-19th century Turin and its vicinities, such as the small northern Italian State of Savoy, whose territory included sections of the present-day Italian regions of Piedmont, Liguria and Sardinia.

Many of these social action saints took inspiration from one another, Cardinal Bertone recounted.

“St. John Bosco was the founder of the Salesian family, apostle to the young people,” the cardinal explained. “He was inspired and guided by St. Joseph Cafasso.”

St. Joseph Cafasso, a Piedmont priest, was also an inspiration for his nephew, Bl. Joseph Allamano, who founded the Missionaries of the Consolation. These missionaries “brought the Gospel and human progress to Africa.”

Cardinal Bertone then discussed St. Joseph Benedict Cottolengo, “the apostle of the very least ones, who – as Pope Francis would put it – opposed the ‘throwaway culture’ and took care of the sickest and most abandoned people.”

Among St. John Bosco’s collaborators was St. Leonardo Murialdo, who founded the Congregation of St. Joseph. Cardinal Bertone said he may be considered “the apostle of workers, as he was close to workers unions.”

St. Luigi Orione took inspiration from St. John Bosco and St. Leonardo Murialdo in his work with young people. He drew on the example of St. Joseph Benedict Cottolengo for his care for the sick.

Cardinal Bertone said St. Luigi Orione founded charitable works “according to the needs he would discover in Italy, Europe and in America.”

Finally, Cardinal Bertone recalled the example of Blessed Francis Faa di Bruno, an engineer and mathematician who took care of women workers, a new reality in the industrial era.

Cardinal Bertone said that the experience of these social action saints developed further and would reach out to “the extreme frontiers.”

Among the various initiatives, Cardinal Bertone recounted that Salesian missionaries from Piedmont in 1905 traveled to the distant Argentine town of Ushuaia, the southernmost city of the world. There they promoted the cultivation of potatoes and livestock.

Cardinal Bertone said there are Salesian weather stations from Piedmont established in the Italian region of Liguria and in the far south of Argentina that are still in operation.

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U.S. NEWS

Virginia bishops on the death penalty: We’re having the wrong debate

by CNA/EWTN News • May 9, 2015

(Matteo Parrini via Flickr CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Richmond, VA — As discussions surrounding a “more humane” death penalty in the United States continue, the two Catholic bishops of Virginia have released a statement asking the faithful to take a stance against the use of capital punishment in today’s society.

“By ending the use of the death penalty we would take one important step – among significant others we must take – to abandon the culture of death and embrace the culture of life,” Bishops Paul S. Loverde of Arlington and Francis X. DiLorenzo of Richmond said in a May 6 statement released by the Virginia Catholic Conference.

Their statement comes after the Supreme Court recently heard arguments in a case challenging Oklahoma’s use of drugs for lethal injection as a violation of the Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Several states have also been discussing means of execution for death row inmates. Last year, the Virginia General Assembly considered legislation that would have allowed pharmacies to create drugs used for lethal injections without disclosure to the public. Another measure proposed that if lethal drugs were not available, death row inmates would be executed by electrocution instead.

To these issues, the bishops responded, “We should no longer debate which inmates we execute or how we execute them. Instead, we should debate this: If all human lives are sacred and if a civilized society such as ours can seek redress and protect itself by means other than taking a human life, why are we continuing to execute people?”

They went on to reference Pope Francis’ March letter to Federico Mayor, president of the International Commission against the Death Penalty, in which the Pope strongly spoke out against capital punishment, saying that “there is no humane way of killing another person.”

“Let us not choose whether to use lethal drugs, electric chairs, gas chambers, or firing squads. Let us take the more courageous step and choose life instead, even when it seems ‘unlovable,’” the bishops wrote in response to Pope Francis’ comments.

The belief “that the poor and vulnerable have the first claim on our consciences,” the bishops said, is seen “in our opposition to abortion and euthanasia, and in our responsibility to welcome immigrants and refugees.”

“But our faith also challenges us to declare sacred even the least lovable among us, those convicted of committing brutal crimes which have brought them the ultimate penalty, the penalty of death.”

The Virginia bishops quoted a 2005 U.S. Bishops’ statement on the matter saying that, “No matter how heinous the crime, if society can protect itself without ending a human life, it should do so.”

Bishops Loverde and DiLorenzo acknowledged that this teaching “challenges many people, including ourselves,” especially in light of the violent crimes for which those on death row have been sentenced.

However, they emphasized, “The death penalty does not provide true healing for those who mourn, nor does it embody the Gospel of Life, which each of us is called to affirm even in the most difficult circumstances.”

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U.S. NEWS

Hopelessness and heroin – what fueled the Baltimore riots and what now?

by Matt Hadro and Adelaide Mena (CNA/EWTN News) • May 10, 2015

Baltimore on May 1, 2015. (Addie Mena/CNA)

Baltimore, MD — As Baltimore works to recover from riots and protests after the death of 25 year-old Freddie Gray, the Church is working to reach a wounded community with a long history of pain and little hope.

Baltimore “is a place of many strengths, a lot of beauty, a lot of goodness, but it also has long-standing systemic problems,” Archbishop William E. Lori told CNA.

The city erupted in anger after Freddie Gray, an African American, died April 19 of severe spinal and neck injuries sustained a week before while in police custody. His death sparked mass protests and some violent riots, but those who live in the city say that rather than being an isolated tragedy, it was the climax of decades of social and economic turmoil.

Interviews with Baltimore residents, former residents, volunteer workers, and Catholic leaders produce a mosaic of anger, hurt, and frustration. Many citizens say they are fed up with unemployment, drugs, poor housing and education, racism, policing tactics, and child hunger.

Baltimore has the fifth-highest murder rate of any major city, according to the FBI’s statistics on crime and as the Baltimore Sun reported. The child poverty rate is 36.5 percent, according to a 2014 report by Catholic Charities of Maryland.

Deep-rooted social problems have poisoned Baltimore’s heart, and residents on the fringes who suffer the most doubt if anyone is listening, if anyone cares.

Catholics provide many services to the needy in the city, including employment training, food banks, education, and housing. Yet they openly admit there is a very long way to go to cure the city’s ills.

“I think we need to reassess our priorities of what we’re investing in currently,” Bill McCarthy, executive director of Catholic Charities Baltimore, acknowledged to CNA.

For instance, many families rely on schools and Head Start programs to provide food for their children during the day. With school closings, hunger is becoming an issue, and one that is “overlooked,” he says.

Baltimore is sometimes described as two different cities. The downtown glistens with high-rise office buildings, hotels, restaurants, an indoor market, an attractive waterfront, and clean parks.

A few subway stops away is what locals call the largest open-air heroin market in the country. Abandoned houses abound. Drug deals take place in broad daylight on street corners. The grocery stores sell food that spoils the next day. High unemployment keeps men on the streets and mass incarcerations change the trajectory of many young men’s lives.

What is this tale of two cities? And why? A trip to Sandtown, epicenter of the violent April 27 riots, might provide some answers. The unemployment rate is near 50 percent and one in three houses are abandoned, according to PrisonPolicy.org. Six in 10 eligible residents did not complete high school.

Days after the riots, volunteers clean up from a food bank distribution event at the historic St. Peter Claver parish. A helicopter circles above and an armored car passes the church, evidence that the horror of April 27 – riots that decimated store fronts and businesses, and a planned senior citizen community in flames – still rings fresh.

Ray Kelly a parish council member, makes the time to talk. He and his fellow parishioners voice fears that West Baltimore has been forgotten.

“The Church is built on charity, the Church is the refuge for the poor,” says Kelly. He points to the church’s outreach to the neighborhood, including a food drive for hungry residents while stores are closed and the neighborhood has no access to fresh food.

“This is a dedicated African-American parish in the middle of Sandtown, and we struggle to do God’s work here,” he says. “But we know what’s right, and we know the blessings come from your charity, so we do everything we can.”

The parish is looking to the Church in the city for more help, he adds.

“There’s a different need here in Sandtown than there is out in Pikesville,” Kelly says of the more affluent Baltimore suburb.

For the archdiocese “to reach out to us without first building us up to a position where we can be reached out to, it just seems like it should be against what the Church stands for.”

Parochial school closings left a tragic and sore open wound in the community, which has no Catholic grade school. The children need a Catholic school to have “hope,” Kelly insists.

“That would be what’s most important to me is getting another school.”

The problems don’t stop at grade school, though. Once boys grow up to be men, they face grotesque enemies – drugs and unemployment, part of a vicious cycle that for many will include jail time.

Baltimore’s infamy as a booming heroin market resulted in a sharp crackdown, especially in Sandtown. Police relations with the community nosedived.

“When we see the police, it’s a tactical effort,” Kelly explains. “They’re coming to get, they’re coming to enforce. There is no engagement. There is no trust.”

Mass incarcerations fueled mass unemployment – once young men are released from prison, many find it near impossible to get a job.

Over at Catholic Charities, McCarthy agrees. “It’s the way we treat re-entered citizens that have re-entered from prisons. It’s horrible,” he says.

Sometimes selling drugs appears the only recourse for a desperate young man, Kelly notes.

“When the landlord comes and says ‘you have to have the rent by Friday’ and you don’t have a job,” he explains, “you want to make that money as fast as you can. Around here a viable source of income is selling heroin or selling drugs out on the street corner.”

“You don’t even really have to invest in a house or anything, you can just put it in your pocket, come out and announce to everyone that you have it. I mean, open air, that’s the way it works, and this is the front lines.”

The overall unemployment rate for the entire Baltimore metropolitan area hovers around the national average at 5.7 percent. But looks can be deceiving, just as a bustling downtown can mask the dry rot of a crumbled social structure just a few city blocks away.

As it works to pick up the pieces after the riots surrounding Freddie Gray’s death, the city without hope desperately needs a Church that preaches hope.

“I think the Church has to start with our young people,” says Fr. Robert Wojtek, a Redemptorist missionary and pastor of two parishes in the city, St. Patrick’s and Sacred Heart of Jesus.

“We can’t let these children and young people today who are experiencing this grow up with these memories dominating their lives and these same issues and the frustration. We have to be able to change those memories and those lives somehow.”

McCarthy sees a need for change as well. Catholic Charities provides housing to many senior citizens but will aim to incorporate more needy young families into its program, for example.

“Frankly what we need to do is sit down and listen to the community, to do more listening than talking and take collective action based on what the common understanding of the priorities of the community are, instead of what we think the community needs,” he says.

“Well-intentioned people over the years, I think, have imposed themselves on communities or have entered communities. I think it’s more important that people are invited in as part of the community in order to affect change.”

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U.S. NEWS

Nun asks jury for mercy, to spare Boston bomber’s life

by Adelaide Mena (CNA/EWTN News) • May 11, 2015

Sister Helen Prejean, an anti-death penalty advocate who testified in the sentencing trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the Boston Marathon bomber. (Don LaVange via Wikimedia Commons)

Boston, MA — In the defense’s final move to save the life of convicted Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Sister Helen Prejean asked the jury not to execute the young man.

The man responsible for the Boston bombings is “genuinely sorry for what he did,” testified Sr. Prejean on May 11 before a federal jury. “He said it emphatically. He said no one deserves to suffer like they did,” she recounted of Tsarnaev.

“I had every reason to think that he was taking it in and that he was genuinely sorry for what he did.”

Sr. Prejean was the last of 44 witnesses heard in the sentencing trial for Tsarnaev after he was found guilty of all 30 charges he faced for participating in the bombings at the April 2013 Boston Marathon.

The attacks, which he conducted with his elder brother Tamerlan, killed three people and injured more than 260. Tamerlan died in a shootout with police days after the bombings.

Instead of facing execution, Tsarnaev’s defense is asking that the young adult, receive life in prison without parole as a punishment for his actions.

Sr. Prejean, a member of the Congregation of St. Joseph since 1957, has been a longtime advocate against the death penalty following her ministry to prisoners on death row. Her life and ministry was portrayed in the 1993 Academy Award-winning film “Dead Man Walking.”

She began meeting with Tsarnaev in March at the request of his defense team, and continued to meet with him, last seeing him only days before the testimony.

Challenging the prosecution’s narrative that Tsarnaev has no remorse, Prejean told the jury that the young man “kind of lowered his eyes” when speaking about victims and his “face registered” what he said about them.

She testified that indeed Tsarnaev felt remorse for his actions and that in her opinion this regret was “absolutely sincere.”

“It had pain in it, actually,” she said of his face, when his actions were brought up. “When he said what he did, I knew, I felt it.”

Sr. Prejean also said she was moved and concerned by the defendant’s age; he was 19 at the time of the bombings. “I walked in the room, I looked at his face and said, ‘Oh my God, he’s so young!’” she said of their first meeting.

The religious sister also revealed that she and Tsarnaev had discussed their religions, saying that she “talked about how in the Catholic Church we have become more and more opposed to the death penalty,” and that he was “very open and receptive” during these talks.

Sr. Prejean is one of many Catholic voices who have petitioned the court and the public to not take the life of Tsarnaev in retaliation for the others lost during the bombing.

On April 7, the Catholic bishops of Massachusetts issued a joint statement reaffirming the opposition of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to taking a life if there are other ways for society to protect itself.

“The defendant in this case has been neutralized and will never again have the ability to cause harm,” the bishops wrote. “Because of this, we, the Catholic Bishops of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, believe that society can do better than the death penalty.”

Bill and Denise Richard, who are Catholics and the parents of the bombing’s youngest victims: 8-year-old Martin Richard, who passed away, and his 7-year-old sister who survived with serious injuries, also oppose the death penalty in this trial.

They stated that if Tsarnaev were to receive the death penalty, their family’s pain would continue rather than end.

“We understand all too well the heinousness and brutality of the crimes committed. We were there. We lived it,” wrote the Richards in an April 16 column for the Boston Globe. “We know that the government has its reasons for seeking the death penalty, but the continued pursuit of that punishment could bring years of appeals and prolong reliving the most painful day of our lives.”

“As long as the defendant is in the spotlight, we have no choice but to live a story told on his terms, not ours,” they affirmed. “The minute the defendant fades from our newspapers and TV screens is the minute we begin the process of rebuilding our lives and our family.”

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U.S. NEWS

EWTN named religious television station of the year

by CNA/EWTN News • May 12, 2015

Michael P. Warsaw, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Eternal Word Television Network. (EWTN)

Irondale, AL — For the third consecutive year, EWTN Global Catholic Network has been awarded the 2015 Gabriel Award for Religious Television Station of the Year – a prestigious honor which acknowledges the Network’s programming, community service, and production values.

“EWTN is the beacon of Catholic broadcast television. It is a consistent and true voice of the Faith,” noted one of the Gabriel Award judges who participated in the annual competition sponsored by the Catholic Academy of Communication Professionals.

Another judge highlighted EWTN’s technical achievements, noting the high-quality imagery and on-screen graphics.

“As a viewer, you know the piece was promoting a Catholic worldview, but never felt like you were being hit over the head with it. Very well done,” the judge said.

The Gabriel Awards recognize both religious and secular multi-media productions in the United States and Canada, and honors participants within various categories such as documentaries, short features, news, radio, television, internet videos, and film.

EWTN, who celebrated their 34th anniversary this year, provides broadcast satellite television and radio services, along with other multi-media networks, available to over 240 million households within 140 countries across the world.

“A Gabriel Award is especially meaningful to EWTN because the awards are presented for programs that uplift and nourish the human spirit and affirm the dignity of human persons – something EWTN strives to do every day,” said Michael Warsaw, EWTN Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer

“We thank the Catholic Academy for this special recognition,” Warsaw said, voicing gratitude for the award.

In addition to the Gabriel Award, EWTN’s own television program “Blessed2Play” also received a Certificate of Merit for the production of the episode “Life of Christ.”

“Blessed2Play,” which airs on Fridays and Sundays, explores the faith lives of sports professionals and athletes. The host of the show, Ron Meyer, noted his gratitude for the recognition, saying he was thankful for all of the participants who made the show possible.

“I am grateful to the estimated 200 athletes, coaches, authors and broadcasters who have sacrificed their time to be guests on the show and make Blessed2Play what it is,” Meyer stated.

Doug Keck, the EWTN President and Chief Operating Officer, also recognized the performance of the Vice President of Programming and Production, Peter Gagnon, Vice President of Spanish Programming, Enrique Duprat, and the Director of Program Acquisitions & Co-productions, John Elson.

“The Network’s programming is a result of a lot of hard work and prayers on behalf of many individuals,” Keck noted, saying that he was “proud that the work of the EWTN team is being recognized for excellence.”

EWTN will receive the Gabriel Award on Thursday, June 25 at the Hyatt Regency Buffalo Hotel in Buffalo, New York.

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U.S. NEWS

Iraqi Christians have lost everything – except their faith, nun tells Congress

by Matt Hadro (CNA/EWTN News) • May 13, 2015

Sister Diana Momeka, O.P. appeared before the House of Foreign Affairs Committee in Washington, D.C. on May 13, 2015. (Matt Hadro/CNA)

Washington, D.C. — Having lost their homes, their heritage and their sense of dignity, Iraqi Christians victimized by the Islamic State feel abandoned by earthly powers, but their faith in God has only grown, an Iraqi nun told members of Congress May 13.

The faith of homeless Iraqi Christians is “increasing more and more,” Sister Diana Momeka, O.P., told the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Many of the displaced lived in devastating conditions – families taking shelter in containers, parents without jobs and children without an education.

But Sister Diana insisted the spirit of the people has not been broken by the adversity.

“It’s making us stronger,” she said.

“We were displaced, yet we feel that the hand of God is still with us … In the midst of this darkness, this suffering, we see that God is holding us,” she explained, adding that it is a “gift of the Holy Spirit” to be able to stay and have faith through hardship.

Sister Diana was part of the Dominican Sisters of St. Catherine of Siena, originally from Mosul in Northern Iraq. Islamist militants bombed their convent in 2009, and after the prioress sought protection from the local government and found none, Sister Diana and the community moved to Qaraqosh.

The ISIS onslaught caught up to them last summer. As the Islamic State swept through parts of Iraq and Syria, establishing a strict caliphate, more than 120,000 Iraqis were displaced on the Nineveh Plain, faced with the decision to convert to Islam, stay and pay a jizya tax to ISIS, or leave immediately.

The religious community moved again, this time to Kurdistan. “We were driven out of our homes in a couple of hours,” the nun described, “without any warning.”

Almost no Christians are left in Mosul, Sister Diana said, except for about 100 Christian hostages of ISIS.

Slated to testify before a congressional committee as part of an Iraqi delegation, Sister Diana’s application for a visa was initially denied by the local U.S. Consulate because of her status as an internally-displaced person.

Amid mounting pressure, she was later able to enter the United States and testified before the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee May 13 regarding “ISIS’s war on religious minorities.”

“I am but one, small person – a victim myself of ISIS and all of its brutality,” Sister Diana stated in written testimony before the committee.

“Coming here has been difficult for me – as a religious sister I am not comfortable with the media and so much attention,” she admitted. “But I am here and I am here to ask you, to implore you for the sake of our common humanity to help us.”

The Christians in Northern Iraq lost “most everything” when ISIS destroyed and desecrated churches, shrines, and other sacred sites, she said.

“We lost everything that today, every Christian that’s living in the region of Kurdistan, we feel we don’t have dignity anymore. When you lose your home, you lose everything you have. You lose your heritage, your culture.”

When monasteries that have existed for centuries have been destroyed, it is a sign that “your history is gone, you are nothing anymore,” the Iraqi nun explained.

Children are growing up without proper education and whole families’ lives have “changed tremendously,” she said. “We’re abandoned, that’s how we feel.”

The local and regional authorities have been of little help to the displaced, Sister Diana said in her testimony, calling their reaction to the crisis “at best modest and slow.” The Kurdish government allowed Christian refugees to enter its borders but did not offer any more significant aid.

The Church in Kurdistan has been a big help to Christians, though, providing food, shelter, and other support, she noted.

Ultimately, the displaced want to return home and not to be re-settled elsewhere, witnesses at the hearing insisted.

“There are many who say ‘Why don’t the Christians just leave Iraq and move to another country and be done with it?’” Sister Diana stated in her testimony. “Why should we leave our country? What have we done?”

“The Christians of Iraq are the first people of the land,” she said. “While our ancestors experienced all kinds of persecution, they stayed in their land, building a culture that has served humanity for the ages.”

“We want nothing more than to go back to our lives; we want nothing more than to go home.”

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U.S. House overcomes initial setback to pass 20-week abortion ban

by Matt Hadro (CNA/EWTN News) • May 13, 2015

(Tatiana Vdb via Flickr CC BY 2.0)

Washington, D.C. — Two years after abortionist Kermit Gosnell was convicted of committing three first-degree murders at his abortion clinic, the House passed a bill Wednesday that effectively bans abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

“This bill is about protecting pain-capable babies and their mothers from the tragedy … of late-term abortion-on-demand,” Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.), the bill’s sponsor, stated May 13 to reporters outside the U.S. Capitol building.

“It is not a Republican issue or a Democratic issue,” he added. “This is a test of our own humanity and who we are as human family.”

The bill bans abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy except in cases of rape, incest, or the life of the mother, “excluding psychological or emotional conditions.” For an abortion to be obtained in cases of rape or incest, the offense must be reported to the proper authorities when a minor seeks an abortion.

This clause ensures the “safety of the child that’s pregnant,” explained Mallory Quigley of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List.

The bill helps not only children but women as well, said one of the leading co-sponsors, Rep. Diane Black (R-Tenn.). “It provides that the mother must get medical attention, medical care, or counseling to help them with this very difficult decision,” she told CNA.

The mother must receive all proper information from the physician about the age of her child, the law, and the fact that if the child is born alive from a botched abortion procedure it would receive all the normal medical care any child would receive. A second physician must be present at any late-term abortion procedure to ensure medical care for the child.

The bill passed by a margin of 242-184, largely along party lines. Four Republicans voted against it, and four Democrats supported it.

GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.) announced that he would “welcome debate” on the legislation in the Senate. “There are 7 countries that allow on-demand abortions at 20-weeks & I don’t believe the US should be in that club,” he tweeted after the bill’s passage.

Many Christian and pro-life groups supported the bill’s passage, including the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

An earlier version of the bill was planned for passage on Jan. 22, the 42nd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, but in an 11th hour turn a group of GOP congresswomen balked at supporting the bill over its rape exception, claiming the legislation would tarnish the party’s image among youth and women voters.

Actually, risks from abortions noticeably increase after 20 weeks of pregnancy, supporters claimed, saying that threats to the well-being of the mother go up as well.

Technology has allowed for a much clearer view of the viability of the pro-life argument, the bill’s supporters insisted, noting that science is clear that by 20 weeks a baby feels pain. The state has a necessary interested in protecting both woman and child, they added.

“Every life deserves the opportunity to reach its full potential,” Rep. Cathy McMorris-Rodgers stated on the House floor before the vote. The congresswoman has a son with Down syndrome and has been a pro-life advocate for children receiving negative pre-natal diagnoses, who suffer from significantly higher rates of abortion than other unborn children.

These unborn children are the most defenseless in society and must be protected, insisted Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wisc.) in an impassioned speech on the House floor.

“What do we stand for in this institution – what do we stand for in America – if we do not stand up for the most defenseless and voiceless among us?” he asked on the House floor.

The bill has far-reaching implications for the 2016 presidential election, the Susan B. Anthony List said, noting that 14 Republican presidential candidates have publicly supported the legislation, providing pro-lifers an opportunity to “go on offense.”

Supporters said 60 percent of Americans support such a bill.

Members of Congress announced last Friday that the bill would be voted on the anniversary of Gosnell’s conviction. The abortionist’s clinic was described as a “house of horrors” by former employees.

Worker testimonies included stories of babies surviving abortion attempts having their spines cut, mothers drugged and dead babies flushed down toilets.

The babies could obviously feel pain, pro-lifers said, and so can unborn babies at 20 weeks of age – that is “beyond question,” Franks stated.

The White House had announced its intention to veto the previous bill in January, and is expected to veto this legislation if it passes the Senate.

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When detention denies dignity: bishops offer look inside U.S. migrant, refugee policy

by Kevin Jones (CNA/EWTN News) • May 14, 2015

Families meet through a border fence. (BBC World Service via Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0)

Washington, D.C. —”Please help us, please pray for us.” These were the words of detained migrants and refugees at a Karnes, Texas facility who spoke Archbishop Gustavo Garcia-Siller of San Antonio and his visiting delegation of religious leaders last year.

“As the archbishop said Mass under a tent in the compound, the fear and trepidation on the faces of the mothers were clear,” said a new report’s account of the 2014 visit. “One by one, they prayed aloud for deliverance from the facility and for reunification with their families.”

“Many had been traumatized from their journey north from Central America. One confessed that her husband had been murdered by gang members and that they had threatened her and her children as well.”

Many detainees had no lawyers to assist with their asylum claims and received little information from enforcement officers, the report said.

Although the facilities were “clean and spacious,” the visitors left “deflated and frustrated, awake to the damage caused by the facility, despite its outward appearance.”

These detainees, and hundreds of thousands more, are the focus of a new joint report, “Unlocking Human Dignity: A Plan to Transform the U.S. Immigrant Detention System,” authored by the U.S. bishops and the Center for Migration Studies of New York.

Seattle auxiliary Bishop Eusebio Elizondo, chair of the U.S. bishops’ migration committee, and Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn, who chairs the Center for Migration Studies, wrote a letter introducing the 44-page report, which examines flaws and abuses in the immigrant detention system, its impact on “the human rights and dignity of our fellow human beings,” and recommendations for systemic reform.

“We experience the pain of severed families that struggle to maintain a semblance of normal family life. We see traumatized children in our schools and churches. We see divided families that are struggling to support themselves in our parishes, food pantries, soup kitchens and charitable agencies,” wrote the two bishops, who visited detention centers in Texas, California, Illinois, Arizona, and New Jersey.

“We see case after case of persons who represent no threat or danger, but who are nonetheless treated as criminals.”

The report noted a significant increase in the number of detainees. Between 1994 and 2013 the number of immigrants detained daily rose from 6,785 to 34,260. Annual detention figures increased from about 85,000 people in 1995 to 440,557 in 2013. Under President Obama, detention numbers have reached record levels.

The Department of Homeland Security, which lacks the authority to imprison criminals, holds hundreds of thousands of non-citizens, and sometimes U.S. citizens, in prisons, jails and other facilities. Detainees are “governed by standards designed for criminal defendants,” the report said.

“Detention brands immigrants as criminals in the public’s eye and contributes to the sense that they deserve to be treated as such,” it continued.

The report charged that detainees receive harsher treatment than criminal defendants, most of whom receive rapid custody hearings and can be released on conditions that ensure their court appearance and the protection of the public. Detainees, in contrast, face increased difficulty securing legal counsel and due legal process.

“It is time for our nation to reform this inhumane system, which unnecessarily detains persons, especially vulnerable populations, who are no threat to us and who should be afforded due process and legal protections,” Bishop Elizondo said in a May 11 statement from the U.S. bishops.

“The current legal and physical detention infrastructure should be largely dismantled,” the report said, recommending “non-penal settings” for detainees that ensure minimum standards like “generous access to religious services.”

The report called for a substantial reduction in the number of immigrant detention facilities and in the role of for-profit prisons. It said detention should not be used to deter illegal immigrants or refugees. Rather, detention should be used “only as a last resort.”

Bishop Elizondo said U.S. policy follows a presumption “to detain immigrants as a management, enforcement and deterrence tool” rather than “to make individual custody determinations based on family and community ties.”

“This has resulted in the long-term detention of asylum-seekers, victims of human trafficking, survivors of torture, and, now, young mothers with children.”

The report explained that Catholic ethics recognize sovereign states’ ability and responsibility to regulate migration. However, it characterized the detention of migrants and refugees as “neither humane nor, in its current form, necessary.”

Some detainees have been severely mistreated, it added.

“Attorneys and pastoral workers from Catholic agencies have learned first-hand of the sexual abuse of women detainees, women forced to deliver babies in restraints, frequent hunger strikes, suicides, government officials pressuring detainees to abandon their legal claims, and the treatment of severe medical conditions with Tylenol, Advil, and Motrin.”

Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn encouraged policymakers to adopt alternatives to detention.

“There are ways to create a humane system and also ensure that immigrants are complying with the law,” he said. “But we have created a detention industry in this country which preys upon the vulnerability of our fellow human beings, the vast majority of whom are not criminals.”

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement itself classifies only 20 percent of detainees as requiring a “high custody level.”

As an alternative, the Brooklyn bishop recommended community-based case management as a cost-effective and successful model in the legal processing of immigrants.

Illegal entry to the U.S. is a crime, but it has historically been treated as a violation of civil law rather than criminal law. The U.S. bishops have “strongly opposed” the criminalization of U.S. immigration law, the report said. Mandatory detention laws have guaranteed “the excessive use of detention” and have precluded the release of those with minimal flight risk.

“Detention wastes not only government funds, but the human potential of hundreds of thousands of persons each year,” said Donald Kerwin, the executive director of the Center for Migration Studies of New York.

The report stressed that detention reform does not require waiting for the passage of comprehensive immigration reform.

Recommended reforms included a call for a congressional study on the creation of “a truly civil immigrant detention system.” The Department of Homeland Security should create a “full menu” of alternatives to detention, with “varying degrees of support and supervision, reporting, oversight and monitoring.”

The report recommended more funding for the U.S. immigration system to diminish a case backlog whose average wait time is now more than 18 months.

Government-supplied legal representation for detainees would “substantially” increase court appearance rates while potentially reducing overall costs due to less use of detention, more efficient court proceedings, and less frequent placement of detainees’ children in foster care, it said.

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Philadelphia archbishop voices ‘deep sadness’, prays for train derailment victims

by CNA/EWTN News • May 14, 2015

Police shut down a ramp where an Amtrak train derailed in Philadelphia, PA on May 13, 2015. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Philadelphia, PA — Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia reacted Wednesday to the deadly train derailment in his city with sadness and prayers.

“In the wake of this disaster, I urge all people of good will to join me in extending prayerful condolences to those mourning the sudden loss of a loved one and in asking the Lord to bring healing to all those suffering physical and emotional anguish in the wake of this incident,” Archbishop Chaput said May 13.

He also prayed for first responders, emergency workers, and medical professionals who have worked to help those affected.

“May God bless and protect them,” he added.

The Amtrak Northeast Regional Train 188 derailed in Philadelphia on Tuesday night while carrying 238 passengers and five crew members.

At least eight passengers were killed and about 200 people, including the train’s engineer, were taken to hospitals. Officials indicated the train was traveling too fast for the curve – it was going 106 mph, where the speed limit is 50 mph.

Archbishop Chaput said he followed news of the derailment with “deep sadness and concern.”

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Don’t let armed drones ease the path to conflict, US bishops warn

by CNA/EWTN News • May 14, 2015

An MQ-9 Reaper Creech Air Force Base, NV on June 19, 2008. (U.S. Air Force photo, Lance Cheung/Wikimedia Commons)

Washington, D.C. — The use of armed drones have practical and moral consequences for conflict and warfare – and the government needs to take action to address them, the U.S. Catholic bishops have said.

“It is incumbent on a nation’s leaders to recognize that the use of drones can lower the threshold on conflict and take appropriate steps to not succumb to their use,” wrote Bishop Oscar Cantu of Las Cruces, who chairs the U.S. bishops’ Committee on International Justice and Peace.

In a May 11 letter to U.S. National Security Advisor Susan Rice, the bishops said leaders should consider the “full cost” of drone warfare.

“Drones provoke anxiety among populations where there are targets, inflicting psychological damage on innocent civilians who live in constant fear they may be hurt or killed and listed as ‘collateral damage.’ This fear and civilian casualties feed into increasing hostility towards the United States so that many say the use of armed drones in these targeted killings is counterproductive to establishing and sustaining longer-term security relationships with countries where drones are used,” they said.

Armed drone technology has the potential for “much harm,” the bishops continued. More countries are acquiring drones and government spending on the technology is rapidly increasing.

Armed drones may be used excessively due to their low initial costs, the bishops warned. This risks expanding conflict zones and increasing the likelihood for war. The use of surveillance drones by China, Japan and the Philippines have worsened tensions over disputed territories.

The bishops’ letter noted the dangers of wrongly targeted drone attacks, as found in the Central Intelligence Agency’s January 2015 report that one of its drones was responsible for the inadvertent death of an American and an Italian aid worker.

The bishops voiced concern that civilians killed in drone attacks are being counted as extremists. They rejected the U.S. administration’s justification of “signature strikes,” saying this means individuals are targeted by drones “not because of who they are, but because of their behavior or associations.”

They called for the U.S. administration to outline a targeting criteria that distinguishes targets from innocent civilians. Such criteria can help avoid the “hostility and radicalization” that results when civilians are harmed.

“As weapons technology becomes more sophisticated, the need for an internationally recognized ethical and moral framework governing their use becomes more urgent,” the bishops added.

They called for U.S. leadership in restrictions on “the production, use and proliferation of drones in general, and of armed drones in targeted killings in particular.”

The bishops recommended that international standards limit armed drone use to avoid targeted killings that are “assassinations” or “extrajudicial killings.”

“There should be a clear and transparent line of authority and oversight regarding the use of armed drones in targeted killings, and specifically over any decision to use them in situations where there has been no declaration of war, so that in cases of humanitarian violations, the appropriate individuals and offices may be held accountable.”

The bishops also criticized any automation of armed drones that involves killing.”The use of fully autonomous killer drones raises serious questions of moral accountability,” they said.

The bishops’ latest letter echoes the words of other Catholic leaders.

Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Holy See’s Permanent Observer to the United Nations in Geneva, in November 2014 told a U.N. meeting on conventional weapons that leaders must address questions surrounding drones “before they become an additional source of greater destabilization when the international community needs more than ever stability, cooperation and peace.”

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Is the pill shrinking parts of women’s brains? New report suggests yes

by Mary Rezac (CNA/EWTN News) • May 15, 2015

(Sarah C. via Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0)

Los Angeles, CA — Adding to recent controversies surrounding various forms of birth control, a new study out of UCLA suggests that the birth control pill may thin areas in a woman’s brain and affect their function.

Published in April in the journal “Human Brain Mapping,” the study measured cortical thickness in the brains of 90 women – 44 of whom were using oral contraceptives, and 46 of whom were naturally cycling.

Only women using the combination form of oral contraceptives were used in the study – it did not measure women using progesterone-only or other forms of oral contraceptives. The research found that oral contraceptive use was significantly associated with a thinning in two areas of the brain: the lateral orbitofrontal cortex and the posterior cingulate cortex.

The lateral orbitofrontal cortex is involved in emotion regulation and response to rewards, while the posterior cigulate cortex regulates inward-directed thought, such as recalling personal memories or planning for the future.

Although the study only measured brain structure, the findings suggest that there could be possible effects on behavior.

“Some women experience negative emotional side effects from taking oral contraceptive pills, although the scientific findings investigating that have been mixed,” Nicole Petersen, a neuroscientist at UCLA and the study’s lead author, told The Huffington Post. “So it’s possible that this change in the lateral orbitofrontal cortex may be related to the emotional changes that some women experience when using birth control pills.”

Because the study is one of the first of its kind, as far as measuring effects of the birth control pill on brain structure, it’s difficult for scientists to draw any definite conclusions at this point.

But Larry Cahill, a professor of neurobiology and behavior at the University of California-Irvine and a co-author of the study, said while the interest in the link between sex hormones and brain structure has increased in the past few years, he’s amazed at the lack of research considering how long the pill has been on the market.

“You might think after 50 years and hundreds of millions of women taking various incarnations of the pill, there would be a large and cohesive and impressive body of evidence on it, but there’s next to nothing,” Cahill told CNA. “I honestly find that amazing.”

Although Cahill cautioned against a panic or alarm because of the recent study, he said it raises further questions for research that are important to the millions of women who use oral contraceptives every day. For example, follow-up studies are needed to determine whether the thinning effect is permanent, or whether it just occurs if a woman is currently using the pill.

In April 2011, Cahill and three other researchers found that the emotional memory of women using hormonal contraception was more similar to that of men than of women. Combined with the evidence of the most recent study, Cahill said one group that might benefit from the pill’s possible impact on emotional memory could be women in combat or other traumatic situations. If using hormonal contraception, these women could be potentially less likely to develop post-traumatic stress disorder than naturally cycling women in similar situations, though more research is needed.

These studies are part of a growing body of research on sex differences in the brain, which is challenging the long-held assumption that men and women are mostly biologically the same, save for their reproductive organs, Cahill noted.

“We’re all blinded by our assumptions, and there’s simply been an assumption … that any differences between (men and women) occur in the bikini zone and that’s it,” Dr. Cahill said. “And now we’re realizing, well, no. There’s sex differences all over the place. It’s important that we stop assuming that women are just men with pesky hormones.”

Challenging assumptions has been somewhat of a road block for Cahill and fellow researchers trying to publish their findings, because they are often dismissed as being “alarmist,” Cahill said. However, as a scientist, Cahill said he believes it’s important to continue to study the potentially good, bad or neutral effects of a medication that millions of women use for large portions of their life.

“If I’m a woman on the pill, or I know a woman who’s on the pill … or I have a daughter who wants to go on the pill, you want to operate from knowledge, not from complete lack of knowledge,” he said.

“That was the goal, to explore what the pill might be doing just as we’ve been doing for 3 or 4 years.”

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Celebrating Our Lady of Chartres

by Sr. Joan L. Roccasalvo, C.S.J. • May 13, 2015

While the story of Fatima is well-known, that of Chartres still needs to be told.

In the 1940s, a French monk and a star-gazer made a curious discovery. He observed that in certain cities, the churches dedicated to Our Lady were strategically located in such a way as to outline the constellation Virgo.

Now Virgo is the second largest cluster of stars that form the outline of a woman carrying two sheaves of wheat. Virgo’s brightest star, Spica, is bluish-white, traditionally Our Lady’s colors. In Greek and Roman antiquity, Virgo was sometimes called the virgin goddess. The designated cities are north of Paris, and they are: Amiens, Rouen, Bayeux, Evreux, Chartres, Paris, and Reims. All have churches or cathedrals dedicated to Our Lady. These monuments tower over people’s homes like mighty guardians, keeping alive the invincible faith of France’s history.

Medieval builders of these Marian churches sacralized the countryside, for their intent was to bring heaven to earth. To echo St. Augustine, we live in two overlapping cities: the City of God and the City of Man, just as Jesus did. The two cities must speak with each another.

The Attraction and Power of Chartres

Visitors are quite unprepared for the beauty of Chartres in an age that teaches ugliness to our children and glorifies it for the rest of us. Chartres’s loveliness thrills the senses and sends chills up the spine. In this period of faith, the arts flowered for God’s sake.

This architectural marvel has stood for 1,000 years. Since the twelfth century, pilgrims have traveled there for different reasons. Jewish and Catholic philosophers visited the cathedral school where the teachings of Plato were taught. By the twelfth century, the cathedral had become a major pilgrimage site. The Chartres of today is the Chartres of the twelfth century.

Today, millions visit Chartres to admire the cathedral’s Gothic beauty, vaulted ceilings, stained glass windows, rose windows, flying buttresses, Labyrinth, and of course, its eerie gargoyles. Believers and secularist go to Chartres to be enveloped by its silent beauty and by a sacred, if not divine, presence abiding there. They sit, heads bowed while others meander, deep into their own thoughts. It’s easy to lose track of time because Chartres’s atmosphere is one of timelessness. All are searching, but searching for what? Who can fathom what lies in the recesses of the heart? Visitors stay for hours at a time. Year after year, they return. Chartres is designed to quiet the mind and the heart, and offer respite from a noisy world.

The Construction of Chartres

Begun in the eleventh century, Chartres took a few hundred years to build. In 1194, the church and much of the city was destroyed by fire. When the veil believed to be the veil worn by Mary at the Nativity was lifted intact out of the rubble, the people’s resolve to restore the cathedral was further strengthened.

People came from far and wide, all classes of people, united in heart and mind. The whole community helped to build the cathedral. There are no signatures on the stained glass or on the sculptures, or anywhere. Orson Welles wrote about Chartres in a 1974 film essay, F for Fake: “And this has been standing here for centuries. The premier work of men, perhaps in the whole Western world, and it’s without a signature: Chartres.” To the medieval soul, building a church dedicated to the Mother of God who interceded for them was the greatest reward one could receive.

How did the architects construct the great walls of colored glass? These cathedrals were taller than the ancient pyramids, larger than the Statue of Liberty and as heavy as the Empire State Building. Their engineering secrets remain a medieval mystery. A compass sufficed as their sole instrument of measure. Masters of the compass had a working blueprint which they shared with a few masons. They had no rulers, no units of length, only the proportions of the human body, an A B A form.

The Human Body, the A B A Form as Cruciform

The church building is the Domus Dei, the House of God, where the Body of Christ assembles for worship. The shape of the traditional church building is that of the human body, the form of a crucifix, i.e., cruciform. The cruciform in churches conveys rich symbolism. The head of the body is the apse, the body of the church is the nave, and the arms, the transept. This human image is completed in the image of Christ who is outstretched on the wood of the cross in expectation of the resurrection. The human body became the basis of the measurement of Chartres. Its layout followed the principle of the body, A B A.

The building of Chartres, which utilized theologians, master stonecutters, decorators and designers, was a costly enterprise. Patrons and royal families, artisans, merchants, and the guilds donated funds to finance the stained glass and rose windows. In 1194, enthusiasm ran high, and the community stood to gain economically as well.

Medieval cathedrals like Chartres dominated the lives of the people. They were magnets for outsiders as well as symbols for the people. Cathedrals were town buildings where vital social and economic, religious, and academic functions were carried out. Around the cathedral were sold textiles, images and relics, fuel, vegetables, meats, and fish. Baptisms, sacraments, marriage, burials, and schooling took place there. But especially for the great Marian feasts of the year, Chartres was the central place to celebrate them.

World War II

Neither the French Revolution nor the two world wars could damage Chartres. In 1939, before the Nazis invaded France, every piece of cut glass was painstakingly removed from 176 stained glass windows with their millions of brilliant colors. After World War II, each piece was cleaned and replaced with stronger leading. This intense labor was one of intense love.

“The American Colonel of World War II, Wellborn Barton Griffith, Jr., is best remembered for helping to preserve the cathedral. When it was learned that the Nazi army was about to attack them at Chartres, the Allies planned to shell the cathedral. Griffith questioned the strategy and volunteered to climb the cathedral tower alone, not knowing whether an enemy unit was a step or turn away. After finding the tower unoccupied, he rejoined his forces, reporting that the cathedral was clear. The order to shell the cathedral was withdrawn, and the Allies took the town” (Relative’s letter to Jay Nordlinger, National Review, May 10, 2011). In 1979, Chartres was added to UNESCO’s list of World Heritage Sites.

Finally …

Chartres’ grandeur appeals to the highest aspirations of the human spirit. In Chartres, one does not simply see beauty. One experiences it and is united to it.

In The Power of Myth, Joseph Campbell, the comparative religionist who left his Catholic faith, writes of Chartres: “I’m back in the Middle Ages. I’m back in the world that I was brought up in as a child, the Roman Catholic spiritual-image world, and it is magnificent. … That cathedral talks to me about the spiritual information of the world. It’s a place for meditation, just walking around, just sitting, just looking at those beautiful things.”

Gothic architecture is nothing without its pervasive light, its luminosity. It is said that Catholic faith is rational and right when, from the inside, one is bathed by the outer light of God’s grace. And “to want to see the stained glass window from the inside is already to believe,” writes Hans Urs von Balthasar.

Chartres, a manifestation of God in stone, has been called a library of spirituality and a visual Bible. Chartres celebrates God’s glory, the dignity of men and women, and what they can accomplish together. The dark Middle Ages, ridiculed by sophists, were anything but dark. This age of faith can enlighten today’s Sophisticates through the genius of Chartres.

Sr. Joan L. Roccasalvo, a member of the Congregation of St. Joseph, Brentwood, NY, holds degrees in philosophy (Ph.L), musicology (Ph.D.), theology (M.A.), and liturgical studies (Ph.D). She has taught at all levels of Catholic education and writes with a particular focus on a theology of beauty and the sacred arts. Her e-mail address is jroccasalvo@optonline.net.

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On Ascension Day the Whole Church Ascends to Heaven

by Msgr. M. Francis Mannion • May 14, 2015

The Preface of each Mass begins with the exchanges: “The Lord be with you,” “And with your spirit”; “Lift up your hearts,” “We lift them up to the Lord.” The words, “We lift them up to the Lord,” are central to what we celebrate on the Solemnity of Ascension.

On the first Ascension day, Christ was lifted up from the earth. In remembering and celebrating this event, the Church on earth today joins Christ even now in being raised to heaven. Ascension day is not something that happened only to Christ long ago, but is a reality that occurs in the community of Christians in a permanent and ongoing manner.

The whole movement of this lifting up, this great Ascension, will be complete only when all of humanity, all of history, all of creation have been drawn into the realm of God’s eternal Kingdom.

Ascension day proclaims the hope and glory held out to all who are in Christ. We who are baptized have gone into the waters of death, and in the living out of our baptism we already experience Ascension.

In all the sacraments, Christ reaches out to humanity and draws it to himself. In the great sacrament of the Eucharist, heaven descends to earth, so that earth might ascend to heaven. This worshipping assembly, we might well say, is itself a great act of Ascension.

We find in the Ascension a pressing spiritual invitation to change our lives in practical and concrete ways. All the good and noble things we do involve a lifting up: acting in charity, reaching out in friendship, bringing the good news to the needy, acting out of our best motivations, making the best choices, putting our best foot forward.

In one of his sermons for Ascension day, Cardinal John Henry Newman spoke very expressively on this matter. Newman spoke of people whose hearts and minds are not lifted up to the Lord. These are people, he says, who are too concerned by worldly success or with the wisdom of the world. Instead of being lifted up they are being pulled down, debased, and degraded. Newman speaks of the ways in which we fail to lift up our hearts: When we are overly anxious, or bitter about something, cold and barren in our thinking, hollow in our souls, blind to the future.

The challenge of Ascension day is presented well by Newman. These are his words: “Start now with this holy season and rise with Christ. See, He offers you his hand; He is rising; rise with Him. Mount up from the grave of the old Adam; from groveling cares, and jealousies, and fretfulness, and worldly aims; from [impulsions] of habit; from the tumult of passion, from … a cold, worldly, calculating spirit, from frivolity, from self conceit and [self righteousness].”

All of us — the whole Church and the whole world — have much to be raised from, and much to ascend to. The process of rising up and ascending to Christ will never be finished until the final Ascension day at the end of history.

As the permanent Ascension of the Church and of Christian believers continues, we are called to keep our sights high, not to let ourselves be dragged down, not to settle for being less than God calls us to be. We are called constantly to make our own the words of the Eucharistic preface, “We lift them up to the Lord.”

Let us take these words to heart as we celebrate one of the great moments of the Easter season: the Solemnity of the Lord’s Ascension.

Msgr. Mannion is pastor emeritus of St. Vincent de Paul parish in Salt Lake City. He holds a Ph.D. in sacramental theology from The Catholic University of America. He was founding president of The Society for Catholic Liturgy in 1995 and the founding editor of the Society’s journal, Antiphon. At the invitation of Cardinal Francis George of Chicago he founded the Mundelein Liturgical Institute in 2000.

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‘Pitch Perfect 2’ delivers astounding fun this weekend

by Carl Kozlowski • May 15, 2015

When’s the last time you thoroughly enjoyed a movie from beginning to end, that put a big grin on your face from start to finish and made you want to feel like you could get up and dance and belt out songs with the best of the actors on screen? Improbable as it sounds, “Pitch Perfect 2” is exactly that kind of movie – and as over-the-top entertaining as a movie can get.

Now before anyone accuses me of being a shill for the movie, or the kind of critic that says outrageously happy things about crappy movies in order to get their names and review quotes in newspaper and TV ads, let me make it clear that until Tuesday, I had never seen even the first “Pitch” movie. That 2012 film, featuring no big-name actors, nonetheless managed to win audiences over worldwide with its ridiculously spirited depiction of the world of college a capella singing competitions.

That’s admittedly a strange thing for a movie to focus on, but the movie – starring Anna Kendrick as a shy freshman at the fictional Barden College who finds popularity and empowerment when she joins an all-girl singing team called the Barden Bellas and leads them to win the national championship – was a refreshing antidote to the sex-drenched messages that are targeted at modern society, and especially teens, on a constant basis.

That’s especially true coming from female pop singers like Beyonce who make it seem like even at the top of their game, it’s necessary to roll around on stage floors and video sets wearing next to nothing in order to get attention, rather than relying on actual singing talent or songwriting chops to succeed. One big reason the first “Pitch” was a hit was the fact that it almost seemed like the perfect pushback against the insidious messages spewed forth by the music industry.

It didn’t have a complex story to tell, just an infectious spirit of joy and explosive musical talent that made it a worthy successor to the Mickey Rooney-Judy Garland, “Hey kids, let’s put on a show!” musicals of the 1930s and 1940s. After conquering the box office and the pop charts with the soundtrack, “Pitch Perfect 2” opens Friday in an attempt to build on the success of the first one.

The Bella’s are back, and this time they’re reaping the rewards of their championship by giving a command performance at the Lincoln Center to a packed audience of dignitaries including the president and Michelle Obama (seen in hilariously obvious stock footage). But when Bella member Fat Amy (Rebel Wilson) rips her pants widely and reveals – offscreen and implied – that she’s not wearing any underwear while spinning on a swing high above the stage, the Bellas are disgraced and stripped of their right to defend their American championship and the right to recruit new members.

But soon they find a loophole to get their honor back, by taking on a German championship team called Das Music Machine at the world a cappella championships in Copenhagen, Denmark. The road to that showdown, filled with musical numbers, funny montages and a non-stop sense of fun, is a silly ride to take, but one that’s seemingly impossible not to enjoy.

The filmmakers behind “Pitch Perfect 2” deserve some real credit and praise for showing us young women who (aside from the offscreen disaster with Fat Amy that opens the film) are creative, ambitious, smart, team workers and essentially sisters working together for positive goals. Aside from using the “B” word a couple times regarding the German team, there is almost no foul language, as well as no violence, no onscreen sex and no onscreen nudity.

In fact, this is a rare Hollywood movie focused upon young attractive women who are either in relationships or heavily pursued for dates, yet who do not engage in premarital sex or even imply it onscreen. The first “Pitch” has a few more sexual references than this one, which means that Banks and her team actually cleaned up the script compared to the first movie (whose one big morally questionable moment was a singing contest set to songs about sex, albeit not graphic songs. Overall, the first “Pitch” is perfectly fine for teens and adults, while the new sequel could likely be fine for younger kids too since the sporadic innuendoes would likely fly over young ones’ heads completely.)

The plus-size performer who proudly calls herself Fat Amy who does have an implied casual sex relationship with a guy from another a capella team, which is alluded to with winks and moments where they sneak off. But surprisingly even here, the man in the pairing (hot rising comedian Adam Devine, as Bumper) wants to make it a fully-rounded love relationship that can have permanence. While he is shot down by Fat Amy at first, she changes her mind later and embraces true love in a devastatingly funny sequence set to a classic 1980s love song.

The Bellas, from Kendrick and Wilson on down, are a wonder to behold, and actress Elizabeth Banks – who plays a hilariously shameless TV analyst of the competition - does a startlingly good job in her directing debut. This movie moves like a freight train from start to finish, slick and powerful and sure of its path.

I didn’t have much hope for a movie with as generic a title as “Pitch Perfect 2,” since it sounded at best like an assembly-line, soulless creation. Thankfully, it’s instead an example of what can happen when Hollywood professionalism delivers a film that’s astounding fun.

Carl Kozlowski has been a professional film critic and essayist for the past five years at Pasadena Weekly, in addition to the Christian movie site Movieguide.org, the conservative pop culture site Breitbart.coms Big Hollywood, the Christian pop culture magazine Relevant and New City newspaper in Chicago. He also writes in-depth celebrity interviews for Esquire.com and The Progressive. He is owner of the podcasting site radiotitans.com, which was named one of the Frontier Fifty in 2013 as one of the 50 best talk-radio outlets in the nation by talkers.com and will be relaunching it in January 2014 after a five-month sabbatical. He lives in Los Angeles.

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SUNDAY • MAY 17, 2015

Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord

First Reading (Acts 1:1-11; NRSVCE)

In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day when he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. After his suffering he presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. While staying with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait there for the promise of the Father. “This,” he said, “is what you have heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

Second Reading (Eph 1:17-23; NRSVCE)

I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power. God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

Gospel Reading (Mk 16:15-20; NRSVCE)

And Jesus said to his disciples, “Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation. The one who believes and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes in their hands, and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and proclaimed the good news everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by the signs that accompanied it.

MONDAY • MAY 18, 2015

Monday of the Seventh Week of Easter

First Reading (Acts 19:1-8; NRSVCE)

While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul passed through the interior regions and came to Ephesus, where he found some disciples. He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” They replied, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” Then he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” They answered, “Into John’s baptism.” Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.” On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. When Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied — altogether there were about twelve of them.

He entered the synagogue and for three months spoke out boldly, and argued persuasively about the kingdom of God.

Gospel Reading (Jn 16:29-33; NRSVCE)

Jesus’ disciples said, “Yes, now you are speaking plainly, not in any figure of speech! Now we know that you know all things, and do not need to have anyone question you; by this we believe that you came from God.” Jesus answered them, “Do you now believe? The hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each one to his home, and you will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone because the Father is with me. I have said this to you, so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution. But take courage; I have conquered the world!”

TUESDAY • MAY 19, 2015

Tuesday of the Seventh Week of Easter

First Reading (Acts 20:17-27; NRSVCE)

From Miletus Paul sent a message to Ephesus, asking the elders of the church to meet him. When they came to him, he said to them:

“You yourselves know how I lived among you the entire time from the first day that I set foot in Asia, serving the Lord with all humility and with tears, enduring the trials that came to me through the plots of the Jews. I did not shrink from doing anything helpful, proclaiming the message to you and teaching you publicly and from house to house, as I testified to both Jews and Greeks about repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus. And now, as a captive to the Spirit, I am on my way to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and persecutions are waiting for me. But I do not count my life of any value to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the good news of God’s grace.

“And now I know that none of you, among whom I have gone about proclaiming the kingdom, will ever see my face again. Therefore I declare to you this day that I am not responsible for the blood of any of you, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole purpose of God.”

Gospel Reading (Jn 17:1-11a; NRSVCE)

After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.

“I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you.”

WEDNESDAY • MAY 20, 2015

Wednesday of the Seventh Week of Easter

First Reading (Acts 20:28-38; NRSVCE)

Paul said to the elders of the church in Ephesus, “Keep watch over yourselves and over all the flock, of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God that he obtained with the blood of his own Son. I know that after I have gone, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Some even from your own group will come distorting the truth in order to entice the disciples to follow them. Therefore be alert, remembering that for three years I did not cease night or day to warn everyone with tears. And now I commend you to God and to the message of his grace, a message that is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all who are sanctified. I coveted no one’s silver or gold or clothing. You know for yourselves that I worked with my own hands to support myself and my companions. In all this I have given you an example that by such work we must support the weak, remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, for he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”

When he had finished speaking, he knelt down with them all and prayed. There was much weeping among them all; they embraced Paul and kissed him, grieving especially because of what he had said, that they would not see him again. Then they brought him to the ship.

Gospel Reading (Jn 17:11b-19; NRSVCE)

Jesus looked up to heaven and said, “Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. While I was with them, I protected them in your name that you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one. They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth.”

THURSDAY • MAY 21, 2015

Thursday of the Seventh Week of Easter

First Reading (Acts 22:30; 23:6-11; NRSVCE)

Since the tribute wanted to find out what Paul was being accused of by the Jews, the next day he released him and ordered the chief priests and the entire council to meet. He brought Paul down and had him stand before them.

When Paul noticed that some were Sadducees and others were Pharisees, he called out in the council, “Brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees. I am on trial concerning the hope of the resurrection of the dead.” When he said this, a dissension began between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. (The Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, or angel, or spirit; but the Pharisees acknowledge all three). Then a great clamor arose, and certain scribes of the Pharisees’ group stood up and contended, “We find nothing wrong with this man. What if a spirit or an angel has spoken to him?” When the dissension became violent, the tribune, fearing that they would tear Paul to pieces, ordered the soldiers to go down, take him by force, and bring him into the barracks.

That night the Lord stood near him and said, “Keep up your courage! For just as you have testified for me in Jerusalem, so you must bear witness also in Rome.”

Gospel Reading (Jn 17:20-26; NRSVCE)

Jesus looked up to heaven and said, “I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.

“Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me. I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

FRIDAY • MAY 22, 2015

Friday of the Seventh Week of Easter

First Reading (Acts 25:13b-21; NRSVCE)

King Agrippa and Bernice arrived at Caesarea to welcome Festus. Since they were staying there several days, Festus laid Paul’s case before the king, saying, “There is a man here who was left in prison by Felix. When I was in Jerusalem, the chief priests and the elders of the Jews informed me about him and asked for a sentence against him. I told them that it was not the custom of the Romans to hand over anyone before the accused had met the accusers face to face and had been given an opportunity to make a defense against the charge. So when they met here, I lost no time, but on the next day took my seat on the tribunal and ordered the man to be brought. When the accusers stood up, they did not charge him with any of the crimes that I was expecting. Instead they had certain points of disagreement with him about their own religion and about a certain Jesus, who had died, but whom Paul asserted to be alive. Since I was at a loss how to investigate these questions, I asked whether he wished to go to Jerusalem and be tried there on these charges. But when Paul had appealed to be kept in custody for the decision of his Imperial Majesty, I ordered him to be held until I could send him to the emperor.”

Gospel Reading (Jn 21:15-19; NRSVCE)

When Jesus had finished breakfast with his disciples, he said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.” A second time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.” He said to him the third time, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” And he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.” (He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, “Follow me.”

SATURDAY • MAY 23, 2015

Saturday of the Seventh Week of Easter

First Reading (Acts 28:16-20, 30-31; NRSVCE)

When he came into Rome, Paul was allowed to live by himself, with the soldier who was guarding him.

Three days later he called together the local leaders of the Jews. When they had assembled, he said to them, “Brothers, though I had done nothing against our people or the customs of our ancestors, yet I was arrested in Jerusalem and handed over to the Romans. When they had examined me, the Romans wanted to release me, because there was no reason for the death penalty in my case. But when the Jews objected, I was compelled to appeal to the emperor — even though I had no charge to bring against my nation. For this reason therefore I have asked to see you and speak with you, since it is for the sake of the hope of Israel that I am bound with this chain.”

He lived there two whole years at his own expense and welcomed all who came to him, proclaiming the kingdom of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance.

Gospel Reading (Jn 21:20-25; NRSVCE)

Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them; he was the one who had reclined next to Jesus at the supper and had said, “Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?” When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, “Lord, what about him?” Jesus said to him, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? Follow me!” So the rumor spread in the community that this disciple would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?”

This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true. But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.