"Lenten Penance, the Synodal Way" is the title of the Pope Francis' message for Lent 2023.
The message, which revolves around the transfiguration of Jesus, points out that the Church is called to imitate the apostles in that episode, because they climbed the mountain together, not alone.
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On Saturday the auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles (USA) was murdered. The motives for the crime have not yet been clarified.
U.S. Bishops' Assembly begins with an exhortation to unityAbortion and jurisprudence in the United StatesLos Angeles Auxiliary Bishop David G. O'Connell was found dead in his home in a Los Angeles suburb on Saturday afternoon, February 18. The Los Angeles Sheriff's Office said it was a homicide due to a gunshot wound. The clergyman was pronounced dead at the scene. The unfortunate news sent shockwaves through the Catholic community in Los Angeles. "I have no words to express my sadness," said Archbishop Jose H. Gomez, Archbishop of Los Angeles. Bishop O'Connell, 69, "was a sower of peace with a great heart for the poor and immigrants. He passionately sought to build a community that honored and protected the sanctity and dignity of every human life. He was a great friend," said Bishop Gomez.
Bishop David G. O'Connell was born in County Cork, in Ireland in 1953. He studied at the seminary All Hallows College of Dublin. In 1979 he was ordained to the priesthood to serve in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. He carried out his priestly ministry as a pastor in several churches in South Los Angeles, an area affected by poverty. He focused his pastoral efforts on communities affected by violence, gangs, and racial tensions, which culminated in the Los Angeles riots of the early 1990s and were triggered by the brutal beating of African-American Rodney King in March 1991 by police officers. O'Connell worked tenaciously to restore trust between law enforcement and the Los Angeles community.
In 2015 Pope Francis appointed him auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles and assigned him the pastoral region of San Gabriel. In his episcopal ministry he worked hard on evangelization, immigrant ministry and Catholic schools. "Parishes and schools are powerful instruments of transformation in the lives of individuals and communities" noted O'Connell. He also served as chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Subcommittee on the Catholic Campaign for Human Development.
Despite his various accomplishments, O'Connell distinguished himself as a simple, down-to-earth priest with an Irish accent that he did not hide. He greatly enjoyed working with the humblest people of South Los Angeles: "It has been the great joy of my life to be the pastor of those communities, especially those suffering from poverty or other hardships."
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In Rome there is a church of incalculable artistic value known as "Trinità dei Monti". Some of its characteristics are explained in this article, in order to encourage everyone to visit it.
Rome is full of places to visit, some more well-known and others less so. "Trinità dei Monti" certainly deserves to be known.
It is located on a viewpoint called the "PincioThe church, the cloister, two anamorphosis frescoes in the corridors of the cloister, a sundial (the so-called astrolabe), the refectory painted by the Jesuit Andrea Pozzo and the chapel of the "The Sundial of the Lord", the "The Church of the Holy Spirit" and the "The Church of the Holy Spirit".Mater Admirabilis".
The building was built between 1530 and 1570 by King Charles VIII of France for the Minims, a religious order founded by Francis of Paola (1416-1507).
The church of "Trinità dei Monti".which dominates the Plaza de España with its two bell towers, was consecrated in 1594.
Like the convent It owes its origin to the spiritual help given by St. Francis of Paola to the King of France, Louis XI, who had called him to join him in Plessis-Lès-Tours (France).
In fact, in 1494, his son Charles VIII, grateful for the support received from his father, inaugurated on Mont Plessis the construction of a building intended to accommodate the French religious of the Order of the Minims.
The works lasted throughout the 16th century. From then on, this place would be considered "the Roman church of the Kings of France". In the year of the canonization of Francis of Paola (1519), the construction of the church and the convent was largely completed.
The church was initially built in Gothic style, with stones from the Narbonne region, with a single nave bordered on each side by a succession of six chapels, to which are added the two chapels of the transept. In the 18th century, some modifications were made and the original Gothic structures were removed.
Today, the church has 17 chapels, each of which bears the name of one of the families that were granted patronage in the 16th century. Its rich decorations make the church a "Trinità dei Monti"an extraordinary testimony of "Roman Mannerism".
An excellent example is the Altoviti chapel, named after the Florentine banker Gian-Battista Altoviti. The wooden altarpiece depicts the baptism of Christ and the frescoes on the vault, some scenes from the life of St. John the Baptist. There is also the Simonetta chapel, dedicated to St. Francis de Sales the year after his canonization (1665).
The scenes of his life have disappeared over time and today the dedication is to St. Francis of Paola and commemorates the founder of the Minims, the first inhabitants of the town. "Trinità dei Monti".
Another chapel is dedicated to Lucrezia della Rovere, as it was given to the niece of Pope Julius II in 1548. In the Bonfil chapel you can admire the famous "Deposition of the Cross" by Daniele da Volterra, a pupil of Michelangelo.
It is the seat of the community of the Sacred Heart and of the Monastic Fraternity of Jerusalem. The convent is a veritable treasure trove of works of art. A cloister houses a cycle of frescoes dedicated to the life of St. Francis of Paola and a gallery of portraits of the kings of France; while in the refectory, where the mendicant friars ate their frugal meals, there are frescoes with illusionistic effects created in 1694 by the Jesuit Andrea Pozzo, with the scenographic Wedding at Cana.
The large trompe l'oeil occupies all the walls of the room, while the vault is supported by false beams that seem to incredibly support its weight.
Two anamorphoses were painted on the walls of the cloister corridors. These are frescoes that, thanks to a surprising optical effect, change their appearance depending on the location.
Anamorphism is an optical illusion whereby an image is projected onto the plane in a distorted form, making the original subject recognizable only if the image is observed under certain conditions, for example, from a precise point of view or through the use of deforming instruments.
The authors were the Minim Fathers Emmanuel Maignan and François Nicéron and they represented Saint Francis of Paola. Moving in a straight line along the wall, the figure of the saint dilates and deforms until it disappears, to become a landscape animated by the story of Francis' crossing of the Strait of Messina.
The second anamorphosis, on the other hand, represents St. John trying to write the Apocalypse. But if you look at the painting from another point of view, it becomes a landscape with plowed fields and villages!
In the 19th century, the Sisters of the Sacred Heart, founded by St. Madeleine Sophie Barrat, obtained ownership of Trinità dei Monti. In 1844, a young novice, Pauline Perdreau, painted a fresco of the Virgin Mary in a corridor. This place was quickly transformed into a chapel as a result of the numerous graces received, as attested by the votive offerings that cover the walls.
The image took the name of "Mater Admirabilis"The image of the Virgin Mary dates back to the time of Pope Pius IX, who liked to come here to pray. The devotion to this image has made it present in all the schools of the Sacred Heart in the world.
At "Trinità dei Monti" was not only art, but also science. Between the two anamorphoses is a complex and fascinating catoptric astrolabe, a sundial with a reflecting sphere. A small mirror in the window reflects sunlight, creating a luminous sphere that moves on the wall during the day. Four Latin inscriptions serve as "instructions for use", explaining the complex operation of the sundial.
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At the Angelus, the Holy Father commented on the words of the Gospel in which Jesus asks us to love our enemies. "God's love is a love always in excess, always beyond calculation, always disproportionate, and today he asks us also to live in this way", and to follow "the logic of gratuitousness", "not that of profit".
Pope Francis recalled once again this Sunday the "so many victims of the earthquake" in Syria and Turkey; and also, as he has been doing with insistence, "the daily dramas of the beloved Ukrainian people, and of so many peoples who suffer because of war, or because of poverty, lack of freedom or environmental devastation: so many peoples... In this sense, I am close to the New Zealand population hit in recent days by a devastating cyclone". "Let us not forget those who suffer, and let our charity be attentive, let it be a concrete charity," he said.
"The words that Jesus addresses to us in this Sunday's Gospel are demanding and seem paradoxical: He invites us to turn the other cheek and to love even our enemies (cfr Mt 5:38-48)," the Pope began by saying before praying the Marian prayer of the Angelus and giving the Blessing to the faithful in St. Peter's Square.
"For us it is normal to love those who love us and to be friends with the one who is our friend; however, Jesus provokes us by saying: if you act in this way, 'what are you doing extraordinary?' (v. 47). What do you do that is extraordinary? This is the point to which I would like to draw your attention today", was the Pope's reflection.
"Extraordinary" is that which goes beyond the limits of the usual, which exceeds the usual praxis and the normal calculations dictated by prudence", Francis added. "In general, however, we try to have everything quite in order and under control, so that it corresponds to our expectations, to our measure: fearing not to receive reciprocity or to expose ourselves too much and then be disappointed, we prefer to love only those who love us, to do good only to those who are good to us, to be generous only to those who can return us a favor; and to those who treat us badly we respond with the same coin, so we are in balance."
But "the Lord warns us: this is not enough!" he exclaimed. "If we remain in the ordinary, in the balance between giving and receiving, things do not change. If God had to follow this logic, we would have no hope of salvation! But, fortunately for us, God's love is always 'extraordinary,' that is, it goes beyond the usual criteria by which we humans live our relationships."
The Holy Father said that "the words of Jesus challenge us. While we try to remain in the ordinary for utilitarian reasoning, He asks us to open ourselves to the extraordinary of a gratuitous love; while we always try to match the counter, Christ encourages us to live the imbalance of love".
We should not marvel at this, the Pope continued. "If God had not become unbalanced, we would never have been saved: Jesus would not have come to look for us while we were lost and far away, he would not have loved us to the end, he would not have embraced the cross for us, who did not deserve all this and could not give him anything in return."
At this point he quoted the Apostle Paul, when he wrote that "the proof that God loves us is that Christ, while we were yet sinners, died for us" (Rom 5:7-8).
"That's right, God loves us while we are sinners, not because we are good or capable of giving something back to him. God's love is a love that is always in excess, always beyond calculation, always disproportionate. Today he also asks us to live in this way, because only in this way will we truly bear witness to him," he said to the faithful.
At the end of his brief speech, Francis further specified God's requirements. "The Lord proposes to us to leave behind the logic of profit and not to measure love in the scales of calculation and convenience. He invites us not to respond to evil with evil, but to dare to do good, to take risks in giving, even if we receive little or nothing in return. For it is this love [that] slowly transforms conflicts, shortens distances, overcomes enmities and heals the wounds of hatred".
Then we can ask ourselves: "Do I, in my life, follow the logic of profit or that of gratuitousness? The extraordinary love of Christ is not easy, but it is possible, because he himself helps us by giving us his Spirit, his love without measure," he concluded, before referring to St. Mary: "We pray to the Virgin, who, responding to God's 'yes' without calculation, has allowed him to make her the masterpiece of his grace."
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Sister Maria Aurora de Esperanza is a member of the Institute of the Incarnate Word. She currently lives in a small religious community based in Scotland and spoke to Omnes about her vocation, discernment, and the work they do.
"In the military, a priest gives a reason for the life you are willing to give.""All for you", the testimony of a young seminarianIt is not always your turn to interview a person you knew as a child and then God leads you to venture off the beaten path. Sister Aurora has a more or less precise place in my childhood memory.
In fact, one of my earliest memories goes back to a summer vacation in southern Chile: camping in a park full of cherry blossom trees, on the shores of a lake at the gates of the mythical Chilean Patagonia, with a family friend of my parents and Aurora's family. The camp became, years later, a somewhat more stable settlement because both families decided to be pioneers by building cabins, on the shores of that same lake, to spend the summers away from civilization.
Sister Aurora was always around: at the beach, at Mass, on a walk or event, somewhere. A few years older than me, Aurora is the big sister of a friend and part of those families close to mine. One of those people who are always there, close to you, without knowing that God had a plan for her: to be a nun, to leave everything to be a missionary, many thousands of kilometers away from the Chilean land where she was born. A nun, in the 21st century. That is impressive.
An impressive reunion, after many years and many kilometers away from our country. The name by which we knew her is now a thing of the past: her name is now Maria Aurora de Esperanza. If you call her by her old name, she corrects you without hesitation.
The blonde hair has given way to a blue veil and the style of a modern young woman became a nun's habit: a simple, elegant, stylish blue. The smile and the lively and cheerful look remain, but have been enhanced.
The always striking Chilean accent, if this is possible, has been softened, neutralized, and "Argentinized" a little, perhaps due to the contact with her sisters of that nationality in the Incarnate Word Institute.
The adventurous spirit of Aurora, the globetrotter, has also been strengthened, or channeled, or found its raison d'être: the one who went from Chile to India to spend a few days with the sisters of Mother Teresa, the Chilean who traveled through Africa, where she had an accident where she lost two travel companions and was hospitalized in a country where there is no Chilean diplomatic representation.
The young woman who spent her weekends in prisons, a lively twenty-something approaching her thirties and watching her friends get married. Everyone wondered what she was waiting for, or rather, who she was waiting for.
-The truth is that the vocational restlessness was born when I was very young, it was a kind of secret that I had no intention of revealing to anyone.
I did not want to be a nun. I always felt that God was asking me for something else. As if I wanted to "listen to him" but did not want to give a "yes" to what he was asking of me, I channeled my concerns into social aid, I wanted to change the world... But that was not enough, deep down I knew that God wanted me all for himself.
In my desire to change the world, the world was changing me, the ideals I had as a child, the desire to do something great, what I dreamed of being, were fading... My faith was darkening, the criteria of the world, the "party" -not in its positive sense- and everything that surrounds it, the empty enjoyment, the lack of convictions...
I was nothing like I had dreamed of being. And I felt that gaze from above questioning me, "What are you doing with your life? By God's grace I saw the need to order my life back to Him and part of that order was to make a discernment about my vocation.
And here I am, very happy and infinitely grateful to God for having given me the gift of vocation to religious lifeI am about to profess my perpetual vows this March 4, committing myself to Him forever... In passing, I take this opportunity to recommend myself to your prayers.
-My family has played a key role. There, and in the school I studied, linked to Opus Dei, was where I received my education in the faith.
At home, the subject of vocation was always treated very naturally - in the most positive sense -.
My mother always said that, for her sake, she would be happy if all her children had a vocation. This meant that I always had a very positive view of giving myself to God.
I have, thanks to God, a very beautiful and large family, who have supported me and have become part of this new life to which God has called me.
-The various accidents I had in my travel adventures helped me: living death closely makes you question the direction you are taking in life. However, if you don't want to change, that's not enough. You could say that they were wake-up calls, but the decision has to come from within, there may be many events or people who come close to us and we will not redirect life.
These accidents were small events that accumulated, and God used them to give me a "yes" to His action, which opens the door to so many other graces that lead us to Him.
There was also a phrase, quoted by a philosophy teacher in college, that marked me very much: "that the person you are does not sadly greet the person you could have been". That phrase stuck with me and I think God made use of it because it reminded me of it when I was reordering my life to God.
-Our community, made up of three sisters, arrived a year ago to found Scotland.
We work helping in four small towns, all very close together, each with its own church, in the diocese of St. Andrews and Edinburgh. Here Catholics make up approximately 7.7% of the population of which only 10% practice the faith.
Even after a year and a half, it is impressive to see how many graces we have received!
I could concentrate on the "doing" and list the various activities we carry out: our work in the schools, the operation of our children's club, visits to the sick and to the inhabitants of the parish, catechesis, the organization of spiritual retreats, etc. All this is, without a doubt, very beautiful, but the essential thing is that "we are here", it is the first and unquestionable fruit. In these lands the importance of this "being here" is so evident.
There are not exorbitant numbers in our apostolates, here the Catholic is a minority, but each story is a miracle. This is not to say that in the rest of the world they are not, but the tangibility of these is what is most evident here.
God works uninterruptedly, we know that. Here in Scotland, that work, that hand of God is so clearly seen!... A world, an environment where nothing leads you to God and God is moving hearts against all that is humanly expected. Seeing what he is doing, one can only exclaim "it is a patent miracle".
-I'll tell you a couple.
A woman was in a difficult situation in her family. She felt she had to go to church. She went, talked to the priest and started attending Mass, having no idea what it was. Today he is receiving catechesis in our community. Everything surprises him and at the same time he sees so much logic in the faith. She will be baptized along with her children. She is so happy that she thanks God for all the difficulties she is going through because they led her to God.
Here's another one. A man, faced with the suggestion of his non-practicing partner to baptize his children, decided to study what his children would hypothetically receive. He read the entire Catechism of the Catholic Church! Everything pointed him to the Truth and he began to come to Church. He wanted to receive catechesis, was baptized, made his first communion and received confirmation and marriage. His wife returned to the life of grace, his two children were baptized: a whole family in grace in less than a week.
What do these cases show us? God at work. Us just "being".
When we told our bishop some of these stories he commented, very happily: "if they were not here they would not have happened".
Being. That's what we've been doing. Being. God is doing. It is Him acting, we have received the fruit of His work, we give catechesis, we beautify the Church, we play with the children, we celebrate with the people, we share with all its fruits ..., but He is the one who works; we are simply "being" here!
-I would invite her to be generous because God does not allow himself to be outdone in generosity! We know that God is the one who loves us the most in the world and therefore he is the one who wants our happiness the most. He gave everything for us on the cross!
If we are aware of this reality, how can we doubt that if He is calling us to follow Him more closely, it will not be the best thing for us? If He is the great counselor, knows everything and shows us the way.
Come on, let's go!
Vocation is a gift!
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We recommend new releases, classics, or content that you have not yet seen in theaters or on your favorite platforms.
Two proposals to watch from the living room Cinema: "Loving", love in marriageCinema: Risen (a fictionalized account of the Resurrection)Cinema: The Miracle of Father Stu
Creator: Steve Barron
Actors: Keeley Hawes, Josh O'Connor, Daisy Waterstone, Callum Woodhouse and Milo Parker
Movistar+, Filmin
Based on naturalist Gerald Durrell's books about your experience as a child on the Greek islands ("My family and other animals", "Bugs and other relatives" y "The garden of the gods"), The Durrells is an endearing four-season British sitcom that conveys a love of life and nature through the routine of an English family looking to rebuild their lives in small, paradisiacal Corfu in the 1930s.
The series has been nominated for four BAFTA awards (including best drama series) and has a record audience in the United Kingdom. In addition, the cast includes Josh O'Connor (Prince Charles in the third installment of "The Crown") and Keeley Hawes ("bodyguard"). In short, a pleasant entertainment for all audiences.
Director: James Cameron
Screenplay: James Cameron, Rick Ja a and Amanda Silver
Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana and Sigourney Weaver Music: Simon Franglen
AT THE MOVIE
Jake Sully lives with his new family on the extrasolar moon Pandora. Together they will witness the return to their world of a familiar threat that may end their world once and for all. Jake will have to work with Neytiri and the race. Na'vi to protect your home.
Sequel to the blockbuster Avatar 1, and a box-office record in its own right since its first weeks, this is a film that is far from perfect - it has problems with the origin of the conflict and its villain, above all - but, in its simplicity, it recovers the adventure films of the 50s and 60s. Among its other virtues are its strong defense of the traditional family, its spectacular nature and its incredible 3D. The perfect opportunity to go to the movies with the family, even if the footage is a bit bloated (3 hours and 12 minutes).
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Pope Francis confirms the path of unity with the Orthodox in view of the 1700th anniversary of the first Council of Nicaea. The ecumenical impulse will characterize the work of the Synodal Assembly and the next Jubilee of 2025.
"We are preparing ourselves" and "we want to celebrate this Council as brothers." Pope Francis confirmed, in his recent trip to Congo -during the meeting he held with the Jesuit community active in the country and reported in the latest issue of 'La Civiltà Cattolica' - that the work to celebrate the 1700th anniversary of the first Council of Nicaea, scheduled for 2025, is going ahead.
One of the Pontiff's "dreams" is to "reach an agreement on the date of Easter" with his Orthodox brethren, which will coincide with the Jubilee Year of 2025 in the two Churches. The most immediate and also the most open interlocutor is evidently the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople Bartholomew. Among other things, he is the first - after so many centuries - to have participated in the inauguration of the ministry of a Pontiff, in this case that of Pope Bergoglio.
Already last May, in an audience to the participants of the plenary of the then Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, Pope Francis mentioned the ongoing "reflection" between the two Churches on how to ecumenically celebrate the important anniversary. And he recalled that already that first event of the whole Church was a moment "of reconciliation", "which in a synodal way reaffirmed its unity around the profession of its faith".
That experience, that "style" and those "decisions", the Holy Father reflected in May, "must illuminate" today's journey and bring to maturity new and concrete steps towards the restoration of the definitive unity of Christians.
In this same line is inserted the invitation that the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, together with the General Secretariat of the Synod, has addressed to the Episcopal Conferences to find a way to listen to the voices of brothers and sisters of other Confessions on questions concerning faith and diakonia in today's world: "if we truly want to listen to the voice of the Spirit, we cannot fail to hear what He has said and says to all who have been born again 'of water and the Spirit' (Jn 3:5)".
And also, in the same direction, it is framed the Ecumenical Prayer Vigil Pope Francis has called for September 30 in St. Peter's Square. The Vigil, whose protagonists will be the young people animated by the Taizé community, is intended to be a moment to entrust to God the work of the Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, which begins in October.
The other aspect is the Jubilee of 2025. In this case, the value and ecumenical imprint of this important appointment for the universal Church is expected, while the path of preparation wants to focus on the conclusions of another Council, Vatican II, through its four Constitutions (liturgy, revelation, the Church in itself and in its relationship with the world).
Precisely in these days a series of books promoted by the Dicastery for Evangelization entitled "Jubilee 2025 - Notebooks of the Council" has been launched, in whose introduction the Pontiff invites bishops, priests and families to find "the most appropriate ways to make the teaching of the Council Fathers up to date". The time has come, Pope Francis reiterates, "to rediscover the beauty of that teaching, which still today provokes the faith of Christians and calls them to be more responsible and present in offering their contribution to the growth of all humanity".
Prayer will therefore be the fixed appointment for the entire year 2024, as a reason to "recover the desire to be in the presence of the Lord, to listen to him and adore him," as well as to thank him for "the many gifts of his love for us and to praise his work in creation," which therefore concerns all humanity.
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If the Church is not faithful to herself, if she accepts the postulates and objectives set by the world, she will cease to be salt and light.
Reading the Dossier of Omnes on the German synodal path I was reminded of those words that St. John Paul II addressed Europe from Santiago de Compostela at the close of his first apostolic visit to Spain on November 9, 1982.
'I, Bishop of Rome and Pastor of the universal Church, from Santiago, I send you, old Europe, a cry full of love: Find yourself again. Be yourself. Discover your origins. Revive your roots. Revive those authentic values that made your history glorious and your presence in the other continents beneficial. Rebuild your spiritual unity.
– Supernatural Church in Germany is at a key moment in which these words of the holy Polish pope could guide it. There may be good faith, something that is not in doubt, in the initiative launched with the synodal path, but there is an evident risk of going astray and even of involving other episcopates in the search for alliances proposed by the promoters of the German synodal path.
Beyond the problem at the origin of this process (that of analyzing the origin of the problem of the sexual abuse) and of the various agendas that are to be implemented (optional celibacy, female priesthood, change in sexual morality, redefinition of the bishop's service of authority...) it seems to me that the issue at stake is the relationship between the Church and society.
What must change in the Church in order to reach out to a society that is increasingly secularized and, therefore, more distant from God? What signs of the times must we listen to, through which the Spirit is also speaking to us? How can we be faithful and at the same time creative in evangelization?
The German episcopate through this synodal journey approaches these questions, he claims to want to listen to the signs of the times. But the end result is that they seem to accept postulates of our society that can lead them away from the sense of the Catholic faith. Disconcerted by the abandonment of the faithful of their churches, they believe that the solution is to change and come closer to the thinking of today's society. But precisely therein lies the biggest mistake.
'For wanting to be who I am not, I am not even me' said a song by the group 'Brotes de olivo'. That is the risk of the Church in Germany, and in some way of Christians all over the world. To stop being ourselves to be like the world, to be 'normal'.
That is why the words that St. John Paul II addressed to Europe seem to me to be timely for the Church in Germany and for all of us.
Church, find yourself again. Be yourself. Discover your origins. Revive your roots. Rebuild your spiritual unity.
We will only be fruitful if we are faithful to Jesus Christ. It is time to turn our eyes to the Crucified One and place him before the eyes of those with whom we live. We have to show Jesus Christ, dead and risen, to the world, to raise him on high so that when they look at him they may find salvation in him. Jesus crucified will be today, as he was in Paul's time, scandal and folly. But only in him will our Church find the strength to continue walking in the midst of the desert we have to cross.
If the Church is not faithful to herself, if she accepts the postulates and objectives set by the world, she will cease to be salt and light.
The road ahead goes precisely in another direction. Because in our relationship with the world we have to recover that prophetic dynamism that is essential to Catholicism. We have to show the beauty of life in Christ, even if this scandalizes a society that is moving in a different direction.
Because today, as always, prophets are needed to change the course of those who have gone astray.
Teaching Delegate in the Diocese of Getafe since the 2010-2011 academic year, he has previously exercised this service in the Archbishopric of Pamplona and Tudela, for seven years (2003-2009). He currently combines this work with his dedication to youth ministry directing the Public Association of the Faithful 'Milicia de Santa Maria' and the educational association 'VEN Y VERÁS. EDUCATION', of which he is President.
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Pope Francis on Friday morning launched his message for Lent 2023. In it, he focused on the passage about the Transfiguration of the Lord, narrated by Matthew, Luke and Mark. "In this event," the Pope said, "we see the response that the Lord gave to his disciples when they manifested incomprehension toward him."
"Wielki post", the great fast: Lent and Easter in PolandLent, a time of miraclesCatechesis, fraternity and LentPope Francis invited in his message for the Lent 2023 to contemplate the passage of the Transfiguration of the Lord. This episode shows Christ's response to the incomprehension of the disciples. In fact, it is preceded by "a real confrontation between the Master and Simon Peter, who, after professing his faith in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God, rejected his proclamation of the passion and the cross".
The passage of the Transfiguration is read every year on the second Sunday of Lent. This is a liturgical season during which "the Lord takes us to himself and leads us to a place apart". The Pope recalled in his message that "even when our daily commitments oblige us to remain where we usually are, living an often repetitive and sometimes boring daily life, during Lent we are invited to "climb a high mountain" together with Jesus, to live with the Holy People of God a particular experience of asceticism".
This experience of asceticism, Francis continued, "is a commitment, always animated by grace, to overcome our lack of faith and our reluctance to follow Jesus on the way of the cross". It is a necessary path "to deepen our knowledge of the Master, to fully understand and accept the mystery of divine salvation, realized in the total gift of self out of love".
The Pope also mentioned the relationship between this ascent and the synodal experience. Thus, he said that "it is necessary to set out on a journey, a journey uphill, which requires effort, sacrifice and concentration, like a mountain hike. These requirements are also important for the synodal journey which, as Church, we have committed ourselves to undertake".
Francis invited the faithful to see in the passage of the Transfiguration a symbol of shared experience. "In the "retreat" on Mount Tabor, Jesus took with him three disciples, chosen to be witnesses of a unique event. He wanted that experience of grace not to be solitary, but shared, as is, after all, our whole life of faith."
Again, the Pope took the opportunity to apply these same ideas to the Synodal Way that the Church is living. He pointed out that "analogously to the ascent of Jesus and his disciples to Mount Tabor, we can affirm that our Lenten journey is "synodal" because we walk it together along the same path, disciples of the one Master. We know, in fact, that He himself is the The Way And so, both in the liturgical journey and in that of the Synod, the Church does nothing but enter ever more fully and profoundly into the mystery of Christ the Savior".
On Mount Tabor, the hopes that appear throughout the Old Testament are fulfilled. The Pope said that "the newness of Christ is the fulfillment of the Old Covenant and the promises; it is inseparable from God's history with his people and reveals its profound meaning. In a similar way, the synodal journey is rooted in the tradition of the Church and, at the same time, open to novelty. Tradition is a source of inspiration to seek new paths, avoiding the opposite temptations of immobility and improvised experimentation".
Francis indicated that this liturgical season has a very concrete objective: "the Lenten ascetical journey, like the synodal journey, has as its goal a personal and ecclesial transfiguration. A transformation that, in both cases, finds its model in that of Jesus and is realized through the grace of his paschal mystery".
With the aim of helping in that change that must occur both within ourselves and in the Church, the Holy Father proposed two ways "to ascend together with Jesus and arrive with Him at the goal".
The first of these is related to the "imperative that God the Father addressed to the disciples on Tabor, as they contemplated Jesus transfigured. The voice that was heard from the cloud said: "Listen to him". Therefore, the first indication is very clear: listen to Jesus. Lent is a time of grace to the extent that we listen to the One who speaks to us".
To listen to Jesus, we must go to the liturgy, but "if we cannot always participate in the Mass, let us meditate on the daily biblical readings, even with the help of the internet. On the other hand, the Pope indicated, "listening to Christ also involves listening to our brothers and sisters in the Church; that mutual listening which in some phases is the main objective, and which, in any case, is always indispensable in the method and style of a synodal Church".
The second key offered by Francis was that of "not taking refuge in a religiosity made up of extraordinary events, of suggestive experiences, for fear of facing reality with its daily hardships, its difficulties and its contradictions. The light that Jesus shows to the disciples is a foretaste of the Easter glory and we must go towards it, following "Him alone".
The Pope concluded his message by asking "that the Holy Spirit may encourage us during this Lenten season in our climb with Jesus, so that we may experience his divine radiance and thus, strengthened in faith, we may continue together on the way with him, the glory of his people and the light of the nations."
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Listening to each other, taking up challenges, looking to the future. From February 5-12, the Synod on Synodality stopped in Prague, bringing together some 200 delegates representing 39 bishops' conferences from 45 countries, and just over 300 delegates who participated online.
Does the Synod want to change doctrine?Keys and risks of a Synod that aims to involve the whole ChurchMsgr. Luis Marín: "The Synodal Church is not an invention of the Pope".There were no conclusions, nor were there intended to be. The objective was to listen to one another, and to bring to the table of the General Secretariat of the Synod a faithful synthesis of what had emerged from the work of the assembly.
Not even the final document of the bishops-only meeting, held at the end of the assembly behind closed doors, provides any conclusions or interpretative guidelines. Only the commitment to "a more synodal Church"which confirms the final document.
However, among the folds of the bishops' considerations are several issues that are likely to be central to the next synodal assembly to be held in October 2023 and then in October 2024.
Therefore, it is necessary to understand how the process is developing, starting precisely from what has happened in Europe, one of the most diverse continents in terms of language and history.
Transforming the Synod from an event to a processPope Francis also established continental stages, that is, moments in which the Churches of a specific geographical area meet to define challenges and possibilities. In addition to the stage of PragueIn addition, one was held in Oceania, one is underway for North America and another in the Middle East for the Churches of the Eastern Rite, while preparations are underway for Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Each continent has followed its own methodology, taking into account size and other practical problems. Europe decided to meet in person, but to maintain a broad representation online, leaving it to the 39 Bishops' Conferences of the continent to choose the representatives of the delegations.
From February 5 to 9, 39 national reports and hundreds of brief interventions were heard, offering a very precise vision of the challenges facing the Churches of the continent.
The final document has not yet been published, but has already been accepted by the assembly. Drafted during the working days, and not prepared in advance, the document was intended to be as faithful a snapshot as possible of the interventions.
It was read to the assembly, which made its observations, and the reason why it has not yet been published is that it is necessary to incorporate some observations and also to edit the text, to make it more homogeneous; a work that will touch the linguistic style, but not the content.
From this document, however, the final considerations were released, which contained some of the commitments of the European delegates to create a so-called "more synodal Church".
Some noted that the eight points of commitment were not mentioned at any point in the eight points of commitment. abuse in the Church and its crisis. But the aim was not to address all the issues, but to focus on the perspectives that really emerged from the debate.
The working document of the continental stage demanded, in its item 108, that the bishops meet after the synodal assembly, and so it happened from February 9 to 12. At the end of this bishops-only meeting, the "final considerations" of the bishops were published.
Again, it was decided not to address specific issues, but to seek a common compromise. Issues such as the war in Ukraine or the 26-year prison sentence of Nicaraguan Bishop Rolando Àlvarez were left out of the bishops' document, with the intention of having pastoral but not political documents.
In this regard, the February 14 statement on the situation in Nicaragua by Archbishop Gintaras Grušas, Archbishop of Vilnius and chairman of the Council of European Bishops' Conferencesshould be considered as a continuation of the assembly.
The statement, which speaks harshly of an injury to the rule of law and calls on the presidents of the Bishops' Conferences of Europe to take a stand before their governments, is a mandate arising from the meeting following the synodal assembly.
The documents have a purely pastoral character. The document discussed in the assembly, about 20 pages long, received several suggestions from the assembly: the request to better specify the position on the war in Ukraine; the request to avoid too much sociological language (as progressives and conservatives) and to use more ecclesial language; the need to better define the role of women in the Church; the specification that the synodal journey should go "with Christ", not without him.
It is a four-paragraph document, the conclusions of which were made in the evening. We read in it that "once again we have felt the pain of the wounds that mark our history, beginning with those inflicted on the Church by the abuses perpetrated by some people in the performance of their ministry or ecclesial office, and ending with those caused by the monstrous violence of the war of aggression that bloodied Ukraine and the earthquake that devastated Turkey and Syria.
In any case, there is a positive reception of the assembly, considered "a form of Pentecost", and a commitment to "deepen the practice, theology and hermeneutics of synodality", and to "address tensions in a missionary perspective", experimenting ways for a "synodal exercise of authority", taking care of "a formation to synodality", and listening to the "cry of the poor".
Sometimes they seem vague considerations, but one can find some of the issues that came up in the assembly. Among them, the gap between East and West Europe, to which must also be added the unexplored gap between North and South, the differences in the management of charisms, even the role and authority of the bishop and the priest.
And it was striking, in an assembly that also seemed to be an exaltation of the role of the laity, how it was precisely in the most secularized places where there was a call to reinterpret the role of the priest, to put him back at the center, to start again from the mission.
The final document of the bishops should also be read with nuances. The bishops have meditated on the results of the assembly. Their final considerations "accompany" the assembly, but do not replace or comment on the text.
There is, in these considerations, a commitment to "support the indications of the Holy Father, successor of Peter, for a synodal Church nourished by the experience of communion, participation and mission in Christ". But it is also a text that puts back at the center the role of the bishops, called to guide the people of God.
One of the underlying fears was precisely that the synodal process would dilute the role of the bishops. For this reason, prior to the continental stage, Cardinals Mario Grech and Jean-Claude Hollerich, secretary general of the synod and synod rapporteur respectively, sent a letter reaffirming the importance of the role of the bishops. As expected, the letter was printed in several languages and made available to the delegates in Prague.
It is, in a certain sense, a new path, bumpy as all new things are. What is certain is that the common belonging to Christ, established from the beginning of the assembly, remains firm. And this is a fact not to be underestimated.
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The Armenian genocide and the Jewish holocaust are related, to the extent that the former set the models that Hitler used for the extermination of the Jewish people.
The term "genocide" was coined by a Genocide expert. ArmenianRaphael Lemkin, a Polish Jewish jurist, who uses this term in his book "Axis Rule in Occupied Europe". According to Lemkin, it was necessary to invent a new word to describe the horrors of the Holocaust and to get the international community to enact laws to prevent further genocides. His goal was achieved when the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (UN Genocide Convention) officially entered into force in 1951, defining, in its Art. II genocide as "any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical heritage or a national, ethnic, racial or religious group:
(a) murder of members of the group
(b) serious injury to the physical or mental integrity of the members of the group;
(c) deliberately subjecting the group to living conditions intended to bring about its total or partial physical destruction;
(d) measures to prevent births within the group;
(e) the forcible transfer of children from one group to another;".
This conclusion, therefore, was reached not only with the sacrifice of the Jewish people in the Holocaust, but also that of the Armenian people, decimated in the first great genocide of the twentieth century.
Hitler and his accomplices conceived and carried out Hitler's own Holocaust precisely because German officials (Germany was an ally of the Ottoman Empire in World War I) witnessed and actively participated in the methods by which the systematic extermination of Armenians was perpetuated.
Once back home, they reported this to the future Führer, who, in 1939, declared: "Who is still talking today about the annihilation of the Armenians? Already in 1931, in an interview with the Leipziger Neueste, Hitler had said, "Everywhere, people everywhere expect a new world order. We intend to introduce a great repopulation policy... Think of the biblical deportations and massacres of the Middle Ages... And remember the extermination of the Armenians."
Germans (there were thousands of officers stationed in the Ottoman Empire during World War I) thus witnessed - and not only - the deportations and massacres (including trains leaving full and returning empty) and provided details of them to Hitler and his collaborators. For example, one officer, Max Erwin von Scheubner-Richter, described the massacres in the eastern provinces where he was vice-consul, in a 1915 report: "with the exception of a few hundred thousand survivors in Constantinople and the big cities, the Armenians of Turkey were, so to speak, completely exterminated".
All this enabled the Führer to devise and carry out the Final Solution for the Jews, convinced that, as with the Armenians, the world would look the other way and he could carry out his criminal plan to annihilate an entire nation.
In a previous articleWe are talking about the Hamidian massacres, carried out against the Armenian population at the end of the 19th century under the rule of Sultan Abdül Hamid II.
Well, precisely during the Hamidian era, in 1908, there was a coup d'état in the Ottoman Empire, through which a nationalist movement, known as the Young Turks, came to power and forced Abdül Hamid to re-establish a multi-party system of government that modernized the state and the army, making them more efficient.
The ideology of the Young Turks was inspired by European nationalisms, but also by doctrines such as social Darwinism, elitist nationalism and pan-Turanism, which erroneously viewed eastern Anatolia and Cilicia as the Turkish homeland (Turks, however, are a race of Mongol and Altaic origin).
According to their visions, they aspired to build an ethnically pure nation and get rid of those elements that were not fully Turkish. In the same article mentioned above, however, we also pointed out that the Ottoman Empire was not founded on an ethnic basis, but on a religious basis. Consequently, belonging to one ethnicity and not to another was based on the system of millet defined.
The logical conclusion was that whoever was not a Muslim was not a Turk: to achieve a Turkish State purified of disturbing elements, it was necessary to eliminate the Christian subjects, that is, Greeks, Assyrians and above all Armenians, the latter considered all the more dangerous since, from the Caucasian zone of the Russian Empire, at the beginning of the First World War, Armenian volunteer battalions were formed to support the Russian army against the Turks, also involving Armenians from this side of the border.
As early as 1909, there was an extermination of at least 30,000 people in the Cilicia region. In 1913, the Committee of Union and Progress founded the Special Organization (a kind of Ottoman SS formed by prisoners convicted of the worst crimes such as murder, rape and robbery who obtained their freedom in exchange for joining this unit, as well as Kurdish tribes: this resulted in a very high incidence of rape during the Genocide) who were responsible, under the rule of the Committee of Union and Progress and, above all, the Three Pashas (the dictatorial triumvirate that ran the Ottoman Empire between 1913 and the end of World War I, composed of Mehmed Tal'at Pasha, Ismail Enver and Ahmed Cemal) for the worst crimes.
On the evening of April 23-24, 1915 (April 24 is commemorated each year as Medz YeghernThe arrests and deportations among the Armenian elite of Constantinople began, resulting, in just one month, in the death of more than a thousand intellectuals, journalists, writers and poets. Subsequently, the Young Turk government ordered the systematic elimination of ethnic Armenians and their subsequent deportation, in forced marches to the desert of Mesopotamia, under the supervision of German army officers.
Millions starved to death in the desert or were massacred, tortured and raped by Kurdish militias and the Turkish army. On the other hand, it was almost impossible for people to intervene to help these people (a decree was passed punishing those who did so with the death penalty).
The few who survived settled in Armenia, France, the United States, but also in Syria and Lebanon (where they constitute a large minority of the population).
Historians estimate that the total number of Ottoman Armenians killed in the Genocide ranges from 1,200,000 to 2,000,000 killed, although the most widely accepted figure is 1,500,000 (between 300,000 and 900,000 victims of the Greek Genocide and between 275,000 and 750,000 victims of the Assyrian Genocide). It is also estimated that between 100,000 and 200,000 Armenians were Islamized and that up to two million Turkish citizens may have at least one Armenian grandparent, often without knowledge of it.
To this day, Turkey continues to deny the facts, to the point that when, on several occasions, Pope Francis openly described it as genocide, the Turkish government and Erdogan himself were quick to react vehemently and offensively.
After the Medz Yeghern, Armenia declared itself independent in 1918. The 1920 Treaty of Sèvres had assigned it a considerable part of eastern Anatolia, but the founder of modern Turkey, Kemal Atatürk did not accept it and militarily occupied that region. It was another
extermination: there is talk of 70,000 Armenians massacred after 1920 in eastern Anatolia, of another 50-100 thousand in the Caucasus, where the Turks had reached as far as Azerbaijan, creating the Islamic Army of the Caucasus, under the command of Enver Pasha.
From 1922 to 1991, the Republic of Armenia was part of the Soviet Union, which froze the conflict between Armenians and Turkic-speaking Azeris with the methodologies carried out by Stalin: state atheism, forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of people and totally improper allocation of territories to one republic of the USSR instead of another.
This created a schizophrenia of borders that did not reflect the ethnic composition of the territories. Armenians, as we have seen, were not only present in present-day Armenia, but constituted a conspicuous minority, sometimes even an actual majority, in territories such as the aforementioned Eastern Anatolia, Naxiçevan ( an autonomous region of Azerbaijan), Javachezia (now part of Georgia), Artsakh (also known as Nagorno Karabakh).
The latter territory was always officially part of Azerbaijan but, in 1993, with the help of Armenia, it gained independence. The international community did not recognize this independence and the recent history of the territory is unfortunately well known.
In conclusion, the Armenian Empire mentioned in the previous article, once so vast and culturally rich, was dismembered over the centuries by various interests.
Their people suffered the worst humiliations, to the point of being decimated by a genocide, which some still do not recognize, and are today under constant threat of annihilation, even in places where the survivors of that same genocide found refuge, by dictatorial regimes (such as that of Aliev in Azerbaijan) or by Islamic extremists (such as ISIS in Syria, which even destroyed the Armenian Genocide memorial in the city of Deir ez-Zor, the destination of the forced marches and in whose desert lie the bones of millions of Armenian dead).
Writer, historian and expert on Middle Eastern history, politics and culture.
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Is celibacy the cause of sexual abuse in the Church? Do these unfortunate cases also occur in other religious denominations? What is the origin of the abuse?
Some see priestly celibacy as an unhealthy repression of sexual impulses, and consider that this would encourage a tendency among clergy to abuse sexually. But sexual abuse is no more frequent among celibate Catholic clergy than in other lifestyles.
Most child sexual abuse happens in the family and at home (70-90 %), committed by family members. The extra-familial (around 20 %) are perpetrated by babysitters, teachers, therapists, monitors, coaches, group or spiritual leaders of any cult and friends of the family.
– Supernatural ANAR foundation in his studio Sexual abuse in childhood and adolescence according to those affected and its evolution in Spain (2008-2019) shows that only 0.2 % of the abuses correspond to priests, compared to 23.3 % for parents. Most child molesters are heterosexual males with a partner, from the family or social circle of the abused, and act in the middle stage of life (30-50 years).
The motivation for the abuse would be pedophilia in 25-50% of the cases. It is also related to problems of psychological or social origin: stress, relationship problems, lack of availability of an adult partner, depression, alcohol or drug abuse, increased sexual desire, antisocial personality traits, impulsive lack of control and mild mental retardation.
There is no evidence of a higher prevalence of sexual abuse in Church activities compared to other institutional contexts involving minors. This is not to downplay the importance of inappropriate behavior by some clergy, but to point out that there is no data to indicate that celibacy is the source of the problem. It cannot be affirmed that celibacy and pedophilia have a causal relationship. We can affirm that when a priest abuses, the gravity is greater because of his responsibility and because of the consequences of the fact that it is precisely a minister of Christ who is the abuser.
The abuses committed by clerics are especially sonorous and produce a media scandal that is painful and necessary to generate a change, and that many victims can finally communicate the pain, anguish, anger and shame after so many years.
The risk factors for pedophilia are temperamental, antisocial behavior, lack of relationships with peers, interest in younger people because they are weaker, passive personality traits, closed, dependent, falsely docile and remiss, but in reality concerned with pleasing superiors and keeping one's own insecurities secret. It is also influenced by traumatic experiences, genetic and physiological factors due to neurodevelopmental alterations.
According to the John Jay Report (JJR), the percentage of accused priests is similar to that of clerics of other religions who do not live celibacy and, those who had committed sexual abuse, did not live chastity. 50-70 % of the accused priests had had sexual relations with adults after ordination (JJR).
The second edition of the JJR (2011) concluded that only "confused" sexual identity was correlated with an increased likelihood of committing abuse, homosexual behaviors were not. The report prepared by Sullins (2018) for the Ruth Institute, noted that there is indeed a strong correlation between homosexuality in the clergy and clergy abuse. Also Prusak (2020) suggests that the perpetrators of abuse among Catholic clergy are often homosexuals.
The indications of the Catholic Church regarding the non-admission to holy orders of persons with paraphilias, disordered sexual behavior, personality disorders or other pathologies that may hinder their service to people, are clear and firm.
According to various studies on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, the abusers are men; the majority of priests are between 29 and 72 years old; average age is 50 years; the highest percentage of victims and aggressors were men. Abusers showed the following psychological characteristics: emotional and/or sexual immaturity (29.6%), personality disorder (21.6%), pedophilia (17.7%), alcohol abuse (13.1%), deviant behaviors (9.8%), passive behavior (5.8%), others such as anxiety, panic attacks, paranoia and hypochondria (3.4%). There are no comparable data on these characteristics in other institutions.
It seems, therefore, that priests who abuse are those who do not live their celibacy coherently and that a well-integrated celibacy would prevent abuse. Thus, the investment would be to promote that priests, like married people, live in a congruent way, their own decisions.
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The Madrid headquarters of the University of Navarra hosted the Omnes forum on interreligious dialogue, a path to fraternity. The event was coordinated by the magazine together with the Episcopal Subcommission for Interreligious Relations and Interreligious Dialogue and the CARF Foundation.
"Fratelli Tutti": Friendship and fraternity, dialogue and encounter.Antonio NavarroThe young people have been creators of the II Interreligious Days of Cordoba".Interreligious dialogue: More collaboration between Christians and MuslimsInterreligious dialogue. As brothers before the CreatorThe issue of forum Omnes was inspired by the Human Fraternity Day, which is celebrated on February 4. The event was preceded by the signature of the Interreligious Declaration on the Dignity of Human Life. Representatives of the Islamic Commission of Spain, various Orthodox patriarchates, the Spanish Reformed Episcopal Church, the Federation of Evangelical Entities of Spain and the Catholic Church participated.
Some representatives of these confessions are those who participated in the Omnes Forum. The guest speakers were the Chief Rabbi of Spain, Moshe Bendahan, the Secretary of the Spanish Islamic Commission, Mohamed Ajana El Ouafi, and the President of the co-organizing Episcopal Subcommission, Francisco Conesa. The interventions were moderated by María José Atienza, editor-in-chief of Omnes.
The first to speak was the Chief Rabbi of Spain, Moshe Bendahan, who focused his presentation on a biblical verse: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself". This phrase is essential since, as the rabbi pointed out, "any human being has the inner value of love", and that is precisely the "divine essence" that unites us all.
However, Bendahan soon warned that "love requires work" and therefore it is necessary to discern the quality with which this essence is lived. To explain this, the Chief Rabbi used the metaphor of a cab in which there are two passengers, on the one hand our divine identity, and on the other, our ego. The vehicle is our own body and the driver, our mind.
This cab driver must have clear beliefs, among which is that "love of neighbor should govern our lives". To concretize his idea, Bendahan provided listeners with a definition of love, which is "the capacity to seek the good of others".
This is where, said the Chief Rabbi, the path of fraternity in interreligious dialogue must be sought. In such a way that we can "focus not on what differentiates us, but on what unites us", being able to "see the neighbor close to oneself".
After Bendahan, it was the turn of Francisco Conesa, President of the Episcopal Subcommission for Interfaith Relations and Interreligious Dialogue. The first thing he emphasized was the characteristic of religions as "promoters of fraternity", especially taking into account that the three participating confessions recognize a "God who is the Father of all".
This universal fraternity is also linked to a second significant feature immediately pointed out by Conesa, which is that "in all our religions the essence is in the practice of mercy".
Knowing these characteristics, the bishop indicated that "among believers there should be particularly this fraternity because we all seek the face of God, we all pray and share the same experience". This allows us to "seek in our own tradition what moves us to dialogue".
As examples of this "culture of encounter", the President of the Sub-Commission mentioned the efforts made by the three confessions to "defend the right to be heard in the midst of society"; to become "sentinels of the poor"; the work aimed at "working for the care of the Earth, which is the Creator's work"; or the promotion of "the sacred meaning of all human life and the value of the family".
Finally, Conesa called on all representatives of the different religions to set an example of this dialogue.
Mohamed Ajana El Ouafi, secretary of the Spanish Islamic Commission, began his speech by pointing out that "the Koran begins and ends with the idea of God as Creator and Lord of all," which allows us to see humanity as a great tree.
Through this metaphor, the secretary pointed out the importance of not becoming obsessed with the small place we occupy in that tree. On the contrary, it is essential to recognize that "plurality is a characteristic of our society".
"Uniqueness," stressed El Ouafi, "is only proper to the Creator. In everything else we find differences", which is not bad in itself, but allows us to practice "mutual knowledge to build bridges of coexistence".
Mohamed then went on to enunciate some proposals to boost interfaith dialogue, including "favoring and promoting mutual knowledge; presenting oneself to others (members of other faiths and the media) to avoid misunderstandings; raising awareness to foster a culture of encounter among members of different religions, focusing on what unites us; and cooperating, not settling for mere coexistence."
To conclude his presentation, El Ouafi pointed out that "it is important to avoid useless discussions. What we must do is to work so that "religions can do their bit in relation, for example, to the care of the environment or the organization of human resources".
After the speakers' interventions, the moderator opened the floor to questions from both the audience and the listeners for the following reasons streaming.
The full video of the forum can be seen below:
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The Pontifical University of the Holy Cross is hosting a conference on journalistic reporting on the reality of migrants and refugees with academics, journalists and heads of humanitarian organizations.
Displaced persons and migrants: "they are people, not numbers""We need effective, supportive and creative ways of welcoming migrants."The conference "Communication on migrants and refugees, between solidarity and fear", promoted by the ISCOM Association and the School of Communication of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, together with the "Information, Migrants and Refugees" Committee, provided a new opportunity for academics, journalists and heads of humanitarian organizations to discuss critical aspects of the media system and to contribute to truthful information that is more respectful of human dignity.
With special attention to ethics and professional ethics in information and communication on migrants and refugees, the conference was attended by more than 100 people, including journalists, communication workers from organizations working on the issue and those responsible for ecclesiastical and educational institutions.
A little less than 10 years ago, the first Francis' pontificate trip to Lampedusa10 years or so later, the Russian invasion of Ukraine. These two facts, above all, have contributed to changing the perception of the migratory phenomenon and, especially, the way of reporting on it, especially from a journalistic point of view.
Ten years ago, the world's press gathered in the heart of the Mediterranean to listen to Francis' denunciation of the "globalization of indifference".
Today, the new humanitarian crisis caused by the conflict in Ukraine - which has been going on for a year now - conditions the political reading and the journalistic representation itself, to the point of affecting substantive choices, for example in terms of reception with the application of a new exceptional right of asylum.
The impact of the terrible earthquake tragedy in Syria and Turkey must also be assessed.
Describing the complexity of the reality of migration and helping to understand the interdependencies and the necessarily international dynamics of the phenomenon: this is the commitment and the challenge of a journalistic narrative that wants to be truly respectful above all of the dignity of the people involved and at the same time of the substantial truth of the facts, to which the constitutive law of the Order of Journalists of Italy, which celebrates in these very days its 60th anniversary, reminds us.
They come from neighboring countries, fleeing wars that also distress us. We have become somewhat accustomed to them, to immigrants. We see them above all for their usefulness, beyond the risks they entail and the fears they arouse.
Those who used to make instrumental use of them for electoral or propaganda purposes now have to resort to other arguments and invent new bogeymen. Immigrants are no longer "others among us", but "others among us", to be "integrated".
Humanitarian crises, along with looting, kindle pity and awaken the solidarity of peoples who are at their best in misfortune.
"Let refugees be protagonists of their own representation, so that they can speak with authority, political intent and collective voice. And participate in the decision-making process". This is how Chiara Cardoletti, UNHCR Representative for Italy, the Holy See and San Marino, opened the day's proceedings, highlighting how the United Nations Refugee Agency "has been working for 10 years to support ethical journalism, so that immigration and asylum issues are the subject of training and professional development. Reporting on asylum seekers, refugees, victims of trafficking and migrants must be based on the correct use of language and adequate safeguards for all those who have sought and obtained protection, without undermining the right to information".
The migratory phenomenon has been one of the areas in which Italian journalism (and not only) has been able, at least in part, to correct its approach. Starting from this premise, Vittorio Roidi, master of journalism and professor of ethics and professional deontology, observed how "the men and women who died in the waters of the Mediterranean in a desperate attempt to escape to a fate of poverty and despair represented one of the great themes of the last part of the last century. We realized that we could not treat them as numbers, but that they were the protagonists of one of the most shocking dramas of our time. And we tried to change the language, to give a more human and less superficial dimension to our stories".
The Charter of Rome, the deontological document adopted by Italian journalists on information and migrants, was the first concrete result of this reflection, "even if," according to Roidi, "the results of this work are perhaps not the desired ones".
Cardinal Augusto Paolo Lojudice, Metropolitan Archbishop of Siena and member of the Migrants Commission of the Italian Bishops' Conference, pointed to the words of Pope Francis - "It is not enough to welcome migrants: we must also accompany them, promote them and integrate them" - as a clear outline "also to be able to narrate migration correctly and far from any form of pietism and instrumentalization".
Their work, their capacity for sacrifice, their youth and their enthusiasm enrich the communities that welcome them. "But this contribution could be much greater if it were valued and supported through specific programs."
Gian Carlo Blangiardo, president of ISTAT, reflected on the migration phenomenon according to statistical data, referring to the growth recorded in Italy in recent decades: "We have gone from a few hundred thousand units in the 1980s to over 5 million at the last census count in 2021, so the foreign population has undergone major transformations, both in terms of inflows and in the structure of presences: from workers to families, from foreigners to citizens".
Among the positive effects, the functionality found in the labor market and the significant, although not decisive, contribution on the birth rate front. A contribution to the development of our country", in Blangiardo's opinion, "that must be valorized within the framework of appropriate government initiatives, in full awareness of a world demographic panorama in which population growth is totally concentrated in the poorest countries".
During the first panel -The war in Ukraine and conflicts in the world: effects on the migration phenomenon-, discussions were held, moderated by Father Aldo Skoda (Pontifical Urbaniana University), Matteo Villa (ISPI), Valentina Petrini (Il Fatto Quotidiano) and Irene Savio (El Periódico).
The latter focused in particular on the effects of the Russian military offensive in Ukraine, which has caused "the flight of 8 million people, in addition to 5.4 million internally displaced persons, according to UN figures. Many are forced for the second or third time to flee their homes, leave everything behind and go to live in a new place".
On the unprecedented response of the EU countries, the analyst of El Periódico acknowledged "the adoption of policies in favor of refugees very different from those used in other parts of the world, as well as various programs to help the Ukrainian population and to speed up the bureaucratic procedures for the recognition of refugee status". And yet, some 5 million Ukrainians have decided to return to their country in recent months."
Questioned on the subject of propaganda and manipulation in times of war, Petrini dedicated his reflection: "Today, keeping one's own population in the dark about what is really happening in Ukraine is a priority for Putin. Fostering European discontent with the Ukrainian war refugees was one of the first manipulative strategies he undertook, through disinformation: machines that are recycled on the topic of the moment and that have in common the victim, in this case the migrants, the refugees, and the macro-objective of destabilizing entities such as the European Union. Putin is no stranger to such operations. He has been trying for years to corrupt Western democracies, financing nationalist movements, giving money to parties without euro, trying to contaminate elections and political debate."
Among forced migrants, people forced by wars to leave their homes, two out of three remain displaced in their country of origin. "Of the last third who leave the country," observes Matteo Villa, "the vast majority remain in neighboring countries, hoping to return home sooner or later." Of course, the increase in protracted crises around the world makes it more likely that those who have left the country will then make a second migration to more distant places. "In the case of Ukrainian refugees (the words are important: refugees, not displaced, because they are protected on a temporary rather than permanent basis), the proportions are not the same because Europe has taken steps to welcome Ukrainians on an unprecedented scale, and has even allowed them to choose their country of destination within the EU."
"But the risk for them" - in the opinion of the ISPI researcher - "is that this kind of 'time-bound' reception comes to an end, and that the views of European societies and governments change. We have to work to narrate these forced migrations, especially to underline their successes, which there are: in some European countries, up to 40% of Ukrainian refugees have already found work."
Integration or inclusion: the challenge of welcoming. This was the title of the second session, moderated by the notary Vincenzo Lino and opened by Ida Caracciolo (University of Campania Luigi Vanvitelli), with the fundamental and clear distinction made by international law between the status of refugee and that of migrant.
"While the sovereignty of States" - Caracciolo pointed out - "knows important and consolidated limits with regard to the reception and integration/inclusion of refugees, the treatment of migrants is still largely left to the discretion of States. Only the corpus iuris The general human rights framework (the two United Nations Covenants of 1966 on civil and political rights and on economic and social rights, the European Convention on Human Rights of 1950 and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union of 2000) applies to both categories, being centered on the individual as such".
Regarding the valuable work of Centro Astalli, Donatella Parisi, its Communications Officer, drew attention to the gradualness and complexity of the process of integrating asylum seekers and refugees. "A process," she said, "that involves different spheres: economic, legal, social, cultural. For this reason, Centro Astalli carries out projects of social accompaniment and cultural awareness. From the first day of reception we work with refugees to improve their opportunities for inclusion and combat racism and xenophobia. Immigrants, with their demand for integration, have been at the heart of the Community of Sant'Egidio since the late 1970s, when they began to be a significant presence in Italian society. Over the years, the commitment to welcome and integration has been growing, in Italy and around the world. Language and culture schools were born. With the humanitarian corridors, a legal and safe immigration route has been created".
Massimiliano Signifredi (press office of the Community of Sant'Egidio) highlighted some of its particularities: "Thanks to the collaboration with the Italian Protestant Churches and the Italian Bishops' Conference, the humanitarian corridors project, based entirely on civil society and replicated also in France and Belgium, has already allowed more than six thousand vulnerable refugees to reach Europe safely, becoming a model of integration. Those who have been accepted have immediately learned the language and found work. The humanitarian corridors have inaugurated a different narrative of immigration, rescuing this epochal phenomenon from instrumentalization and fear."
Raffaele Iaria (Fondazione Migrantes) coordinated the closing debate - The care of words and respect for people: the ethics of those who report -, animated by the testimony of some journalists who have been reporting on the migration phenomenon for years.
"We remain concerned about the consequences of the flows while there is a constant depersonalization of the migrant," warned Angela Caponnetto (RAI), questioning "European governments increasingly divided on the issue, 8 Member States have even asked to review the right of asylum, considered a push factor for those who try to reach Europe hoping for a better life, with the risk of increasingly locking themselves in a 'fortress'." In this context, the role of the reporter is fundamental in shaping thousands of human lives that risk remaining only soulless shadows."
Anna Meli (Carta di Roma Association) evoked the words of Valerio Cataldi (president of the Association), for whom "in the last ten years the "fear machine" has been consolidated, starting in spring with the alarm of "a million people ready to leave from the coasts of Libya" and continuing with the count of arrivals in Italian ports. An anxiogenic dynamic, a trickle of figures that arouses anxiety and produces fear. Where reality, real life, the substantial truth of the facts are something else".
'Emergency', 'indiscriminate reception', 'invasion'. What terms do we use to talk about immigration? To what extent do the words we choose correspond to reality? Are we really able to contextualize the migratory phenomena that affect our country and Europe? These are the questions that Eleonora Camilli raised at the end of the conference. For the Social Editor journalist, "we are confronted with the often distorted narrative of immigration. And about the double standards of protection, reception and narrative between different migratory flows: in particular between the arrivals via the Mediterranean or the Balkan route and the extraordinary flow of refugees from Ukraine".
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The celebration of the I Jornada Sports and Faith highlights the Church's commitment to a specific pastoral approach in this area, which Pope Francis himself especially encourages.
Sport, a protagonist in a new worldThe village experience that comes from sportA congress on sport at the VaticanOn March 9 and 10, the headquarters of the Salesian school in Pamplona will be hosting the I Conference Sports and faith. A meeting organized by Salesianos Pamplona, in collaboration with the Archbishopric of Pamplona and Tudela and that it wants to be "the starting point to take advantage of sport as an instrument of evangelization", as pointed out Litus Ballbe, priest and responsible for the Pastoral of Sport of the Spanish Episcopal Conference at the presentation of this event.
Ángel Miranda, director of Salesianos Pamplona, has talked to Omnes about this day in which will participate, among others, professional athletes such as Enhamed Enhamed, Paralympic athlete, directors of sports schools such as Ignasi Talo, Director Brafa Sports Center o Angelo De Marcellis, director of the Pastoral Sports Ministry in Teramo and president of the Italian Sports Center of the province of Teramo.
-The question posed has two implicit questions, one more focused on the Salesian approach to the subject and the other on a general vision of sport.
When the Salesian family considers the identity of any of its presences, it refers to the original focus of the pastoral proposal of the Salesian Family. Don Bosco which is synthesized in four words to define each work as "house" for those who do not have one, "school" for those who do not have one, "church" for those who do not attend it, and "courtyard" where to meet and live with friends.
It is clear that the practice of sports is easily framed within the Salesian "courtyard" (some ecclesial documents place it, curiously enough, within the "courtyard of the Gentiles" as a great clue to the believing conception of the practice of sports.
When it comes to contemplating sports practice from the perspective of faith, perhaps someone will try to take a look at it from the perspective of faith. middle way proposing Jesus in long "athletic marches" or nautical sports on the lake, more or less "underwater" fishing, or perhaps mountaineering, supposedly at the service of the mission.
The meeting that is being prepared is not so much along these lines as in an approach more oriented to the "dialogue" between the practice of sports and faith. A dialogue that assumes an anthropological vision of the person who practices, who directs, who animates or who in one way or another approaches the practice of sports.
In other words, the conference was born from a double question. On the one hand, if in the practice of sport your "doing" qualifies and enhances the "being" of the people who enter your field. On the other hand, if, as a practitioner or user of sport, you are able to discover or find in sport some keys that open you to a vision and meaning of life where the believing dimension of the person has a space. That way it is possible to open the way to a reading of the practice of sport, if not better, at least different.
-First of all, it is important to emphasize that the design of our day is perceived more as an opportunity for an open dialogue between the practice of sports and faith, also for any young person, of any confession, of any experience and level of development of the transcendent dimension of his or her life.
Nevertheless, speaking from our Christian perspective, it does not hurt to remember that the Church serves the extension of the Kingdom in four ways: the proclamation of the Kingdom, the encounter in the community, the celebration of faith and life, and the service to our brothers and sisters.
Without pretending to develop this reflection, and sticking to the meaning of the question, it is easy to discover in sports practice traits of these four dimensions of ecclesial service insofar as it announces and transmits values of encounter, coexistence, help, availability; it is a place of encounter, collaboration, ability to share goals, coexistence; it makes possible the integral development of the person in the environment of concrete values and, in addition, it becomes a time and space for joy, celebration and improvement of coexistence.
Another thing is to remain in the external signs, ... the sign of the cross in its infinite varieties of speed and gesture when going out to the field, the protective stamps inside the luggage, the sending to heaven or to the unknown infinity of the triumph and so many and many ... evocations of a "something" or of a "someone" more or less close that surpasses us and raises deep questions to the life and to do of our day to day. As you will understand, this opens a whole track to that double reading of what sport brings to the person who is in the process of contemplation, openness, socialization, projection of one's own existence and the possibilities of a sport practice that favors the physical, social ethical development and, why not! the opening to the transcendence of individuals and groups.
-I place this question in the look. The "look" belongs to the person. It is the person who, in different ways, perhaps in different ways, looks, sees, contemplates, admires, celebrates, and shares or practices the sport activity.
It is or are the people who applaud, shout, comply or not comply with regulations, hire, pay, reject or collaborate, with more positive or negative visions of the practice of sports. As the Gospel says, what "comes out" of us, from the heart, is what stains, not what enters...
That is why our perspective towards young people is fundamentally educational. Enabling young people and, why not older ones, practitioners to learn to win and lose, to be the most brilliant or the good collaborator, to value their own success and that of others, to be a starter or a bench player, to accept or reject the other, the different, to strive to improve, to respect the rule and the law, ... We can go on! Only in this way, although we will not "avoid" the "slanted" looks, we will be helping the growth of generations of people with healthy critical approaches to so many ethical, economic, social and not only sporting "slants" that we discover in our environment.
-I think it is pointed out in the tone and content of the conversation we have been having. And here, the social vision and the plural praxis of the family reality will require an almost kaleidoscopic view of the role that all of them can and should play.
Assuming the family as first and foremost responsible for the education and integral development of their children, it is clear that, to the extent that sport is part of their reality and life, it will be necessary to admit functions of support, control, adaptation to reality, establishment of educational priorities and positive channels of socialization through sport, harmonization of ideals and goals, etc. and all within the horizon of a sport practice that, in the process of integral development of the person, is a "means" and not an "end" determining the meaning of life of young people.
And here, a complementary question arises that has to do with the "education of parents" who, beyond the environment, the media, personal or group images or criteria of educational and social integration, need to "learn to choose and accompany" the processes of growth and integral development of their children.
Transferring this approach to the activity of educators, coaches, monitors, sports organizations, sports policy makers, companies providing financial support, etc. to the frame of reference of our meeting, we will discover that we are more in a phase of search than of response, of project than of results, of dialogue than of debate, and all with that which we normally understand as "sports spirit".
-Last October, a meeting of people and institutions related to sports took place in the Vatican under the slogan "....Sports for all"The event was attended by entities from different levels of the Spanish Church and was subsequently echoed in the proposal for a specific national conference on the subject, which has been crystallizing under the organizational support of several entities of the Church in Navarra.
For this purpose, we count on an environment and a rich local history of people and organizations close to the professional and amateur sports activity, generating over time the identity traits of the people and the town in the environment of a popular sports activity with undeniable fruits of social integration.
In this frame of reference, the group of educational-cultural entities has not been lacking in coherence with its believing reflection on the pastoral care of or through sporting activity, which proposes the convenience of making a reflection open to dialogue between two realities that form an indivisible part of its ordinary activity.
We are therefore talking about a day of creative and imaginative dialogue on the possibilities of generating processes of integral growth of people through a sporting activity where there is no lack of values and experiences of development of a sense of life open to transcendence. A very concrete activity of dialogue between faith and culture, where sport is made present as "good news" for our recipients and the practice of sport as an aid to the growth of people in their level of openness to the "Good News" of Jesus and the Church.
A day that has tried to harmonize different contents and messages around the idea of a Church open to the world of sports, personal experiences of living the faith in the practice of sports, the organization and development of sports according to the educational-religious identity, if any, of the organizations and the exchange of lines of social commitment from sports. The day will also close with a more group and assembly work on proposals for pastoral action in the environment of sports activities.
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It is necessary to go a step further, as some sisterhoods have already done, creating help centers for pregnant women or collaborating in some way with other social initiatives with the same purpose.
The short news is that the Constitutional Court has rejected by majority the appeal of unconstitutionality, filed 13 years ago, against the Organic Law 2/2010, of March 3, on sexual and reproductive health and the voluntary interruption of pregnancy, better known as the Abortion Law.
The aforementioned Organic Law is declared fully constitutional and may be enacted in the same terms in which it was approved by Congress.
In this matter, I believe that it is not enough to proclaim a rejection, a simple opposition. It is necessary to go into detail in order to substantiate this opinion.
The Court has rejected, as we have said, the appeal filed in 2010 by the PP against the aforementioned law, approved under the government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, by not endorsing the draft sentence proposed by Judge Enrique Arnaldo, in response to that appeal.
In this draft, the rapporteur understood that the aforementioned law was compatible with Article 15 of the Constitution ("....Everyone has the right to life..."), although it had reservations regarding the regulation of the information to be provided to the woman before making the decision (Art. 17.5), by not obliging her to receive it verbally, and the protection of the right to conscientious objection of healthcare personnel (Art. 19.2), as it was felt that the wording of the regulation in the proposed terms left a margin of interpretation that left objectors unprotected.
Beyond these clarifications, there are some points that should be emphasized, the most decisive of which, perhaps, is the recognition of abortion as a "fundamental right that protects the right to life..., to ideological freedom and to non-discrimination" (art. 12).to ideological freedom and non-discrimination" (art. 12), thus contrasting the supposed right to abortion, or the right to the life of the unborn, with the right to life of the woman, and also considers that the acceptance or not of abortion is an ideological question, and that respect for life becomes relative, depending on the opinion of each individual. It is also striking that abortion is approved so that women do not feel discriminated against, discriminated against whom?
Article 15.b), which establishes the authorization of abortion within the first twenty-two weeks of pregnancy whenever there is a risk of serious anomalies in the fetus, is ambiguous, as it leaves a wide margin of discretion to interpret what "serious anomalies" are and whether they are irreversible.
While the TC was ruling, the Congress has already modified the law in an even more radical sense, by eliminating the three-day period of reflection before abortion and allowing young women to have an abortion from the age of 16 without parental permission, in addition to prohibiting any activity, near abortion centers, aimed at offering alternative information to women who go to these centers.
We have expanded on the content of the law in order to have a clear, albeit succinct, idea of the current state of the matter.
In view of this situation, it is no good to think that this is a personal matter that concerns those who abort or perform abortions; but this is not so, the deterioration of society affects us all and it is the responsibility of all, not only of Christians, to intervene to correct this drift.
The brotherhoods are public associations of the faithful of the Catholic Church that have among their missions, entrusted by the Church, "the sanctification of society from within" (cfr. c.298 CIC). Thus the participation of the brotherhoods in the defense of the life of the unborn is not a minor matter, nor is it optional, it is part of their mission.
A defense that goes beyond institutional declarations. It is necessary to go a step further, as some sisterhoods have already done, creating help centers for pregnant women or collaborating in some way with other social initiatives for the same purpose.
It is also decisive to enter into the battle of public opinion, with well-founded opinions, dismantling the idea that those who deny individual liberties and the right to life are progressives; no, progressives are those who are committed to the recognition of the dignity of the person and the defense of his fundamental rights, as stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (United Nations 1948), among them "the right of everyone to life" (art. 3) and "to legal protection, without discrimination" (art. 7). This opens up a field of work for the sisterhoods that urgently needs to be explored.
D. in Business Administration. Director of the Instituto de Investigación Aplicada a la Pyme. Eldest Brother (2017-2020) of the Brotherhood of the Soledad de San Lorenzo, in Seville. He has published several books, monographs and articles on brotherhoods.
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Joseph Evans comments on the readings for the Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time and Luis Herrera offers a short video homily.
Today’s first reading calls on the people to share in God’s own holiness: "Be ye holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy." And what does this holiness consist in? Not in displays of power, nor in sublime wisdom; not even in miracles. It consists in the firm rejection of resentment while also making any necessary reprimands. No grudges but open correction Essentially, holiness is love of others: “You must love your neighbour as yourself. I am the Lord.” And God himself, in his inner life, is love.
I wrote last week that "the Old Law focused more on social morality – at least as it came to be understood’." It actually also spoke of inner attitudes but all too often ancient Israel limited righteousness to outward observance. Jesus merely insisted that holiness involved interior transformation and raised the bar to an even higher level. And we see this particularly in the two antitheses we read today, which are the last two of the six famous antitheses he gave in the Sermon on the Mount.
Our Lord refers to a command given by God on Mount Sinai: "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth". If we consider this brutal today, it is because we are seeing it with Christian eyes. In its time it was a step forward, introducing a basic sense of justice: a crime must be paid for by a proportionate punishment, not violent revenge. But Jesus, without repealing this command justice is still required), adds the new dimension of Christian meekness. Evil is overcome through a response of meek generosity more than through equivalent retribution. "But I say unto you..."Don’t resist evil; turn the other cheek; if they take your coat, give your cloak too; give to one who begs and borrow to one who asks. In other words, evil is smothered when suffered with generous meekness – as we see Our Lord doing on the Cross.
And the final antithesis is the most demanding and God-like of all. "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'But where does God say ‘hate your enemy’? He actually doesn’t. ‘It was said’ by Jewish tradition, not written in divine Scripture. It was a good example of how God’s law had been diluted, even corrupted, over time. And so Jesus, while confirming and elevating what was true in Israel’s law, corrects what was false.
He then calls on us to "love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.", just as God the Father blesses all, evil and good, with rain. There is no merit in loving only those who love us: even pagans and the hated tax-collectors do that. But in order to share in God’s holiness, we must love all without distinction. "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your heavenly Father is perfect." And so once again we see, holiness – perfection – is love.
The priest Luis Herrera Campo offers its nanomiliaA short one-minute reflection for this Sunday's readings.
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In his catechesis on "the passion to evangelize, apostolic zeal", Pope Francis stressed this morning in the Paul VI Hall packed with faithful that "only those who are with Jesus can bring the Gospel", and that the main message is: "He is close to us".
The ChosenIn the skin of the apostles and the holy womenTo the thresholds of the apostlesMissionaries who allow themselves to be evangelizedDuring the general audience, the Holy Father resumed the cycle of catecheses on the apostolic zealThe proclamation of "the joy of the Gospel," which is born of a relationship with God. After "having seen in Jesus the model and the master of proclamation, we move on today to the first disciples," the Pope said. Last Wednesday, Francis synthesized and commented on his recent apostolic journey to the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan.
As usual, a summary of the catechesis was translated into several languages, including Arabic. Before giving the Blessing, the Pope invited everyone to "bear witness to the Gospel every day", and recalled "the beloved and martyrized Ukraine"He prayed that "his cruel sufferings would soon come to an end". Earlier, he had also prayed in a special way for the sick.
"This is what must be said, first and foremost: God is near. We, preaching, often invite people to do something, and that is fine; but let us not forget that the main message is that He is close to us," began the Pope, who divided his catechesis into three parts: why announce, what to announce, and how to do it, commenting on chapter 10 of the Gospel according to St. Matthewwhich he invited to read.
"The proclamation must give primacy to God, and to others the opportunity to welcome Him, to realize that He is near," Francis stressed as he reflected on the first disciples. The Gospel tells us that 'Jesus appointed twelve to be with him and to send them out to preach' (Mk 3:14). This means that 'being' with the Lord and 'going out' to proclaim him - we could say, contemplation and action - are two dimensions of Christian life that always go hand in hand.
In the final synthesis, the Pope pointed out that "the gift of knowing Jesus, which we have received freely, we are also freely called to share with others. What we proclaim is the love of God, which transforms our lives. And the way to transmit it is with simplicity and gentleness, without attachment to material goods and together, in community. No one goes alone, the Church is missionary, and in mission she finds her unity".
"I encourage you to read the Gospel often and to confront our lives and our apostolates with the words of Jesus, which show us the way to be disciples and missionaries after the measure of his Heart. May God bless you," the Pope said.
In the introduction to his message, the Pope affirmed that "There is no going without being", and neither is there "being without going". First of all, there is no going without being: "Proclamation is born of an encounter with the Lord; all Christian activity, especially mission, begins there. Witnessing to him, in fact, means radiating him; but, if we do not receive his light, we will be extinguished; if we do not frequent him, we will carry ourselves instead of him, and all will be in vain. Therefore, only he who is with Jesus can carry the Gospel of Jesus".
"But, equally, there is no being without going," he added. "In fact, following Christ is not an intimate fact: without proclamation, without service, without mission, the relationship with Him does not grow."
The Holy Father noted that, in the Gospel, the Lord sends the disciples before they have completed their preparation. "This means that the experience of mission is part of formation. Let us remember then these two constitutive moments for every disciple: to be and to go. He called the disciples before sending them out, Christ addresses a discourse to them, known as the "missionary discourse". It is found in chapter 10 of the Gospel of Matthew and is like the 'constitution' of the proclamation".
In relation to the three aspects mentioned above, these were some of the Pope's words:
1) Why proclaim. "The motivation lies in five words of Jesus that will do us good to remember: 'Freely you received it; freely give it to others' (v. 8). The proclamation does not start from us, but from the beauty of what we have received freely, without merit: to meet Jesus, to know him, to discover that we are loved and saved. It is such a great gift that we cannot keep it to ourselves, we feel the need to spread it; but in the same style, in gratuitousness". "The joy of being children of God must be shared with our brothers and sisters who do not yet know it! This is the reason for the proclamation.
2) "What to announce? Jesus says: 'Go and proclaim that the kingdom of heaven is at hand' (v. 7). It has been related at the beginning.
3) How to announce. "This is the aspect on which Jesus elaborates the most; 'I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves' (v. 16). He does not ask us to know how to face the wolves, that is, to be able to argue, counterattack and defend ourselves. We would think like this: we become relevant, numerous, prestigious and the world will listen to us and respect us. No, I send you like sheep, like lambs. He asks us to be like this, to be meek and innocent, ready to sacrifice; in fact, the lamb represents this: meekness, innocence, surrender. And He, the Shepherd, will recognize His lambs and protect them from the wolves".
On this aspect, added the Pope, who is the Pastor of the universal Church, as indicated in point 882 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, "it is striking that Jesus, instead of prescribing what to take on mission, tells us what not to take"; "that we should not rely on material certainties, that we should go into the world without worldliness. This is how it is announced: showing Jesus more than speaking about Jesus". "And finally, going together: the Lord sends all the disciples, but no one goes alone. The apostolic Church is entirely missionary and in mission she finds her unity," he concluded.
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Representatives of different religious denominations present in Spain have signed the Interreligious Declaration on the Dignity of Human Life in the face of laws in which, in some cases, human life is seriously unprotected, such as abortion or euthanasia.
The Spanish Bishops' Conference has hosted the signing of the Interfaith Declaration on the Dignity of Human Life and the Dignity of the Human Persona. The text has been signed by representatives of the Islamic Commission of Spain, different Orthodox patriarchates, the Spanish Reformed Episcopal Church, the Federation of Evangelical Entities of Spain and the Catholic Church.
The statement responds, as Rafael Vázquez, secretary of the Episcopal Subcommission for Interconfessional Relations of the EEC, to the "common concern about "the approval of laws in which human life is left unprotected". Among them, Vázquez specifically pointed to the law of euthanasia and that of the abortionratified a few days ago by the Spanish Supreme Court.
Mohamed Ajana, secretary of the Islamic Commission of Spain, Bishop BessarionTimotei, Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, Msgr. Patriarchate of RomaniaAndrey Kordochkin, Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate; Carlos López, Spanish Reformed Episcopal Reformed Church and Carolina Bueno, executive secretary of the Federation of Evangelical Entities of Spain were the signatories of this declaration together with the Secretary General of the Spanish Bishops, Francisco César, EEC Secretary General.
"With respect for the representatives of the three branches of government and their democratic legitimacy," the representatives of the various denominations stressed, "we want to offer a voice to the debate on life, which must respectfully welcome the opinion of all. Also of those who make this reflection on the basis of their religious convictions".
Before the signing, Carolina Bueno and Mohamed Ajana were in charge of reading several verses from the Bible and the Koran in which the commitment to the protection and defense of life, especially the most defenseless, is firmly expressed.
– Supernatural Interreligious Declaration on the Dignity of Human Life specifically reflects the concern of the faithful and religious leaders about laws that go "not only against the principles of the Creator, but also against the most essential of human rights: the right to freedom of thought and conscience. right to life"and recalls that "human dignity does not depend on life circumstances or social consensus, but is an intrinsic quality of every human being, whose rights must always be respected".
In this line, the text underlines the duty to protect life "from the beginning to the end" and that this defense and care "especially of the weakest, are signs of the progress and prosperity of a society and such respect cannot be considered a step backward or contrary to freedom".
The different denominations are not unaware of the "complex situations, of apparent conflicts of rights, which are difficult to resolve" and which often surround the "reasons" for these laws, but recall that these "profound ethical and moral dilemmas cannot be resolved in a generic way by sacrificing one of the fundamental rights affected (in this case, the right to life) by making the other prevail".
In addition, they ask the faithful, society in general and the political community "to reflect once again and make a commitment to cooperate and work together so that all human life may be protected".
From respect for the representatives of the three branches of the Spanish State, Legislative, Executive and Judicial; from recognition of their democratic legitimacy as public servants to dictate laws, administer justice and exercise delegated power in representation of popular sovereignty; not doubting that they work in good conscience and in good faith for the common good; we the undersigned wish to state the following:
For all these reasons, as representatives belonging to different religious confessions but united in the defense of life, human dignity and human rights - especially of the most vulnerable - we ask our faithful, society in general and the political community to reflect once again and assume the commitment to cooperate and work together so that all human life may be protected and safeguarded as a gift from God, endowed with the highest dignity.
In Madrid, on February 15, 2023
Sign the Declaration
- Dr. Mohamed Ajana, Secretary of the Islamic Commission of Spain
- Bishop Bessarion, Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church of the Ecumenical Patriarchate
- Timotei, of the Orthodox Church of the Patriarchate of Romania.
- Rev. Andrey Kordochkin, Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate
- Bishop Carlos Lopez, Spanish Reformed Episcopal Church
- Ms. Carolina Bueno, Executive Secretary of the Federation of Evangelical Entities of Spain.
- Francisco César, Secretary General of the EEC
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In the relationship with others, in marriage, we need to recover the "we" as opposed to the "I", and that requires effort, because you and I have a natural resistance to donate ourselves, to lose so that we all win.
The bad guy is always the other. It happens in international politics, in parliaments, in institutions, in marriages and even within the Church. Why can't we get along? There is an explanation: it is called sin and, although it is a term that today has lost much of its meaning, in reality it is the explanation for most of the evils of our world.
Sin, in common language, is related in a childish way, with what is forbidden, not with what is bad, that is why we even see it as an advertising hook in slogans and commercial brands.
The word refers us to pleasure, to adventure, to transgression or to leaving the established. The loss of innocence has become a value because, by erasing God from our lives, we convince ourselves that we are free.
The problem is that, as in those parties that teenagers organize, believing themselves to be older, when their parents are not at home; in the end, freedom ends in disorder and, sometimes, with the police or the ambulance at the door.
To speak of sin today, in our secular and apparently adult and self-sufficient societies, is an anachronism because we live in the belief that there is no one above us, that we are accountable only to our own conscience -which curiously enough is usually a merciful and understanding judge of ourselves and demanding and inquisitive with everyone else-.
To ignore sin, or rather, the concupiscence or inclination to evil that all human beings have, distances us more and more from reality and submerges us in a world of unrealizable fantasies.
That is why many couples get married really thinking that they will do it forever, but eventually see that it is impossible; that is why many politicians convince themselves that their ideas will put an end to the world's problems and then cannot help but spoil it more and more; that is why national politics is increasingly polarized and lacking in consensus; that is why the major international blocs sharpen their knives or rather ready their nuclear briefcases.
Since "I" am the measure of all things, the only just judge who knows right from wrong, the bad guys are always the others. It does not cross my mind to think that the person, or the political party or the nation in front of me might also be legitimately seeking good in their own way.
We magnify their defects and mistakes, and minimize their virtues and successes. And I am not only talking about knowing, as any intelligent person knows, that we can all humanly fail (the best soccer players miss a penalty), but also about realizing that behind my intention there is easily hidden, unconsciously, a certain selfishness. And selfishness (economic, emotional, power, group...) is the natural enemy of the common good.
A marriage is not the cohabitation of two individual interests; a people or a nation is not the sum of small individualities.
We need to recover the "we" in front of the "I", and that requires effort, because you and I have a natural resistance to donate ourselves, to lose in benefit of all of us winning.
Ignoring sin does not make us freer, but more slaves to our selfishness, a force that begins by destroying those closest to us, but that spreads like a virus and ends up killing us ourselves because we are made to live in family, in community, to be a people. Hence the suicidal drift of the West, ever older and without generational replacement.
The "know thyself" of the Delphic oracle was missing a fundamental premise: God. Without knowing God and his message, we cannot fully know ourselves and will continue to sin - yes, that old word - or, in other words, to destroy the ties that bind us to our neighbor and give us meaning.
The men and women who work for the common good are those who do not remain on the surface, but who discover, behind the layer of makeup with which we all face the world, a weak being capable of being dragged down by evil at the first sign of change.
He who knows himself, discovers a root wound that inclines him to seek his own interest over that of others and fights against it. And he who is able to reach there, does not remain in the sadness of discovering his own failure; but finds much lower, in the depths, a desire for good, for truth, for beauty, for love.
St. Augustine, for example, a great sinner, discovered this and left us this phrase with which I would like to close this article, leaving the sweet taste of hope. And the fact is that, in spite of our sins, which are many, "God is closer to us than we are to ourselves".
Journalist. Graduate in Communication Sciences and Bachelor in Religious Sciences. He works in the Diocesan Delegation of Media in Malaga. His numerous "threads" on Twitter about faith and daily life have a great popularity.
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Galileo Galilei was an Italian astronomer, engineer, mathematician and physicist, closely related to the scientific revolution, he was also a convinced Christian. And no, he was not killed by the Inquisition.
It has been heard that science and faith cannot share a common place, since the sciences are "the certain knowledge of things by their causes," according to the Aristotelian view.
On the other hand, faith, the truth of which is revealed, or, as it indicates that Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), is that which comprises an adherence of the intelligence and will to the Revelation that God has made of himself through his works and words.
However, throughout the history of science there were scientists who presented themselves as convinced Christians, such as Copernicus, KeplerNewton and Galileo himself.
Thanks to theological thinking, as the expert Mariano Artigas points out, they obtained a path suitable for the realization of "systematic works that led to the consolidation of the experimental method".
Galileo has around him a series of theories that many confused scientists or those who do not know the story, have decided to tell, so that he is a martyr of science oppressed and killed by the Holy Church.
The truth is that Galileo was not killed by the Inquisition Tribunal. In 1610, Galileo was convinced of the theory of the heliocentric system, which he defended without having foundations; however, the problem does not lie in the belief that the sun is the center of the universe, but in the biblical interpretations he made based on that theory.
In the book of Joshua (10:12-13), it indicates that he requests Yahweh that the sun and the moon stand still. This indicated that the earth remained still, while the sun and the moon were the ones revolving around it. The heliocentric theory clearly contradicted this.
Galileo reveals this truth, which he does not substantiate, and the Holy Office, which at that time was not open to interpretations that did not come from theologians endorsed by them, admonishes Galileo and orders him not to propagate this thought again, since it could cause confusion.
For 16 years Galileo remains silent; however, in 1632 he publishes his work Dialogue on the two great world systems, the Ptolemaic and the Copernican..
In this one the figure of Pope Urban VIII is humiliated, since he is represented as the character who disagrees with Copernicus' theory and always loses the discussions.
In this year Galileo is accused of failing to keep his promise and pleads before the court in Rome.
He was sentenced to prison and forced abjuration. His time in prison was spent in various palaces of his friends in Tuscany and Florence.
He died of illness, but it is clear that in life he received all kinds of attention.
Ultimately, Galileo is not killed or tortured in any way. He remained faithful to his belief and faith. Thanks to his case, the Second Vatican Council deplored the trial of Galileo, in the Constitution on the Church and the Modern World, stating that: "in this regard, certain attitudes are to be deplored which, not understanding well the meaning of the legitimate autonomy of science, have sometimes occurred among Christians themselves; attitudes which, followed by bitter polemics, have led many to establish an opposition between science and faith" as Mariano Artigas recalls.
Similarly, Pope John Paul II deplored the process in a famous speech of November 10, 1979, noting that the scientific and Catholic Galileo objectively taught a remarkable harmony between science and faith.
This harmony was one of the main drivers of the scientific creativity of the great pioneers of modern science, including Galileo.
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The feast of St. Valentine is celebrated both within the Church (locally) and in popular culture. His legend as an intercessor for favors in love makes him one of the best known saints. Temples in many countries claim to have his relics, however, it is difficult to know for sure. In a church in Dublin they claim to have the blood and some bones of the saint.
"He who prays is like a lover, he carries in his heart the beloved person".The truth of human love. A different way to celebrate Valentine's Day#MakeLoveHappen: love, besides a gift is buildingOn February 14th, the Church and popular culture celebrate St. Valentine's Day. This date owes its name to a saint whose history is marked by uncertainty. St. Valentine of Rome is a difficult figure to place in the space and time of antiquity, which does not prevent him from being one of the best known saints. After the Second Vatican Council, Valentine was removed from the saints' calendar, but his date is still remembered locally.
Since the Middle Ages, the feast of lovers began to be celebrated on February 14th. Some say it is because St. Valentine would celebrate weddingas in times of prohibition of marriages. Others say it is because it is the beginning of the mating season in nature. Be that as it may, the reality is that it is a date known worldwide as the day of lovers.
Due to the aforementioned historical inaccuracies, the remains of the saint are lost throughout the length and breadth of the European continent. So much so that there are several temples, scattered all over the geography, that claim to have relics of St. Valentine. The veracity of these claims is difficult to prove, but what is certain is that relics are a good way to encourage the piety of the faithful.
In the Church of Whitefriar Streetalso known as Our Lady of Mount Carmel (Dublin, Ireland), some bones and blood of St. Valentine are preserved in a chapel. Its prior, Father Simon Nolan, talks in this interview about the history of relics in Dublin, the popular cult and the intercession of the saints.
-Father John Spratt (1796-1871), a former Carmelite prior of Whitefriar Street, was noted for his work to relieve the poor of DublinHe was also a renowned orator. After a tour giving homilies in the churches of Rome in 1835, Pope Gregory XVI presented Father Spratt with the relics of St. Valentine. The Carmelite church on Whitefriar Street was just being built at the time (it was erected in 1825) and by giving the relics the Pope also wanted to show his support for the Dubliners.
There is a very strong symbolism in the relics of St. Valentine, which were recovered from the Roman catacombs, arriving in Ireland when the Church was emerging after the Catholic emancipation (which took place in 1829).
The remains were brought in procession to Whitefriar Street Church in 1836 and received by the Archbishop of Dublin, Murray. The relics have been here ever since.
The current shrine of St. Valentine dates from the fifties of the last century and has an altar with a glass front, where the reliquary is located, and a statue of the saint. The image was made by a famous Irish sculptor, Irene Broe. The statue of St. Valentine shows the saint wearing the red robes of a martyr and holding a palm, a symbol of the triumph of the martyrdom.
-The original documentation from the Holy See states that the reliquary contains some bones of St. Valentine, martyr, with some blood. We have never claimed to have all the relics of St. Valentine, it is possible that there are several relics of the saint in different places.
-St. Valentine (3rd century) lived in a tumultuous period of the Roman Empire, a time of war. As part of the war effort, Emperor Claudius II forbade Roman soldiers to marry. St. Valentine defied the ban and secretly married loving couples. He paid the ultimate price for his work, as he was executed on February 14, 269, which is now his feast day.
St. Valentine is a witness and defender of the marriage. He was willing to lay down his life for the cause of human love and the freedom of religion.
-Of course! For hundreds of years Catholics have been encouraged to venerate relics. It is not even possible to consecrate an altar in a Catholic church if relics of saints are not placed inside it. The Mass starts with the priest kissing the altar containing the relics. Relics allow us to approach the saints, members of Christ, children and friends of God, our intercessors. Religion is not meant to be merely intellectual.
Much of our religion involves sensory elements (the images, incense and the musicfor example). Relics help us to feel close to the saints, who have already reached the place where we want to go.
However, relics should bring us closer to the saint and, above the saint, to God, beyond the invisible and the material. They should lead us to consider the love of God made real in the saint; to seek to learn from the virtuous life of the saint and to follow his example; to give thanks to God who confirms the virtue of the saint through signs and healings that come through his intercession.
-Through the prayer of petition, praying by asking, in other words. Everything is modeled on the Lord's prayer, the Our Father, which is the pattern of all prayer. The Lord's Prayer begins by praising God the Father and then goes on to ask for things: daily bread, deliver us from evil, etc.
We believe that we can ask the saints for help because they are close to God. They intercede for us before God. They are our "helpers" and "friends" in Heaven. All healings, all graces, are granted by God, but the saints can help us by asking God, by being at our side, especially when life is difficult. They understand what it is to live as men even while contemplating the divine.
-St. Valentine lived in an extremely tumultuous time, associated with the beginning of the fall of the Roman Empire. Contemporary records of this time do not usually survive. The reality is that most mentions of St. Valentine date from a few hundred years after his death. Some things were passed down orally. It is very common for saints to have different traditions, -usually in different places-, "different voices" with different "stories" that are passed on and eventually written down.
Many people visit the sanctuary throughout the year but the week leading up to the holiday we are extremely busy at the church on Whitefriar Street, where a lot of national and international media interest gathers.
Some engaged couples visit the sanctuary this week and receive blessings. Tour groups, schools, scout groups and university groups also come. Countless couples come to the shrine to celebrate their love, and also people who are looking for love, or people who are going through difficulties in their marriage or who are worried about their sick children. Many sign the shrine's petition book, leaving their prayers, hopes and wishes.
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The human being is the same; and he cries out, as always, to love and be loved, even though, at times, he affirms and sings the contrary.
That '85 CasioHelping young people to live true loveLove, affectivity and feelings: themes of the II Virtual Congress for Catholic EducatorsMusic is undoubtedly one of the elements that best reflects the desires and longings of a given culture. We have been expressing our feelings -of love and lack of love- through songs for centuries.
Looking at the lyrics of the melodies we listen to helps to understand the culture in which we live and to know what people -especially young people- carry in their hearts.
Postmodern music sings the great contradictions of the deconstructed love of our time. The lack of love is expressed in a stark way and shows our growing difficulty to love each other.
The individualistic technological culture in which we are immersed often prevents us from discovering the other and, even if it is not what our heart desires, we end up accepting ephemeral loves.
Deep down, we want to be the only one for each other, confesses Olivia Rodrigo in Happier. That's why it hurts so much to fall out of love, and we can't stand betrayal because it reminds us of our lack of commitment, as a scorned woman acknowledges. Shakira in her latest productions. In the end, there is nothing left to do but try to justify a life of solitude as in How to be lonely of Rita Ora.
There are those who desperately and absurdly sing that we love ourselves better, as Miley Cyrus does in Flowers.
There is also no shortage of songs that speak of a trash love that, like fast food, satisfies but does not fill.
The music ultimately reflects the wounds -sometimes deep- of the lack of love that, as a society, we carry in our hearts.
Fortunately, despite these heartbreaking experiences, and as a kind of vindication against the nihilism of this century, we continue to sing of the beauty that lies in the desire to love and be loved unconditionally and forever.
We listen to beautiful melodies of betrothal love such as the popular Perfect by Ed Sheeran. There is no shortage of songs that speak about the strength of a mother's or daughter's love, such as the Love songs to you o Oh mom by Rigoberta Bandini. There are also those on the authentic and selfless love of friends, in That which you give me by Jarabe de Palo.
They are hopeful signs that, although the circumstances, the ways of expressing what we feel are different, the human being is the same; and cries out, as always, to love and be loved. If only good music contributed to a greater extent to the cultural battle.
We urgently need new models of life to help us put back together the pieces of a deconstructed love.
Professor at the Faculty of Law of the International University of Catalonia and director of the Institute for Advanced Family Studies. She directs the Chair on Intergenerational Solidarity in the Family (IsFamily Santander Chair) and the Childcare and Family Policies Chair of the Joaquim Molins Figueras Foundation. She is also Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Law at UIC Barcelona.
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"God is always new", is the title of the book with thoughts of Benedict XVI which has been selected and prepared by Luca Caruso, who works at the Ratzinger Foundation.
It shows how Benedict XVI understood faith not as a set of rigid doctrines, but as a path to follow.
Caruso is an expert on Ratzinger's thought and for those who know him little he recommends reading his writings where he speaks of the need for Christians to deepen their dialogue with God and, above all, to be people of authentic, sincere and credible faith.
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Since the announcement of a Synodal Way in Germany in March 2019, not only cardinals, bishops and bishops' conferences have spoken out about it. The Holy See has also repeatedly spoken out about it. A summary.
Among the Holy See's statements on the German Synodal Way, the letter written by Pope Francis in his own handwriting has a special weight. "To the people of God on pilgrimage in Germany", dated June 29, 2019, when the German Bishops' Conference had announced the Synodal Way, but it had not yet formally begun its journey.
Logically, in practically all the pronouncements of the Holy See in this regard, reference is made again and again to this papal letter.
The German Bishops' Conference announced the constitution of a Synodal Way at its Spring Assembly in March 2019.
Pope Francis made a statement on the matter in a letter "to the people of God on pilgrimage in Germany"..
He recalled in it what he had told the German bishops in 2015: that. "one of the first and great temptations at the ecclesial level was to believe that the solutions to present and future problems would come exclusively from purely structural, organic or bureaucratic reforms.". He described this position as "new pelagianism".
The Pope spoke of the "primacy of evangelization" as of a "discipleship path of response and conversion in love to the One who first loved us". and that "leads to recovering the joy of the Gospel, the joy of being Christians.".
The main concern should be "how to share this joy by opening ourselves and going out to meet our brothers". Expressly, Francis spoke of "recognizing the signs of the times"which, however "is not synonymous with simply adapting to the spirit of the times.". Rather, in order to resolve the issues at hand, it is decisive the sensus ecclesiae.
The People of God should not be reduced to a "illustrated group".which "do not allow yourself to see, taste and be thankful for this scattered holiness".. In this context, he spoke of holiness "from next door".
And he added: "We need prayer, penance and adoration that put us in a position to say like the publican: 'My God, have mercy on me, for I am a sinner!'; not as a prudish, puerile or pusillanimous attitude but with the courage to open the door and see what is normally veiled by superficiality, the culture of well-being and appearance.".
Rainer Woelki, Cardinal of Cologne, said that he particularly liked the reference to the "primacy of evangelization"Therefore, "we must be a missionary Church and we must not look to a 'perfect apparatus', but to Christ, the risen Lord."and that it is comforting "the naturalness and assurance with which the Holy Father uses concepts that in this country we often only express with hesitation and a certain timidity, which we have almost forgotten".Transformation, conversion, mission. The Archbishop of Cologne concluded his remarks with an appeal: "Let us take the words of the Holy Father, let us take them seriously! Let us bring the Good News to today's world.".
Although other bishops also expressed themselves in this sense, the Synodal Way -which was being constituted at the time- deduced from the Pope's letter simply a "encouragement" for their work. The Pope's statement on the "primacy of evangelization" -the central aspect in the letter- was not seriously considered.
Walter Kasper, formerly a cardinal of the Curia, called that omission "the fundamental error in the system of the Synodal Way".In Germany, it seems that it was not understood that the Pope's call for a new evangelization should not only be an additional facet of the Synodal Way, but a fundamental principle of the Synodal Way.
Instead of evangelization, the Synodal Way preferred to talk about "power and division of powers in the Church.". In general, there was the impression that the Pope's letter, marked by a very serious concern, received little attention.
Pope Francis himself would return to the subject on different occasions. For example, Bishop Heinz Josef Algermissen, bishop emeritus of Fulda, referred to an audience with the Holy Father in October 2020, saying that Francis had complained that in Germany they are treated in a way that is not in line with the Pope's wishes. "political issues" The letter of the Pope, in which he spoke of evangelization as the key question for the future of the faith, was not taken into account, but he commented that Francis had the impression that in the German dioceses it had hardly been taken into account at all. Bishop Algermissen added that the Pope had given him the task of seeing to it that the letter of June 29, 2019, was remembered.
During the visit ad limina of the German bishops of November 2022, it became clear, according to various sources, that the disregard of his letter of June 29, 2019 had "hurt and angry" to the Pope.
In response, the president of the German Bishops' Conference, Bishop Bätzing, promised that bishops would "they're going to dig deeper into the charter.".
Also in another respect, the Synodal Way turned a deaf ear to the statements of Pope Francis: in September 2019, when the preparatory work of the German Synodal Way was beginning, Francis said in an audience for the Synod of the Greek Catholic Church of Ukraine: "A synod is not a parliament."This was not to be misinterpreted as a survey of opinions followed by negotiation of compromises. "You have to deal with things, debate them, as usual; but it is not a parliament. A synod is not a vote as in politics: I give you this, you give me that.".
In a general audience in November 2020, the Pope repeated this idea: synodal processes should not be perceived with the categories of political parties or companies. "Sometimes I am saddened when I see a community that has good will but is going in the wrong direction because it thinks it is helping the Church with meetings, as if it were a political party.". However, the Synodal Way continued to persist in achieving majorities and in voting.
In September 2019, the prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, Cardinal Marc Ouellet, sent a letter to the then president of the German Bishops' Conference, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, in which he stated that the. "binding synodal process" is not foreseen, so "not admissible under canon law"..
Cardinal Ouellet pointed out that plans for the Synodal Way would have to be in line with the guidelines set forth by Pope Francis in his June 2019 letter. According to Cardinal Ouellet, a German synod cannot change the universally valid teaching of the Church.
The letter was accompanied by a four-page opinion of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, which stated: "It is clear that these questions concern not only the Church in Germany, but the universal Church, and - with some exceptions - cannot be the subject of deliberations or decisions of a particular Church without violating what the Holy Father expresses in his letter."
The German Bishops' Conference responded that Cardinal Ouellet's letter referred to an earlier draft of the Statutes for the Synodal Way, which had since been revised. In addition: "We hope that the results of an opinion formation in our country will also be useful for the universal Church and for other Episcopal Conferences in individual cases. In any case, it is not understandable why the debate on questions on which the Magisterium has made determinations, as your letter suggests, should be eliminated."
A visit from Cardinal Marx to Cardinal Ouellet was announced. "to clear up misunderstandings". The German Bishops' Conference approved the revised statutes in November 2019, and the Synodal Path began in early December 2019 with the four preparatory forums.
After they had expressed their concern about the Synodal Way in letters to the German Bishops' Conference, cardinals and bishops, and even bishops' conferences of other countries - from the Ukrainian Bishops' Commission for Marriage and the Family, to Bishop Czeslaw Kozon of Copenhagen and the Nordic Bishops' Conference; from the president of the Polish Bishops' Conference, Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki, to 74 bishops from the United States, Canada, Africa and Australia - and cardinals of the Curia such as Walter Kasper, Robert Sarah and Paul Josef Cordes would have spoken out, the Vatican published in July 2022 a brief statement signed by the "Holy See" The Synodal Way - that is, by the supreme authority of the Church - in which it forbade the Synodal Way to make any decision that would "compel the bishops and the faithful to adopt new forms of government and new doctrinal and moral orientations.". The document stated: "It would not be admissible to introduce in the dioceses, prior to an agreement reached at the level of the universal Church, new official structures or doctrines that would constitute a breach of ecclesial communion and a threat to the unity of the Church.". The Declaration quoted the Pope's June 2019 letter, in which the Holy Father speaks of the need to. "to keep always alive and effective communion with the whole body of the Church.".
The Vatican's clearest criticism of the Synodal Way to date was expressed by the Prefects of the Dicasteries for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Luis Ladaria, and of the Congregation for Bishops, Cardinal Marc Ouellet, at the so-called Interdicasterial Meeting with the German bishops, during his ad limina visit in November 2022. The meeting was chaired by Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin.
In his presentation, Cardinal Ladaria started from the Pope's letter of June 29, 2019: a new indication of the importance that, in relation to the German Synodal Way, is given to the Holy Father's writing in the Vatican and not only by the Pope. As Prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, he expressed five concerns, "that emerge from a careful reading of the texts treated so far in your Synodal Journey"..
First of all, the cardinal referred to the "literary genre of texts".. In them, he said, there are statements about positions in the people of God, references to scientific and sociological knowledge, results of exegesis that are still under discussion, "general protocols on the possible public recognition of the Church's doctrine and, finally, references to anonymous theologians with no possibility of identification.". He therefore advocates that the Synodal Path should produce one final document rather than a multitude of texts.
Secondly, Cardinal Ladaria mentioned the "connection between the structure of the Church and the phenomenon of clergy abuse of minors and other abuse phenomena.". Of course, further abuses must be prevented. However, this does not mean "to reduce the mystery of the Church to a mere institution of power or to consider the Church from the outset as a structurally abusive organization".
Ladaria's third observation is related to the "vision of human sexuality according to the doctrine of the Church."The cardinal cited in particular the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church as an authority. From the texts of the Synodal Way, he said, one can get the impression "that there is almost nothing to save in this area of Church doctrine. Everything has to be changed".. The cardinal poses a question: what effect does this have on the faithful? "Who listen to the voice of the Church and strive to follow its guidelines for their lives? Do they think they have done everything wrong so far?". And ask for "more confidence in the vision" that "the Magisterium has developed in recent decades on sexuality"..
Fourth, the Prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith discusses "the role of women in the Church and, in particular, the question of women's access to ordination to the priesthood.". Cardinal Ladaria reproaches that the texts of the Synodal Way reduce everything to the affirmation that the Church does not respect the dignity of women because they do not have access to priestly ordination. Ladaria: "It is a matter of accepting the truth that 'the Church has no authority whatsoever to ordain women priests' (St. John Paul II, Ordinatio sacerdotalis).". However, it recognizes "the recent deliberations of the Synodal Path". The company is now seeking clarification on the issue from Pope Francis. This, "it would undoubtedly tone down the very controversial tones of the text on women's access to ordination to the priesthood, and for that we can only be grateful.".
Finally, Cardinal Ladaria expresses his objections with regard to "the exercise of the magisterium of the Church and, in particular, the exercise of the episcopal magisterium." according to the Synodal Way and criticizes the fact that in its texts it has been almost completely forgotten "the indication of the conciliar Constitution Dei Verbum and, in particular, the question of the transmission of the faith through apostolic succession.". That is why he denies equating the mission of the bishops with that of the bishops. "other offices in the Church, such as those of theologians and experts in other sciences.".
At the same meeting, the Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, Cardinal Marc Ouellet, also referred to Pope Francis' June 2019 letter.the fact that the letter "has not really been assumed as a guide for the synodal method". has had important consequences. "After this initial distancing from the pontifical magisterium on the methodological level, growing tensions with the official magisterium on the substantive level emerged in the course of the work."which gave rise to proposals "openly contrary to the doctrine affirmed by all the popes since the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council.". This is equivalent to a "change of the Church" and not only to "pastoral innovations in the moral or dogmatic field.".
Cardinal Ouellet is struck by the fact that "the agenda of a limited group of theologians several decades ago has suddenly become a proposal of the majority of the German episcopate.". In this context, he mentions the abolition of compulsory celibacy, the ordination of viri probatiaccess of women to ordination, the access of women to ordination, a "moral re-evaluation of homosexuality". and reflections on sexuality inspired by gender theory, as well as the "structural and functional limitation of hierarchical power"..
However, the Prefect also speaks of the "possibility of combining perspectives through a methodological change that could help to improve the theses of the German Synodal Way.". For this purpose, it recommends "listen more deeply to the approach of Pope Francis and the World Synod of Bishops.".
In a "Joint Communiqué," the Holy See and the German bishops summarized the most important points of the Interdicasterial Dialogue. The document affirmed that Cardinals Ladaria and Ouellet "clearly and openly expressed the concerns and reservations that exist about the method, content and proposals of the Synodal Pathway.".
Cardinal Secretary of State Parolin pointed out that "can't be left out" the exchange of ideas of the Inter-Dicasterial Dialogue. In addition, mention was made of the "numerous contributions" in which "the central importance of evangelization and mission as the ultimate goals of the ongoing processes was noted."but also "the awareness that some issues are non-negotiable.".
However, the question that arises after the ad limina visit is how the bishops will introduce these proposals into the Synodal Way. The Central Committee of German Catholics has already announced that it will maintain its agenda for the Fifth Plenary Assembly in March.
Among the demands of the Synodal Way is the blessing of same-sex couples. In March of 2021, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith responded to a dubium that had been presented to them. In the document signed by the Prefect, Cardinal Luis Ladaria, and the Secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Archbishop Giacomo Morandi, it was stated that the Church has no authority to bless same-sex unions. With the nature of the blessing granted by the Church, only the following is compatible "that which is ordained to receive and express grace, in the service of God's plans inscribed in creation and fully revealed by Christ our Lord.".
In Germany, however, they were organized on May 10, 2009. "blessing services for people who love each other."The president of the German Bishops' Conference, Bishop Georg Bätzing, declared, however, that he did not consider such public actions to be public. However, the president of the German Bishops' Conference, Bishop Georg Bätzing, declared that he did not consider such actions public. "a useful signal and a way forward."which were not suitable as "instrument for political-ecclesiastical demonstrations or protest actions.".
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At the Angelus, Pope Francis invited everyone to pray a Hail Mary for peace in Nicaragua, and expressed his sorrow for the situation of Monsignor Rolando Alvarez, bishop condemned to 26 years in prison, and for those deported from the country. He also prayed for "the martyred Ukraine" and for the victims of the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria.
Pope Francis' diplomacy in Nicaragua"Ukraine suffers and deserves peace," says Pope on Day of PrayerRescues against the clock in TurkeySyria, a painful wound that requires solidarity and patienceAfter the Angelus prayer, in which the Holy Father asked if we are satisfied with "not doing evil", instead of "trying to grow in love for God and for others", Pope Francis recalled "the pain" of suffering peoples, such as Turkey and Syriawhere there have been so many thousands of victims of the "catastrophe" of the earthquakes, about which the Roman Pontiff has been looking at pictures today. The Pope asked us to "pray" and see "what we can do".
He went on to ask that "we should not forget the martyred Ukraine"and let us pray that the Lord will "open roads of peace and give us the courage to travel them".
Immediately, the Pope has shown his closeness and asked for prayers for the bishop of Matagalpa (Nicaragua), Monsignor Rolando Alvarez, who was sentenced to 26 years in prison, and for those deported from the "beloved nation" of Nicaragua. He also asked for prayers for the Lord to "open the hearts of the political leaders" of the country, and invited them to pray a Hail Mary for peace in Nicaragua.
Before the Angelus, the Holy Father commented on the Gospel of today's liturgy, in which Jesus says: 'Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish but to fulfill' (Mt 5:17). To fulfill: this is a key word for understanding Jesus and his message. What does it mean?"
The Pope said that "God does not reason with calculations and tables; He loves us like a in loveNot to the minimum, but to the maximum! It does not say to us: I love you up to a certain point. No, true love never goes to a certain point and is never satisfied; love goes beyond, it cannot do less. The Lord showed us this by giving his life on the cross and forgiving his murderers (cf. Lk 23:34). And he has entrusted to us the commandment he holds most dear: that we love one another as he has loved us (cf. Jn 15:12). This is the love that gives fulfillment to the Law, to faith, to life!".
Earlier, Francis had recalled that the first step is taken by God. "The message is clear: God loves us first, gratuitously, taking the first step towards us without our deserving it; and, therefore, we cannot celebrate his love without taking the first step in our turn to reconcile ourselves with those who have hurt us. Thus there is fulfillment in the eyes of God, otherwise external, purely ritualistic observance is useless. [...] The commandments that God has given us must not be locked up in the suffocating safes of formal observance, otherwise we remain in an external and detached religiosity, servants of a 'master god' instead of children of God the Father."
Finally, the Pope urged us to ask ourselves about our calculations and conformisms: "How do I live my faith? Is it a question of calculation, of formalism, or is it a love story with God? Am I content with not doing evil, with keeping up 'the façade,' or do I try to grow in love for God and for others? And from time to time do I confront myself with the great commandment of Jesus, ask myself if I love my neighbor as He loves me?"
"For perhaps we are inflexible in judging others and forget to be merciful, as God is merciful to us," the Holy Father concluded. "May Mary, who perfectly observed the Word of God, help us to give fulfillment to our faith and charity."
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Marriage Week in the United States reaches its climax on February 12, World Marriage Day. It is a date on which the entire believing community is called to reflect on the gift of marriage and a good time to learn about formation and accompaniment initiatives for married couples.
"Marriage: one flesh, given and received," is the theme for Marriage Week 2023 and highlights the union of spouses into one flesh.
Marriage is the image of Christ's love for his Church. "Spouses are called to give themselves fully to each other, just as Christ gave himself to his Church," the Pastoral Letter notes. Marriage. Love and life in the divine plan.The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, which emphasizes how "The married couple forms an image of the Trinitarian God. Like the Holy Trinity, marriage is the communion of love between persons equal to each other: husband and wife."
– Supernatural National Marriage Weekwhich was born in 2010, aims to reflect on the gift of marriage. In this sense, it aims to offer tools for spouses and resources for young people to discover the vocation to marriage.
In this regard, a survey conducted by Georgetown University's Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) indicates that from 1975 to 2021, the number of marriages has been steadily declining in the United States.
According to CARA, in 2021, of the 66.8 million Catholics in the country, 54% are married; 11% divorced and 21% never married.
In their Pastoral Letter on Marriage, the U.S. bishops highlight the four major challenges facing this sacrament: cohabitation, contraception, same-sex unions and divorce.
On the first point, many young Americans choose to cohabit with their partner for various reasons, including economic ones; some never marry either in church or before a civil authority.
The central problems with them are not the "costs" or donations related to a wedding, but the lack of knowledge of the marriage vocation and the absence of catechesis.
Faced with this reality, the U.S. bishops launched in 2004 the National Pastoral Initiative on Marriagean effort to promote, preserve and protect marriage.
The results of that effort were, among others, a Pastoral Letter and the issuance of guidelines or policies for marriage preparation in North American dioceses.
Its objective is to strengthen marriage in the Church through pastoral care and catechetical formation before and after marriage.
Each diocese, at the direction of the bishop, adopts, modifies or expands these policies. However, most dioceses have consistently adopted such guidelines for marriage preparation.
The central nucleus of marriage preparation is catechesis and pre- and post-marriage accompaniment. In the first phase, once the first contacts with the parish priest have been initiated, after ascertaining the freedom and absence of impediments of the engaged couple, the catechetical phase begins, which consists of pre-marriage meetings, retreats, the completion of a "pre-marriage study" and the accompaniment of the parish priest and other experienced couples.
The "premarital study"is a tool through which a series of questions about various aspects of marriage are applied.
It is not a marriage test, nor a psychological evaluation. It is an instrument that allows the engaged couple to get to know each other better and explore areas that may be unknown or obscure. It addresses issues such as child rearing, faith life, financial management, or future projects. Subjects that, perhaps at an initial moment for the lovers might seem irrelevant, but that have been the cause of marriage annulments and civil divorce.
For the premarital study almost all dioceses use FOCCUS, which translates as "Facilitating Communication, Understanding and Couple Study" and the Premarital Study, PMI.
Another tool in the process of marriage preparation is the pastoral care. The pastor or a permanent deacon accompanies the couples in all phases of preparation.
In many dioceses there are also apostolates for married couples. These are married couples who have been married for several years, committed to the parish, to the family and who have been called to help other couples. They receive catechetical and pastoral training before beginning their apostolate.
This accompaniment of other married couples is essential for the newlyweds not only before, but also after marriage, because, having gone through the vicissitudes of marriage, they can offer practical advice to the newlyweds on how to face the difficulties of this state of life and emerge stronger.
During National Marriage Week, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops makes available digital resources, in social networks Twitter, Facebook in English and Instagram There is also a Spanish-language website called For your Marriage which contains a variety of tools. Among them, a marriage retreat for the home, catechetical videos on the sacrament, the pastoral letter on marriage in Spanish, prayers and liturgical suggestions for the celebration of National Marriage Week and World Marriage Day on Sunday, February 12, 2023.
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"The Sisters of Life are women consecrated to God through the traditional three vows, whose main mission is to help and accompany pregnant women. Their work, which is carried out in the United States and Canada, has helped save hundreds of lives.
Can we overcome social polarization on the issue of abortion?Abortion againWhat happens in the first eight weeks of life?Since 1991, smiling women in blue and white habits can be found in the streets of the United States with a very specific mission: to protect life. They are the "Sisters of Life. These nuns go "wherever the Holy Spirit leads" to accompany pregnant mothers at risk of aborting the baby or in situations of great vulnerability, with the aim of becoming mothers themselves who welcome and help these women.
They are very aware that "each person is a story, a present and dreams", so they give themselves daily to all of them. They give diapers, housing, food, etc., but always keeping in mind that "what they really need is God in their life".
In Omnes we spoke with Sister Maria Cristina, who has contacted several religious to be able to answer this interview in which they talk about their mission and experience. As they tell us, their work can be summarized as follows: "Every life is sacred, it is a unique image of God. Every life matters.
-Each person, from the moment of conception, is unique and unrepeatable. There has never been another person like him or her, nor will there ever be. Each life is holy. Every life matters!
Once an elderly lady called, saying that she was expecting quadruplets, that she had gone to a private clinic and was expecting 2 boys and 2 girls. The story sounded very strange and the doctors did not want to take the risk of treating her because they thought it was barbaric and crazy. Because of our fourth vow to defend life, we saw clearly that if the lady was telling the truth, there were 5 lives at stake. We had to defend them all and take the risk of being called crazy.
The person matters from the moment of conception. Recently, in our graveyard, we buried frozen embryos in pipettes, because the mother had just converted to Catholicism and had realized that she still had several frozen embryos, her children, in the hospital! It was a beautiful ceremony and gave the mother a peace that even she could not have imagined. As a mother, she named her children - she knew how many were boys and girls - and gave them the rest they needed and the peace her own heart needed.
-It depends. A lot of times we start by inviting them to take their pulse and listen to their heartbeat, then we ask them: "Who calls to life?"
Recognizing that we don't give ourselves a single moment of life - not even one heartbeat - is the first step in knowing that life is a gift. To know that we are small before a God who gives life is the first step. To know that we are dependent on God gives us peace of mind and is an invitation to let Him take care of everything. Our God is a God of eternal life, we are made from and for eternity.
With some people it is immediate, but with others it takes longer. Many people have not even considered this simple thing. They have to know that their life is a gift and that it is good, to see that their child's life is a gift.
Listening to the woman without haste, getting to know her and to really know what her worries and fears are... In this process, she is accompanied and friends are sought so that the loneliness that overwhelms them while facing this pregnancy disappears.
Sometimes, by listening to the person, their life, their successes and failures, their sorrows and joys, you can clearly see how God has been in that person's life and how the baby they are carrying, without internet, cell phone or anything else, is putting new people in their life and giving them the opportunity to dream again and to look at their own future with hope.
-Each person who comes to us is a story, a present and dreams.
A pregnant woman who does not want to become a mother is rejecting the reality that she is already a mother. In every convent the day always begins praying for the most vulnerable and asking God to inspire us in our mission.
When we contact a mother for the first time, the most important thing is to listen to her, to know her, to love her and to remind her of all her good things. She is good and has dignity, that is why we are here to accompany her, to teach her that she has to be respected above all and loved mainly because she is worthy, because she is good, not because we are good. She has been chosen to bring a life into the world, because she is surely a good mother and the life she carries belongs to God.
The spiritual battle that every person experiences is real and it is good to help these people who live trapped by the culture of death to identify God and the enemy, to freely choose what is good for them.
Sometimes we accompany them to an ultrasound, so they can see and hear the baby's heart for the first time. That heart that sounds like a galloping horse is a cry for freedom.
Recently, a girl who was very vulnerable to having an abortion told us that her concern was that her parents were on their way to the United States and they were living on the streets of Mexico City and had not eaten for days. Well, God opens doors, and we got food for them and a shelter so they would not be on the streets, until they could continue their journey.
Accompanying them to high-risk pregnancy consultations is really an invitation to a sacred moment, a moment of total vulnerability, of absolute poverty where, only at the feet of Jesus Crucified with Mary, we can learn, without forgetting that it is there that God saves the world.
In the middle of Covid, we received an email asking for prayers for a girl who was in a coma after giving birth and was going to be disconnected because she had been this situation for weeks. We immediately contacted them and told them not to do anything until we went to the hospital. God opened doors, as the Covid visitor control system and access was blocked. We got to the room and there was the girl, plugged into I don't know how many machines. The family told us that she was Catholic and this gave us permission to call the hospital chaplain to visit her and give her the Anointing of the Sick. While we waited, we prayed the Rosary, and at each Our Father saying "lead us not into temptation and deliver us from evil," the girl would grunt. It is that the temptation to avoid suffering, despair, is for everyone. Two days later, we were told that her organs began to function and, in a short time, she was at home with her children.
We love going to deliveries and c-sections too! And sometimes, it's just in the hope of baptizing that little boy or girl who comes with some rare disease and no hope of life, and celebrating their first breath and that they have made it to Heaven. Wouldn't this be celebrating the life of a saint?
-The crisis is not living reality. Helping her to embrace reality and live it well is the challenge.
The enemy attacks these girls in several ways: loneliness, fear and accusation. To fight against loneliness, we accompany them, either ourselves or collaborators, in their daily lives, at medical appointments. We bring them food, we welcome them for a few days in a house, we take them out of situations of domestic violence, we go with them out of the city to breathe fresh air, without the pressure of the cell phone, noise and rush... We go wherever they need and the Holy Spirit guides us. We help them to heal relationships with family and friends, through forgiveness, which sometimes takes time.
We help them to name their fears and to manage them so that they do not block them, because fear is not from God. Sometimes these are fears and shame before pregnancy, or a child that comes with a disease... Fears can be diverse, but the sower is always the same, the enemy, and the solution is to trust in God.
We want them to recognize their identity as daughters of God, this brings a lot of healing. This identity can be hidden and forgotten if the girl was baptized. Sometimes we have to start from zero, explaining to them that they are the creatures of a Creator who is Love and Life. Here we attend women of all religions, or who have no religion, but no one gives a second of life to herself.
Each person is a world! And it is an adventure to meet and accompany them.
-Restoring their dignity and identity is the best thing we can do for them. Recognizing that life is a gift, both theirs and that of the baby they are expecting. They can be given diapers, cribs, strollers, etc., but what they really need is God in their life.
For those women who have suffered an abortion, we help them through this grief by starting with naming the child.
A pregnant woman, whether she is a mother and cares for her child, has an abortion or gives her child up for adoption, is a mother. Therefore, we help her to be a mother in all these circumstances. We have a mission: hope and healing. For those who went through abortion, we help them to name their child, to grieve, to celebrate Mother's Day in peace, and to forgive themselves and those who did not give them hope and led them to have an abortion.
-Young people leave home and go to university, often far from home and family, and they need a motherly presence that listens to them. We are mothers! And consecrated life in the habit is a vocation and a public witness, which helps them to consider their own vocation, which always begins with knowing that they are beloved sons and daughters of God, worthy. We help young people to know their dignity, to learn to be respected, to live chastity and not to let themselves be used. The opposite of love is not hatred, but being used.
College girls who become pregnant are very tempted to have abortions, because they think that their life and professional future are over. In addition, the debts that many students take on here when they enter college are very large.
People are searching for love and meaning, for an answer to the questions in their hearts. They are trying to find a meaning for their suffering. The great questions of life... What is authentic love? Am I capable of it? How can I discern it? Worship, look to Jesus, He is the answer to all the desires of our hearts.
-Vocation is a call from God. It is good to have time to listen to God, therefore, we must give women time to listen. Vocation is giving life and we have to find out in what way God invites us to give it. When God calls you, you know it.
The religious vocation is above all a spousal vocation with the Lord, with a spiritual motherhood that leads you to give your life to others for the love of Christ. In addition to the traditional vows of poverty, obedience and chastity, we take a fourth vow to defend life.
If someone is interested in our order, they should contact us and start a relationship. We do not kidnap anyone here. They should not be afraid to contact us and get to know us. On our website you can fill out a questionnaire that does not oblige you to anything.
If God calls her, God will give her the grace she needs to continue.
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"The sick and disabled have God in their souls and teach us many things. In these years we have learned from them, because they bring and teach a lot," Myriam Goizueta, who has been president of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Lourdes in Madrid for 11 years and has made nearly 70 trips to the French sanctuary, told Omnes. Marta, 22, sees "Jesus in disguise" in every sick person.
"Caring for the sick is not an 'optional activity' for the Church."Caring for people with disabilities: a perspective on the meaning of life.Czech "Lourdes", a symbol of reconciliationThe Church celebrates the 31st World Day of the Sick on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, February 11. "God's style is closeness, compassion and tenderness," Pope Francis notes in his messageThe Pope said, looking at "the shrine of Lourdes as a prophecy, a lesson that is entrusted to the Church".
The lesson is from Heaven, from the Virgin Mary, who in 1858 appeared eighteen times in the grotto of Massabielle, in Lourdes (France), to the 14 year old girl Bernadette Soubirousfrom February 11 to the afternoon of July 16.
Since then, millions of people from all over the world come to Lourdes every year to discover the grace of this place. The sanctuary is above all a place of healing of bodies and hearts, where people come to pray to the one who revealed her name to St. Bernadette Soubirous: "I am the Immaculate Conception"".
But the lesson also belongs to the sick, emphasize leaders of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Lourdes from Madrid. The Hospitality will go to the grotto of Massabielle next May and October, in what will be the 99th and 100th pilgrimages since its foundation, in 1958, by a group of women who wanted to follow in the footsteps of St. Bernadette and accompany the sick to the grotto.
"Our goal is to accompany and bring sick people to Lourdes, but we are all sick people who are thirsty for God and we have to ask Our Lady for help," the president of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Lourdes told Omnes, Myriam Goizuetawho entered the Hospitality at the age of 17, and who now, at 62, notes that "in Lourdes there have been thousands of conversions, conversions of faith".
"The sick and disabled people have God in their souls and they teach us many things. In these years we have learned to place ourselves at the same level, and to learn from them," adds Goizueta. St. Bernadette said that Our Lady looked at her as a person, and we have lost our fear of looking at people with disabilities".
"My name is Marta, I am 22 years old and I had the opportunity to go on pilgrimage to Lourdes for 5 days, from October 12 to 16 [2022]. It was my first pilgrimage with the Hospitality of Madrid and I would define it as a real gift from Heaven. When I found out that we had Gema in the room, I felt dizzy to death, I'm not going to lie. Gema barely speaks, can't swallow liquids and is 100 percent dependent on % for all daily tasks.
This is how Marta begins her account of the pilgrimage to the Marian shrine of Lourdes in which she participated in October last year, with the Hospitality of Our Lady of Lourdes in Madrid. There were around 900 pilgrims, close to a thousand, from the three dioceses of Madrid, Madrid, Getafe and Alcalá, including the sick and disabled, the hospitallers (volunteers), and a few other pilgrims, explains Guillermo Cruz, the consiliary of the Hospitality of Madrid, who emphasizes how "the Hospitality has already had quite a long journey. The first thing is to remember what we were born for. We were born to bring the sick to Lourdes, pilgrims. That is what we were born for, for the sick.
Marta continues with her testimony: "I am used to contact with sick people because I am very lucky (although it may sound strange) to have a brother with cerebral palsy. His name is Manu and he is 20 years old. He's the most cheerful, cheerful and friendly guy I know. We could say that I live in a constant Lourdes, although on a smaller scale and very often falling into the mediocrity of routine".
"I had hardly had any contact with Gema during the trip and the first contact we had was when we arrived in Lourdes. To put it bluntly, I was afraid of not measuring up. Not knowing how to understand her or doing it badly. That she would not be at ease. I am very devoted to Our Lady and for many years I have been asking her to educate me and to make me like her," says Marta.
"After going to the grotto and going to confession, I understood two things. First, that I am nothing. That I am like the donkey carrying Jesus on Palm Sunday. The second thing I understood is that I did not come to this pilgrimage to serve to the sick, but to serve God. It was clear to me that I was also on pilgrimage and that I came to serve, but it was hard for me to understand who do I serve? God. And this is when a phrase of St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta came to my mind, "Each one of them is Jesus in disguise" and the priest confirmed it to me, telling me the Gospel passage of the works of mercy.
"I still get emotional," Marta concludes, "when I think of the moment when I was consoling Gema, I repeated to myself this phrase 'each one of them is Jesus in disguise' and I saw myself, the biggest disaster on this planet, consoling Jesus himself."
Marta's story is the background of what Guillermo Cruz tells Omnes, commenting on the meaning of the task, of the work that the Hospitality does. "We, God willing, will make the 100th pilgrimage of the Hospitality in October. In May it will be the 99th. We were born, for the sick, and I have pointed it out. Secondly, it is a matter of discovering that when we go on pilgrimage to Lourdes, that we all go on pilgrimage, both hospitallers and the sick and the disabled, in the end what we are doing is an experience that teaches us to live, so to speak, that leads us to the mercy of God" by the hand of Our Lady.
"And then, this pilgrimage also has to lead us to renew our life in Madrid," he points out, because "we have been born for the whole diocese. We have gone from the famous Train of Hope, which was a well-known pilgrimage that could be done on trains, and was very well publicized, to having to change it to buses and so on," but the meaning is the same.
Officially, as described on its website, the Hospitalidad de Nuestra Señora de Lourdes de Madrid is a lay organization dependent on the archbishopric. Its main mission is to accompany sick and disabled people to Lourdes.
All of us who are part of the Hospitality are volunteers who, after five years of service, consecrate ourselves to Our Lady and to the service of the sick and disabled, they explain.
In its letter this week, Cardinal Carlos Osoro, Archbishop of Madrid, said that "in the trips that, during my episcopal ministry, I have made with the sick to Lourdes, I have seen in their lives and in the lives of those who accompany them the faith and strength that sustains them in the midst of difficulties. On every occasion I have invited them to find support and consolation in the Lord, through the intercession of our Mother the Virgin Mary. I always have an immense desire in my heart to place myself and the sick before the mystery of God.
Devotion to Our Lady of Lourdes is widespread in Spain. In Seville, for example, the diocesan Hospitality has organized a triduum in honor of Our Lady of Lourdes, which has been celebrated these days in the convent church of Santo Angel. On the 11th, the acts are presided over by Carlos Coloma, consiliary of the Diocesan Hospitality. Seville-Lourdes.
In Saragossa, the Hospitality of Our Lady of Lourdes has celebrated its 30th anniversary. After the pandemic, a pilgrimage to Lourdes took place in July 2022, led by the archbishop, Monsignor Carlos Escribano, and the president, Purificación Barco, with several hundred pilgrims.
The apparitions of the Virgin Mary to Bernadette Soubirous took place in 1858. Four years later, in 1862, the Church officially recognized the apparitions of the Virgin Mary. In 1933, Bernadette Soubirous was canonized. And on the centenary of the apparitions, in 1958, Cardinal Roncalli, the future Pope John XXIII, consecrated the Basilica of St. Pius X.
The Hospitality Notre-Dame de Lourdes is an archconfraternity created in Lourdes (Hautes-Pyrénées - France) in 1885 and under the French law of associations of 1901. Its members are the hospitallers, volunteers coming from various countries of the world. They welcome and accompany the thousands of pilgrims, especially the sick or disabled, who make the pilgrimage to Lourdes.
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Spain's Constitutional Court wants to include abortion as a constitutional right in a law that, among other things, will allow ending the life of unborn children with Down Syndrome up to 5 and a half months of gestation.
Spain wants to join the countries whose fundamental rights, especially in the most vulnerable people, are in retreat. In recent days, the Constitutional Court has rejected the report that declared unconstitutional the "Organic Law 2/2010 on sexual and reproductive health and voluntary interruption of pregnancy", and has requested a new report.
As the president of the Episcopal Subcommission for the Family and Defense of Life of the Spanish Episcopal Conference, Msgr. José Mazuelos: "A court has been rigged to pass a law that is unjust, ideological and contrary to science."
The objective of this new report is to declare abortion as a right, "declaring constitutional that there are human beings who have no rights, and thus endorsing an ideological, anti-scientific law that promotes inequality" as underlined by the note issued by the Episcopal Subcommission for the Family and Defense of Life of the Spanish Episcopal Conference in view of this decision of the Constitutional Court.
The note includes three of the characteristics of this law, which aims to make constitutional the right to eliminate a life. The law responds fundamentally to an ideological question and to the service of the most savage neocapitalism that advocates the elimination of human beings in the first stage of their life.
In addition, this law rejects thecientific evidence that, thanks to advances, it is possible to affirm even more forcefully that denying that a new life exists in the womb of a pregnant woman from the moment of conception is irrational.
The abortion law is also profoundly unjust and promotes inequality, since it allows people with disabilities to have a better quality of life. Down Syndrome are aborted up to five and a half months of gestation, that is to say, their life has absolutely no value whatsoever. By making this "right" constitutional, it will be allowed to violate human life and the equality of all.
History teaches us that every time human beings have questioned the dignity or value of certain human lives on various grounds, such as race, skin color or belief, they have been seriously mistaken. Similarly, it is a regrettable mistake to question the dignity of human life on the basis of age.
The note of the Episcopal Conference does not forget that, within the defense of life, it is necessary to have a broad view that includes the defense of the most vulnerable among whom, in this case, are also many of the most vulnerable women. women who are under pressure to end the pregnancy. At this point, the note states that "we want to be at their side, welcoming them and offering them comprehensive help. At the same time, we turn to those women who have had a voluntary abortion, with the desire to remind them that, in the merciful face of Jesus, they will find consolation and hope" and asks the "different administrations that, instead of proclaiming the right to abortion, they promote initiatives that help women to live their maternity, avoiding being forced to have an abortion".
In this field, there are numerous initiatives not only linked to the Catholic Church but also private initiatives that, every day, help women who have problems in carrying their pregnancies to term. Mother NetworkProvida or Maternity Project.
There is also Project Rachel, which provides services to women who have had abortions as well as persons involved in induced abortion with individualized care through a diocesan network of priests, counselors, psychologists and psychiatrists.
Last June, the United States ratified the repeal of the famous Roe v WadeThe European Union, implying that the elimination of a human being does not fall under fundamental rights. However, in Europe, there is pressure to include abortion in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.
In the face of this violation of the fundamental rights of the most vulnerable, the San Pablo CEU University Foundationtogether with One of Us and more than 50 civil organizations, have organized in Brussels an international conference on this proposal in which more than 150 people participated, including members of the European Parliament, jurists and intellectuals from Slovenia, Hungary, Portugal, France, Slovakia, Austria, Germany and Italy. In the interventions, it has been underlined that in the face of this proposal, the active defense of life is fundamental.
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Peter Hahne, a Protestant journalist and an expert on the German Evangelical Church, stresses that the model used by the Synodal Way in Germany is obsolete and, at present, there are in fact more dropouts in the Protestant Church than in the Catholic Church.
Georg BätzingI like being a Catholic, and I will continue to be one".Cardinal Marc OuelletThe Synodal Council proposed in Germany would mean renouncing the episcopal office".German bishops in Rome: Cardinals of the Curia express "concerns and reservations" about the "synodal path".Peter Hahne, a Protestant, has been in charge of political programs on German public television ZDF for almost 30 years. He was also a member of the Council of the German Evangelical Church EKD for 18 years.
-To put it in marketing terms: if the objective is to reform the Church, to bring it closer to the people, to win new faithful, that is, to make the Church attractive again, then we must take as an example those who practice it successfully; any company would do so.
Catholicism, however, takes as an example a company in danger of bankruptcy, Protestantism. Everything that is claimed in the Synodal Way is a Protestant take on the Catholic Church: the abolition of celibacy, the ordination of women, etc., all this already exists in the Protestant Church. However, despite the scandal of abuse, there are still more Protestant Christians leaving the Church than Catholics. Pope Francis has said it: we already have a Protestant Church, we do not need a second one.
-For me, as a Christian, the most important thing is the spiritual dimension. The Synodal Way seems to develop without prayer, without the Holy Spirit and also without evangelization. If I want to renew the Church, the first thing I have to do is to pray and let the Holy Spirit act; then set priorities at the spiritual level. And what is the center of the Church? Worship, in the Catholic Church the Eucharist. As far as I can see, in the Synodal Way this dimension does not seem to play any role; and if it does, it is rather to make up, to give a superstructure to its socio-political structures, following the motto: everything is evangelization.
-For me, evangelizing does not mean bringing people closer to an institution, but to God. And in bringing them back to God, I naturally bring them back to the Church, because there is no Christianity without community, without the Church. And I say this also as an evangelical Christian.
I recommend reading carefully, for example, the obituary of Benedict XVI written by the President of the Episcopal Conference. If the obituary is born from the heart, saying that Benedict was one of the greatest teachers of the Church and at the same time a theological guide and in spiritual thought, then I would have to stop and say: "If he is so good, it is best to adopt his recipe for reforming the Church". Then you can bury the Synodal Path.
-During his visit to Bavaria, Pope Benedict delivered a homily to priests in Freising Cathedral. All Catholics should read this speech. It dealt with the question of what our task is as priests, but also in general as Christians, in this world. He put aside the prepared speech with the wonderful remark that it could be read in print. For 14 minutes, he delivered a free speech from the heart without speaking anything about politics or the climate, but was centered on Jesus. If one were to make this speech the standard for reform in the Church today, one would be guaranteed success, although spiritually there is no guarantee. For me, this is the right way.
In Fribourg, Benedict spoke of de-worldliness; however, the Synodal Way represents a worldliness. It is always suspicious that "the world" applauds the Church, and today one has the impression that the bishops are looking for applause; to be loved, to be acclaimed. And they do not realize the trap they are falling into. The Bavarian Lutheran bishop Hermann Bezzel once said, "The Church is perishing because of servants who have no vocation." For me, that is the key. Today we have too many frustrated politicians in the pulpits.
-Here some abuses are used as a pretext to make a revolution in the Church. What is being discussed in the Synodal Way has nothing to do with the abuse scandal. If that were so, it would mean that such scandals would not have been committed in the Evangelical Church, because there the pastors are married. However, in the Protestant Church exactly the same thing happens, although not on such a scale. A man who is a pedophile can marry a thousand times, but he will continue to abuse children.
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More than 250 people gathered at the Study Week organized by the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome to talk about freedom, formation and spiritual accompaniment.
To help the human and supernatural growth of those who belong to ecclesial movements and new communities without neglecting, on the other hand, to deepen the challenges and problems posed today by this sensitive area of the spiritual accompaniment.
All this was discussed during the Study Week organized during these days at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross on the initiative of the Faculties of Canon Law and Theology.
Some 250 people from thirty different countries attended this week either in person or online. Among them were teachers, catechists, community leaders, missionaries, formators, spiritual assistants and doctors who were able to deepen their understanding of various aspects of accompaniment and also participate in a series of workshops with case studies and sharing of experiences and testimonies.
Among the religious realities represented there were members of some dioceses, but also members of Congregations and Movements such as the Movement of the Apostles, the Movement of the Apostles and the Movement of the Apostles. Focolarethe Legionaries of Christ, the Neocatechumenal Way, the Legionaries of Christ, the Neocatechumenal Way, the Prelature of Opus Dei or the Community of L'Emmanuel, the New Horizons Association, to name but a few.
The week was inaugurated by Cardinal Kevin FarrellPrefect of the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life, who also sponsored the entire initiative.
"The primary object of spiritual accompaniment must be 'real' progress in the Christian life," the Irish bishop began, "so it is necessary to favor 'not identification with the charism, but identification with Jesus Christ!' In fact, it is precisely the charism that within a movement is placed "at the service of the imitation and following of Christ".
With regard to the choice of spiritual companions, the Cardinal said that "impositions or limitations on the part of those in charge of movements or communities" must be avoided, precisely because personal freedom must always be safeguarded.
Msgr. Massimo Camisasca, founder of the Priestly Fraternity of the Missionaries of St. Charles Borromeo, emphasized accompaniment as a path of formation. "The first step of a true accompaniment is to listen. Every member of the faithful who receives spiritual accompaniment benefits from this attitude and, in this way, spiritual direction becomes "a school of prayer, understood as a dialogue with God". However, for this approach to bear fruit, it is necessary to graft the person "into a praying community".
Also speaking during the Week was the Pro-Prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization, Archbishop and theologian Rino Fisichella, who focused his reflection on how to form evangelizers who are "men and women of God". The answer lies in acquiring a new awareness that makes Christians capable of "entering into the heart of cultures, of knowing them, understanding them and guiding them towards that desire for truth that belongs to every man and woman in search of the meaning of their lives".
On the importance of integrating psychology and faith spoke the Bishop of San Benedetto del Tronto (in the Marche region of Italy), who showed how this discipline can help people "achieve greater concrete freedom and greater readiness to follow Jesus," although it can never give all of human reality the ultimate horizon of existence.
Amedeo Cencini, of the Pontifical Salesian University, contemplated the figure of the companion as an "older brother in faith and discipleship," who offers the "younger brother" that help of a spiritual nature that allows him to "discover God's action in his life and freely decide to respond to it."
Here, too, training is a must: "the spiritual companion must be able to accompany one's own decision-making process. In fact, promote it as the believer's normal way of being'.
"The one who accompanies has the function of enlightening, orienting, observing in order to understand where the Spirit is guiding that soul. But he cannot impose: his function is one of service, not of dominion", were the words with which the Rector of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, Luis Navarro, summarized the main points that emerged from the Week of Studies, knowing that there are still aspects to be improved "in this service to souls willed by God for his Church".
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The week before the Pope's arrival in Congo (DRC) there were heavy rains. On January 31, when the young people were preparing to spend the night at Ndolo Airport, there was thunder and lightning. But it was all noise and lights, during Francis' stay in Kinshasa, not a single drop of water fell. The sun shone in all its splendor, along with the joy that reigned throughout the week.
"Forgiveness is a source of peace," Pope encourages in KinshasaThe Pope travels to DR Congo and South Sudan. "Mbote François"Welcome, now you are welcomeJust as rain soaks the ground and fills it with life, the Pope's words have been a shower of hope in the hearts of this great country. Hope is the word that could sum up his entire trip. Francis has filled with hope the young people, the victims of the war in the East, the priests, religious men and women, the bishops. Now we await the fruits of his words. The Pope's trip is a blessing for all Congolese men and women, a breath of hope in the midst of so many difficulties.
It all began on January 31, when the Pope landed at the Ndjili International Airport in Ndjili, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. After a brief welcome, the popemobile set off for the Palace of the Nation. The arms raised in the air through the streets of Kinshasa accompanied him without interruption during the 25 kilometers of the trip.
The images speak for themselves: faces radiant with joy, hands in the air, and bodies in continuous movement. What a joy to receive the Pope!
At the National Palace, the Pope's speech to the authorities set the tone for the trip. Francis defined himself as a pilgrim of peace and reconciliation. He encouraged the Congolese to assume their responsibility in building a better future, but what stood out most were the words addressed to the International Community: "Do not touch the Democratic Republic of Congo, do not touch Africa. Stop suffocating it, because Africa is not a mine to be exploited or a land to be plundered. Let Africa be the protagonist of its own destiny".
From the National Palace, he went to the Apostolic Nunciature. There, the Luc Gillon Choir, together with a group of children dressed in St. Lawrence and DRC t-shirts, welcomed him with songs and enthusiasm.
There were many young people who spent the night of January 31 to February 1 at the Ndolo airport. Everything was prepared for the Mass. The volunteers in charge of the confessionals spent a large part of the night going back and forth to facilitate the sacrament of reconciliation. Hervé, one of the volunteers, said that "a priest, I don't know his name, was heroic, he spent a large part of the night confessing without interruption". I myself was able to participate in the confessions along with other priests until half past two in the morning. People were eager to be reconciled with God and to prepare themselves well for the Mass with the Pope.
In his homily, Francis spoke essentially about peace, which was the theme of the trip. He developed three sources of peace: forgiveness, community, and mission. "Peace be with you. Let us let these words of our Lord resound, silently, in our hearts. Let us listen to them addressed to us and decide to be witnesses of forgiveness, protagonists in community, people on mission of peace in the world."
Under a blazing sun, almost two million people followed the celebration with joy. Geraldine, 84 years old, got up at four in the morning to participate in the Mass. She arrived at 6 a.m., but after standing for an hour, she realized she would not last all morning and had to go home to follow the ceremony on television. Most of the people stood for hours under the sun, but with a smile on their lips: "the Pope does not come every day", one heard people say.
The Mass was in the Zairean rite, and there was no lack of singing and dancing. The choir was made up of more than 700 people, and a group of "joyeuses" (little girls dressed in white) danced during the Gloria and the offertory, as is the tradition at Sunday masses.
The Mass did not last an hour and a half as planned, but was only thirty minutes longer. At the end of the Mass, Cardinal Ambongo thanked the Pope and denounced, in front of the authorities and television cameras, the misery in which the Congolese people find themselves.
This was the title of an article about the Pope's first day in the DRC. From the light of the Mass to the darkness of the stories of the victims in the east of the country. In July, the Pope's trip was scheduled to include a stop in Goma, the largest city in the east of the country. The situation of insecurity did not allow this stop, but the Pope wanted to receive some victims of the war.
The meeting took place at the Nunciature. The Pope, next to a large crucifix presiding over the room, listened to the horrifying testimonies of the various victims: beheadings, rapes, forced to eat human flesh... This was just a glimpse of the suffering of the people of eastern DRC. It is difficult not to awaken consciences. But unfortunately, many people in the world continue to close their eyes to this reality. Just look at the space that this trip has occupied in the Western media.
The testimonies were followed by a declaration of forgiveness and the deposit at the foot of the crucifix of weapons and instruments that were used against the victims. An emotional Pope thanked the victims for their courage. At the end of the day, some representatives of the charities were received by the Holy Father.
The Martyrs Stadium hosted the meeting with catechists and young people. Some eighty thousand people packed the stadium to listen to the Pope who was welcomed like a musical star. To the rhythm of the songs the young people showed their enthusiasm as Francis moved towards the podium.
After a few words from the catechists, the Pope made a historic speech in which he gave the young people five "ingredients for the future," one for each finger of the hand: prayer, community (others), honesty, forgiveness, and service.
After asking us to look at our hands he said, "I would like to draw your attention to one detail: all hands are similar, but none is the same as the other; no one has hands like yours, that is why you are a unique, unrepeatable and incomparable treasure. No one in history can replace you."
An "electric" moment was when the Pope spoke about corruption. Francis made the young people repeat: "pas de corruption", no to corruption. But the young people did more than repeat, and for several minutes they chanted different phrases against corruption.
Young people needed hope and the Pope gave it to them. The Pope's message did not just pass, it resonated with young people. The social networks immediately echoed the five ingredients of the future.
A tide of nuns invaded the streets around the Cathedral. In the Congo there are many congregations, some imported, others local. The priests went unnoticed in front of so many nuns dressed in their Congolese habits.
Life in the Congo is full of difficulties, and priests, religious men and women, are in the front line. Francis encouraged us not to fall into spiritual mediocrity; he reminded us of the need for formation, and above all he encouraged us to continue with a life of dedication and service: "Sisters and brothers, thank you from my heart for what you are and what you do; thank you for the witness you give to the Church and to the world. Do not be discouraged, we need you. You are valuable, important, I tell you in the name of the whole Church." These last words filled us with encouragement and hope.
Before leaving for South Sudan, the Pope met with the Congolese bishops. Following the passage of Jeremiah's vocation, Francis invited them to be good shepherds: "Dear brother bishops, let us take care to be close to the Lord so as to be his credible witnesses and spokesmen of his love to the people. He wants to anoint them through us with the oil of consolation and hope."
In closing, the Pope asked the bishops to be merciful: "I would like to add just one thing: I said 'be merciful'. Mercy. Forgive always."
At the airport, President Felix Tshisekedi was waiting to see him off. The Pope continued on his way to South Sudan where the agenda would also be tight.
Kinsasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo.
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Rescue workers carry Zeynep Atesogullari out of a building destroyed in Diyarbakir by the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that struck parts of Turkey and Syria on February 6, toppling hundreds of buildings and killing thousands of people.
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Sacrilege is an act of contempt for the sacred that calls for a response on the part of the Church to compensate for the damage done. The acts of atonement to be carried out differ according to the type of profanation suffered.
Sacrilege is the desecration of a sacred thing, place or person, i.e., sacrilege involves the violation of the sanctity of things, places and persons dedicated to divine worship.
Therefore, sacrileges can be of three types: local, personal or real.
Let it be noted that the true sacrilege is when these sacred realities are destroyed or profaned as such, lacking the respect and honor due to God and to what is dedicated to God.
The royal sacrilege is manifested above all in the lack of respect for the sacraments, sacred vessels, images and in the theft of sacred things or goods.
On the other hand, the personal sacrilege is given mainly when violence is practiced against a sacred person especially with deeds and not only with words. Also when one sins against the vow of chastity, in which not only the person who has made the vow or professes celibacy sins, but also the accomplice.
Third, the local sacrilege is that which occurs when a person is killed in a sacred place or a sacred place is dedicated to a profane use or a robbery is committed in such a place.
The most frequent sacrilege is against the Most Holy Eucharist, by receiving it unworthily or by profaning the consecrated forms. It is the most serious sacrilege, because the Holy Eucharist is the holiest reality of the Church.
It is also necessary to avoid the desecration of the sacrament of penance, when the penitent confesses without due repentance or, also, if the confessor is moved by unhealthy curiosity or provokes the penitent to sin. It is fundamental for priests and religious, who are called to live above all for divine worship, to manifest the holiness of the sacraments in the way they celebrate or receive them. Consecrated persons manifest in the way they live what they do or do not carry within themselves.
A sacrilege is a specific sin against the virtue of religion, which promotes the glory of God and the sanctification of man. This sin must be confessed by specifying whether it is a thing, place or person. Specifically, sacrilege aggravates a specific sin, adding a new reason for sin and will be more or less serious in relation to the degree of sanctity of the thing, place or person.
For example, to kill a priest would be a doubly grave sin, for killing him and for being a priest. But it is not sacrilege to steal money from a priest, unless it is money received for a cultic purpose. However, it would always be a sin with an obligation to make restitution, especially if the amount was considerable. The penalty applied to grave sacrilege can be excommunication, which prevents one from falling back into such a sin, or another temporal penalty, when spiritual penalties are disregarded.
When a sacrilege occurs and is made public, the first and most urgent thing, in the case of sacred things, such as consecrated forms, images, sacred vessels, etc., is to try to recover these profaned sacred realities.
In the case of sacred places, such as temples, they should be restored if possible and convenient.
If the sacrilegious act has been carried out against a person, in this case it is necessary to rehabilitate him, purifying in some way and as far as possible the spaces where they have been found or the state in which the persons and sacred places are found. Then, these sacred realities must be put back in their proper places. But if the state of the consecrated forms or images makes it impossible to continue to serve their purpose, they must be deposited in worthy places where further desecration is impossible.
The Church's primary response to sacrilege is the redresswhich is the compensation for the injury done, based on the requirement of the virtue of justice, which obliges to give to each one what belongs to him.
Let us not forget that together with mercy there is always justice, in God and in us. Consequently, atonement or reparation for our sins is fundamental in the life of the Church and in the life of Christians, completing what is lacking in the Passion of Jesus Christ, not so much in relation to Christ, as is evident, but in relation to us. What is proper to atonement is to manifest divine holiness, which is also manifested in the holiness of things, persons and sacred places.
Redress is always interior, but exteriority is a necessary part of this just compensation due to the sacred. The sacramental is in itself something exterior that leads us to something interior.
The main act of atonement is obviously the worthy and devout celebration of the Holy Mass or adoration of the Blessed Sacrament; in fact, it is the normal atonement when it is a response to a sacrilege committed against the Holy Eucharist, which is the great treasure of the Church.
A sacrilege committed against sacred images, sacred vessels, relics of saints, sacred vestments, etc. is repaired by acts that in some way restore their sacred value.
I conclude this brief reflection with an invitation to priests and Christian communities to properly apply the classical principle: holy things must be treated in a holy manner.
The devout priest celebrates devoutly, while the worldly priest becomes the protagonist, hiding the Lord. There are three main moments in the celebration of Holy Mass, namely, the Offertory, the Consecration and Communion. The bread and wine offered are in some way sacred. The consecrated bread and wine contain the presence of the body, soul and divinity of Christ; the bread received is the very body of Jesus Christ.
Let us see to it that not even the smallest particle is ever lost, always using the most devout way of receiving it. The priest, in the way he celebrates and even in the way he dresses, must show his sacred character.
Penitentiary in Santa Maria Maggiore, Rome
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Joseph Evans comments on the readings for the Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time and Luis Herrera offers a short video homily.
In his Sermon on the Mount Jesus gave six antitheses, six statements which seem to contradict teachings from the Old Law. Four of these appear in today’s gospel. But introducing these antitheses Jesus makes clear that he is not contradicting them but rather taking them to a higher level. "Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfil them."
In them, Jesus reveals the higher level of morality which the gospel enjoins on us. Whereas the Old Law focused more on social morality – at least as it came to be understood – the New Law requires from us the inner conversion which is the essential foundation of life in society. The Old Law told us not to kill or commit adultery; it regulated marriage and, as part of this, permitted divorce; it forbade false oaths; it laid down basic notions of justice and made clear boundaries between neighbours and enemies.
But Jesus teaches (in a way which hints at his divinity: only God can modify a law which God first revealed) that we must live out the interior attitudes which are the foundations of these precepts. To avoid killing we must resist the inner anger which leads to violence and seek the early reconciliation which stops problems escalating. To avoid adultery, we should seek the purity of heart which leads us to respect the dignity of others, in particular women. This might require radical actions to resist sin and its occasions – hence the metaphors of plucking out our eye or cutting off our hand.
Jesus then gives a new view of marriage in which women cannot simply be discarded. Marriage is indissoluble and to divorce one’s spouse and marry another is adultery. Next, he insists on a profound attitude of truthfulness; we should say simply ‘yes’ or ‘no’ without making unnecessary oaths. The next two antitheses (not in today’s gospel) call on us to abandon all desire for revenge, preferring to suffer a wrong than to inflict one, and no longer make a distinction between enemy and neighbour. We should even love those who are hostile towards us.
The Old Law must be lived but in a deeper, more interior way, with a "righteousness exceeding that of the scribes and Pharisees", aiming at inner conversion, not outer propriety. The law must not be relaxed, but in its essential requirements, not its contingent applications. We no longer practise circumcision or animal sacrifices but we must dedicate ourselves to God body and soul.
Meekness and purity of heart, absolute fidelity in marriage, a deep truthfulness, rejecting any desire for vengeance, and dissolving the distinction between neighbour and enemy … These are the foundations of peaceful social life, arising from peace in our souls.
The priest Luis Herrera Campo offers its nanomiliaa small one-minute reflection for these readings.
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If we want to educate in a religious experience, we must begin by helping young people to perceive this experience of the sacred.
Nothing is sacred. This seems to be the watchword of our time.
The awareness that we are in a sacred place or experiencing a sacred event refers us directly to a special presence of God. A presence that becomes in that moment and place, in some mysterious, almost tangible way. That was Moses' experience before the burning bush. "Bare your shoes, for the ground you are treading on is holy" (Ex 3:5).
This experience of the sacred, essential to the religious fact, permeated the lives of our ancestors. They knew that there were moments that were sacred, events in which time stopped and touched eternity.
The Eucharist, in a very special way, takes us to the same supper of Holy Thursday, before the unique sacrifice of Christ on the cross, to the mystery of the resurrection of Jesus. Sacred times in which eternity is touched. As it happened to Peter, James and John at the moment of Jesus' transfiguration on Mount Tabor. A moment in which, for a second, appearances are torn away and let us see the infinite.
Our ancestors also knew that there were sacred places. Privileged spaces, doors to the infinite, where God's presence was palpable. In sanctuaries like Lourdes or Fatima, the supernatural becomes close. In Nazareth we are overwhelmed to read on the altar "Verbum Caro Hic Factum Est". Here, 'hic', in this place heaven and earth came together. A place to enter with respectful silence, almost on tiptoe. Barefoot the soul.
And yet...
Today nothing is holy. Everything has been disenchanted. And trivialized, which is the way to put an end to that experience of being before something that takes us beyond, that transcends its own reality.
Undoubtedly, this loss of awareness of the sacred is one of the consequences of the 'disenchantment' that characterizes our secular era, as defined by the philosopher Charles Taylor. A mentality that shapes modern man. For today's man, time is nothing more than a succession of events, one after the other. And space is pure matter that refers only to itself. The very concept of the sacred seems to belong to another era, to the Middle Ages.
Undoubtedly, if we want to educate in a religious experience, we must begin by helping young people to perceive this experience of the sacred. Beginning with our own celebrations and temples. We must leave space for silence and discover that the temple is a sacred place inhabited by the living God. To recognize his presence. To be in awe and awe. To help them to enter with gestures, music, art in that experience that overwhelms the soul and puts it in contact with the mystery. And in this, we have to be sincere, we have been losing sensitivity and we have been infected by this profane environment.
But education in the sacred embraces the whole of life. We must teaching children and young people to discover the footprint of the Creator when they contemplate nature. Show them that there is meaning in human history. Help them to tear away from appearances and see beyond.
We need to reconnect with the sacred and educate the new generations about it. And it is not an easy task. There is a whole culture that makes it difficult. But it is essential to do so if we truly want to face the evangelization of this world.
Perhaps this is, by the way, one of the keys to the success of the work of J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of 'Lord of the Rings. That through fantasy he has managed to reveal that the world is really 'enchanted'. His medieval epic makes us connect with the most intimate beats of our being and gives us back hope. There is a space for the sacred in all his work.
In our favor, as always, we have the heart of the young person who vividly senses that there must be 'something more'. That time cannot run out. That, as Máximo said in the movie GladiatorWhat we do in life is echoed in eternity".
Teaching Delegate in the Diocese of Getafe since the 2010-2011 academic year, he has previously exercised this service in the Archbishopric of Pamplona and Tudela, for seven years (2003-2009). He currently combines this work with his dedication to youth ministry directing the Public Association of the Faithful 'Milicia de Santa Maria' and the educational association 'VEN Y VERÁS. EDUCATION', of which he is President.
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Sviatoslav Shevchuk, Major Archbishop of the Catholic Church in Ukraine, has launched a new appeal for help and remembrance to the entire international community during a virtual meeting organized by ACN.
"Catholics in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus, are united."How does the Church in Poland help Ukrainians?ACN launches campaign to support the Church in UkraineThe Major Archbishop of the Catholic Church in Ukraine, Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, together with the Apostolic Nuncio to Ukraine, took part in the ceremony. UkraineMons. Visvaldas Kulbokas in an online meeting, organized by ACN International to report on the situation in the Ukrainian nation almost a year after Russia began an offensive against Ukraine. ACN has been, since then and before, one of the institutions that, along with Caritas Internationalis, has provided a continued support the Catholic Church in that country.
After almost a year since the beginning of the Russia's invasion of UkraineThe latter is in a "very deteriorated" humanitarian and social situation, stressed the major Archbishop of the Catholic Church in Ukraine.
Bishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk called it a "miracle" that "one year later he is still alive" and focused, among other things, on the terrible situation of the Catholic Church in the territories occupied by Russian forces.
In fact, he stressed that they know nothing about the status of Father Ivan Levytsky and Father Bohdan Heleta, two Catholic priests arrested by Russian militia since last November.
The conflict is leaving cities destroyed and, especially, the major archbishop pointed out, Russian missiles have destroyed key industries: "50% of Ukraine's electricity production is destroyed, this means that every village, every town, experiences lack of electricity on a daily basis".
"People are returning to their homes and they have no electricity or water, and it is not enough with the energy that can be produced through generators," said Msgr. Shevchuk, "for example, last week in Odessa there were 4 days without electricity at all".
Since the beginning of the war, the Catholic Church in Ukrainehas mobilized to assist and help the Ukrainian population. In this regard, the major archbishop stressed that "from the Church, people are waiting for a word of hope, as well as food or clothes".
Msgr. Shevchuk explained the key lines of the pastoral plan that the Ukrainian Catholic bishops The first step was to "heal the wounds of this war, both physical and psychological wounds, and to maintain the structures of charity and solidarity, to be able to work as a united community".
As part of this healing work, Shevchuk explained that "listening centers have been established in each eparchy, where anyone who needs help can go for assistance".
Special attention deserves the chapter of the areas occupied by the Russian army: Donetsk and Lugansk, in the east, and Kherson and Zaporiyia, in the south, where the presence of the Catholic Church is under suspicion and there are "searches of parishes or even news of torture of the faithful or priests accused of collaborating with the Ukrainian partisans" described Bishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk. In this regard, the Nuncio pointed out that, at present, three vicariates covering an area of 60,000 square kilometers do not have the attention of any Catholic priest because they have been arrested, have been forbidden to continue or have been forced to leave".
For his part, Visvaldas Kulbokas stressed that the majority of Ukrainians want the victory to "protect and rebuild their country".
Pope Francis' constant attention, his role as the voice of this war to the world and the diplomatic work of the Holy See has also been the subject of thanks from the Major Archbishop of the Catholic Church in Ukraine who pointed out that "thanks to the fact that the Holy See maintains an open line of communication with Russia, we are able to work for the release of prisoners. On this point, Shevchuk said that during his last meeting with the Holy Father he gave him a list of 42 doctors, both civilian and military, with the aim of working for their release.
At all times, both Bishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk and Visvaldas Kulbokas have been grateful for the prayer support and material donations they have received from all over the world.
At this point, the Major Archbishop of the Catholic Church in Ukraine stated that "today I can say that in Ukraine people are not dying from hunger or lack of clothes, but we do not know what will become of us in the future" and he wanted to end his speech with a clear request "Do not forget Ukraine! Without your help we will not survive!"
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Pope Francis sent a brief message for the World Day of Prayer and Reflection against Human Trafficking, whose theme is "Walking for Dignity".
The Church celebrates the World Day of Prayer and Reflection against Human Trafficking on the same day that St. Bakhita, Patroness of the victims of this type of exploitation, is remembered. This year Pope Francis sent a message to involve young people in the fight against these abuses.
"Trafficking in human beings disfigures the dignity"The Pope stated emphatically. "Exploitation and subjugation limit freedom and turn people into objects to be used and thrown away. And the trafficking system takes advantage of the injustices and inequalities that force millions of people to live in vulnerable conditions."
Francis pointed to the millions of people living in delicate situations due to the economic crisis, wars and climate change. All of them are especially vulnerable to this system, making them "easy to recruit."
Far from being close to a solution, the Pontiff noted, "trafficking is growing at an alarming rate, affecting above all immigrants, women and children". But this cannot lead to discouragement, but "it is precisely in this reality that all of us, especially young people, are called to join forces to weave networks of good, to spread the light that comes from Christ and his Gospel".
The Pope concluded by highlighting some of the ideas that the young people had written in preparation for the day. He invited everyone to "walk with open eyes to recognize the processes that lead millions of people, especially young people, to become victims of trafficking to be brutally exploited. To walk with an attentive heart to discover and support the daily paths to freedom and dignity. To walk with hope in our feet to promote anti-trafficking actions. To walk hand in hand to support each other and build a culture of encounter, leading to the conversion of hearts and inclusive societies, capable of protecting the rights and dignity of every person".
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After the apostolic trip to Africa, the Pope returned to the Vatican and held the Wednesday general audience in the Paul VI Hall. The audience welcomed the Holy Father with loud applause, which Francis gratefully received.
After the apostolic trip to Africa, the Pope returned to the Vatican and held the Wednesday general audience in the Paul VI Hall. The audience welcomed the Holy Father with loud applause, which Francis gratefully received.
Pope Francis returned to the Vatican after his trip to the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan. Returning to his usual schedule, he held his Wednesday general audience in the Paul VI Hall, where he was greeted by a round of applause.
The audience began with the reading of the Word of God, specifically a passage from the Gospel according to St. Matthew, which speaks of Christians as the light of the world. After the proclamation of the Word, Francis spoke about his apostolic journey to Africa. The first thing he did was to thank God "who has allowed me to make this trip, which I have wanted for a long time". He also mentioned his two companions on the second stage, when he was in South Sudan, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Moderator of the Church of Scotland, saying: "we went together to witness that it is possible and necessary to collaborate in diversity, especially if we share faith in Christ".
Regarding the first stop of the trip, the Pope spoke of the Democratic Republic of Congo "as a diamond, for its nature, for its resources, above all for its people; but this diamond has become a source of contention, of violence and, paradoxically, of impoverishment for the people". In the face of this situation, Francis said "two words: the first is negative, 'Enough! Africa! The second is positive: together, together with dignity and mutual respect, together in the name of Christ, our hope".
In Kinshasa Francis had a meeting with victims of violence, during which he listened to "the powerful testimonies of some victims, especially women, who placed weapons and other instruments of death at the foot of the Cross. With them I said 'no' to violence and resignation, 'yes' to reconciliation and hope".
Later, he met with the leaders of various charities in the country, whom he thanked for their work: "Your work with the poor and for the poor does not make noise, but day after day makes the common good grow. For this reason, I stressed that charitable initiatives must always be promotional, that is, not only to assist but also to promote the development of individuals and communities".
Francis was also able to meet with young people and catechists, whom he described as the future of Africa. His enthusiasm for renewal and for the hope led him to indicate five ways for them to build a better future: "prayer, community, honesty, forgiveness and service".
In his last public meeting, in the cathedral of the capital, the Pope spoke to the clergy, seminarians and consecrated men and women. He exhorted them "to be servants of the people as witnesses to the love of Christ, overcoming three temptations: spiritual mediocrity, worldly comfort and superficiality. Finally, with the Congolese bishops, I shared the joy and the fatigue of pastoral service. I invited them to allow themselves to be consoled by the closeness of God and to be prophets for the people, with the power of the Word of God, to be signs of his compassion, his closeness and his tenderness.
The second leg of the trip took us to South Sudan. As the Pope said, "this visit had a very particular physiognomy, expressed by the motto that took up the words of Jesus: 'I pray that they may be one'. In fact, it was an ecumenical pilgrimage of peace, carried out together with the heads of two Churches historically present in that land: the Anglican Communion and the Church of Scotland. It was the culmination of a journey begun a few years ago, which had seen us meet in Rome in 2019 with the South Sudanese authorities to take on the commitment to overcome the conflict and build a new peace. peace".
Francis regretted that the peace process had not progressed over the years, so, meeting with the country's authorities, he invited them "to turn the page, to carry forward the peace agreement and the road map, to say decisively 'no' to corruption and arms trafficking and 'yes' to encounter and dialogue. Only in this way will there be development, people will be able to work in peace, the sick will be cured, children will be able to go to school".
Emphasizing the ecumenical character of the trip, the Pope highlighted the prayer with the two religious representatives who accompanied him. He considered this a necessary message on cooperation, because "it is important to witness that religion is fraternity, peace, communion; that God is Father and always and only wants the life and good of his children".
Due to the internal conflicts in South Sudan, the Holy Father met with internally displaced persons. During the dialogue, he especially addressed the women, "who are the force that can transform the country; and I encouraged everyone to be the seeds of a new South Sudan, without violence, reconciled and pacified".
Later, in the meeting with the clergy and consecrated people, he wanted to put Moses as an example for all the pastors of the Church. "Like him, shaped by the Holy Spirit, we can become compassionate and meek, detached from our interests and capable of struggling also with God for the good of the people entrusted to us."
At the end of the audience, the Pope wanted to mention "the Eucharistic celebration, the last act of the visit to South Sudan and also of the entire trip. During the Mass, Francis said, "I echoed the Gospel by encouraging Christians to be 'salt and light' in that land so tried and tested. God does not put his hope in the great and the powerful, but in the small and the humble".
This message is very timely, the Holy Father said, because God "continues to say it even today to those who trust in him. It is the mystery of God's hope, who sees a great tree where there is a small seed. Let us pray that, in the Democratic Republic of Congo and in South Sudan, and in all Africa, seeds of his Kingdom of love, justice and peace may sprout".
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The economic sector is one of the areas whose reform has been especially profound with Predicate Evangelium. With the new Apostolic Constitution, the number of economic agencies of the Holy See has risen to six. And all of them, with the exception of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See (APSA), are newly created.
A crucial law for the reform of the Curia arrives: financial managementThe Secretary of State will no longer manage financial and real estate assets.Vatican finances: how they work and what are their organs?One of the areas in which the reform of the Vatican organizations has been most involved is that of the financial management institutions of the Holy See.
Following the reform instituted with the Praedicate EvangeliumThe Holy See has liquidated most of the previous institutions in this area, creating five new ones and reforming the tasks and management of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See.
After Predicate EvangeliumThe number of economic agencies of the Holy See is six. And all of them, except for the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See (APSA), are of recent creation.
It was instituted in 2014 by Motu Proprio Fidelis Dispensator et prudens. Its main mission is to orient and guide the economic strategy of the Holy See in order to ensure that it is managed "in the light of the social doctrine of the Church, following the best recognized international practices in the field of public administration" (art. 205 §2 EP).
To this end, the Council proposes to the Pope the approval of policies and guidelines that ensure prudent and efficient management of human, financial and material resources, reducing unnecessary risks and seeking maximum cost-effectiveness for the fulfillment of the intended purposes.
It is composed of fifteen members: eight are chosen from among Cardinals and Bishops representing the universality of the Church and seven are lay people, chosen from among experts of various nationalities. The law provides for meetings to be held at least four times a year.
As part of its strategic task the Council verifies the consolidated budgets and balance sheets before they are approved by the Roman Pontiff; it determines the criteria, including that of value, for acts of alienation, purchase or extraordinary administration that require the approval of the Secretariat for Economic Affairs to be validly carried out; it examines the reports of the Secretariat, of the Auditor General, of the bodies and entities subject to its supervision (including the IOR) ... And when it deems it necessary, it can request relevant information from the Authority for Supervision and Financial Information (ASIF).
Exercises the function of papal secretariat in economic and financial matters (art. 212 EP). The qualifier papal identifies this body as particularly close to the Roman Pontiff, to whom it answers directly. It was also instituted in 2014.
The Secretariat is primarily responsible for the control and supervision of the economic activity of the institutions that are part of the Holy See or closely related to it, so that it is carried out according to the programs proposed by the Council.
The trend is for more and more institutions to come under its control. In fact, in the Holy See's 2022 budget it can be seen that the consolidated perimeter has increased compared to that of the previous year, including new entities to be monitored.
In 2022, the number of entities under the Secretariat's control will be 90, 30 more than in 2021. By expanding the perimeter, a more complete and global vision of the economic situation of the Holy See is provided; and, the greater the visibility, the greater the transparency of its results.
The Secretariat is divided into two functional areas: one for economic and financial control and the other for administrative control. It is responsible for drawing up the economic guidelines and programs to be implemented by the institutions; it prepares the annual budget of the Holy See and verifies its compliance; it draws up the consolidated annual balance sheet from the individual balance sheets; it authorizes acts of alienation, purchase or extraordinary administration; it evaluates the patrimonial and financial risks of economic management and proposes corrective actions.
The Human Resources Department reports to the Secretariat and, as of 2020, its responsibility also extends to the St. Peter's obolus and other papal funds. In November 2022 Pope Francis has appointed a layman, economist Maximino Caballero, as Prefect of the Secretariat.
The APSA is responsible for the administration and management of the patrimony of the Holy See. It must not only conserve it, but improve it and make it profitable in order to provide the necessary resources for the Roman Curia to fulfill its universal mission.
The APSA is intended to be the body that centralizes the management of assets under the control of the Secretariat of Economic Affairs, thus avoiding parallel administrations that manage assets without oversight.
The patrimony of the Holy See consists of both productive real estate (rented houses and apartments that generate income) and unproductive real estate (palaces that serve as the seat of curial dicasteries, universities and colleges). It also includes investment funds, bank accounts and other financial securities.
Its president is assisted by a secretary and a council. After the reform, the members of the council can be "cardinals, bishops, priests and laymen" (art. 221 §1 EP). Therefore, these offices are no longer reserved only to ecclesiastics.
It is divided into three functional areas. The real estate area is in charge of managing the properties concentrated mainly in Rome and Castelgandolfo, as well as properties in other countries such as England, France and Switzerland, which are managed through intermediate companies following local regulations.
The area of financial affairs, or securities management, deals with the investment of funds and other financial securities, seeking to generate the best profitability. And thirdly, the service area includes the accounting offices, purchasing, legal advice, pilgrimage to San Pedro, etc.
This Office has been responsible, since 2014, for the review of the consolidated balance sheet of the Holy See. To this end, it carries out a technical control - the well-known accounting audits - on the annual balance sheets of the various curial institutions and bodies linked to the Holy See that converge in the consolidated balance sheet.
The new statute of 2019 provides for the Office to act as an anti-corruption Authority, in order to detect suspicions of fraud in the destination of financial resources, in the awarding of contracts or in disposals. It can initiate audits at the request of the Council, of the Secretariat or of the heads of the bodies under the Council's competence; but they can also be initiated ex officio by the Auditor General, who will previously inform the Cardinal Coordinator of the Council, stating the reasons. In any case, the identity of the complainant is protected and cannot be revealed, except to the judicial authorities by reasoned decision.
If the audit reveals criminal indications, the Auditor General shall inform the judicial authorities of the Vatican, who may decide whether to initiate proceedings before the competent court.
The auditors working in the Office are professionals in this field, some with more than twenty years of experience in international companies.
It was created in 2020 and is responsible for authorizing any legal, economic or financial act that, for the good of the Church or of private individuals, must be covered by secrecy and removed from the control of the competent bodies.
The Commission, according to its own statute, is composed of a president, secretary, and some other members appointed for five years by the Roman Pontiff.
In 2019, in order to prepare valid instruments for investment policy, Pope Francis determined the creation of this body. Its mission is to guarantee the ethical appropriateness of the Holy See's movable investments according to the social doctrine of the Church and, at the same time, to ensure their profitability.
Its members are appointed for five years and include high-level professionals. The Committee is competent only for investments in securities, since real estate is managed and controlled by the entities that own them.
Faculty of Canon Law. Catholic University of Valencia San Vicente Mártir.
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Pope Francis has worked throughout his pontificate for peace, always insisting on the common responsibility that unites everyone to achieve social justice.
It would seem that peace, which concerns us so much, is only a "social question," of agreements and laws. True peace also has to do with the spirit and the heart of each one of us; hence the importance of cultivating what the Christian tradition calls the "spiritual life" or "interior life".
We highlight the Pope's teachings on two occasions in January: his address to the Diplomatic Corps accredited to the Holy See, which focused on the great pillars of peace; and his Apostolic Letter Totum amoris eston the occasion of the 400th anniversary of the death of St. Francis de Sales. In this letter (signed on December 28) the Pope underlines the centrality of love in the spiritual or interior life of the Christian.
This year the Pope's address to the Diplomatic Corps accredited to the Holy See (9-I- 2023) was a continuation of his January 1 Message for the World Day of Peace: "No one can save himself alone. Starting again from Covid-19 to trace together paths of peace.".
Francis now wished to express "an invocation of peace in a world that sees growing divisions and warsThe "Prince of Peace" (Is 9:5), after the contemplation, during Christmas, of the Son of God, called in the Sacred Scriptures "Prince of Peace" (Is 9:5).
It also marks the 60th anniversary of the encyclical Pacem in terrispublished a few months before his death and half a year after the so-called "Cuban Missile Crisis", which represented a nuclear threat and a step in the direction of the annihilation of humanity.
It is precisely the diplomatic task - the Pope observes - "... that is the most important one.is an exercise in humility because it requires sacrificing a little self-love to enter into a relationship with the other, to understand his reasons and points of view, thus contrasting with human pride and arrogance, the cause of all belligerent will.".
First of all, Francis reiterated that "possession of atomic weapons is immoral"in the line of St. John XXIII. He laments the stalemate of the "Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action" (nuclear agreement with Iran) and the war in Ukraine, as peaks of an iceberg that he has been calling the third world war (in progress) "in pieces" in a globalized world. To these are added other active wars or armed conflicts in the world.
He calls for an end to the "logic" of armaments - the arms race - because peace is not possible where instruments of death proliferate.
In the wake of the Pacem in terrisThe following four fundamental goods or ".pillars that regulate both the relations between individual human beings and between political communities."They are truth and justice, solidarity and freedom. The four are intertwined, the Pope observes, in a fundamental premise: "tvery human being is a person". That is to say, I might add, in a correct anthropology as the foundation of a correct ethics, compatible with a Christian vision of life.
First, "building peace in truth means above all respecting the human person, with his or her 'right to existence and physical integrity', who must be guaranteed 'freedom in the search for truth, in the expression of thought and in its dissemination'".as already pointed out in John XXIII's encyclical.
In this context, together with the recognition of women's rights, the Pope stresses the need to defend life against induced abortion and the discarding of other weak human beings: the sick, the disabled and the elderly. He insists, as on other occasions, on the inadmissibility of the death penalty and his desire that it disappear from the legislation of today's world.
He points out the need to promote the birth rate to protect the future of society. And it advocates a "integral vision of education"which implies "to integrate the paths of human, spiritual, intellectual and professional growth, allowing the individual to free himself from multiple forms of slavery and to establish himself in society in a free and responsible manner.".
It notes the real educational catastrophe that the pandemic has left behind, and calls for states to rethink "the shameful and asymmetrical relationship between public spending on education and funds earmarked for armaments".
He warns that peace requires universal recognition of religious freedom (limited in one third of the world) and denounces the fact that one in seven Christians in the world is persecuted. In addition, he defends that religious freedom is not limited to freedom of worship but also includes the freedom for everyone to "be able to live in peace".to act according to their conscience also in public life and in the exercise of their profession".
Finally, in this first section, Francis points out two fundamental principles concerning peace in truth. First, that religions "they are not problems, but part of the solution for a more harmonious coexistence."(Speech at the Plenary Session of the Seventh Congress of World Religious Leaders, Astana, September 14, 2022). Second, that "the root of all conflict is the imbalance of the human heart" (Mk 7:21).
A second pillar of peace is justice. Just as the 1962 crisis was resolved thanks to trust in international law, so too now it is necessary to create spaces for dialogue among peoples to avoid polarization, totalitarianism and ideological colonization.
Third, peace requires solidarity. That is to say, "to know that we are responsible for the fragility of others in the search for a common destiny"."(Fratelli tutti, 115). In the wake of the pandemic, Francis wishes to point out three areas where greater solidarity is urgently needed: migration (there is an urgent need to develop a normative framework for welcoming, accompanying, promoting and integrating migrants, as well as assisting and caring for shipwrecked persons, not only in some countries where they land); the world of the economy and work (providing profits in relation to the service of the common good and combating exploitation); and care for the common home (with more incisive attention to climate change).
As far as freedom is concerned, the Pacem in terris pointed out that peace building requires that there be no place for "injury to the freedom, integrity and security of other nations, regardless of their territorial extent or defense capabilities" (n. 66).
The Bishop of Rome calls attention to the prevalence, in various parts of our world, of a culture of oppression, of aggression and of the weakening of democracy, and once again expresses the wish formulated by "the good Pope" (St. John XXIII): that among men and their respective peoples "...".not fear, but love, which tends to express itself in a loyal, multiform collaboration, bearing many goods." (Pacem in terris, 67).
Pope Francis' apostolic letter, Totum amoris est (Everything belongs to loveOn the fourth centenary of the death of St. Francis de Sales (28-XII-2022), he places love as the origin, manifestation and goal of the Christian's spiritual life.
The content of the letter can be described schematically with nine words. Four to describe the context of the thought and doctrine of St. Francis de Sales; and five that point out his "decisions". The four words of the context can be: affectivity, incarnation, renewal and discernment. The five words in relation to his "decisions": freedom, holiness, joy, charity and Jesus Christ.
1. Affectivity. "God is God of the human heart"(synthesis of his thought). Importance of integrating affectivity in the whole of man and therefore of the spiritual life. "It is in the heart and through the heart that that subtle and intense unitary process takes place by virtue of which man recognizes God and, at the same time, himself, his own origin and depth, his own realization in the call to love.".
"Faith is above all a disposition of the heart". Indeed. And in the Christian sense (already in its biblical root) the heart is understood not primarily as a feeling - faith is not something purely emotional - but also not primarily or merely an intellectual assent - which is also a dimension of faith - but the whole person, which therefore includes his or her affections.
2. Incarnation. The holy doctor rejected both voluntarism (which confuses holiness with justification through one's own strength and produces a self-indulgence deprived of true love) and quietism (a passive and affectless abandonment, which belittles the flesh and history). "At the school of the Incarnation, learn to read history and inhabit it with confidence.". One of his first lessons is that "love is what gives value to our works"; and maintains that "Everything in the Church is for love, in love, through love and from love."(Treatise on the love of God). John Paul II called him "Doctor of divine love".
3. Renewal. This saint lived between the 16th and 17th centuries. From the intellectual and cultural point of view, he gathered the best of the previous century to pass it on to the following century, "...".reconciling the heritage of humanism with the tendency towards the absolute characteristic of mystical currents". All this, together with a "remarkable theological dignity": putting the spiritual life (prayer) first and also assuming the dimension of ecclesial life (feeling in the Church and with the Church) in the theological task. And in this way he points out that the theological method does not go hand in hand with individualism.
4. Discernment. He discovered that in his time a new world was opening up, where there was also a "thirst for God", although in a different way than before. To this he had to respond "with old and new languages". He knew how to read the moods of that time. He said: "it is very important to look at the condition of the times". In this way he was able to elaborate a fruitful spiritual and pastoral synthesis, centered on personal relationships and charity. He also knew how to proclaim the Gospel in a flexible and effective way.
As a conclusion to the above, the Pope observes: "This is also what awaits us as an essential task for this change of era: a Church that is not self-referential, free from all worldliness, but capable of inhabiting the world, of sharing the life of the people, of walking together, of listening and welcoming.". This is what Francis de Sales did, reading his time with the help of grace. That is why this doctor of the Church invites us to "to get out of the excessive preoccupation with ourselves, with the structures, with the social image, and to ask ourselves what are the concrete needs and spiritual hopes of our people.".
1. "Repropose" freedom (in a Christian perspective), within the framework of the initiative of divine grace and the collaboration of our human action.
To reformulate the question of true "devotion": not as a simple set of more or less pious or ascetic practices, but rather as a manifestation of charity, something like what a flame does with respect to fire. And, therefore, going to the root of devotion, which is holiness, for all Christians in every state of life, also in the "secular city".
3. To present the Christian life as "ecstasy of work and life", in the literal sense of the term ecstasy (going out). That is to say: the "joy of faith" that arises when we go out of ourselves towards God and others. And not as a set of obligations: "It is not living in us, but outside of us and above us.", in "a perpetual ecstasy of action and operation".
Pope Francis had already said it and now he takes it up again: "The great risk of today's world, with its multiple and overwhelming offer of consumption, is an individualistic sadness that springs from a comfortable and greedy heart, from the unhealthy search for superficial pleasures, from an isolated conscience. When the interior life is closed in on one's own interests, there is no more room for others, the poor no longer enter, the voice of God is no longer heard, the sweet joy of his love is no longer enjoyed, the enthusiasm for doing good no longer palpitates. Believers also run this risk, which is certain and permanent. Many fall into it and become resentful, complaining and lifeless beings." (Exhort. ap. Evangelii gaudium, 2)
4. Consider, as a criterion for discerning the truth of this lifestyle, charity towards one's neighbor: if there is no charity, the "ecstasies" of prayer can be illusory and even come from the devil.
5. To keep in mind the deep origin of Christian love which attracts the heart (for spiritual life cannot exist without affection): "the love (of God) manifested by the incarnate Son". That is, Jesus Christ, in his whole life and especially on the cross. This is why, says this holy doctor, "calvary is the mount of lovers".
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The charitable and social activity of the Church in Spain, Caritas, will allocate more than ten million euros this year to accompany more than seven thousand people in their training and social and labor insertion itineraries. The number of households with all their members unemployed exceeds one million in Spain.
What does the Church do for employment?"Work is essential in human life and is the path to sanctification."Unemployment has been among the top three concerns of Spaniards for years, according to the Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas (CIS). The officially registered unemployed in Spain now number almost three million, and households with all their members unemployed have once again exceeded one million, according to the January Labour Force Survey (EPA).
The Church in Spain tries to alleviate the plight of the most vulnerable and excluded people in various ways. Now, Spanish Caritas has resolved the call corresponding to 2023 of the Operational Program for Social Inclusion and Social Economy (POISES), co-financed by the European Social Fund, and endowed with a total budget of 10,063,536.02 euros.
The recipients of this program are mainly "people with very low qualifications and who require, especially after the pandemic, digital skills, for example; long-term unemployed, people with little work experience, women often alone, and immigrants with residence permits. In other words, people must be in a regular situation, or in the process of becoming so," Mar de Santiago, a technician in the Caritas Española Solidarity Economy team, explains to Omnes.
Of this significant volume of resources, 4.9 million euros will be allocated to accompanying people in their search for employment, helping them to improve their skills and search techniques and intermediating with companies (social and labor market insertion itineraries).
Another 4.3 million will be devoted to training actions to improve their labor qualification; while 838,000 euros will go to social economy projects, mainly insertion companies, whose purpose is to offer employment and improve the training of people at risk of social exclusion.
These resources, which are part of the POISES 2020-23 call for proposals and whose development is coordinated through the Caritas Española Solidarity Economy team, support the employment, training and social economy programs of 59 diocesan Caritas throughout Spain.
The 10 million euros will be allocated to 50 social and labor insertion itineraries, 220 training courses and 25 Caritas insertion companies.
The objective set by Caritas for 2023 through this Operational Program will allow the accompaniment of around 5,000 participants in social and labor insertion itineraries, 2,600 in training actions and 200 more in insertion companies.
"The resources of the European Social Fund that Cáritas has been managing since 2000 support access to the labor market for groups at risk of social exclusion and highlight employment as the best way to move towards personal autonomy and inclusion," adds Ana Sancho, from the Caritas Española Solidarity Economy team.
The POISES program has been implemented since 2016 with support from the European Social Fund. In our country it is implemented under the responsibility of the Spanish government through the ESF Administrative Unit of the Ministry of Labor, Migration and Social Security.
Natalia PeiroCaritas Secretary General, recently stated that "it is essential that we all become aware of the importance of taking vulnerable individuals and families into account in the design, monitoring and evaluation of public policies".
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Pope Francis has sent a telegram to those affected by the terrible earthquake that has shaken localities in Turkey and Syria. The magnitude of the first one was almost 8 points on the Richter scale.
The Holy Father expresses his sorrow for the victims and prays for them and their families, for the injured and for the rescue teams working against the clock to try to free people from the rubble.
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Topics such as love, solidarity, social networks and proselytism are some of the issues that young people of different religious confessions will discuss and dialogue about in the II Interreligious Conference organized by the Diocese of Cordoba, together with other entities.
Pablo BlancoUnity makes the Gospel message more credible".Ecumenism, the path to peace"Young people are needed to resist the aging of the soul."Cardinal Mendonça to young people: "Life is a waste if we live half-heartedly".On February 13 and 14, the Palacio de Congresos de Córdoba will host the II Jornadas Interreligiosas, which this year focuses on the youngest, as indicated by its slogan ".Young people and spiritualities".
For two days, various speakers from different religious denominations will address topics of interest such as social networks, testimonies, love and the presence of God in personal life, all from the perspective of youth. The registration is open for those who wish to participate.
The promoter of this conference, the young priest from Cordoba, Antonio Navarro, delegate of Ecumenism and Interreligious Dialogue of a diocese marked by its intercultural DNA, explains to Omnes that, although young people are growing up in an increasingly multicultural environment, "being young does not always mean knowing how to listen and respect" and work in this field is always necessary.
-We embarked on this project because there are many young people who live their spiritual life, their relationship with God, with depth and enthusiasm, and do so without "leaving" their environments and their daily lives, but inserting their faith in those contexts that are often distant from religion.
Being of different faiths, there are considerable differences between them, but also today's world presents them with a series of common challenges and obstacles, such as materialism, secularism, superficiality... They have many ideas and experiences on these issues, with a fresh and interesting vision.
-The problem is to consider that interreligious dialogue is something "for experts". The Magisterium of the Catholic Church clearly indicates (Dialogue and MissionNo. 28-35) that interreligious dialogue has four modes. One is that of daily coexistence, in which people of different religions have positive relationships in work, leisure, family and friendships... Another is that of spirituality, sharing the experience that each one has of their morals and their forms of prayer. One more is that of solidarity and peace building, collaborating in favor of a more just and fraternal society, in joint actions. The last of these is that of specialists, which will have no meaning or fruit if it is not preceded by the three previous ones. What would be the point of religious leaders meeting if ordinary believers do not talk to each other?
-In general, the new generations have grown up in a more varied and plural world, have spent time abroad, and are accustomed to living with people from other countries, cultures and religions.
However, this does not preclude the emergence of fundamentalist movements among them, which lead to intolerance and prejudice. Just as an advanced age is fully compatible with an open and courteous mind, being young is not always the same as knowing how to listen and respect.
Today, a good number of young people are becoming more and more polarized, conceiving a world fragmented into clashing and irreconcilable identities, especially in ideological and political issues.
-The fundamental ones are those of every human being: to love and be loved in a sentimental project that is worthwhile, and to have a role in society through a job with which to become independent.
This is not easy today, since the bonds of loving commitment are fragile and fickle, there is no family stability and much less job stability, with jobs that, demanding great training and dedication, are poorly paid.
Maintain the hope is complicated for many of them. The legal framework does not defend those who want to create a family, and the temptation of individualism is great.
-We could talk about many more, in fact, some have been left out. The topics have been chosen according to what young believers usually tell us. To a certain extent, it could be said that they are not only the actors of the dialogue in these Days, but also the creators who contributed the ideas and we, the official organizers, have only given them shape.
The II Interreligious Conference "Spirit of Cordoba", promoted and coordinated by the Palacio de Congresos of Cordoba, where they are held, aims to bring interreligious knowledge to the participants.
Together with the young faithful of the Catholic Church, the Islamic Board of Cordoba, the Federation of Jewish Communities and Evangelical Religious entities are participating in the Conference.
February 13 will begin with the panel discussion "When God changes your life" followed by the second block of that day entitled "Our commitment to create a more caring society"; the third block of the second day of the meeting is "Love in times of Tinder" and a fourth block is dedicated to reflect on the transmission of faith in each of the religions under the title "Transmission of faith: between proselytizing and witnessing".
Finally, block number five will be held on the 14th under the title "Internet and social networks, a barrier or a bridge?
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Manos Unidas launches its 64th campaign with the slogan "Stop inequality is in your hands". To present it, two missionaries have spoken about their experience in a press conference with the president of the organization.
"Faithful to missionary sending": the EEC's guidelines for 2021-2025Antonio Hernández DeusAfrican women stand out for their hope and optimism"."Manos Unidas projects show that another world is possible."Manos Unidas This year launches its 64th campaign. More than 6 decades helping third world countries through cooperation projects and that, each year, continues to emphasize the painful reality of hunger in the world. This year's campaign is an invitation to personal involvement in the fight against hunger and poverty under the slogan "Stopping inequality is in your hands". The campaign was presented by the president of Manos Unidas, Cecilia Pilar, and the missionaries Dario Bossi and Virginia Alfaro.
Cecilia Pilar began by presenting the situation that many people are currently experiencing. The figures are worrying, she said, because we know that every nine seconds a person dies of hunger. In total, more than three and a half million people die every year.
All this information clashes with the figures on wealth, which continues to increase. However, Pilar emphasized in her presentation that this increase is not reflected equally in all countries.
The conditions in which millions of people live cannot be reduced to numbers, the president said, but must be assumed by all as a common responsibility.
Several countries of the world "experience many neocolonial relationships", pointed out the Cambonian missionary, Dario Bossi, in his intervention. In fact, the world powers have in fertile but economically poor lands, monstrous projects that destroy the land, causing deaths and crimes against people.
Bossi explained the difficulty to confront these projects, because if the communities refuse, the powers and companies undertake campaigns of persecution to pressure the natives of the places. But not everything is negative, as the missionary wanted to emphasize. The communities also try to organize and unite to fight against these aggressions.
Outside help is needed and Dario stressed the importance of the Church listening to the people and taking the side of the most threatened, putting its institutional strength at their service.
Virginia Alfaro is a lay missionary in Angola. There she coordinates a community intervention program called "Happy Childhood". This project promotes access to basic rights for women and children.
Through the intervention program, Alfaro helps to "create opportunities", improving the education of the children and establishing a quality education. During her intervention, the missionary emphasized that most of the children do not have access to this education. In fact, only 11 % of the children receive a preschool education, which is as expensive as a private university.
On the other hand, Virginia explained, most teenage girls drop out of the educational system because they become pregnant. The importance of fighting this can be expressed in numbers and so did Alfaro. She pointed out that girls who finish primary education can produce between 10 and 20 % more resources to support themselves, and if they finish secondary education, they can produce up to 25 % more.
In addition to education, the missionaries as Virginia fight for health and welfare. In his presentation, Alfaro emphasized that 94 % of the world's malaria deaths occur in Africa, with malaria being the leading cause of death among children and pregnant women in Angola.
For pregnant women, the risk of illness is compounded by the precariousness of the "paternity drain". Many men abandon the mothers of their children because there is no link between male identity and the father figure, so women, intimately linked to their motherhood, must fight for their rights in a fragmented society.
The speakers at the press conference insisted several times on the need to understand that changing the situations of the most vulnerable is everyone's responsibility. They encouraged growing awareness and participation in the projects that are being implemented worldwide to fight inequality.
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Conversion paths are always unique. Professor Ordway describes her journey to faith as an engaging fencing match in which academic reason finally surrenders to the loving Cross of Jesus and the motherly arms of Mary.
The book Not God's type is the story of Holly Ordway - an atheist academic, professor of English Language and Literature in the United States - told in first person with frankness and honesty. It is the story of a competitive fencing fighter, argumentative, rationalist, who tenaciously seeks the truth, without fatigue or rest, in short, a courageous investigator of the truth by the rational way.
"Willing to listen to arguments about the veracity of Christianity.""Willing to listen to arguments about the veracity of Christianity", she had the gift of meeting Christians who were able to help her in her reflections, among them her fencing teacher. Her testimony is "an account of God's work, the story of grace at work in and through human beings". "an account of God's work, the story of grace at work in and through human beings."
As the translator Julio Hermoso writes in the foreword to the Spanish edition, "Lewis and Tolkien, among others, play a leading role [...]: they are the tools at hand for a teacher of English Literature who has grown up reading them, and does not hesitate to stand on their solid and broad shoulders".
Her search for the truth does not start from doubts, but from two beliefs and a deep desire that Ordway expresses as follows: "Although my creed held that there was no ultimate meaning, I was obdurate in the belief that there was such a thing as truth and valued truth as an absolute good. [...] I wished to know the truth and to live by it, whatever it was.". Ordway narrates her double conversion, first to Christianity and later to Catholicism.
As an academic, Ordway found it "exciting to learn more about theology and about doctrine." Gradually she came to understand the Christian faith, which until then she had considered to be a belief of people "uneducated and superstitious.". Gradually Ordway moved forward "toward a conversation about faith".. She began to feel comfortable with Christians answering her questions, something that did not fit with what she expected. Ordway discovered that faith "could be based on reason", i.e., that the faith was open to debate and investigation.
Professor Ordway sought answers to such questions as the origin of morality, the existence of conscience, the eternity of truth, life after death, perfect justice or mercy, and on one basic question: the first cause of the universe. She looked at this question from various points of view, gave it a lot of thought and finally decided that there was no good reason to reject it; therefore, "it seemed that there was a creator of the universe". A first cause that "had intentionality [...] which we could call God: the origin of all morality".
Ordway left behind the shell of atheism. She accepted God as a person which had serious implications for her life. She rationally admitted that God was one, the Creator, the origin of all goodness. She delved into the historicity of the Resurrection and laid down "the weaponss"she decided to become a Christian. She was baptized. Her attention continued to be drawn to the cross; it was not enough for her to know about Jesus, she wanted to know him.
In this journey towards Christianity - Ordway says - the most difficult and transforming part was to find oneself for the first time at the foot of the cross.. "In my journey to Christian faith, I had focused on the resurrection; but, after my baptism, that sacramental entry into the death and resurrection of Christ, I began to discover that the cross is the wellspring of healing and transforming grace: it is not merely a part of the historical events of Jesus' passion and death, but the place where the incarnate God bore the full dark weight of human misery.".
Ordway then embarked on her journey to the Catholic Church. She read, studied, reflected and concluded that Catholic doctrine made a lot of sense, although she still felt comfortable in Anglicanism.
Marian dogmas and devotion to the Virgin Mary presented her with an obstacle. However, she could not fail to recognize the truth of the Church's teaching: "If Jesus is fully human and also fully divine, then his mother, Mary, is the mother of the second person of the Holy Trinity; she is the Mother of God, who bore God in her womb.". Finally, she decided to come out of her inner fortress and was received into the Catholic Church.
Not God's typeis a profoundly hopeful testimony of a conversion from atheism to Catholicism. It shows that it is possible to come to believe in the existence of God through study, reflection and listening.
After intense intellectual work and many conversations, Ordway personally verified that Christianity is based on events that have occurred in the past. historical and attested She also notes that theology and philosophy offer serious and complex answers that do not simplistically appeal to blind faith. If Ordway had been unaware or ignorant of these realities for so many years of her life, she attributes it simply and honestly to the fact that she had not been informed.
In the search for truth God goes ahead. He is the one who places in the soul of the person the seed of the desire not to succumb to darkness, that is, the desire to search until he finds the light. God rewards the search for truth and gives his grace to those who embark on this path to reach the desired goal.
Access to Holly Ordway's personal blog here.
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Brotherhoods cannot lose sight of the fact that their mission, as public associations of the faithful of the Catholic Church, is the Christian perfection of their members.
Beauty, liturgy and brotherhoodsBrotherhoods: Head or heartThe Social Doctrine of the Church: guide and basis for the life of the Brotherhoods.Sometimes it is useful to remember basic concepts that are taken for granted but need to be refreshed so that they are not forgotten in the routine of everyday life.
In the case of sororitiesBeyond their daily activities, we cannot lose sight of their nature and purpose: they are public associations of the faithful of the Catholic Church whose mission is the Christian development of their members.
The ways to accomplish this mission are the trainingThe mission of the Congregation is the transmission of Christian doctrine, the fostering of the virtue of Charity, the promotion of public worship and the sanctification of society from within (cf. CIC c. 298.1 CIC).
It is the ecclesiastical hierarchy that establishes them as public associations and grants them juridical personality to fulfill their mission in the name, by delegation, of the Church.
At Sisterhoods are entrusted with activities reserved by their very nature to ecclesiastical authority (cf. CIC c.301) and are therefore, logically, under the supervision of that authority (cf. CIC 303).
They are not autonomous entities; their mission, activities and pastoral orientations are determined by the Church, immediately represented by the Ordinary of the diocese in which the brotherhood is constituted.
Having centered the bases of the nature and aims of the brotherhoods, it seems clear that these will have to be attentive to the pastoral indications that in every moment the Church proposes to the faithful, to assume them as their own and to take care in their diffusion and implementation among their brothers, with an active obedience. In each diocese these indications of government are set by the ordinary of the diocese, in Spain by the Spanish Episcopal Conference.
It is in this context that the work presented by the same last January under the title of "The faithful God keeps his covenant."which he subtitles as "Instrument for pastoral work on the person, family and society offered to the Church and Spanish society from the faith in God and the perspective of the common good"..
This extensive document, rather than a program of actions, proposes ".reflections to be shared with the members of the Church and with Spanish society, starting from a look at the current cultural, social and political situation.".
Its intention is to "to stimulate reflection and dialogue on issues of particular importance for ecclesial and social life at a time of convergence of multiple events, political, economic and cultural expression of a great transformation that affects the transmission of faith and coexistence in our society.". Reflections that "want to encourage the public presence of Catholics in the environments and institutions of which they are a part".
This is where the sororitiesThe institutions are offered a work plan that has already been drafted and is fully guaranteed. A plan that revolves around three axes: person, family and society.
The document does not offer a catalog of activities to be carried out, but rather proposals to reflect on, deepen and adjust them to the programming of the brotherhoods in their task of ongoing formation and sanctification of society.
The main thrust of this report is already set out in the Introduction: "...".Person and society are inseparable, and the family is the alliance that unites them.". This basic outline has been altered by a profound cultural and social crisis, which is why the Church "offers the proposal of an anthropology adequate to elementary human experience".
From here he identifies some of the problems of today's society: the crisis of the welfare state; the culture of individualism (reduction of the person to the individual); the replacement of convictions by feelings; the dictatorship of relativism, and the consequences of these problems in the family and society.
Following this analysis, he notes "the lack of public commitment on the part of Catholics" whom he encourages, or rather exhorts, to intervene by proposing and, if necessary, confronting a Christian anthropology.
This Document is intended to provoke in the sororities The aim is that, without neglecting the day-to-day management of the organization of worship services, processional processions, attention to the brothers, etc., they should also be centers of intellectual and doctrinal excellence that can play a decisive role in the reconstruction of civil society.
It is quite possible that this undertaking will be rejected, even opposed, also in the sisterhoods, by those who are encapsulated in their ivory tower, disconnected from reality, and fear that their false security will be shaken. It is better to ignore them.
D. in Business Administration. Director of the Instituto de Investigación Aplicada a la Pyme. Eldest Brother (2017-2020) of the Brotherhood of the Soledad de San Lorenzo, in Seville. He has published several books, monographs and articles on brotherhoods.
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The Pope's World Network of Prayer has launched the video with the intention for the month of February. This month the Holy Father prays for parishes.
"Parishes must be close communities, without bureaucracy, centered on people and where to find the gift of the sacraments". This is how the Pope speaks of parishes, for which he asks for prayers in the new intention for the month of February.
In the video published by the Global Prayer NetworkFrancis calls on parishes to be open to everyone: "We should put a sign on the door of every parish that says: 'We should be open to everyone. Free admission". In this way, the temples will avoid becoming "a club for the few, which give a certain social belonging".
Through communion, the Pope says, parishes will become "communities of faith, of fraternity and to welcome the most needy".
Below is the complete video of the Holy Father:
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Today there are still people who consecrate themselves completely to Christ. While it is easy to imagine monks living within the walls of the cloister, there are also consecrated lay people living in the midst of the world. Fernando Lorenzo Rego is a consecrated layman in the Regnum Christi who recounts his experience in an interview with Omnes.
"All for you", the testimony of a young seminarianVocations: to God we pray...Theology for the laity: why and what for?Not all consecrated persons live in a convent or monastery. There are those who, being completely dedicated to God, live their vocation in the midst of the world. They are consecrated laity.
Fernando Lorenzo Rego is one of these people. He belongs to the Regnum Christi and in an interview with Omnes explains the meaning of consecrated life, the vocation of the laity and the charism of the Kingdom of Christ.
-For the sake of brevity, I could say that it is to make Jesus' way of life accessible to every Christian.
Jesus has become incarnate to reveal man to man, in the words of Saint John Paul II. Consecrated life has no other meaning than to reproduce one or more aspects of the life of Jesus in the present time so that it can be actualized and understood by the Christian of today, in the midst of his daily life, and can reach heaven.
-There have always been challenges for Christian life and there will always be challenges for consecrated life. The present times are no different. On the contrary, it presents added difficulties in a society that is individualistic, agnostic and far removed from a transcendent vision - at least in the West.
In spite of this, there are traces today that show a deep concern for human beings. How else can we understand the great phenomenon of the growth of volunteerism, or of non-governmental organizations that care for those who nobody cared for a few years ago? Is it not speaking of a desire to give oneself for others, of an eagerness to fill the space that material things cannot fill?
Precisely, this emptiness manifests itself as the thirst of one lost in the desert in his anguished longing for an oasis. That oasis, together with other ecclesial realities, is offered by consecrated life.
Jesus says: "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick". Today's world is very sick, "the Church is a field hospital", as Jesus likes to say, "the Church is a field hospital". Pope Francis. In this hospital, for these sick people, accepting their own limitations, consecrated life offers a way to Jesus, our Savior, so that this wounded human being may find a full meaning to his or her life.
-Having a clear reason for living, putting before us the purpose of our life: Jesus Christ. Knowing how to take what helps us for it and leaving aside what hinders us.
I like visual comparisons..., it's like if someone needs to cook a paella. He goes to a supermarket that offers him a multitude of very attractive products. What does he do? He has his ideal in mind. He contemplates the delicacies on offer, which he even puts in his hand to try; but he only chooses what will help him to prepare a succulent paella.
The consecrated person does not demonize anything. He lets go of what is not for him. Many realities are good; others are not so good and some are bad for everyone. But he takes reality "insofar as" it helps him to fulfill his ideal. It is living the principle and foundation that St. Ignatius of Loyola promotes so much.
Thus, the lifestyle, the time he devotes to many good and holy activities, he devotes if necessary. I am thinking, for example, of the time he gives to union with God, to the relationship with his companions in community, to the attention to the people to whom he directs his mission, to study or work, to human relationships, to entertainment, to rest, to sports, to cultural cultivation, to the care of his own home, etc.
The ordinary essential activities as a human being - body and spirit, including the affections - together with the constant and untiring dedication for his concrete mission: the attention to others wherever he is dedicated and the mission assigns him. This can be teaching -at different levels-, spiritual guidance and accompaniment from children and adolescents to adult life, research, the most varied professional practice, manual work, parish life or the most varied ecclesial organizations, in volunteer work, in political life, in the world of health, in the field of workers, in the business world, in communication... An endless number of realities are prone to land and concretize the mission.
The essential thing is to seek God daily so as to know how to raise him up for others where and how they need him, without losing oneself along the way. Because the obstacles are numerous; but the love of God and his grace are always there to support the work.
-I have already made some progress. It supposes "structuring" one's own life where the relationship with God and his will not only occupies the main place, but the only one. This must be very clear in a consecrated life. One lives absolutely facing Him. One does not give Him only the best moments, but all of them. Although this involves many very different facets.
For example, a life of union with Him is essential. But it is also essential to have moments of balanced recreation, "mens sana in corpore sano", for human relationships. All of this should always be in view of the mission that Jesus wants for each one of us and in line with the charism of the institution.
Surrender to the people to whom our mission is directed is nothing other than surrender to God. A God discovered in each person in need.
-It is true, in the world, people live a deep relativism of ideas, behaviors, attitudes. But this happens when there is no clear ideal, or when one's life is based on something unstable, perishable.
However, when you affirm your life on the rock (cfr. Mt 7. 24) you will have difficulties that come from within, from the struggles against evil, from the contemplation of many who are lost for lack of Christ; but your ideal sustains you, drives you, renews you, launches you every day to achieve these goals. Not yours, but those of Christ.
Moreover, something contrary to what was expected happens. That firmness, that life established on rock can be transformed into a lighthouse for many who are about to capsize in that impetuous sea of relativism. Not because one is the source of light, but because it reflects the light that God sends to each person. Let us not forget, God does not remain with his arms folded - if we can express ourselves in this way - in the face of the advance of evil. That is why he raises up many new ways in our time to broaden the channels of grace. And within these ways, he calls many to follow him on the path of total surrender to him.
-Curious question; I couldn't miss it.
Outwardly, nothing apparently changes: neither in activities, nor in the way you present yourself, nor in your work or professional demands... You are "just one of the people", as we like to say. But for God you are different: completely dedicated to Him, enthusiastic and in love with God. This translates into the day-to-day life of a community, directed and accompanied by a director.
The life of prayer occupies a preeminent place. An average of three hours a day to be with Him (Eucharistic celebration, personal and community prayer, spiritual reading) and His Blessed Mother (praying the rosary, praying at her side...). It is a time for petition, thanksgiving, praise and adoration.
Then one distributes one's time according to one's needs: to go to classes, to receive them or to teach them, to launch or manage projects, to accompany people in their daily lives, to prepare apostolic initiatives, to fulfill professional obligations....
You also have to put your own things in order, clean and tidy up the house, shop, cook, rest, do sports...
Many of these activities are done in community. But there is also community when one works apparently alone, because one feels accompanied by prayer, by advice, by welcome when one returns to the center -that is what we call our house-, substituted when one is unable to...
At midday we return to the center, when possible; after lunch and rest, we return to the "tajo" in the afternoon until late at night, if necessary.
Our center is a home, like an ordinary family home, cozy, simple; but, thanks to God and the generosity of other people, we have what we need. First and foremost, a chapel where we keep Jesus the Eucharist to be with Him; then the communal areas like any home (a living-dining room, kitchen and laundry area, etc.) and the individual rooms.
The monks and friars live the choir. We do not. We assume the lifestyle of lay people in community, but without the commitments of prayer that they have, without distinctives (we dress like any lay person of our own condition), with a consecration to God through private vows canonically recognized as a society of apostolic life and inserted in the world, as I have explained above.
-The charism of the Kingdom of Christ, of Regnum Christi, is centered on the personal experience of Christ - like all charisms - but those who live it try to imitate Jesus when he goes out to meet each person to show him the love of his heart. As Jesus did with the first ones, he gathers these people together and forms them as apostles, so that they can strengthen this possible Christian leadership. In this way, he sends them to collaborate in the evangelization of others and of society. But he does not neglect them, but accompanies them with prayer, spiritual support and the advice of his own experience.
We live this charism of Regnum Christi by contributing our condition as laity and consecrated persons, being - as I said before - one more of the People of God, with our work and the offering of our own life.
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