Vatican City, Dec 17, 2014 / 12:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- As inmates are moved by a letter Pope Francis has sent to the prison of a small town in central Italy, the news broke that a man serving a life sentence will be among those at an audience with Pope Francis Dec. 20. The Saturday meeting will be between the Roman Pontiff and members of the Community Pope John XXIII, which was founded by Fr. Oreste Benzi, who died in 2007. Members of the community will be received by Pope Francis on the occasion of the opening of Fr. Benzi's cause for beatification, and the list of participants includes Carmelo Musumeci, who was sentenced to life in prison for having committed a homicide in 1991. While in prison, Musumeci completed high school and then earned a law degree. Pope Francis addressed the issue of life imprisonment in an Oct. 23 address to delegates of the International Association of Penal Law, saying that “all Christians and men of good will are … called today to fight not only for the abolition of the death penalty, whether legal or illegal, and in all its forms, but also in order to improve prison conditions, with respect for the human dignity of the people deprived of their freedom. And I link this to life imprisonment. A short time ago the life sentence was taken out of the Vatican’s Criminal Code. A life sentence is just a death penalty in disguise.” The encounter between Pope Francis and Musumeci thus comes in the midst of a pontificate with particular pastoral concern for prisoners. Among his first decisions as Bishop of Rome was to celebrate Holy Thursday at a juvenile prison near the city. And meeting with prison chaplains on Oct. 23, 2013, he asked them to tell prisoners, “I am praying for them, I have them at heart, I am praying to the Lord and to Our Lady that they may be able to get through this difficult period in their lives in a positive way, that they may not become discouraged or close in on themselves.” These words encouraged the members of the Community Pope John XXIII to forward a request to have Musumeci among those who will meet Pope Francis Dec. 20. Longing to meet the Pope, Musumeci has addressed a letter to Pope Francis. “Pope Francis, I am now living the 24th year of a 'death penalty in disguise,’ as you call it. And since I got the news that brothers and sisters of the Community Pope John XXIII had included me in the list of people who will meet you in Vatican City State, I have been unable to sleep.” “Lost in sadness and melancholy, I confess, Pope Francis, that often no more hope lies in my heart. I am tired of hope, and counting the days and nights… I am also tired of waiting for death, and I confess that some nights I wish to go toward death, so as to end my penalty in advance.” As the Dec. 20 meeting is being prepared, Pope Francis sent on Dec. 14 a letter to inmates of the prison of Latina, which he delivered through Msgr. Yoannis Lahzi Gaid, Pope Francis' second secretary who spent several years as a deputy parish priest in Latina. Msgr. Lahzi Gaid gave the letter to Fr. Nicola Cupaiolo, the chaplain of the prison, who then gave the letter to the 120 prisoners, 30 of them are women imprisoned in the high security branch for crimes of terrorism or mafia. The Pope addressed all the prisoners who had written to him: “Reading your letters was a great comfort to me. It is impossible to me writing back to each of you, so I wish that each of you feel this letter as my personal response to him.” Wishing them a Merry Christmas, Pope Francis hoped that “hours, days, months and years that you have spent or you are spending in this prison are considered and lived nota s a wasted time or as a temporary punishment, but as a real occasion of growing in order to find the peace of heart and the strength to spring up, returning to live the hope in the Lord that never disappoint you.” Pope Francis also said he is pleased that many of the prisoners “are following a path of faith with the chaplain, Fr. Nicola, and with those are collaborating in being close to you not because of a duty but for their inner openness to sincerely consider you sisters and brothers.” Pope Francis sent to the prisoners a new Missal, so that “you could find in the Holy Mass the path of walking daily with the Lord … the needed food to sustain the path to salvation and liberation” that no prison “can prevent.”   Read more

Vatican City, Dec 16, 2014 / 01:14 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis touched on the importance of being humble and open to the Lord's correction, encouraging the faithful to offer him their sins to God in order to be saved. “The humble, poor people that trust in the Lord: these are the ones who are saved and this is the way of the Church, isn’t it?” the Pope asked during his Dec. 16 daily mass in the Vatican's Saint Martha Guesthouse. “This is the path I must follow, not the path in which I do not listen to His voice, do not accept correction and do not trust in the Lord.” Pope Francis centered his reflections on the day's readings, taken from the Book of the Prophet Zephaniah and from the Gospel of Matthew, which the pontiff said both speak of a “judgment” on which both salvation and condemnation depend. While Zephaniah in the first reading talks about a “rebellious and polluted” city, there is still the presence of some who repent of their sins, the Pope observed, saying that this group is the “people of God” who possess the “three characteristics (of) humility, poverty and trust in the Lord.” However the people in the city who refused to trust in the Lord and accept the corrections he gave him cannot receive salvation because they are closed to it, he said, while it is the meek and the humble who trust that will be saved. “And that is still valid today, isn’t it? When we look at the holy people of God that is humble, that has its riches in its faith in the Lord, in its trust in the Lord – the humble, poor people that trust in the Lord: these are the ones who are saved.” The Pope then turned to the gospel reading in which Jesus tells the chief priests and elders the story of a father who asks his two sons to work in their vineyard. While the first son says that he will go and does not, the second initially denies his father’s request, but later goes to work. In telling this story, Jesus makes it clear to the chief priests and elders that they were not open to the voice of God preached by John the Baptist, adding that this is why tax collectors and prostitutes will enter the kingdom of heaven before they do. This statement from Jesus echoes the situation of many Christians today who feel “pure” simply because they go to mass and receive communion, the Pope noted, explaining that God asks for more. “If your heart is not a repentant heart, if you do not listen to the Lord, if you don’t accept correction and you do not trust in Him, your heart is unrepentant,” he said, observing how the Pharisees were “hypocrites” for being scandalized at the attention Jesus gave to prostitutes and tax collectors.  Although they were affronted at Jesus acceptance of the sinners, they then “secretly approached them to vent their passion or to do business,” the pontiff explained, saying that because of their hypocrisy they are not welcome in paradise. Pope Francis said that this judgment gives hope provided that we have the courage to open our hearts to God, even if that means giving him the full list of our sins. He recalled the story of a Saint who believed that he had given everything to God with great generosity. However in a conversation with the Lord, the saint was told that there was still something he was holding onto. When the saint asked what it was that he still had not given, the Lord replied “Your sins,” the pontiff recalled. The moment in which we are able to tell the Lord “these are my sins – they are not his or hers, they are mine…take them” will be the moment when we become that “meek and humble people” who trust in God, the Pope said, and prayed that “the Lord grant us this grace.” Read more

Vatican City, Dec 16, 2014 / 09:03 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican has published the results of its apostolic visitation examining the quality of religious communities across the U.S. in a report described as realistic yet encouraging. Voicing than... Read more

Vatican City, Dec 16, 2014 / 12:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- In an effort to improve the Holy See budgeting system, the Secretariat for the Economy has already trained Vatican employees in new budgeting policies, and 2015's budgets are to be released by the spring. All this, according to the latest bulletin released by the economy secretariat. After the issuance of the handbook of financial management policies, the Secretariat for the Economy trained more than 160 staff members in November and December, representing 79 entities dealing with finances within the Vatican, in order “to assist and support entities with the new budgeting process and budget template.” “Each session was organised as a meeting of collaborators rather than a classroom, and included a detailed explanation of the reasons for the new policies,” the bulletin stressed. By Jan. 9, 2015 each of these entities should have compiled their 2015 budget and given it to the Secretariat for the Economy. The secretariat will review the budgets and consolidate them “according to international standards.” Given the needed training after the issuance of the new policies, the 2015 budget is scheduled to be published in the spring, but the Secretariat for the Economy anticipates that “in future years the annual budget will be finalised prior to the start of each year.” In order to facilitate the compilation of the budget, “the secretariat – with the assistance of staff seconded from the curia as well as staff from the Secretariat of State and the Prefecture for Economic Affairs – has recently provided entities with pre-completed budget templates to help entities in the transition to the new budgeting process.” The Secretariat will also provide “individual support and guidance for each entity,” and finally it “will soon issue the first set of a series of Practice Notes to all entities.” “The Practice Notes will be developed over time and will be issued after approval by the Council. They will provide a guide for the accounting activities, including donations, recording of personnel and operating costs as well as the approach to recording investments, other assets and liabilities,” reads the bulletin. At the moment, the Secretariat for the Economy is working on the arrangements for the 2014 Financial Statements, including the arrangements for external audits. The Holy See balance sheet were already certified by an external auditor, but new arrangements are needed since the auditions were made on the basis of the previous management policies. The bulletin also reads that “while the 2014 Statements will not be prepared in accordance with the new Policies, it is necessary to carefully map the closing 2014 balances to the opening balances for 2015. It is also necessary to take this opportunity to record any transactions or balances not previously included and to conduct a full inventory so that all amounts are correctly carried forward in to 2015.” According to the motu proprio Fidelis dispensator et prudens, a general auditor will be appointed. In fact, while financial reforms are being carried forward, the new Vatican financial bodies are working to shape the economic structure. The Secretariat for the Economy bulletin says, “we look forward to 2015 as a time when the economic and administrative structures will become operational. Statutes for the Council, Secretariat and the Auditor General are on track to be finalized and submitted to the Holy Father for his approval.” In a briefing with journalists Dec. 10, Fr. Federico Lombardi, director of the Holy See press office, made public that “there is a restricted group of three cardinals” carrying forward the drafting of the statutes, though he was not able to disclose who these cardinals are. In the mean time, “the Council for the Economy has presented to the Holy Father and the Council of Cardinals its recommendations on the strengthening of APSA’s role, governance and focus as the Central Treasury of the Holy See and Vatican City State.” Read more