Vatican City, Aug 7, 2014 / 08:39 am (CNA/EWTN News).- In light of the increasingly dramatic situation of Christians in Iraq following the expansion of ISIS forces to the plain of Nineveh, Pope Francis has appointed Cardinal Fernando Filoni as his pers... Read more
Vatican City, Aug 7, 2014 / 08:34 am (CNA/EWTN News).- As Iraq’s largest Christian city fell into the hands of the Islamic State, Pope Francis issued an urgent appeal asking for peace, and called for worldwide efforts to assist those affected by increasing violence. “In light of the very distressing events, the Holy Father renews his spiritual closeness to the many who are experiencing this extremely painful trial,” an Aug. 7 statement from the Vatican read. “He joins with the heartfelt appeals of the local bishops, asking, together with them and for their troubled communities, that a chorus of incessant prayer may rise from the whole Church to invoke the Holy Spirit for the gift of peace.” Going on, the statement also included an “urgent appeal” to the entire international community, “so that, actively taking steps to end the humanitarian tragedy taking place, efforts be made to protect all those affected or threatened by violence.” He asked for global efforts “to ensure all necessary assistance – especially the most needed aid – to the great multitude of displaced persons whose fate depends entirely on the solidarity of others.” According to BBC News, the militant Sunni Islamist organization Islamic State of Iraq captured the city of Qaraqosh, located in the Nineveh province, overnight following the withdrawal of Kurdish army forces. Having been the country’s largest Christian town, sources close to BBC state that thousands are fleeing. Reports reveal that at least a quarter of Iraqi Christians are leaving Qaraqosh and surrounding areas, and as many as 100,000 people are believed to be heading toward the autonomous Kurdistan Region. Qaraqosh’s fall comes just days after the Islamic State took control of Sinjar, a Yazidi-majority town fewer than 80 miles west of Mosul, Aug. 3. These mark the latest efforts in an operation launched by ISIS earlier this spring with the intention of establishing a caliphate. Since June they have taken control of Mosul and swaths of territory in the country's north and west. The extremist group now refers to itself as the Islamic State. The Vatican message assured that the Pope is following “the dramatic news coming from northern Iraq” with “deep concern,” and is particularly distressed over the danger to “defenseless people,” most especially the Christian community, who are at greatest risk. Iraqi Christians, the statement read, are “a people fleeing their villages because of the violence that in these days is raging and disturbing the nation.” Thousands of Christians and other minorities fled Mosul after a July 18 ultimatum demanding they convert, pay jizya or be killed. They went to other towns in Nineveh province and in Iraqi Kurdistan. Many were stripped of their possessions at Islamic State checkpoints, escaping with nothing but the clothes on their backs. Inhabitants of Mosul who have fled to other locations in Nineveh province, such as Bakhdida, lack drinking water, electricity and medicine, the Islamic State having cut off their supplies. Repeating the Pope’s appeal for peace made during his Sunday, July 20, Angelus address, the Vatican message lamented that “Our brothers are persecuted, they are driven out, they have to leave their houses without having the possibility of taking anything with them.” “Dearest brothers and sisters who are so persecuted, I know how much you suffer, I know that you are stripped of everything. I am with you in the faith of the one who has conquered evil!” In conclusion, the Roman Pontiff called upon “the conscience of all,” and assured each believer that “The God of peace will awaken in all the authentic desire for dialogue and reconciliation.” “Violence will not defeat violence. Violence is defeated by peace! Let us pray in silence, asking for peace; everyone, in silence...Mary Queen of Peace, pray for us!” Read more
Vatican City, Aug 7, 2014 / 05:33 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Amid the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli ambassador to the Holy See lauded Pope Francis’ continued calls for peace, stating that religious leaders often help two sides of a conflic... Read more
Des Moines, Iowa, Aug 7, 2014 / 04:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- An advocate for Catholics living in rural settings said it is unfortunate that this group sometimes feels like second-class citizens, and cautioned that the Church neglects them at her own peri... Read more
Montgomery, Ala., Aug 7, 2014 / 02:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Robert Bentley, Alabama's governor and a trained physician, has expressed disappointment that a law he signed last year requiring abortionists in the state to have hospital admitting privileges was struck down by a federal judge. “We are extremely disappointed by today’s ruling,” Bentley stated. “As a doctor, I firmly believe that medical procedures, including abortions, performed in Alabama should be done in the safest manner possible,” he said, explaining that the law in question “ensures that if a complication arises there is continuity of treatment between doctor and patient.” “This ruling significantly diminishes those important protections,” he charged. On Aug. 4, U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson ruled against a 2013 Alabama law requiring doctors who perform abortion procedures to have hospital admitting privileges. Thompson said the law would make it more difficult for women living in the three largest Alabama cities – Birmingham, Mobile and Montgomery – to obtain abortions, because clinics in those areas do not meet the standards set out in the law and could be forced to close or acquire new doctors. “The resulting unavailability of abortion in these three cities would impose significant obstacles, burdens, and costs for women across Alabama,” he wrote in his opinion. However, Gov. Bentley said that the law exists to protect women’s health as well as the unborn. “Abortion is a fundamental assault on the sanctity of innocent human life,” he said, adding that he “will always fight for the rights of the unborn, and support an appeal of today’s decision.” According to the Montgomery Advisor, emergency room doctor Dr. James Anderson had testified before the district court that it “would benefit women to have abortion doctors with admitting privileges at a local hospital.” “When starting off brand new with a patient, you have to be like a detective,” he said, explaining that patients do not always reveal if they have had an abortion procedure in emergency situations, and that additional information from abortion providers helps ensure that the doctor is not “starting in the dark” in such cases. Laws similar to Alabama’s have been implemented in Missouri, North Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Utah, while they have been blocked in Kansas and Wisconsin. The Alabama case was brought by Planned Parenthood Southeast and abortion clinics in Birmingham and Mobile, saying that the clinics in Birmingham, Mobile and Montgomery would close if the law were to be enacted. Currently, these clinics use doctors from Nigeria, Chicago and Georgia, and cannot meet the residency requirements and other rules necessary to gain admitting privileges in those cities. Two clinics in Tuscaloosa and Huntsville have local doctors with local hospital admitting privileges. Thompson, in his opinion, paralleled a right to procure and abortion with the right to bear arms, and wrote that were the state to “implement a new restriction on who may sell firearms and ammunition” such that “only two vendors in the State of Alabama were capable of complying with the restriction,” then “the defenders of this law would be called upon to do a heck of a lot of explaining – and rightly so in the face of an effect so severe.” Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange said that he would appeal Thompson’s decision. Read more
Vatican City, Aug 7, 2014 / 12:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican's congregation for religious has released guidelines on the management of congregations, requiring them to adapt to international financial reporting standards and to verify that their financial operations align with their charisma. The guidelines are contained in an Aug. 2 circular letter, released Tuesday, signed by the prefect and the secretary of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, Cardinal Joao Braz de Aviz and Archbishop José Rodriguez Carballo. The letter follows upon a Vatican symposium on religious congregations' management of goods held in March; it aims at providing a common juridical framework for religious institutes. The circular letter stresses that in the first place, religious congregations should commit to transparency. “Evangelical testimony requires that works are managed in full transparency with respect for civil and canon law, and are put at the service of the many forms of poverty. Transparency is fundamental for the experience and effectiveness of the mission,” it reads. Religious congregations are asked for a clear accountability of their balance sheet, distinguishing between the balance sheet of the works and that of the communities, and establishing common rules of financial reporting for every branch of a given institute. They are also to adopt audits to certify the veracity of these balance sheets. In order to meet such standards, the congregations are urged to seek the help of qualified experts who are at service of the Church, including professors of relevant fields at Catholic universities. “Transparency and reliability of patrimony and management reporting may be better achieved with the help of experts, in order to guarantee the adoption of adequate procedures, taking into account the size of the institute and of its works,” the letter reads. The letter also recommends that institutes take a balanced approach to external consulting. “It is necessary to avoid both extremes: on one side, not hiring consultants in order to save money, thus risking to get into legal, economic, and fiscal problems; on the other side, wasting the institute’s money” in indiscriminately hiring consultants who may not be effective, the letter advises. The Congregation also suggested that having only one person serving as an institute's treasurer can lead to a detachment of the community's members from their cost of living and its associated difficulties and management, which can result in “a dichotomy between reality and mission.” The letter asks religious congregations for more financial programming, with preventive budgets, resource planning, and planning for eventual financial problems, as well as monitoring the works in financial deficit and the promotion of sustainable works. The document also recommends that congregations have “a clear scenario of the way the works within each province are managed, both the institute’s works, and those promoted by the institute.” Congregations are also requested to insert the notion of “stable patrimony” into their constitutions or any other fundamental texts, in order to better define which goods are the institute’s property, thus “safeguarding the continuity of the institute as a public legal entity.” The guidelines of the circular letter are also aimed at promoting more collegiality in congregations' management of goods, by making the members of the congregation co-responsible for financial matters. In fact, among the recommendations there is that of using budget preview “not only for the works, but also within communities, as a mean of formation to the economic dimension, for the growth of a common awareness of these issues.” Read more
Madrid, Spain, Aug 6, 2014 / 05:13 pm (CNA).- The social networking site May Feelings, dedicated to sharing prayers and messages, has announced a new contest to reward the “most original, creative and effective” efforts that challenge youth... Read more
Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Aug 6, 2014 / 05:08 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Angelica Galvez set off this summer on a grueling, one-month journey to the U.S. – fleeing economic hardship in violence-ridden Honduras and seeking a better life for her six-year-old daughter. “We traveled by train, we had to sleep on a hill and even beg for money,” she told local Catholic weekly newspaper Fides. The young mother's hopes were cut short, however, once she reached El Paso, Texas. She was detained on June 28 for several weeks and later deported along with seven other women and 22 children. For Angelica, a journey of 30 days to America ultimately lead to a four-hour flight back to her home country, where drug-related conflict has ripped the economy and robbed many locals of their livelihoods and lives. “It's very harsh and to arrive there and not even be given an opportunity,” she said of her time in the U.S., adding that “frustration over the lack of job opportunities” in Honduras is what pushed her to risk seeking what she called the “American dream.” “We crossed the river, we walked a lot and immigration caught us. They treated us very poorly and offended us,” she said of the day she and her daughter were detained by officials in Texas. “They did not treat us well. I have cried a lot. They took us away at three in the morning without telling us they were taking us to Honduras,” Angelica recalled. Escalating violence in recent months has had devastating effects on security, economy and daily life in the country. San Pedro Sula, Honduras' second largest city, has in recent years been called the murder capital of the world. Drug trafficking and gang violence led in 2012 to 1,218 homicides in the city: a rate of 169 per 100,000 people. By comparison, the same year, New Orleans, considered the most violent city in the U.S., had a murder rate of 53 per 100,000 people. Jill Marie Gerschutz-Bell – a legislative affairs specialist in Catholic Relief Services' D.C. Office – called the situation a “refugee crisis” due to “violence, insecurity and displacement in Central America and Mexico.” “The gangs which are terrorizing young people and their families here initially got their start on the streets of Los Angeles,” she explained. U.S. deportation of young people to Central America in the 1990s helped the gangs “flourish” due to the lack of jobs and easy access to weapons in the receiving countries, she said. Recent statistics say 52 percent of the Honduran population suffers from lack of employment; more than two-thirds of the country lives in poverty and five out of ten live in extreme poverty. Now, Angelica must pay back the money she borrowed to emigrate. “I brought around two thousand Honduran lempiras (around one hundred dollars) and another one thousand dollars to cross to river.” According to Fides, the first flight carrying 30 women and children who were captured and deported from El Paso arrived in Honduras on July 14. Sister Valdete Willeman, director of the local Center for the Care of Returning Migrants, received the families. “It hurts to see these mothers coming back carrying their children, even one with a six-month-old baby on that dangerous migration route,” she said. Sister Willeman lamented the “huge trauma” that these women and mothers endure. “The children are the most vulnerable. They came back sick with fevers and sore throats. Obviously they were affected by the change in weather and the poor diet.” “The life of someone who has been deported is marked, like a seal,” Sister Willeman said, adding that she was saddened to see a young 16-year-old mother carrying her two year-old son. “A mother and her six month-old baby were even captured, a baby who has nothing to do with this reality.” Read more
Lima, Peru, Aug 6, 2014 / 02:08 pm (CNA).- Archbishop Jose Antonio Eguren of Piura and Tumbes in Peru is calling on the faithful to pray and fast, asking God for the reversal of the nation’s new law allowing some abortions. In a letter sent Aug. 5, Archbishop Eguren repeated his condemnation of a new protocol on abortion enacted on June 27 by the administration of President Ollanta Humala. He warned that it is “the first norm on abortion in our country” that has “dangerously opened the doors to State-sanctioned abortion on demand.” In response, he said, greater recourse “to the power of prayer and fasting” is needed, that Christ will grant us the grace “to see this norm that is intrinsically and gravelly immoral overturned.” “For this reason and after prudent discernment, I have decided to ask that on each first Friday of the month, we hold a Day of Prayer and Fasting in our communities. The Blessed Sacrament should be solemnly exposed in all of our parishes and oratories and in our personal and communal prayer, we should commend to the Sacred Heart of Jesus the unborn children, their mothers and our leaders,” the archbishop said. “Let us ask for the unborn the gift of a healthy birth, for their mothers the realization of the great gift of motherhood and that they be delivered from all evil, and for our leaders the wisdom to understand that choosing life means ensuring the future of our country,” he stressed. He added that the faithful should “not forget to make amends on this day to the Sacred Heart of Jesus which has been wounded by this norm on abortion that attacks the dignity of the human person.” Archbishop Eguren also suggested that Mass and the Rosary be said for these intentions. “Let us not forget that prayer and fasting are two invincible weapons that Jesus has placed in our hands and that He himself practiced and recommended. The teaching of Jesus encourages us on this journey: 'Whatever you ask the Father in my name, He will grant'.” Read more
Orlando, Fla., Aug 6, 2014 / 12:12 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A relationship with God is the most important thing to remember in difficult times, said Bishop John Noonan of Orlando at the opening Mass for the 132nd Knights of Columbus Supreme Convention. ... Read more
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