ROME, SWEET HOME? – THERE’S ALSO THIS…

UPDATE….I was briefly outside (where it was warmer than my apartment which is 64 degrees) and learned that it was the government that decided that heat could be turned on on November 21st, not the 8th as I wrote below, so the Vatican was merely going along with Italian rules.

ROME, SWEET HOME?

Honolulu to Rome – 11 time zones, 4 airports and 9,576 miles! The trip to Hawaii was Rome to Newark, then Newark non-stop to Honolulu (9,249 miles). Thank the Lord I have a great Frequent Flyer program with United!

I am safely back in Rome and I think we all know that, after a wonderful trip, long or short, there is something special about arriving home, with perhaps having our own bed and pillow being the best thing.

However, I arrived back to a Rome that was colder than when I left. The heat has not yet been turned on in my building and I am soooo cold! The temps really drop when the sun goes down! I learned this morning that the Vatican, which owns my building, will only give permission to provide heat on November 21st!!

Turning the heat on in the fall and off in the spring has always been a government decision in Italy. Because of the gas and oil crises this year, the Italian government had given permission to have the heat go on in the region of Lazio on November 8 but privately owned homes and businesses could decide their own time frame for turning on the heat, thus the Vatican decision. Heat can be turned on earlier in the typically colder northern regions and a bit later in the usually warmer southern.

As I write, I am wearing 3 layers of wool and have a warm scarf around my neck. I have a small electric heater that I turned on just outside my bathroom door to make it possible to shower and dress. My AC unit also provides heat so I can turn that on for brief spells in my office, Deo gratias!

This plaque in my office has a new meaning today!

I did see a news story today that reported that Prince Harry was at Pearl Harbor on Friday, Veterans day – and so was I but our paths did not cross, He visited the Arizona monument and at one point I was filming it from the dock of the Missouri but…..the twain did not meet!

And now a few stories from Sunday and Monday….

THERE’S ALSO THIS…

PAPAL TELEGRAM OF CONDOLENCES FOR VICTIMS OF EXPLOSION IN ISTANBUL – In a telegram signed by Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, and addressed to the Apostolic Nuncio in Türkiye, Archbishop Marek Solczyński, on Tuesday, Pope Francis expressed his deep sadness upon learning of the deaths and injuries caused by the explosion of a bomb in Istanbul on Sunday. Pope Francis “sends condolences to the families and friends of those who have died, assuring the injured and those who mourn their loved ones of his spiritual closeness,” the message reads.  The Pope said he offers his prayers so “that no act of violence will discourage the efforts of the people of Türkiye to build a society based on the values of fraternity, justice and peace.” The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew, also expressed “firm condemnation” of the attack and, according to local media reports, went to the scene of the bombing to remember the victims. Pope sends condolences to victims of Istanbul explosion – Vatican News

IN A LETTER TO ARCHBISHOP OF BARCELONA, POPE FRANCIS DISCUSSES ST IGNATIUS’ CONVERSION, AND SPIRITUAL EXERCISES – Exactly five hundred years ago on Monday, St Ignatius arrived in Barcelona, a city which played an important role in his formation. To mark the occasion, Pope Francis sent a letter to Cardinal Archbishop Juan José Omella Omella of Barcelona, in which he examines the saint’s conversion and his famed Spiritual Exercises. Pope Francis began his letter by vividly evoking the event being commemorated.   Five hundred years ago today, he wrote, “Our protagonist, having served the king and his convictions to the point of shedding his blood, was wounded in body and spirit, had stripped himself of everything, and was determined to follow Christ in poverty and humility.” “It mattered little to him,” the Pope continued, “whether he stayed in houses for the poor, or had to withdraw into a cave to pray, and least of all that this meant being ‘esteemed vain and mad’ (S.E. 167).” Pope: May we turn wars, plagues into opportunities for conversion – Vatican News

POPE ADDRESSES MEMBERS OF DICASTERY FOR COMMUNICATION – Pope Francis spoke with members and employees of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication as they meet in plenary session, and urged media professionals to let their heart and Christian values shine through in their work. The Pope gave his prepared remarks to Dr. Paolo Ruffini, the Dicastery’s Prefect, and then spoke off-the-cuff, so that he could offer something “more spontaneous and uncensored, which is more fun!” He offered his reflections on the importance of communication, calling it a “round trip”. “There is no one-way communication: it goes and comes back; it goes and comes back. And in this we too grow.” Pope Francis: ‘Media professionals must engage with audience’ – Vatican News

POPE FRANCIS MET WITH SOCCER PLAYERS AHEAD OF A MATCH IN ROME’S OLYMPIC STADIUM. The third edition of the 2022 Match for Peace, organized by the Pontifical Foundation Scholas Occurrentes, took place on Monday evening at Rome’s Olympic Stadium, with the support and blessing of Pope Francis. Ahead of the match, the Pope greeted the world-renowned soccer players, organizers and their families, in the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall. The Holy Father thanked the athletes for sowing seeds of peace in a world marked by war. Peace, the Pope said, is the fruit of gestures like theirs, namely “of closeness, friendship, the outstretched hand,” and “not with the stone in your hand to throw it.” These “seeds of peace,” he said, may be small, but “are capable of changing the world.” “Thank you for this that you do, for today’s game, because you say, ‘We want peace’, in a world that always looks for wars and destruction.” Pope thanks ‘Match for Peace’ players for offering outstretched hand – Vatican News

 

 

 

POPE EXPRESSES GRATITUDE TO GEMELLI HOSPITAL MEDICAL STAFF

POPE EXPRESSES GRATITUDE TO GEMELLI HOSPITAL MEDICAL STAFF

In a letter, Pope Francis conveys his gratitude to Rome’s Gemelli Hospital administration and staff where he was recently hospitalized for a scheduled surgery. He describes the hospital as a place that takes care of both body and heart.

By Vatican News staff writer

Pope Francis has expressed gratitude to the board of directors and the medical staff who took care of him during his recent hospitalization at the Agostino Gemelli hospital in Rome.

“Upon returning from hospitalization, I feel the desire to address a grateful and affectionate thought to you and, through you, to all those who form the big Gemelli Hospital family,” the Pope said in a letter dated 15 July, affirming that he experienced a “fraternal reception and warm care” which made him feel at home.

On Sunday, July 4, the Holy Father was admitted at the hospital where he underwent surgery for diverticular stenosis of the colon. Following the successful operation and some days in convalescence, Pope Francis returned to the Vatican on July 14.

Essential importance of care, professionalism

In the letter addressed to the president of the hospital’s board of directors, Prof. Carlo Fratta Pasini, Pope Francis attested to the importance of human sensitivity and scientific professionalism in health care.

He noted that the Gemelli hospital is a place where thousands come every day with their expectations and concerns. There, “besides the care of the body, the care of the heart takes place.” It is a care that he prays will continue, “through an integral and attentive care of the person, capable of instilling consolation and hope in moments of trial.”

Now, the Pope continued, “I carry in my heart, so many faces, stories and situations of suffering.”

The Pope’s gratitude

Further appreciating the service of the medical personnel, the Holy Father highlighted that their job is not only delicate and demanding, but is also “a work of mercy” through which the sick “come into contact with the wounded flesh of Jesus.”

“I am grateful to have seen it, to cherish it within me, and to bring it to the Lord,” the Pope said.

Concluding, Pope Francis reiterated his gratitude to the hospital and staff, and imparted an Apostolic blessing on the president of the board of directors, and all who are part of the family of the Gemelli Hospital.

 

POPE WRITES PATRIARCH ABOUT GIFT OF RELICS OF ST. PETER

The Vatican today published the Aug. 30 letter from Pope Francis to Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I that accompanied the gift of relics of St. Peter given to the patriarchate delegation on the June 29 feast of Sts Peter and Paul, Apostles. The Vatican also released a video in Italian that basically summarizes the content of that letter: https://youtu.be/9xMqFnGSjrc

POPE WRITES PATRIARCH ABOUT GIFT OF RELICS OF ST. PETER

To His Holiness Bartholomew Archbishop of Constantinople Ecumenical Patriarch

Your Holiness, dear Brother,

With deep affection and spiritual closeness, I send you my cordial good wishes of grace and peace in the love of the Risen Lord. In these past weeks, I have often thought of writing to you to explain more fully the gift of some fragments of the relics of the Apostle Peter that I presented to Your Holiness through the distinguished delegation from the Ecumenical Patriarchate led by Archbishop Job of Telmessos which took part in the patronal feast of the Church of Rome.

Your Holiness knows well that the uninterrupted tradition of the Roman Church has always testified that the Apostle Peter, after his martyrdom in the Circus of Nero, was buried in the adjoining necropolis of the Vatican Hill. His tomb quickly became a place of pilgrimage for the faithful from every part of the Christian world. Later, the Emperor Constantine erected the Vatican Basilica dedicated to Saint Peter over the site of the tomb of the Apostle.

In June 1939, immediately following his election, my predecessor Pope Pius XII decided to undertake excavations beneath the Vatican Basilica. The works led first to the discovery of the exact burial place of the Apostle and later, in 1952, to the discovery, under the high altar of the Basilica, of a funerary niche attached to a red wall dated to the year 150 and covered with precious graffiti, including one of fundamental importance which reads, in Greek, Πετρος ευι. This contained bones that can quite reasonably be considered those of the Apostle Peter. From those relics, now enshrined in the necropolis under Saint Peter’s Basilica, Pope Saint Paul VI had nine fragments removed for the private chapel of the papal apartment in the Apostolic Palace.

The nine fragments were placed in a bronze case bearing the inscription, Ex ossibus quae in Archibasilicae Vaticanae hypogeo inventa Beati Petri apostoli esse putantur: “Bones found in the earth beneath the Vatican Basilica considered to be those of Blessed Peter the Apostle”. It was this same case, containing nine fragments of the bones of the Apostle, that I desired to present to Your Holiness and to the beloved Church of Constantinople over which you preside with such devotion.

As I reflected on our mutual determination to advance together towards full communion, and thanked God for the progress already made since our venerable predecessors met in Jerusalem over fifty years ago, I thought of the gift that Patriarch Athenagoras gave to Pope Paul VI: an icon depicting the brothers Peter and Andrew embracing, united in faith and in love of their common Lord. This icon that, at the behest of Pope Paul VI is displayed today in the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, has become for us a prophetic sign of the restoration of that visible communion between our Churches to which we aspire and for which we fervently pray and work. Hence, in the peace born of prayer, I sensed that it would be highly significant were some fragments of the relics of the Apostle Peter to be placed beside the relics of the Apostle Andrew, who is venerated as the heavenly patron of the Church of Constantinople.

I sensed that this thought came to me from the Holy Spirit, who in so many ways prompts Christians to regain that full communion for which our Lord Jesus Christ prayed on the eve of his glorious Passion (cf. Jn 17:21).

This gesture is intended to be a confirmation of the journey that our Churches have made in drawing closer to one another: a journey at times demanding and difficult, yet one accompanied by evident signs of God’s grace. Pursuing this journey calls above all for spiritual conversion and renewed fidelity to the Lord who requires on our part greater commitment and new, courageous steps. Difficulties and disagreements, now and in the future, must not distract us from our duty and responsibility as Christians, and particularly as Pastors of the Church, before God and history.

The joining of the relics of the two brother Apostles can also serve as a constant reminder and encouragement that, on this continuing journey, our divergences will no longer stand in the way of our common witness and our evangelizing mission in the service of a human family that today is tempted to build a purely secular future, a future without God.

Your Holiness, beloved Brother, I have found great comfort in sharing these thoughts with you. In the hope of soon encountering you once more, I ask you to pray for me and to bless me, and I exchange with Your Holiness a fraternal embrace of peace.

From the Vatican, 30 August 2019

FRANCIS

(I took the images included with the papal letter from the video)

POPE WRITES LETTER TO PRIESTS: GRATITUDE, ENCOURAGEMENT, PRAISE

Thanks to the Knights of Columbus, the incorrupt heart of St Jean Marie Vianney was on a tour of the United States from November 2018 to June 2019. These photos were taken by ChurchPOP English editor Jacqueline Burkepile:

POPE WRITES LETTER TO PRIESTS: GRATITUDE, ENCOURAGEMENT, PRAISE

Written in Spanish, Pope Francis’ Letter to Priests on the 160th anniversary of the death of the Cure d’Ars, St. Jean Marie Vianney, was also released by the Holy See Press Office in Italian, French, English, German, Portuguese, Polish and Arabic. He died on August 4, 1859.

Jean Baptiste Marie Vianney was a parish priest in Ars, France, known for his sanctity of life. Canonized in Rome in 1925 by Pope Pius X, he is venerated as the patron saint of pastors in the Church. His incorrupt body and heart are in the shrine dedicated to him in Ars.

Pope Francis’ letter begins: “Dear Brothers, A hundred and sixty years have passed since the death of the holy Curé of Ars, whom Pope Pius XI proposed as the patron of parish priests throughout the world. On this, his feast day, I write this letter not only to parish priests but to all of you, my brother priests, who have quietly “left all behind” in order to immerse yourselves in the daily life of your communities. Like the Curé of Ars, you serve “in the trenches”, bearing the burden of the day and the heat, confronting an endless variety of situations in your effort to care for and accompany God’s people.

“I want to say a word to each of you who, often without fanfare and at personal cost, amid weariness, infirmity and sorrow, carry out your mission of service to God and to your people. Despite the hardships of the journey, you are writing the finest pages of the priestly life. Some time ago, I shared with the Italian bishops my worry that, in more than a few places, our priests feel themselves attacked and blamed for crimes they did not commit. I mentioned that priests need to find in their bishop an older brother and a father who reassures them in these difficult times, encouraging and supporting them along the way.

“As an older brother and a father, I too would like in this letter to thank you in the name of the holy and faithful People of God for all that you do for them, and to encourage you never to forget the words that the Lord spoke with great love to us on the day of our ordination. Those words are the source of our joy: “I no longer call you servants… I call you friends” (Jn 15:15).”

The Holy Father writes of the pain of the sex abuse scandal and of gratitude for vocation, recalling that, “vocation, more than our choice, is a response to a free call from the Lord.” He thanks his brother priests “for their fidelity to their commitments”. It is “truly significant” – he observes – that in a “ephemeral” society and culture, there are people who discover the joy of giving life.

Pope Francis writes that the “heart of a pastor is one who has developed a spiritual taste for being one with his people, a pastor who never forgets that he has come from them…this in turn will lead to adopting a simple and austere way of life, rejecting privileges that have nothing to do with the Gospel.”

Another important word for Francis is encouragement: The mission to which we are called does not exempt us from suffering, pain and even misunderstanding. Rather, it requires us to face them squarely and to accept them, so that the Lord can transform them and conform us more closely to himself.”

The papal letter ends: “Brothers, once again, I continually give thanks for you… May we allow our gratitude to awaken praise and renewed enthusiasm for our ministry of anointing our brothers and sisters with hope. May we be men whose lives bear witness to the compassion and mercy that Jesus alone can bestow on us.”

Click here to read more: https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2019-08/pope-writes-to-priests-thank-you-for-your-service.html

POPE FRANCIS: NEW RULES FOR RELIGIOUS LIFE – EDITORIAL STAFF OF VATICAN MAGAZINE FOR WOMEN RESIGNS

I will have more to say tomorrow morning about the stunning news of what seems to be the mass resignation of the editorial board and founder of the Vatican’s monthly magazine on and for women that is published by the Vatican paper “L’Osservatore Romano.” Tune in tomorrow morning to Catholic Connection with Teresa Tomeo as we have our weekly radio chat. You can tune in starting at 9 am ET by going to ewtn.com and clicking on LISTEN LIVE.

If for some reason you did not already know this, Teresa Tomeo is the host of Catholic Connection, which is a co-production of Ave Maria Radio and the EWTN Global Radio Network and is broadcast on over 500 radio stations worldwide. It can be heard weekdays 8-10am ET on Ave Maria Radio, and from 9-10am ET on EWTN Radio.

Tune in tomorrow!

POPE FRANCIS: NEW RULES FOR RELIGIOUS LIFE

Pope Francis changes the Code of Canon Law, to provide for the dismissal ‘ipso facto’ of religious who are illegitimately absent from their religious house for a full year.
By Christopher Wells (vaticannews)

Pope Francis has made several changes to ecclesial canons concerning the dismissal of consecrated persons from the religious institutes to which they belong.

According to the revised canons, religious who have been “illegitimately absent” from their religious house for a full twelve months are dismissed ipso facto from their Institutes. The new canons also stipulate that the superior of the institute must gather evidence of facts and issue a declaration, which must be confirmed, for the dismissal to be legally recognized.

In his letter, with the incipit Communis vita, Pope Francis notes that “community life is an essential element of religious life”, and that religious cannot leave the common life without permission from their superior. In recent years, however, the Pope says there have been cases where religious have left their communities without that permission, and sometimes cannot be traced. Although canon law had provided for such cases, the Pope said it was sometimes difficult to provide a legal remedy, especially when the whereabouts of the religious was unknown.

It was for that reason, Pope Francis said, that he has decided to make changes to canon law by making a prolonged illegitimate absence from one’s religious house one of the reasons for dismissal, ipso facto, from one’s religious institute. In order for this dismissal to have legal effect, the declaration of the fact must be confirmed by the Pope, for institutes of pontifical right; or by the Bishop of the principal See, for institutes of diocesan right.

The new regulations were promulgated by publication in L’Osservatore Romano, and will go into effect on 10 April 2019. Subsequently, they will be published in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis.

Click here to read Latin text of papal letter: https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2019-03/pope-francis-new-rules-for-religious-life.html

EDITORIAL STAFF OF VATICAN MAGAZINE FOR WOMEN RESIGNS

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Claiming a lack of support for open dialogue and for an editorial line run by women, the director and editorial staff of a Vatican women’s magazine have resigned.

But the editor of L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, which publishes the magazine, countered that he has given the staff “the same total autonomy and freedom” that have marked its work since it began.

“There is a return to the clerical self-referentiality and an abandonment of that ‘parrhesia’ (courage) so often asked for by Pope Francis,” said Lucetta Scaraffia, founder and director of “Women-Church-World,” a monthly supplement to L’Osservatore Romano.

In December, Pope Francis appointed Andrea Monda, an Italian journalist and religion teacher, to be editor of L’Osservatore Romano.

The new management at the newspaper has not shown support for the magazine’s mission and has tried to “weaken” it by launching initiatives that “seem competitive, with the result of pitting women against each other, instead of encouraging open discussion,” Scaraffia wrote in an editorial that was to be published in the supplement’s April 1 issue.

Scaraffia sent Catholic News Service a copy of the editorial March 26 and a copy of an open letter to Pope Francis, explaining their resignation.
Monda’s choice of new writers for L’Osservatore Romano and his suggestion of new writers for the supplement, Scaraffia said, suggests she and the editorial board are no longer seen as trustworthy and has closed the door to any chance of “true, free and courageous dialogue among women who love the church in freedom and with men taking part,” she said in the editorial.

Responding in a note published by the Vatican press office, Monda said he never tried to weaken the magazine, underlining how its budget had been fully approved and translations guaranteed despite the need to cut costs within the curia.

“My commitment was and remains strengthening the daily edition of the Osservatore Romano, certainly not in terms of competition but of complementarity with the supplement,” he wrote.

“In no way have I selected anyone, man or woman, according to the criterion of obedience. If anything, on the contrary, avoiding any interference with the monthly supplement, I pushed for the daily newspaper to create discussion that was truly free, not built on a dynamic of one side against another” or closed cliques, he wrote.

Monda added the monthly supplement will continue “without clericalism of any kind.”

The publication began as a monthly insert in the Vatican newspaper seven years ago to give attention to women’s voices. When it was relaunched in 2016 as a magazine, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, said, “If we do not listen attentively to the voice of women in the great decisive moments in the life of the church, we would lose” the crucial contribution of the feminine genius in the church.

Scaraffia said the April 1 issue would be the last for her and the all-female editorial board, in order to “safeguard their dignity.”

The publication, which had the support and encouragement of Popes Benedict XVI and Francis, she said, was founded to be autonomous and run by women.

In her letter to Pope Francis dated March 21, Scaraffia said they were “throwing in the towel because we feel surrounded by a climate of distrust and continuous delegitimization.”

Because of their openness to exploring the world of women in the church and of other faiths, Scaraffia said they were able to cover and explore many new subjects and experiences, including the abuse of women religious.

“Now it seems that a vital initiative has been reduced to silence and returns to the antiquated and arid custom of choosing, from the top, under the direct control of men, women who are deemed trustworthy.”

(JFL: following ios thebstatement of Editor-in-Chief of “L’Osservatore Romano” Prof. Andrea Monda

I acknowledge Prof. Scaraffia’s free and autonomous decision to discontinue her coo peration with L’Osservatore Romano, and to consider as closed her editorship of “Donna Chiesa Mondo” (“Women Church World”). Along with our very best wishes, we offer her our sincere thanks for the valuable work she has done in these years, with great commitment and in full freedom.

In these few months since my appointment as Editor-in-Chief, I have guaranteed Prof. Scaraffia and the group women on the editorial staff the same complete autonomy and the same total freedom that have characterized the monthly insert since its inception, by refraining from interfering in any way in the the printing of the daily newspaper’s monthly supplement, and limiting my contribution (to suggesting topics and persons to engage) to be freely evaluated by Prof. Scaraffia and the editorial staff.

In no way did my efforts undermine the scope of the Donna Chiesa Mondo monthly. Indeed, its budget was entirely confirmed and its translation and circulation in other countries always guaranteed, notwithstanding the Curia’s general need for cost-containment. My commitment has been and continues to be that of empowering the daily edition of L’Osservatore Romano (certainly not in terms of competition, but of complementarity with the supplement) as is natural and right as it may be.

In no way have I chosen anyone, man or woman, with the criterion of obedience. If anything, on the contrary, forbearing to intervene in the monthly supplement, in creating the daily edition I sought comparisons that were truly free, not built on the mechanism of one against the others, or of closed groups. And I did so precisely in the sign of the openness and parrhesia requested by Pope Francis, with whose words and with whose Magisterium we all identify.

If, on the basis of current ecclesial and cultural events, I have devoted attention to topics such as that of plurality and difference in the world of the Church, this derives solely from the centrality that these topics have acquired, thanks precisely to the role of women.

This coming Monday, 1 April — just to offer an example — a round-table on the publication of an essay, signed by 17 highly regarded theologians and scholars, entitled “La voce delle donne” (“The voice of women”) (Ed. Paoline), will be held in the editorial offices. I can offer my assurances that the future of L’Osservatore Romano’s monthly supplement has never been under discussion; and therefore, that its history will continue uninterrupted. Without clericalism of any kind.

YOU GOTTA LOVE HIM! – THE 10 COMMANDMENTS ARE “A GUIDE TO AN AUTHENTIC HUMAN LIFE” – POPE FRANCIS EXPRESSES CLOSENESS TO “MARTYRED LAND OF SYRIA”

YOU GOTTA LOVE HIM!

A young boy upstaged Pope Francis on Wednesday, escaping from his mother and running onto the papal podium at a general audience, tugging on the hand of a Swiss guardsman and playing behind the pontiff’s chair. (Reuters story and photo)

The boy’s mother briefly spoke to the pope as she tried to pull the child away, saying that he was mute. Pope Francis told her to let him carry on playing.

“This child cannot speak. He is mute. But he can communicate,” the pope told hundreds of pilgrims. “And he has something that got me thinking: he is free. Unruly … but he is free,” he added to laughter.

“Let’s ask the grace (of God) that he may speak.”

The mother told the pope that the family came from his native Argentina. As she left the stage, a smiling Francis leaned towards Archbishop Georg Gaenswein sitting next to him and whispered: “He is Argentinian. Undisciplined.”

THE 10 COMMANDMENTS ARE “A GUIDE TO AN AUTHENTIC HUMAN LIFE”

Pope Francis concluded his catechesis on the Ten Commandments during the Wednesday general audience, reflecting on them in the light of Christ.
“Dear brothers and sisters, “ he began. “In this, our final catechesis on the Ten Commandments, we reflect on how, in the light of Christ, the Decalogue should be seen not as a series of rules, but rather the guide to an authentic human life that comes to fulfilment in the love, joy and peace born of obedience to the Father’s will. Our Lord came not to abolish the Law but to fulfil it.”

Francis noted that, “the Holy Spirit, by enabling us to live a new life in Christ, takes away our hearts of flesh and opens them to the holy desire to abandon sin and to be conformed to Jesus’ own heart, his love and his desires.”

The Holy Father explained that, “the Ten Commandments invite us first to enter into a faithful and loving relationship with God our Father, to reject every false idol that enslaves us, and to find our authentic rest in the freedom of Christ and the Holy Spirit. They then teach us how to live redeemed lives, marked by fidelity, integrity and honesty towards our neighbor.”

In conclusion, Pope Francis said, “the commandments show us the face of Christ and open the door to the new life of grace; by accepting God’s offer of saving love, we find our true selves and the source of a joy that will never end.”

POPE FRANCIS EXPRESSES CLOSENESS TO “MARTYRED LAND OF SYRIA”

Pope Francis sends a letter to the Franciscans stationed in Syria, saying the Church sees Jesus’ suffering in the trials and poverty of the Syrian people.
By Devin Watkins (vaticannews)

In a letter sent to Franciscan friars in Syria, Pope Francis expressed his closeness to the “martyred land of Syria.”

“I wish to share in your sufferings and tell you that I am close to you and to the Christian communities which are so tried by the pain experienced in their faith in Christ Jesus.”

The Pope’s letter was addressed to Fathers Hanna Jallouf and Louai Bsharat, OFM.
Pope Francis reflected on the great suffering, poverty, and pain that Jesus experiences in the Syrian people. “It is Jesus! This is a mystery. It is our Christian mystery. In you and in the inhabitants of our beloved Syria, we see Jesus suffering.”

Martyrdom
Pope Francis compared their sufferings to martyrdom. “Nothing more than martyrdom can mark the Christian’s way of participating in humanity’s salvation history.”

He said martyrs advance the Kingdom of God and “sow Christians for the future.”
Calling them “the true glory of the Church and our hope”, the Holy Father said the witness of martyrs is “a warning not to get lost even in the midst of the storm.”

“Not a few times the sea of life has a storm awaiting us, but out of the existential waves we receive an unexpected sign of salvation: Mary, the Mother of the Lord, looking in astonishment and silence at the innocent, crucified Son who fills life and salvation with meaning.”

Pain into hope
Pope Francis assured the Franciscan friars stationed in Syria that he remembers them constantly during Mass and prays that their “unspeakable pain” may be transformed into divine hope.

He then quoted Paul’s Letter to the Romans: “What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? As it is written: ‘For your sake we are being slain all the day; we are looked upon as sheep to be slaughtered.’ No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us.”

Finally, Pope Francis prayed that the Virgin Mary guard the Franciscans in Syria “under her Cloak of Grace” and that she intercede for them to receive “the gift of perseverance.”

LETTER OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS TO THE PEOPLE OF GOD

The following letter was written by Pope Francis in Spanish and translated into English, French, Italian, Portuguese, German and Polish.

LETTER OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS TO THE PEOPLE OF GOD

“If one member suffers, all suffer together with it” (1 Cor 12:26). These words of Saint Paul forcefully echo in my heart as I acknowledge once more the suffering endured by many minors due to sexual abuse, the abuse of power and the abuse of conscience perpetrated by a significant number of clerics and consecrated persons. Crimes that inflict deep wounds of pain and powerlessness, primarily among the victims, but also in their family members and in the larger community of believers and nonbelievers alike. Looking back to the past, no effort to beg pardon and to seek to repair the harm done will ever be sufficient. Looking ahead to the future, no effort must be spared to create a culture able to prevent such situations from happening, but also to prevent the possibility of their being covered up and perpetuated. The pain of the victims and their families is also our pain, and so it is urgent that we once more reaffirm our commitment to ensure the protection of minors and of vulnerable adults.

1. If one member suffers…

In recent days, a report was made public which detailed the experiences of at least a thousand survivors, victims of sexual abuse, the abuse of power and of conscience at the hands of priests over a period of approximately seventy years. Even though it can be said that most of these cases belong to the past, nonetheless as time goes on we have come to know the pain of many of the victims. We have realized that these wounds never disappear and that they require us forcefully to condemn these atrocities and join forces in uprooting this culture of death; these wounds never go away. The heart-wrenching pain of these victims, which cries out to heaven, was long ignored, kept quiet or silenced. But their outcry was more powerful than all the measures meant to silence it, or sought even to resolve it by decisions that increased its gravity by falling into complicity. The Lord heard that cry and once again showed us on which side he stands. Mary’s song is not mistaken and continues quietly to echo throughout history. For the Lord remembers the promise he made to our fathers: “he has scattered the proud in their conceit; he has cast down the mighty from their thrones and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty” (Lk 1:51-53). We feel shame when we realize that our style of life has denied, and continues to deny, the words we recite.

With shame and repentance, we acknowledge as an ecclesial community that we were not where we should have been, that we did not act in a timely manner, realizing the magnitude and the gravity of the damage done to so many lives. We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them. I make my own the words of the then Cardinal Ratzinger when, during the Way of the Cross composed for Good Friday 2005, he identified with the cry of pain of so many victims and exclaimed: “How much filth there is in the Church, and even among those who, in the priesthood, ought to belong entirely to [Christ]! How much pride, how much self-complacency! Christ’s betrayal by his disciples, their unworthy reception of his body and blood, is certainly the greatest suffering endured by the Redeemer; it pierces his heart. We can only call to him from the depths of our hearts: Kyrie eleison – Lord, save us! (cf. Mt 8:25)” (Ninth Station).

2. … all suffer together with it

The extent and the gravity of all that has happened requires coming to grips with this reality in a comprehensive and communal way. While it is important and necessary on every journey of conversion to acknowledge the truth of what has happened, in itself this is not enough. Today we are challenged as the People of God to take on the pain of our brothers and sisters wounded in their flesh and in their spirit. If, in the past, the response was one of omission, today we want solidarity, in the deepest and most challenging sense, to become our way of forging present and future history. And this in an environment where conflicts, tensions and above all the victims of every type of abuse can encounter an outstretched hand to protect them and rescue them from their pain (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 228). Such solidarity demands that we in turn condemn whatever endangers the integrity of any person. A solidarity that summons us to fight all forms of corruption, especially spiritual corruption. The latter is “a comfortable and self-satisfied form of blindness. Everything then appears acceptable: deception, slander, egotism and other subtle forms of self-centeredness, for ‘even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light’ (2 Cor 11:14)” (Gaudete et Exsultate, 165). Saint Paul’s exhortation to suffer with those who suffer is the best antidote against all our attempts to repeat the words of Cain: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Gen 4:9).

I am conscious of the effort and work being carried out in various parts of the world to come up with the necessary means to ensure the safety and protection of the integrity of children and of vulnerable adults, as well as implementing zero tolerance and ways of making all those who perpetrate or cover up these crimes accountable. We have delayed in applying these actions and sanctions that are so necessary, yet I am confident that they will help to guarantee a greater culture of care in the present and future.

Together with those efforts, every one of the baptized should feel involved in the ecclesial and social change that we so greatly need. This change calls for a personal and communal conversion that makes us see things as the Lord does. For as Saint John Paul II liked to say: “If we have truly started out anew from the contemplation of Christ, we must learn to see him especially in the faces of those with whom he wished to be identified” (Novo Millennio Ineunte, 49). To see things as the Lord does, to be where the Lord wants us to be, to experience a conversion of heart in his presence. To do so, prayer and penance will help. I invite the entire holy faithful People of God to a penitential exercise of prayer and fasting, following the Lord’s command.1 This can awaken our conscience and arouse our solidarity and commitment to a culture of care that says “never again” to every form of abuse.

It is impossible to think of a conversion of our activity as a Church that does not include the active participation of all the members of God’s People. Indeed, whenever we have tried to replace, or silence, or ignore, or reduce the People of God to small elites, we end up creating communities, projects, theological approaches, spiritualities and structures without roots, without memory, without faces, without bodies and ultimately, without lives. 2 This is clearly seen in a peculiar way of understanding the Church’s authority, one common in many communities where sexual abuse and the abuse of power and conscience have occurred. Such is the case with clericalism, an approach that “not only nullifies the character of Christians, but also tends to diminish and undervalue the baptismal grace that the Holy Spirit has placed in the heart of our people”.

Clericalism, whether fostered by priests themselves or by lay persons, leads to an excision in the ecclesial body that supports and helps to perpetuate many of the evils that we are condemning today. To say “no” to abuse is to say an emphatic “no” to all forms of clericalism.

It is always helpful to remember that, “in salvation history, the Lord saved one people. We are never completely ourselves unless we belong to a people. That is why no one is saved alone, as an isolated individual. Rather, God draws us to himself, taking into account the complex fabric of interpersonal relationships present in the human community. God wanted to enter into the life and history of a people” (Gaudete et Exsultate, 6). Consequently, the only way that we have to respond to this evil that has darkened so many lives is to experience it as a task regarding all of us as the People of God. This awareness of being part of a people and a shared history will enable us to acknowledge our past sins and mistakes with a penitential openness that can allow us to be renewed from within. Without the active participation of all the Church’s members, everything being done to uproot the culture of abuse in our communities will not be successful in generating the necessary dynamics for sound and realistic change. The penitential dimension of fasting and prayer will help us as God’s People to come before the Lord and our wounded brothers and sisters as sinners imploring forgiveness and the grace of shame and conversion. In this way, we will come up with actions that can generate resources attuned to the Gospel. For “whenever we make the effort to return to the source and to recover the original freshness of the Gospel, new avenues arise, new paths of creativity open up, with different forms of expression, more eloquent signs and words with new meaning for today’s world” (Evangelii Gaudium, 11).

It is essential that we, as a Church, be able to acknowledge and condemn, with sorrow and shame, the atrocities perpetrated by consecrated persons, clerics, and all those entrusted with the mission of watching over and caring for those most vulnerable. Let us beg forgiveness for our own sins and the sins of others. An awareness of sin helps us to acknowledge the errors, the crimes and the wounds caused in the past and allows us, in the present, to be more open and committed along a journey of renewed conversion.

Likewise, penance and prayer will help us to open our eyes and our hearts to other people’s sufferings and to overcome the thirst for power and possessions that are so often the root of those evils. May fasting and prayer open our ears to the hushed pain felt by children, young people and the disabled. A fasting that can make us hunger and thirst for justice and impel us to walk in the truth, supporting all the judicial measures that may be necessary. A fasting that shakes us up and leads us to be committed in truth and charity with all men and women of good will, and with society in general, to combatting all forms of the abuse of power, sexual abuse and the abuse of conscience.

In this way, we can show clearly our calling to be “a sign and instrument of communion with God and of the unity of the entire human race” (Lumen Gentium, 1).

“If one member suffers, all suffer together with it”, said Saint Paul. By an attitude of prayer and penance, we will become attuned as individuals and as a community to this exhortation, so that we may grow in the gift of compassion, in justice, prevention and reparation. Mary chose to stand at the foot of her Son’s cross. She did so unhesitatingly, standing firmly by Jesus’ side. In this way, she reveals the way she lived her entire life. When we experience the desolation caused by these ecclesial wounds, we will do well, with Mary, “to insist more upon prayer”, seeking to grow all the more in love and fidelity to the Church (SAINT IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA, Spiritual Exercises, 319). She, the first of the disciples, teaches all of us as disciples how we are to halt before the sufferings of the innocent, without excuses or cowardice. To look to Mary is to discover the model of a true follower of Christ.

May the Holy Spirit grant us the grace of conversion and the interior anointing needed to express before these crimes of abuse our compunction and our resolve courageously to combat them.

FRANCIS

1 “But this kind [of demon] does not come out except by prayer and fasting” (Mt 17:21).
2 Cf. Letter to the Pilgrim People of God in Chile (31 May 2018).
3 Letter to Cardinal Marc Ouellet, President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America (19 March 2016).

[

LETTER OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS TO THE PEOPLE OF GOD

The following letter was written by Pope Francis in Spanish and translated into English, French, Italian, Portuguese, German and Polish.

LETTER OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS TO THE PEOPLE OF GOD

“If one member suffers, all suffer together with it” (1 Cor 12:26). These words of Saint Paul forcefully echo in my heart as I acknowledge once more the suffering endured by many minors due to sexual abuse, the abuse of power and the abuse of conscience perpetrated by a significant number of clerics and consecrated persons. Crimes that inflict deep wounds of pain and powerlessness, primarily among the victims, but also in their family members and in the larger community of believers and nonbelievers alike. Looking back to the past, no effort to beg pardon and to seek to repair the harm done will ever be sufficient. Looking ahead to the future, no effort must be spared to create a culture able to prevent such situations from happening, but also to prevent the possibility of their being covered up and perpetuated. The pain of the victims and their families is also our pain, and so it is urgent that we once more reaffirm our commitment to ensure the protection of minors and of vulnerable adults.

1. If one member suffers…

In recent days, a report was made public which detailed the experiences of at least a thousand survivors, victims of sexual abuse, the abuse of power and of conscience at the hands of priests over a period of approximately seventy years. Even though it can be said that most of these cases belong to the past, nonetheless as time goes on we have come to know the pain of many of the victims. We have realized that these wounds never disappear and that they require us forcefully to condemn these atrocities and join forces in uprooting this culture of death; these wounds never go away. The heart-wrenching pain of these victims, which cries out to heaven, was long ignored, kept quiet or silenced. But their outcry was more powerful than all the measures meant to silence it, or sought even to resolve it by decisions that increased its gravity by falling into complicity. The Lord heard that cry and once again showed us on which side he stands. Mary’s song is not mistaken and continues quietly to echo throughout history. For the Lord remembers the promise he made to our fathers: “he has scattered the proud in their conceit; he has cast down the mighty from their thrones and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty” (Lk 1:51-53). We feel shame when we realize that our style of life has denied, and continues to deny, the words we recite.

With shame and repentance, we acknowledge as an ecclesial community that we were not where we should have been, that we did not act in a timely manner, realizing the magnitude and the gravity of the damage done to so many lives. We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them. I make my own the words of the then Cardinal Ratzinger when, during the Way of the Cross composed for Good Friday 2005, he identified with the cry of pain of so many victims and exclaimed: “How much filth there is in the Church, and even among those who, in the priesthood, ought to belong entirely to [Christ]! How much pride, how much self-complacency! Christ’s betrayal by his disciples, their unworthy reception of his body and blood, is certainly the greatest suffering endured by the Redeemer; it pierces his heart. We can only call to him from the depths of our hearts: Kyrie eleison – Lord, save us! (cf. Mt 8:25)” (Ninth Station).

2. … all suffer together with it

The extent and the gravity of all that has happened requires coming to grips with this reality in a comprehensive and communal way. While it is important and necessary on every journey of conversion to acknowledge the truth of what has happened, in itself this is not enough. Today we are challenged as the People of God to take on the pain of our brothers and sisters wounded in their flesh and in their spirit. If, in the past, the response was one of omission, today we want solidarity, in the deepest and most challenging sense, to become our way of forging present and future history. And this in an environment where conflicts, tensions and above all the victims of every type of abuse can encounter an outstretched hand to protect them and rescue them from their pain (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 228). Such solidarity demands that we in turn condemn whatever endangers the integrity of any person. A solidarity that summons us to fight all forms of corruption, especially spiritual corruption. The latter is “a comfortable and self-satisfied form of blindness. Everything then appears acceptable: deception, slander, egotism and other subtle forms of self-centeredness, for ‘even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light’ (2 Cor 11:14)” (Gaudete et Exsultate, 165). Saint Paul’s exhortation to suffer with those who suffer is the best antidote against all our attempts to repeat the words of Cain: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Gen 4:9).

I am conscious of the effort and work being carried out in various parts of the world to come up with the necessary means to ensure the safety and protection of the integrity of children and of vulnerable adults, as well as implementing zero tolerance and ways of making all those who perpetrate or cover up these crimes accountable. We have delayed in applying these actions and sanctions that are so necessary, yet I am confident that they will help to guarantee a greater culture of care in the present and future.

Together with those efforts, every one of the baptized should feel involved in the ecclesial and social change that we so greatly need. This change calls for a personal and communal conversion that makes us see things as the Lord does. For as Saint John Paul II liked to say: “If we have truly started out anew from the contemplation of Christ, we must learn to see him especially in the faces of those with whom he wished to be identified” (Novo Millennio Ineunte, 49). To see things as the Lord does, to be where the Lord wants us to be, to experience a conversion of heart in his presence. To do so, prayer and penance will help. I invite the entire holy faithful People of God to a penitential exercise of prayer and fasting, following the Lord’s command.1 This can awaken our conscience and arouse our solidarity and commitment to a culture of care that says “never again” to every form of abuse.

It is impossible to think of a conversion of our activity as a Church that does not include the active participation of all the members of God’s People. Indeed, whenever we have tried to replace, or silence, or ignore, or reduce the People of God to small elites, we end up creating communities, projects, theological approaches, spiritualities and structures without roots, without memory, without faces, without bodies and ultimately, without lives. 2 This is clearly seen in a peculiar way of understanding the Church’s authority, one common in many communities where sexual abuse and the abuse of power and conscience have occurred. Such is the case with clericalism, an approach that “not only nullifies the character of Christians, but also tends to diminish and undervalue the baptismal grace that the Holy Spirit has placed in the heart of our people”.

Clericalism, whether fostered by priests themselves or by lay persons, leads to an excision in the ecclesial body that supports and helps to perpetuate many of the evils that we are condemning today. To say “no” to abuse is to say an emphatic “no” to all forms of clericalism.

It is always helpful to remember that, “in salvation history, the Lord saved one people. We are never completely ourselves unless we belong to a people. That is why no one is saved alone, as an isolated individual. Rather, God draws us to himself, taking into account the complex fabric of interpersonal relationships present in the human community. God wanted to enter into the life and history of a people” (Gaudete et Exsultate, 6). Consequently, the only way that we have to respond to this evil that has darkened so many lives is to experience it as a task regarding all of us as the People of God. This awareness of being part of a people and a shared history will enable us to acknowledge our past sins and mistakes with a penitential openness that can allow us to be renewed from within. Without the active participation of all the Church’s members, everything being done to uproot the culture of abuse in our communities will not be successful in generating the necessary dynamics for sound and realistic change. The penitential dimension of fasting and prayer will help us as God’s People to come before the Lord and our wounded brothers and sisters as sinners imploring forgiveness and the grace of shame and conversion. In this way, we will come up with actions that can generate resources attuned to the Gospel. For “whenever we make the effort to return to the source and to recover the original freshness of the Gospel, new avenues arise, new paths of creativity open up, with different forms of expression, more eloquent signs and words with new meaning for today’s world” (Evangelii Gaudium, 11).

It is essential that we, as a Church, be able to acknowledge and condemn, with sorrow and shame, the atrocities perpetrated by consecrated persons, clerics, and all those entrusted with the mission of watching over and caring for those most vulnerable. Let us beg forgiveness for our own sins and the sins of others. An awareness of sin helps us to acknowledge the errors, the crimes and the wounds caused in the past and allows us, in the present, to be more open and committed along a journey of renewed conversion.

Likewise, penance and prayer will help us to open our eyes and our hearts to other people’s sufferings and to overcome the thirst for power and possessions that are so often the root of those evils. May fasting and prayer open our ears to the hushed pain felt by children, young people and the disabled. A fasting that can make us hunger and thirst for justice and impel us to walk in the truth, supporting all the judicial measures that may be necessary. A fasting that shakes us up and leads us to be committed in truth and charity with all men and women of good will, and with society in general, to combatting all forms of the abuse of power, sexual abuse and the abuse of conscience.

In this way, we can show clearly our calling to be “a sign and instrument of communion with God and of the unity of the entire human race” (Lumen Gentium, 1).

“If one member suffers, all suffer together with it”, said Saint Paul. By an attitude of prayer and penance, we will become attuned as individuals and as a community to this exhortation, so that we may grow in the gift of compassion, in justice, prevention and reparation. Mary chose to stand at the foot of her Son’s cross. She did so unhesitatingly, standing firmly by Jesus’ side. In this way, she reveals the way she lived her entire life. When we experience the desolation caused by these ecclesial wounds, we will do well, with Mary, “to insist more upon prayer”, seeking to grow all the more in love and fidelity to the Church (SAINT IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA, Spiritual Exercises, 319). She, the first of the disciples, teaches all of us as disciples how we are to halt before the sufferings of the innocent, without excuses or cowardice. To look to Mary is to discover the model of a true follower of Christ.

May the Holy Spirit grant us the grace of conversion and the interior anointing needed to express before these crimes of abuse our compunction and our resolve courageously to combat them.

FRANCIS

1 “But this kind [of demon] does not come out except by prayer and fasting” (Mt 17:21).
2 Cf. Letter to the Pilgrim People of God in Chile (31 May 2018).
3 Letter to Cardinal Marc Ouellet, President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America (19 March 2016).

[

POPE CALLS FOR SOLIDARITY AND PENANCE IN LETTER ON ABUSE CRISIS

POPE CALLS FOR SOLIDARITY AND PENANCE IN LETTER ON ABUSE CRISIS

Pope Francis has written a letter to the whole People of God addressing the ongoing crisis of sexual abuse in the Church.

Christopher Wells (Vatican media)

“If one member suffers, all suffer together with it.”
These words, taken from St Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, struck the key note for Pope Francis in an impassioned letter addressed to the whole People of God.

The letter comes in response to an ongoing crisis of sexual abuse by “a significant number of clerics and consecrated persons” – crimes that were covered up and perpetuated by those who should have been protecting the vulnerable. In particular, the Holy Father referred to a report released by a Grand Jury in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania that, he wrote, “detailed the experiences of at least a thousand survivors, victims of sexual abuse, the abuse of power and of conscience at the hands of priests over a period of approximately seventy years.”

However, despite being occasioned by the recent scandals, the Director of the Holy See Press Office, Greg Burke insisted that the letter was meant for the whole Church. “This is about Ireland, this is about the United States, and this is about Chile. But not only. Pope Francis has written to the People of God – and that means everyone.”

Abandoning the little ones

In his letter, the Holy Father speaks of the realization that the “wounds” caused by abuse “never disappear and that they require us forcefully to condemn these atrocities and join forces in uprooting this culture of death.” He admits that the Church has failed to deal adequately with the crisis of abuse. “With shame and repentance, we acknowledge as an ecclesial community that we were not where we should have been, that we did not act in a timely manner, realizing the magnitude and the gravity of the damage done to so many lives,” the Pope says. “We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them.”

Pope Francis calls for solidarity with those who have been abused. “Such a solidarity,” he said, “demands that we in turn condemn whatever endangers the integrity of the person.” It is a solidarity, “that summons us to fight all forms of corruption, especially spiritual corruption.”

The Pope also notes that the Church has delayed in applying the “actions and sanctions” that are necessary for the implementation of a “zero tolerance” policy, but said he is “confident that” those actions and sanctions “will help to guarantee a greater culture of care in the present and the future.”

Conversion, prayer, and fasting

Pope Francis calls on all the baptized to be a part of the “ecclesial and social change we so greatly need.” This change, he continued, requires “personal and communal conversion.” And in order to experience that “conversion of heart,” he encouraged “the entire faithful People of God to a penitential exercise of prayer and fasting” – a reference to our Lord’s words in Matthew 17:21 that “this kind [of demon] does not come out except by prayer and fasting.” Greg Burke explained, “Pope Francis says greater accountability is urgently needed, not only for those who committed these crimes, but also for those who covered them up – which in many cases means Bishops.”

A response from the whole Church

The Holy Father emphasizes that the present crisis demands a response from the whole Church as a body. “Consequently, the only way that we have to respond to this evil that has darkened so many lives is to experience it as a task regarding all of us as the People of God.” This response requires the “active participation of all the Church’s members,” and “will be helped by the penitential dimension of fasting and prayer.”

Pope Francis says, “It is essential that we, as a Church, be able to acknowledge and condemn, with sorrow and shame, the atrocities perpetrated by consecrated persons, clerics, and all those entrusted with the mission of watching over and caring for those most vulnerable. Let us beg forgiveness for our own sins and the sins of others.”

FULL LETTER TO FOLLOW IN SEPARATE POST

PAPAL LETTER TO THE PILGRIM PEOPLE OF GOD IN CHILE – IN MEMORIAM: 74 YEARS AFTER NORMANDY

PAPAL LETTER TO THE PILGRIM PEOPLE OF GOD IN CHILE

On May 31, Holy See Press Office Director Greg Burke announced that the weekend of June 1-3, Pope Francis would host a group of Chilean priests at the Santa Marta residence. He added that, “With the aim of going forward with the process of reparation and healing of the victims of abuse, once again in coming days Archbishop Charles Scicluna and Bishop Jordi Bertomeu will go to Chile, this time on a mission in the diocese of Osorno, in agreement with Pope Francis.”

That press office statement also announced that, “In the meantime, as he had promised the bishops of Chile, the Holy Father will send the president of the Episcopal Conference of Chile a letter personally written by him and addressed to the People of Chile.”

Following is CNA’s translation of the full text of Pope Francis’ May 31 letter: To the Pilgrim People of God in Chile (you may have to cut and paste link if it is not working):

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/full-text-of-pope-francis-letter-to-the-church-in-chile-35580?utm_source=CNA&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=daily_newsletter

IN MEMORIAM: 74 YEARS AFTER NORMANDY

I offer this column from Aleteia as a tribute to all those who died in Normandy 74 years ago, to those chaplains who prayed with men of all faiths who knew they might die yet hoped they would not die, but in particular I offer this as a tribute to those men who, when they knelt down, knew precisely why they were on their knees!

Aleteia: These incredible images remind us of the brave sacrifice of thousands and the important role of chaplains and priests during the aftermath.

Seventy-four years after the Allied invasion of Normandy, we remember and honor those who served during the largest seaborne invasion in history.

Chaplains and Catholic priests played an important role in providing essential spiritual and psychological guidance during the days and weeks that followed. Unarmed, they courageously put themselves on the front lines to say Mass, offer pastoral care for active and wounded soldiers, and provide last rites for the dying and prayers for those killed.

Click “Launch the slideshow” on the link below to see some incredible photos from D-Day and brave chaplains and priests who served during the aftermath:

D-Day, 74 years later: Remembering the heroic chaplains and priests of Normandy