Catholics in Ethiopia last week joined the festival of the Meskel, or Holy Cross in Amharic, during which the Orthodox Church celebrates the discovery of the True Cross by the Roman Empress Helena in the fourth century. Cardinal Berhaneyesus D Souraphiel, the Catholic Archbishop of Addis Ababa said Catholics celebrate the feast together with Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church members.In Ethiopia, besides the feast being a Christian one, it is also an annual cultural feast where many people travel to their places of birth to be with their families.
The Bavarian bishops have come out in strong support for Abbess Mechthild Thürmer of the Bavarian Benedictine Abbey of Kirschletten, who in July was threatened with imprisonment by a court in Bamberg for preventing the deportation of a woman immigrant by granting her church asylum.“The bishops see no reason for a court sentence. They fully support the tradition of church asylum, which lays bare the exceptionally inhuman hardship of the EU asylum system”, Freising conference president Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich told the press on 1 October.
Detroit Archbishop Allen Vigneron, vice president of the US bishops’ conference, offered an opening prayer at a fundraising event for Michigan Right to Life, despite the fact that the organisation was announcing its endorsement of President Donald Trump at the event. The US bishops have said that it is not their place to become involved in partisan politics, only to articulate Church teaching that will help Catholics form their consciences for voting.
Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, who resigned as Lyon archbishop amid France’s worst sexual abuse scandal, has lamented that his name was still linked to charges of which he has been acquitted. He told the daily La Croix: “Preynat doesn't get stopped in the street. Nobody spits into the face of the publisher of Matzneff”, mentioning an accused paedophile writer. Now chaplain to an order of nuns, Cardinal Barbarin said he regretted not having acted earlier against the now laicised priest Bernard Preynat and prayed daily for his victims. He was convicted last year for not denouncing Preynat but this was overturned on appeal last January.
The Catholic Church in Slovenia has praised left-wing and Christian parliamentarians for adopting a legal amendment, drafted with trade union backing, which sharply restricts shop opening on Sundays and public holidays. “By adopting this amendment, they have fulfilled the will of citizens,” the Church’s spokesman, Tadej Jakopic, said in a statement. The lay Catholic was reacting to last week's adoption of the bill by 72 votes to 13 in the 90-seat Slovenian State Assembly.
Cardinal Joseph Zen, Bishop Emeritus of Hong Kong, travelled to Rome for four days last week to lobby for “a good bishop” for Hong Kong. “It’s more than one and a half years that we have no bishop and now the whole atmosphere is very much political, so I would like to remind the Holy Father that we really need a bishop who is a good shepherd for the flock,” said 88-year-old Cardinal Zen. He did not secure a meeting with Pope Francis.
Meanwhile Mike Pompeo, the US Secretary of State, met on Thursday last week with Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin and Archbishop Paul Gallagher, Vatican Secretary for Relations with States. A Vatican Press Office spokesman said “the parties presented their respective positions regarding relations with the People's Republic of China, in a respectful, relaxed and cordial environment.”
The 2018 Provisional Agreement the Holy See signed with the People’s Republic of China, concerning the appointment of bishops, that has reportedly been renewed “is only a starting point,” which already has brought some results, Cardinal Parolin said at a conference on China in Milan on Monday. “It is necessary to continue the dialogue so it can bear more substantial fruit.”
Former Vatican spokesman Fr Federico Lombardi, president of the Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI Foundation, announced last week that the 2020 Ratzinger Prizewould be shared by Australian Professor and theologian Tracey Rowland and French philosopher Jean-Luc Marion, a former student of philosopher Jacques Derrida .
Last week the Vatican released a detailed budget, balance sheet and earnings statement for the first time. The consolidated report provided the first-known publicly released information about the Vatican’s net equity – estimated at 1.4 billion euros, but increasing to as much as 4 billion euros when the Vatican Museums, the Vatican bank and other sources of funding are included.
Brazil’s Indigenous Missionary Council (CIMI) released its annual report on violence against indigenous people in Brazil on 30 September. The report found 276 cases of violence against indigenous people over the course of 2019. The authors write that, “the violence against indigenous peoples is based on a government project that aims to make their land and the common assets contained therein available to agribusiness, mining, and logging entrepreneurs, among others.”
The Iraqi Postal Service has issued, for the first time, a series of stamps which celebrate the country’s historic churches, located in various regions and of different Christian denominations. Bishop Shlemon Audish Warduni, Chaldean auxiliary in Baghdad, said the stamps were “a positive gesture, and a sign of good will”.
Marking the 60th anniversary of Nigeria's independence, the Catholic Bishops have lamented that the country is “almost on the verge of total collapse,” and urged that, "we must rebuild the country on a fairer foundation." Archbishop Augustine Akubeze of Benin City, president of the bishops’ conference, asked, “How can we celebrate when many of our people cannot afford to eat? How can we celebrate when we watch daily, the killings of Nigerians by the insurgents?”
Zambia’s Conference of Catholic Bishops has called on the government to prioritise environmental programmes for the poor and vulnerable. During a 25 September Webinar, Fr Cleophas Lungu, the Secretary General of the conference, lamented that, “we cut trees recklessly and pollute our streets with solid waste and dump toxic waste into our water”. He urged “preservation of our natural forests, endangered tree species such as the mukula tree (rose wood) as well as animal species like the black lechwe”.
Uganda’s hospitals are struggling to cope with an exponential increase in the number of coronavirus infections. In the whole of northern Uganda there are currently only 25 intensive care units, 20 being at St Mary’s Lacor Hospital in Gulu, managed by the Archdiocese of Gulu and which famously helped contain a 2000 outbreak of Ebola. The hospital has reached the maximum possible reception of patients for COVID-19, equal to 140 beds. Many patients struggle to reach hospital anyway through lack of transport or ambulances short of fuel.
An Anglican priest in Kenya has been reporting on a centre he founded 18 years ago to rescue girls fleeing forced marriages and female genital mutilation (FGM).Since Canon Christopher Chochoi established the Cana Girls’ Rescue Home in 2002, more than 200 girls have passed through the centre in Baringo County, northwest Kenya. FGM is widely practised among the local Pokot community, but, he said, “those girls are my responsibility and because they ran away from outdated cultural beliefs, I will not let them down.” Securing 50 cows as bride price for a circumcised girl, compared to fewer for uncircumcised ones, pushes parents to have their daughters undergo the terrifying procedure that blights them for the rest of their lives.
The annual Al Smith dinner to raise money for Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New York went virtual this year due to the pandemic. The white tie dinner is usually the last time the nation’s two presidential candidates meet, and engage in light repartee, before the election, but this year, President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden sent in taped video messages.President Trump highlighted his administration’s accomplishments for Catholics, including churches in the billion-dollar coronavirus relief measures. Vice President Joe Biden, highlighted his own commitment to Catholic social doctrine.
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