The Vatican hosted a Day of Reflection and Prayer for Lebanon on 1 July. Lebanese religious leaders were to join Pope Francis for an ecumenical encounter aimed at rekindling hope in a country facing severe political and economic crises. Several patriarchs were expected to attend, including Cardinal Bechara Boutros Rai, the leader of Maronite Catholics, and Patriarch Ignatius Joseph III Younan, the Syriac Catholic Patriarch of Antioch. Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, the Vatican Secretary for Relations with States, said last week, “the Holy See is deeply concerned about the collapse of the country economically, financially, and socially.” He felt a weakening of the Christian presence due to emigration, “risks destroying the internal equilibrium and the reality of Lebanon itself, further putting the Christian presence in the Middle East at risk.”
Myanmar’s cardinal has urged the country’s people to “be agents of life to be messengers of God’s love.” In a sermon last Sunday Cardinal Charles Bo, Archbishop of Yangon, suggested that, “those in power believe only in the violent option” and “violence will never bring God’s kingdom on Earth.” He said that even as fighting escalates across the country, citizens should hold onto hope.Around 900 people have been killed and 230,000 people displaced amidst street protests and military crackdowns since the military coup five months ago.
The Vatican has refused to support an Indian nun dismissed by her congregation after she called for the arrest of a bishop accused of rape. Sr Lucy Kalappura, a member of the Franciscan Clarist Congregation in Kerala, has been an outspoken advocate for a nun who has accused Bishop Franco Mulakkal of Jalandhar of raping her several times between 2014 and 2016. The bishop vehemently denies the allegations. Sr Kalappura, 54, was dismissed from the order in 2019 for “defiance, violating the norms of the congregation and infringing on the vow of poverty” and told to leave the convent. Kalappura had been given the required canonical warnings but failed to show “needed remorse”, said a letter signed by Sr Anne Joseph, the superior general. Sr Kalappura appealed the decision to the Vatican, and was informed on 13 June that the Apostolic Signatura, the Vatican’s highest court, had upheld her dismissal.
Pope Francis has offered prayers and condolences to all those affected by the building collapse in Florida on 24 June. He praised, “the tireless efforts of the rescue workers and all engaged in caring for the injured, the grieving families and those left homeless.” Archbishop Thomas Gerard Wenski of Miami pledged prayers for the victims, their families and first responders. Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Miami is working at a reunification centre for families and providing emergency food vouchers, counselling, and housing for residents who are homeless due to the collapse of 12-story Champlain Towers. At the time of writing nine people were confirmed to have died, with more than 150 still missing.
Just weeks after a fragile ceasefire, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa, paid a pastoral visit to Gazaon 14-17 June. He offered encouragement to Christians and all Gazans, many of whom had their properties destroyed or damaged during the May conflict with Israel. “Don't lose courage," he told them. At the Rosary Sisters school, he met parents and inspected damage to the buildings and visited a job creation project started by the Latin Patriarchate in 2018.
The parents of Amazon CEO and founder Jeff Bezos have made a $12 million (£8.6 m) gift to a Catholic high school. Miguel Bezos, a Cuban immigrant who married Jeff Bezos’ mother after she divorced, pledged the money to the Salesianum School in Wilmington, Delaware, where he arrived as an unaccompanied minor from Cuba in the early 1960s. Miguel Bezos described as a “blessing” being cared for by Fr James P. Byrne, an Oblate of St. Francis de Sales, who died last year.
Jim Wallis, the well-known US theologian, preacher, author and justice advocate has stepped down from Sojourners, the social justice organisation which he founded in the early 1970s in Washington D.C., to lead a new Faith and Justice Center at Georgetown University.
. The sudden closure of Apple Daily, the popular pro-democracy newspaper, under Hong Kong’s national security law, is the latest blow to freedom in the territory. The final edition of 24 June said the tabloid was a "victim of tyranny" as it ended a 26-year run. Authorities deployed the national security law to raid the newsroom two weeks ago to arrest senior executives and freeze the paper’s assets. Jimmy Lai, Apple Daily's Catholic owner and an outspoken critic of the Chinese government, is currently in jail for attending a pro-democracy demonstration.
The apostolic nunciature in Poland confirmed last weekend that the Vatican had sent Italian Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco to investigate negligence claims against Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz. The nunciature said the cardinal visited Poland on June 17-26 at the request of the Holy See to probe alleged “negligence” by Dziwisz during his term as metropolitan archbishop of Kraków (2005-2016). A Polish TV programme last year accused Dziwisz of failing to investigate clerical abuse allegations.Dziwisz, 82, subsequently said that he wanted to see the allegations clarified in a transparent manner.Dziwisz served as personal secretary to John Paul II until the Polish pope’s death in 2005.
Cardinal Mauro Gambetti, the new archpriest of St Peter’s Basilica, has clarified details of a ban on the celebration of private Masses in the upper part of the basilica. He said on 22 June that requests to celebrate, instead of concelebrate, early morning Masses at St. Peter’s by groups “with particular and legitimate needs” may be allowed. In March, the Secretariat of State posted a communication in the sacristy of St Peter’s Basilica restricting the celebration of individual Masses at the basilica’s many side altars.
Pope Francis has asked Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago to conduct an investigation of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, led by Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson. The Vatican press office said the apostolic visitation “is taking place in the context of a normal examination of the activity of the [Vatican] dicasteries”.
Hundreds of unmarked graves found at a second Catholic-run former residential school site for indigenous children has sparked renewed anger in Canada. Last week, the Cowessess First Nation said that the remains of 751 people had been detected by ground-penetrating radar at the site of a former residential school in Saskatchewan, just weeks after the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc nation found 215 unmarked graves in British Columbia. At least four Catholic churches on First Nations reserves in western Canada have been destroyed by “suspicious” fires. “There is a lot of anger here now against the Catholic Church” said one chief, but he added, that, “the church burning is devastating to our community - some of our members attended church.” Demands are growing for a formal apology from the Catholic church, and for the release of related records.
Archbishop Joseph Arshad of Islamabad-Rawalpindi, president of the Pakistan Catholic Bishops’ Conference, has called on Pakistan's government to revive the Ministry of Minorities Affairs. “A lot has to be done for minorities so that they don't feel insecure in Pakistan,” he said last week, adding that forced marriages and forced conversions are alarming issues for them. "There was a ministry for minorities in the past which was a good, successful experience” he said. This referred to the ministry established in 2008 with Shahbaz Bhatti as its first minister. After he was assassinated in 2011 it was discontinued in that form.
In Peru, the National Jury of Elections (JNE) still has not declared a winner in the presidential election held on 6 June. Pedro Castillo leads in the vote count by some 44,000 votes. Keiko Fujimori alleged voter fraud and called for ballots to be reviewed, despite national and international observers reporting voting took place without irregularities. The Peru Bishops’ Conference, led by Archbishop Miguel Cabrejo of Trujillo, published a statement urging trust in electoral authorities.
A group of foreign investors has begun implementing Work and Development Areas, known as ZEDEs, in coastal Honduras. These experimental cities will operate with their own legal code, leading to the name of “charter cities.” Residents of the island of Roatán, where the first ZEDE is being formed, have expressed concern that their land could be usurped. Roatán and other communities on Honduras’ Caribbean coast have large Indigenous and Afro-descended populations, known as the Garifuna. Bishop Michael Lenihan of La Ceiba spoke out against the projects on 18 June, saying, “we say 'No to ZEDES'” and demanding “other forms of development that are fair for all.”
The ecumenical Taizé movement has quietly settled four brothers in a poor mixed-population suburb of northeastern Paris and holds daily prayer sessions well received by local Catholics. The brothers, who moved into a church rectory last December in Pantin, form the movement's first permanent community outside of Taizé in rural Burgundy. The four were invited by Bishop Pascal Delannoy of St Denis, a suburban Paris diocese with many immigrants, especially Muslims.
Workers’ fatigue and lead pollution fears could mean the reconstruction of Notre Dame cathedral in Paris might not finish on time, the head of the rebuilding effort has said. "I can feel they're really tired,” General Jean-Louis Georgelin told parliamentarians, arguing his crew was understaffed. He stressed the structure was secure, but cast doubt on President Emmanuel Macron's deadline of the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics. Precautions against poisoning by roof-top lead spread over the area by the April 2019 fire are especially onerous, taking up 25 per cent of each worker's time, he said. Most were probably unneeded in his view.
Tokyo Archdiocese is maintaining infection control measures despite the Japanese government lifting the Covid-19 state of emergency in many cities ahead of the upcoming Olympic Games, starting on 23 July. On 21 June, Archbishop Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi of Tokyo said that, with many visitors expected, Catholics would remain on their guard. Limited numbers of people will be allowed to enter churches.
Some 82 per cent of US Catholics report having a favourable opinion of Pope Francis, the same approval rating the Pope enjoyed in two earlier surveys, according to the Pew Research Center. Breaking the numbers down by political affiliation, 90 per cent of Catholic Democrats registered a favourable impression of the pope compared to only 73 per cent of Catholic Republicans. Pope Francis is also widely admired by non-Catholics, 63 per ceent of whom said they had a “very” or “mostly” favourable opinion of the pope.
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