Addressing participants taking part in the Plenary Assembly of the Congregation for Eastern Churches in the Vatican on Friday last week, Pope Francis drew inspiration from Pope Benedict XV, founder of the Congregation, to berate those who prosecute the many wars in the world. During his pontificate, Benedict XV denounced the incivility of war as “useless slaughter”, Francis recalled, before underlining how his warning “went unheeded by the leaders of the nations involved in the First World War, just as St John Paul II’s appeal to avert the conflict in Iraq went unheeded”. Turning to the world today, the Pope said, “humanity still seems to be groping in the dark”. He highlighted the massacres from conflicts in the Middle East, in Syria and Iraq; those in the Ethiopian region of Tigray, and the “drama” facing Lebanon. “We are attached to wars, and this is tragic. Humanity, which prides itself on being ahead in science, in thought, in so many beautiful things, is lagging behind in weaving peace. It is a champion in making war. And this makes us all ashamed. We must pray and ask forgiveness for this,” he said. Without making any direct reference to Ukraine he pointed to the “threatening winds” that arestill blowing across the steppes of Eastern Europe, “lighting the fuses and fires of weapons and leaving the hearts of the poor and innocent cold”. Drawing his speech to a close, Pope Francis said that “the world needs the witness of communion … If we cause scandal with liturgical disputes, we play into the hands of him who is the master of division,” he said. “Let us beware, therefore, of experiments that can harm the journey towards the visible unity of all Christ’s disciples,” Francis added
Catholic agencies responding to drought in Somalia say humanitarian interventions are urgently needed to meet basic food needs, protect livelihoods and prevent a humanitarian disaster in the country, writes Fredrick Nzwili. The agencies’ call came as the UN warned that 7.7 million people required humanitarian assistance this year, with 4.3 million impacted by drought and 270,000 displaced. The UN Food and Agricultural Organization said 1.4 million children in the country will suffer malnutrition due to the drought. “The immediate response to this new dry spell is the distribution of basic necessities [and] distribution of water or filling of wells to prevent waterborne diseases,” said Sara Ben Rached, the director of Caritas Somalia in a report. Paul Healy, country director of Tr caire Somalia, said the international community needed to provide humanitarian assistance now. The risk of disease outbreaks was high as people and animals competed for untreated water. The Zimbabwe Catholic bishops’ conference has issued a statement ahead of the country’s local elections on 26 March calling for peaceful, free and fair polls, writes Marko Phiri. The statement issued in collaboration with local churches titled “The Elections We Want” comes amid concerns raised by opposition political parties and international observers about an uneven political field that has long favoured the ruling Zanu-PF party. Zanu-PF leader Emmerson Mnangagwa won a disputed presidential election in 2018. Recent efforts by opposition parties to hold rallies have been met by reports of police harassment and arrests of opposition supporters. Among other concerns is the role of the military where soldiers have been put in charge of supervising voting while also being accused of harassing opposition activists and pro-democracy campaigners. The bishops called for the “professional and non-partisan conduct of our security forces”.
Mudslides claim 200 lives Brazil’s Catholic Bishops have launched an appeal to help the city of Petr polis after 200 people were killed in mudslides and floods following torrential rains on 15 February. More than 900 are homeless in the town, located in mountains north of Rio de Janeiro. Rapid urbanisation, particularly mountainside construction, has left areas of Petr polis susceptible to disasters associated with severe weather. The Caritas Medical Centre in Sham Shui Po district has set up isolation tents outside the centre, as Hong Kong’s health facilities are in the throes of its worst coronavirus outbreak. A Caritas emergency room nurse said that health staff are in “battlefield mode, tackling the outbreak. Like mainland China, Hong Kong has adhered to a zero-Covid strategy, but a surge of the Omicron virus variant has left the authorities reeling. The Catholic Church in Kazakhstan has officially welcomed the formal abolition of the death penalty in the country, ratified on 1 January. “The rejection of violence in all its forms, the recognition of the illegality of torture and the abolition of the death penalty in criminal law are the result of the progress of ethical thought in the historical and cultural development of society,” the Church said. The last execution was carried out in 2003. Southern India’s Christian community has protested over the removal by local officials of a 20-foot statue of Jesus, calling it a violation of a new law protecting religious structures in Karnataka state. The statuewas erected 18 years ago beside St Francis Xavier Church in the village of Gokunte, Bangalore Diocese. Officials also damaged several stations of the cross, under the pretext that they encroached on government property. Human rights activists in Pakistan – including Catholic women in Lahore Diocese - have challenged a proposal to replace the annual International Women’s Day marches on 8 March with a Hijab Day. Pakistan’s federal minister for religious and minority affairs, Noorul Haq Qadri, said in a letter to Prime Minister Imran Khan on 9 February that the marches “make fun of Islamic principles, social values, modesty and chastity”. Shaheen Yousaf, Catholic Women’s Organisation coordinator in Lahore Archdiocese, defended the international Women’s Day activities, but said they should “respect cultural norms and avoid being too liberal”. Oil spills on opposite sides of Peru in January - one near Lima and the other in an Indigenous village in the Amazon – were marked by simultaneous Masses on 13 February. Participants prayed for those suffering from pollution from both spills as they commemorated the second anniversary of “Querida Amazonia”, (Beloved Amazonia), the papal exhortation issued by Pope Francis after the 2019 Amazonian Synod. Video messages were exchanged between Archbishop Carlos Castillo Mattasoglio (pictured) of Lima and Bishop Miguel Angel Cadenas of Iquitos.
In mid-January, a ship offloading oil at a refinery near Lima spilled about 6,000 barrels of oil into the Pacific Ocean, fouling at least 30 miles of shoreline. On 20 January, vandals cut an oil pipeline in a small Amazonian village, contaminating the river that people depend on for water.
In Tigray, the director in charge of Mekelle’s Ayder C.S. Hospital and the Faculty of Health Sciences, a government institution administered by Mekelle University, has urged the world “to stop this manmade tragedy and allow humanitarian aid to reach our region quickly and without restrictions”. Dr Amanuel Haile said that the hospital in the Tigrayan capital, which serves a population of more than nine million people, has struggled to cope since conflict between Ethiopian government forces and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front broke out 15 months ago. And, since the blockade of July 2021, “everything is lacking: food for patients, linen, detergents, disinfectants, etc,” he said; “we have to beg to keep the hospital running”.
Churches in Myanmar’s mainly Christian regions continue to be primary targets for the military junta, despite calls by Catholic leaders to protect places of worship. At least 15 parishes in Loikaw Diocese have be en severely affected by escalating fighting, while at least seven Catholic churches have been hit by artillery shelling and airstrikes. Last week, soldiers encamped inside the Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in Doukhu destroyed windows and pictures of the Way of the Cross. Before that, one of the church’s bell towers was destroyed by an airstrike.
Last weekend, representatives of the Humanitarian Country Team in Palestine, comprising UN and international and Palestinian agencies, met the Salem family in the occupied East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah. They highlighted that the family of12, including six children and their elderly mother – all of whom are Palestine refugees – face eviction in March from their family home of 70 years. The family is one of 218 Palestinian families in East Jerusalem threatened with forced eviction by Israeli authorities. Many Jewish and Christian faith leaders, and human rights organisations, have appealed for such evictions to be stopped.
Caritas Mozambique is urging the international community to support its “Together for Cabo Delgado” campaign, aiding people displaced by conflict in the province. Secretary-General Santos Gotine reported increasing numbers affected by insurgent attacks in Cabo Delgado: the month of February has seen more than 20 attacks on four villages, with 2,800 homes damaged and 14,000 people fleeing their homes. Bishop Carlos Hatoa Nunes of Chimoio has endorsed the appeal for humanitarian assistance. The distress has been compounded by two recent tropical storms.
Cardinal Luigi De Magistris, the former head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, died on 16 February in Caligari, Italy, just a week short of his 96th birthday. He was raised to the College of Cardinals by Pope Francis in 2015, at the age of 88, in recognition of his long Vatican service. With the death of Cardinal De Magistris, there are now 213 living members of the College of Cardinals, of whom 119 are eligible to vote in a papal conclave.
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