Religious orders discuss problems with bishops
More than 500 leaders of women's congregations meeting in Rome in early May for the assembly of the International Union of Superiors General discussed contributions to the synodal process, particularly given their "vulnerability" with declining numbers and their lack of power and status. Feedback has suggested problems with bishops deciding to close schools, hospitals or other institutions without consulting sisters who had operated them for decades, and even clergy using "access to the sacraments" to force sisters into accepting their decisions. However, much is positive, particularly since “synodality is part and parcel of religious life," said Sr Gemma Simmonds of the Congregation of Jesus, one of four religious charged with synthesising contributions from religious. "There's a huge amount of energy in religious life and a tremendous investment in the synodal process," she said.
Dementia care for nuns
A Catholic Sisters Cognitive Impairment-Alzheimer’s Global Initiative has been launched by the International Union of Superiors General and the US Leadership Conference of Women Religious. It will provide resources to congregations and conferences of religious for education, training, assessment and direct care for sisters experiencing dementia or other forms of cognitive impairment. “Having aging sisters in the community is a blessing, not a problem,” said a representative, “so the sisters want to do everything possible to make sure their older members have a physically, spiritually and mentally healthy old age.”
SRI LANKA - Religious leaders reject new PM
Sri Lankan religious leaders, including Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, have criticised the president's appointment of a new prime minister as unconstitutional and unethical. “The decision to appoint Ranil Wickremesinghe as the prime minister is in complete opposition to the will and aspirations of the people,” responded Cardinal Ranjith after the announcement on 12 May. He said Wickremesinghe lacks support from voters. Catholic clergy and religious have supported protests in Colombo demanding that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa resign. He has clung to office amidst civil unrest, economic meltdown, power cuts and shortages of fuel and medicine.
HAITI: Gang leader indicted over missionary abductions
A notorious Haitian gangster appeared in a court in the United States this week for allegedly organising the armed abduction and kidnapping of 17 Christian missionaries in Haiti last year. Joly Germine, the 29-year-old leader of Haiti’s ‘400 Mawozo gang’, was indicted for holding most of them in captivity for more than 60 days. The missionaries were in Haiti doing volunteer work on behalf of a non-profit organisation representing Amish, Mennonite and Anabaptist communities in the U.S. Their ordeal brought international attention to gang abductions in Haiti.
SYRIA: CAFOD calls on UK to reverse Syria aid cuts
CAFOD has called on the UK government to reverse cuts to its Syria aid budget. Also, to ensure UK aid funds reach local Syrian organisations who can best deliver to the neediest communities. CAFOD was speaking at the sixth Brussels Conference on supporting Syria on 10 May. Howard Mollett, CAFOD’s Head of Humanitarian Policy, said, “the hardship faced by ordinary people is spiralling.” He reported that, “the UN pooled fund for life-saving projects in North West Syria, which is the main budget directly accessible by local Syrian organisations, has less than half the level of funding it received a year ago.”
NIGERIA: Volatile security in the north causes two more deaths
A Nigerian priest kidnapped in March has died in captivity. The 48-year-old priest - Fr Joseph Aketeh Bako – was abducted by gunmen from St John Catholic Church, Kudenda, Kaduna State, where he served as parish priest. Archbishop Matthew Manoso Ndagoso of Kaduna offered the sympathies of the diocese. Further north, Bishop Matthew Kukah of Sokoto condemned a blasphemy killing where a young female college student in Sokoto was stoned and burned to death on 12 May. Mobs also attacked two parishes – including Holy Family Cathedral - in predominantly Muslim Sokoto. Bishop Kukah suspended all Mass and commended the governor for acting promptly by declaring a 24-hour curfew. He joined President Muhammadu Buhari in condemning the killing of Deborah Samuel.
US Indigenous report
A new report from the U.S. Interior Department details efforts to forcibly assimilate Indigenous children at schools funded by the U.S. government. The report looked at 408 schools in 37 states or territories which tens of thousands of children attended from 1819 to 1969. Approximately half of the schools were administered in conjunction with Christian denominations, both Catholic and Protestant. The educational effort often coincided with efforts to steal the land belonging to the Native tribes, whose treatment at the hands of settlers of European descent has been the subject of renewed scrutiny. Through much of those same years, newly arrived European immigrants were also forcibly assimilated to U.S. cultural norms in public and many private schools, and fights within the Catholic hierarchy in the last half of the 19th century were common between German prelates seeing to avoid assimilation and Irish bishops favouring it.
WEST BANK: Outcry after killing of journalist
It was unique to hear bells of all Christian religions of Jerusalem toll together on 13 May to honour the funeral procession of Shireen Abu Akleh. The well-known Palestinian Christian journalist was shot and killed two days earlier, and a colleague injured, while covering a military raid in the refugee-camp city of Jenin in the West Bank. However, there was horror when mourners and pall bearers were violently beaten by the Israeli riot police, as the coffin was being carried from St Joseph hospital to the funeral in East Jerusalem. On Monday, Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa, Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, condemned the violent intrusion of the Israeli Police into the funeral procession of Abu Akleh. “Israeli Police's invasion and disproportionate use of force, attacking mourners, striking them with batons, using smoke grenades, shooting rubber bullets, frightening the hospital's patients, is a severe violation of international norms and regulations, including the fundamental human right of freedom of religion, which must be observed also in a public space,” said the archbishop. An earlier statement from the patriarchate lamenting Abu Akleh’s killing, pointed out that “according to eyewitnesses, she has been killed by the Israeli army.” An investigation was urged and a call to bring those responsible to justice.” This was echoed last weekend by the UN Security Council.
Pope Francis will travel to Canada at the end of July, the Vatican has announced. He is expected to meet Indigenous survivors of abuse committed at so-called residential schools. Francis, 85, will travel to Edmonton, Quebec City and Iqaluit, the Vatican said, adding that more details on the July 24 to 30 visit will be published in the coming weeks.The announcement comes after the pope last month apologised for abuses that members of the Church committed against Indigenous children at residential schools.
PHILIPPINES: Bishops advise against election protests
As hundreds in Manila voiced anger at the recent presidential poll, which saw Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr win, two senior bishops and a Catholic university warned supporters of defeated runner-up Leni Robredo not to sow unrest. Bishops’ conference president Bishop Pablo Virgilio David of Kalookan and Archbishop Socrates Villegas of Lingayen-Dagupan called on Robredo's supporters to continue doing what is good despite her overwhelming defeat. Archbishop Villegas felt, “we must learn not to give up even on people who have been seduced by darkness.” He called on Robredo's supporters to “reach out to others,” particularly to those who supported Marcos Jr. Robredo supporters included “Priests for Leni” who have been left “despondent” by the election result. Jesuit-run Ateneo de Manila University reminded its students to rebuild a society fragmented by politics. “Use this moment as an opportunity to begin the arduous task of making whole again our heavily damaged democracy,” Ateneo president and Jesuit Father Bobby Yap said; “we all know it will be tough, painful and exhausting, but always remember that nation building is a never-ending exercise that we all must take part in.”
CNS cutbacks
Following the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops announcement that it would be closing the domestic operations of the Catholic News Service – cutbacks approved by the bishops in executive session last November - several diocesan newspapers have indicated they will have to change their way of working. Diocesan newspapers are the principal clients of CNS. “We can’t cover national news with a staff of five people,” said Malea Hargett, the editor of Arkansas Catholic. “We can’t cover what’s going on at the Supreme Court or what’s going on at the U.S.C.C.B. We just don’t have the staff.” The advent of the Catholic News Agency, an ideologically driven wire service owned by the conservative media conglomerate the Eternal Word Television Network (Ewtn), which distributed its content to diocesan papers at no fee, further undermined CNS. “I think Catholic News Agency was really the death knell for CNS, because it was free, and CNS wasn't,” said Bishop Christopher Coyne of Burlington, Vermont. Christopher Gunty, CEO of the Catholic Review, the Archdiocese of Baltimore’s newspaper, speculated that several diocesan papers might need to pool resources and create their own news cooperative in order to fill the gap left by the CNS closure. “We might end up having to share our stories,” he said
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