An eighteenth-century laywoman known as “Mama Antula” will be Argentina’s first female saint.
María Antonia de Paz y Figueroa was born in 1730, and left her wealthy family aged 15 after rejecting an arranged marriage. She founded a centre in Buenos Aires to teach people the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius. In 1760, she established a community of consecrated laywomen who shared a life of prayer and charity, helping local Jesuits.
After the expulsion of the Society of Jesus from South America in 1767, “Mama Antula” kept the Ignatian tradition alive, travelling around north-eastern Argentina to promote Ignatian retreats. In eight years, she provided retreats for 70,000 people.
A miracle involving the healing of a woman from cancer has been attributed to the intercession of Bl María Antonia of St Joseph, who will be canonised early in 2024.
The Nicaraguan government removed the legal status of the Franciscan Order in the country on 24 October, along with 16 other organisations – mainly other religious bodies – claiming they had not produced accounts for 2022, forfeiting their property and assets to the state. The same action was taken against the Nicaraguan Jesuits in August before their Central American University was closed.
Nevertheless, the St Francis of Assisi Institute in Matagalpa was still functioning normally the day after the announcement. “No action has been taken against any of the Franciscan educational establishments, and we have had no notice of any expulsion or seizure,” said the director of a Franciscan school.
The order also runs four other secondary schools around the country, having worked in Nicaragua for 58 years.
Pope Francis has expressed his closeness to the Mexican resort city of Acapulco on the Pacific Coast, devastated by a hurricane on 25 October.
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, wrote in a telegram to Archbishop Leopoldo González González of Acapulco on 27 October that Pope Francis “offers fervent prayers for the eternal rest of the deceased, while asking the Lord to grant his consolation to those who suffer the devastating effects of the hurricane.” He hoped Christians would contribute to the reconstruction of affected areas.
In Acapulco, at least 40 people were killed, hundreds injured and infrastructure destroyed by Hurricane Otis.
The diocese of Stockton, California issued a warning about persons impersonating clergy and charging money for the sacraments.
The imposters assumed the identities of two actual clerics from the Archdiocese of Toluca, Mexico – Archbishop Raúl Gómez González and Fr José Adán González Estrada – and have been targeting unsuspecting members of the Hispanic community in Modesto, California.
“Some people have said it was $100, and some people said it was $1,800,” Erin Haight, communications director for the diocese, told Our Sunday Visitor. “We’ve heard from some callers who said they’re even charging for chairs so that people can sit.” The imposters have demanded birth certificates in some cases, raising the possibility that they could be committing identity theft, or are involved in human trafficking.
When questioned by those they are targeting, the scammers have threatened legal action and used other intimidation tactics. “We’ve sort of come to the conclusion that these impostors are targeting people who maybe might not call law enforcement because they’re afraid, maybe because of their immigration status,” Haight added.
The diocese has contacted Church officials in Mexico and encouraged those who have been scammed to contact local law enforcement.
Bishop Robert Deeley of Portland, Maine, offered prayers for those killed and wounded in last week’s mass shooting in the town of Lewiston, as well as for their families and for the community. A gunman murdered 18 people in a restaurant and nearby bowling alley, and wounded 13 others.
“We pray for all those impacted by this terrible violence, that the Lord may provide them with consolation in the midst of their sorrow,” Bishop Deeley said. “In this moment of trial and uncertainty, let us raise up our prayers, asking God to give strength to them and to our community now and in the coming days, and we ask him to protect our law enforcement officers as they seek to prevent further harm.”
Hundreds of people gathered for a vigil at the Basilica of SS Peter and Paul in Lewiston after the gunman was captured and the “shelter in place” order was lifted.
Myanmar has allocated land in the commercial capital and largest city, Yangon, to build a Russian Orthodox Church. Observers said this was to strengthen ties between the military junta and Moscow, which is its key arms supplier.
A senior cleric of the Church met the junta-appointed city mayor on 19 October to discuss building the church in North Dagon Township. The regime will assist construction underway and Yangon municipality will supply water and electricity.
The regime said this was a result of a meeting in May between Metropolitan Sergiy of Singapore and South-East Asia and the Minister of Hotels and Tourism of Myanmar, U Aung Thaw. The minister is also the chairman of the Myanmar- Russian Friendship Association. During the meeting Metropolitan Sergiy said Russian travellers tend to visit Orthodox churches in the countries they travel to, and a church in Myanmar would attract Russian tourists.
This proposal was welcomed by Myanmar, where the tourist industry has been in decline since the military coup in February 2021. Speaking in Rome at a Synod Mass on 23 October, Cardinal Charles Maung Bo of Yangon referred to attacks on the Christian community since the coup, saying that Myanmar’s churches “have borne the brunt of cruelty”.
Catholic officials have welcomed the southern Indian state of Karnataka relaxing a ban on the hijab by to allow Muslim women to wear it while attending government recruitment exams.
“There was no need for any such ban and we are happy that the present government has taken steps to relax it,” said Fr Faustine Lucas Lobo, spokesperson for the Karnataka Catholic Bishops’ Council.
The ban was imposed in February 2022 when the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was leading the state government. It was issued after an altercation between hijab-wearing Muslim students and a mob of Hindu nationalists who objected to “the religious practice inside academic institutions”.
Hindu organisations remain unanimous in demanding a nationwide ban on the hijab or any other sign of religious attire in class, including for Catholic nuns.
A Benedictine novice who was kidnapped, along with two postulants, on 17 October from their monastery in Eruku, Nigeria, was shot the following day. The body of 31-year-old Br Godwin Eze was then thrown into a river. The two postulants – Br Anthony Eze and Br Peter Olarewaju – were freed on 21 October.
“The community here is still struggling with the trauma of what has occurred,” said Bishop Emeritus Ayo-Maria Atoyebi of Ilorin. He reported that Christians “are being targeted”.
Following their abduction, the monks were forced to walk barefoot and were beaten with machetes. Their abductors had demanded a ransom. Brother Eze was killed to show “how serious they were”. A search is underway to retrieve the body of Brother Eze, while the two freed postulants are recovering in a hospital.
The Church in Central Africa has called for multilateral action for peace. “Everything must be done to put an end to the suffering of the people of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo,” the Association of Bishops’ Conferences of Central Africa said last week in an appeal to leaders in the Great Lakes countries of Burundi, DR Congo and Rwanda.
Bishops meeting at a side event of the Synod in Rome encouraged the region’s politicians to “build bridges of peace between our states” and called upon “all those who continue to sow death, devastation and division in our region, from far or near, to listen to the Church’s call for universal solidarity.”
The president of the Bishops’ Conference of Benin said that “the catastrophic security situation in Libya…opens the door to terrorism throughout the Sahel region”.
Archbishop Roger Houngbédji of Cotonou warned that armed groups “are causing fear and terror”, adding that “the label ‘jihadists’ should not be applied to these gangs, as often happens in the West, especially in order not to confuse these groups with Muslims, who are also victims of their violence and abuse.”
The archbishop reported that “a solidarity exists among us religious leaders that enables us to search together for paths to justice and peace, especially when we are experiencing social and political crises.”
Benin has seen increasing incursion of armed groups from the north, despite the government offering assurances that it can “prevent terrorists from entering our country.”
Speakers from Ukraine, Armenia and Kosovo addressed a webinar on Monday, organised by the Conference of European Churches, on “Protection of worship places and cultural heritage in war and conflict zones”, as attacks increase on places of worship and cultural heritage across Europe.
Speakers included Fr Garegin Hambardzumian, head of the Department of Preservation of Cultural Heritage of Artsakh, the Armenian Apostolic Church, who focused on safeguarding worship places in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh in Armenian). Prof Liudmyla Fylypovych of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine highlighted the situation of religious sites in Ukraine.
Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of a Polish bishop whose diocese has been rocked by sex scandals, the latest being reports of a sex party involving a male prostitute in a priest’s home.
The Vatican gave no formal reason for the resignation of Bishop Grzegorz Kaszak of Sosnowiec in south-western Poland. A diocesan priest has faced criminal investigation over the incident at his apartment in Dabrowa Gornicza in late August, where it was reported that a participant at a “gay orgy” collapsed after overdosing on erectile dysfunction pills.
The priest allegedly then tried at first to bar paramedics from entering the apartment. The police are investigating “a failure to provide assistance to a person in a situation that poses an immediate threat of loss of life or serious damage to health”. The priest – who has been dismissed from all functions – has denied he obstructed paramedics and questioned the definition of “orgy”.
A Belgian court has ruled that a doctor who euthanised a 38-year-old woman with unbearable psychological problems did not break the national law that legalised the procedure.
After a long legal battle including an appeal to the Constitutional Court, a local court in the Flemish city of Dendermonde rejected a case brought by the dead woman's sister, the first against a euthanasia doctor in Belgium. The sister tried to have Dr Joris Van Hove charged with poisoning Tine Nys by delivering the lethal injection in violation of the euthanasia law.
Critics reject Belgium’s 2002 euthanasia law, originally designed for terminal cancer patients, especially since it was gradually extended to suffering minors and psychological cases. The Bishop of Antwerp Johan Bonny has denounced excesses and favoured palliative care, but recently said euthanasia was “not necessarily an evil as such” if legal guidelines are strictly followed.
Cardinal Pietro Parolin has warned French bishops that members of the Points-Coeur association are pretending to be Church-approved religious communities despite being stripped of their canonical status in 2020.
The male and female branches of the association still wear habits, live like a religious community and promote vows of consecrated life, he said in a letter to the head of the French bishops’ conference Archbishop Éric de Moulins-Beaufort.
“They … have no more canonical link to the Church, even if they often continue to work civilly with NGOs,” Parolin said. “This attitude cannot fail to arouse scandal among the faithful and among victims.” He warned bishops not to readmit these associations in their dioceses, saying the groups lost their canonical status because of “grave and prolonged irregularities”.
Switzerland's Federal Court has confirmed that Geneva, once called the “Protestant Rome” for its Calvinism and then strongly influenced by neighbouring France’s secularism, cannot forbid a Corpus Christi procession by the traditionalist Catholic Priestly Fraternity of St Peter (FSSP).
Canton officials, using the laïcité laws separating Church and State, initially banned a small procession last year, but a local court accepted the FSSP’s appeal. The more traditionalist Society of St Pius X, which unlike the FSSP has no canonical status with the Vatican, failed in a similar appeal for its own procession.
Residents of a Spanish village have protested against the “shameful theft” of more than 20 religious paintings by Carmelite nuns.
The 10 sisters recently moved to Valencia, closing down the Carmel founded in 1460 in the village of Piedráhita in the province of Avila. Subsequently, removal vans took away the contents of the museum of sacred art once housed in the convent, including a seventeenth-century painting of the Risen Christ by Alonso Cano. Last weekend, 300 villagers staged a protest, waving banners, and shouting “Hands up – this is a hold-up.”
According to The Times, the village mayor María Carmen Zafra said the nuns had closed the convent “without any consultation, depriving us of a place of worship integral to the community, taking with them cherished and historically important pieces of our heritage”. Regional authorities have since appealed to the nun’s “generosity” and asked for the return of the paintings.
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