The National Human Rights Commission of India said the deaths of 13 people in a gunfight in Manipur were “alarming and disturbing”, coming after government claims to have restored peace in the region.
Observers have criticised the failure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which governs the state in coalition, to end the conflict which broke out in May.
Around 200 people were killed in inter-ethnic clashes between tribal Christians and majority Hindus in Manipur over the inclusion of indigenous communities in government quota programs reserved for disadvantaged populations.
In November, India’s highest court ordered the disposal of 175 victims from mortuaries, following disputes over burial grounds. Tens of thousands – mainly Kuki tribal people – remain displaced from their homes. Christians make up 41 per cent of Manipur’s population.
The Pakistani bishops’ human rights office has accused the government of whitewashing a mob attack on Christian buildings in Jaranwala four months ago, which it said was “the worst incident against Christians in the history of Pakistan”.
The National Commission for Justice and Peace said in a report of 4 December that “a common impression given to majority Muslim communities is that Christians themselves created this.” The state ignored the “violent activities of some groups”, said the report titled “Oppressed again: A critical analysis of Jaranwala tragedy”. It also accused Pakistan’s media of biased reporting and called on the government to review the controversial blasphemy law which is often used against the minority Christian community.
More than 80 Christian homes and 26 churches were destroyed in a riot in Jaranwala in Punjab province on 16 August 2023 over allegations that a Qur’an had been desecrated.
The Maronite Archbishop of Damascus reported that the war in Gaza is “terrifying” to young Syrians and that 95 per cent of them want to leave the region.
In his Advent message, Archbishop Samir Nassar warned that young people are increasingly choosing to emigrate because of the lack of opportunities at home. He said that without the new generations “the Church loses its foundation and has no future”, but for 12 years the Syrian population has been living “in a situation of incessant danger, waiting for peace”.
Fears about the Israel-Gaza conflict are exacerbating existing crises driven by conflict, poverty, pandemics and earthquakes, he said, and he reported profound tension throughout the Middle East. The end of World Food Programme assistance in Syria next month is one of “many shadows over the future of the country and of young people”.
A priest in southern Nigeria has been kidnapped en route to anoint a parishioner with the Sacrament of the Sick. Fr Kingsley Eze, parish priest of St Michael’s Umuekebi Church in Imo State, was abducted around on the evening of 30 November when he and a passenger left his car on the journey to do some shopping.
According to eye-witness accounts compiled by Agenzia Fides, the information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies, the kidnappers robbed street vendors and began to shoot indiscriminately, wounding a passer-by, before forcing Fr Eze and his companion to follow them.
The chancellor of the diocese Fr Princewill Iwuanyanwu confirmed the kidnapping: “We solicit your fervent prayers that he may come back to us safe and sound.” Imo State in has been the centre of major attacks, mainly targeting Christians.
In a message to the first African Catholic Education Congress held in Ivory Coast last week, Pope Francis said Catholic education must foster community, not competition.
He invited “all those involved to work to ensure that Catholic education prepares young people not for the competitive spirit that leads to selfishness, but for the spirit of community and solidarity”. He reflected that “quality education is a sign of hope and a solid foundation for the peaceful coexistence that Africa needs today”.
Inspired by the Global Compact on Education, launched by Pope Francis four years ago, the African Education Pact seeks to educate young people based on Christian values and traditional African culture. “It will be able to help shape a generation that draws on the socio-cultural values of the African continent…being capable of dialogue with other cultures and religions,” said Francis.
An Angolan bishop emphasised the responsibility of Africa’s political leaders to promote peace, ahead of the biennial meeting of regional bishops on 22-24 November.
Bishop Antonio Francisco Jaca of Benguela, who heads the Commission for Culture and Social Communications of the Bishops’ Conference of Angola and São Tomé and Príncipe, said that peace and well-being should be promoted over wars, hatred, and division.
“We hope this meeting can bring to Angola experiences that can make our country favour the culture of encounter, where people must meet and seek to make the world a better place,” he said, in a homily at the meeting’s opening Mass.
Police in Spain have arrested a woman in her sixties for praying the Rosary in front of the Spanish Socialist party headquarters in Madrid. She was one of a group praying in protest at the recent decision of the Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to offer an amnesty to Catalan separatists.
Footage of the arrest, showing the woman being taken in handcuffs to a police car was published on social media with the caption: “This is the dictatorship that socialism has turned Spain into.” According to ACI Prensa, a chief inspector and 20 police officers had also been sent to the headquarters of the PSOE (the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party) to break up the protesters.
One of the group organisers, José Andrés Calderón said the police had told him the group could not pray there and if they did “they would interrupt the prayer and fine us”. Protesters were informed they had infringed a law requiring groups to register with police their intention to gather 10 days before doing so.
Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki of Cologne has succeeded in procuring church tax funding for a new seminary in Cologne, despite controversy over its purpose and financing.
The Cologne College for Catholic Theology (Kölner Hochschule für Katholische Theologie, KHTH) has become a conservative rival to the theological faculty at the University of Bonn, where diocesan priests have traditionally trained.
The KHTH was formed in 2020 from the former Divine Word Missionaries University at Sankt Augustin near Bonn, and supported by a special fund at the personal disposal of the archbishop. However, as the fund began to run short last year Woelki was forced to seek alternative finances. On 9 December, the Archdiocese of Cologne’s church tax council decided that the KHTH would be granted €1.8m from the state tax levied on all registered Catholics.
At its foundation, Woelki emphasised that the KHTH would be of “central pastoral importance” in the archdiocese in future, but the archdiocesan council expressed concerns about the project and it was rejected by the 15 church deans. The state government of North Rhine-Westphalia also opposed the foundation. Representatives of German lay Catholics said the new seminary was “superfluous” as there were already sufficient theological institutions in the archdiocese.
Pope Francis marked the eightieth anniversary of the Focolare Movement last week, expressing appreciation for “its commitment to unity, love, and peace” inspired by Chiara Lubich, who founded it in Italy in 1943.
He welcomed Focolare representatives to Rome, calling on them to be witnesses and builders of the peace of Christ, saying: “Today, unfortunately, the world is still torn by many conflicts and continues to need artisans of fraternity and peace among individuals and nations.”
The movement of spiritual and social renewal, officially known as the Work of Mary, has more than two million people are involved in its work in 182 countries.
Lourdes shrine recorded around 3.07 million visitors in 2023, 30 per cent more than in 2022, as pilgrimages revived after the Covid-19 pandemic. It expects 3.1 million visitors next year and expects by 2025 to reach the 3.5 million mark recorded in 2019, the last full pre-pandemic year.
The return of foreign pilgrims, about 60 per cent of visitors this year, helped increase numbers. The pilgrimage peak on 15 August was almost the same as in 2019. Visitor totals slumped to 800,000 in 2020 as the sanctuary was shut for two months and then slowly reopened sections for prayer and processions. The grotto was reopened in February 2022.
Bishop Joseph Strickland, who was relieved of the pastoral governance of the Diocese of Tyler, Texas by Pope Francis in November, denied reports he had been barred from saying Mass in his former diocese.
The bishop, who has no current posting, reported that Bishop Joseph Vasquez, the apostolic administrator in Tyler, “said it might be a good idea for me to leave the diocese, it was a suggestion”.
When Rome removes a diocesan bishop, he normally returns to his home diocese, but Strickland was a priest in Tyler before becoming bishop so it is not clear where he could go.
The University of Notre Dame named Fr Robert Dowd CSC as its eighteenth president, succeeding Fr John Jenkins CSC who is retiring after 19 years in post. He will take over the role on 1 July 2024.
Dowd, who graduated from Notre Dame and taught political science there, is currently vice president and associate provost for interdisciplinary initiatives.
“Informed by our Catholic mission, we will work together so that Notre Dame is an ever-greater engine of insight, innovation and impact, addressing society’s greatest challenges and helping young people to realize their potential for good,” he said.
Churches in South Korea need to break away from their authoritarian and institutional approach and embrace flexibility, according to speakers at a seminar titled “De-religionisation and Society, and the Future and Prospects of Korean Catholics”.
The event, hosted by the Catholic Cultural Institute of Korea, addressed the rising numbers of religiously-unaffiliated people, but this was termed a decline in institutional religion rather than “de-religionisation”.
Speakers called for the Church “to be like a fluid and flexible tent that embraces everyone”. More people “quench their spiritual thirst outside of the Church” in counselling and healing programmes or retreats and temple visits.
The number of young people attending Sunday Mass has dropped by 17 per cent since the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a survey by the Korean Catholic Research Institute in March. Catholics in South Korea account for about 10 per cent of its 52 million population.
Pope Francis has inaugurated a World Day of Children, to be marked on 25-26 May 2024 in Rome. It is being promoted by the Dicastery for Culture and Education as development from World Youth Day.
“Like Jesus, we want to put children at the centre and care for them,” said Pope Francis on 8 December. The idea of a day dedicated to children was proposed to the Pope in July by a child during a podcast made by Vatican Media with Pope Francis. “I like it very much!” the Pope said in response.
More than 120 Nativity scenes from all around the world are on display in the colonnades of St Peter’s Square in Rome. The Vatican exhibition celebrates the eight-hundredth anniversary of the Greccio Crib, the first depiction of the Nativity created by St Francis of Assisi in 1223.
The scenes come from 22 countries, including the Philippines, Venezuela, the Czech Republic, Taiwan and Guatemala, feature a mechanised crib and another carved in the shape of a wooden coffee machine. Others have been handstitched in fabric.
The exhibition also displays Nativity scenes from famous collections including from Turin Cathedral, from the Ulma Family Museum in Poland and one created by the Italian television network RAI Vatican. Two depictions of the Nativity created by prisoners are also on show, which runs until 7 January.
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