Coptic priest stabbed to death
A priest of Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Church has died after a vicious knife attack in a poor neighbourhood of Cairo. It is the latest in a rising tide of hate crimes against the country’s Christian minority, in which more than 100 people have been killed in the past 10 months.
In this latest attack, which was captured on CCTV, Fr Samaan Shehata, 45, who was making a charitable collection for his parish, was chased by a man and stabbed several times.
According to the state media, police have arrested a suspect, Ahmed al-Sonbaty, and are investigating his alleged Islamist connections. However, Bishop Anba Angaelos (pictured), the leader of the Coptic Church in the United Kingdom, has voiced concern about the slow reaction of the Egyptian authorities to the attack. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has also condemned the attack.
Call to tackle trafficking
Caritas India is urging politicians to act quickly to address the deepening problem of human trafficking in Assam. The Catholic charity reports that 22 per cent of all cases of trafficking in India, including the highest number involving children, occur in Assam. It is estimated that since 2012 at least 4,754 children – 2,753 of them girls – have gone missing in Assam. Most are believed to have been taken for child labour and sexual exploitation.
Three northern French dioceses that were ravaged in the First World War have launched a project called “Make Peace” to commemorate the centenary years of the conflict.
Arras, Lille and Cambrai dioceses, all close to the Belgian border, are to hold conferences, exhibitions, films and ecumenical meetings between now and April of next year. The Catholic University of Lille is to give a series of lectures entitled “From the just war to the challenge of a just peace.”
Bishop Orlando Olave Villanoba of Tumaco, in south-western Colombia, has called for a thorough investigation by the Government into the killing of six coca farmers by anti-drugs police. Four officers have been suspended since the fatal shooting that occurred during a protest in El Tandil, a town in the bishop’s diocese.
The incident has stirred up anger over Colombia’s faltering programme to eradicate the growing of coca leaves, used in making cocaine. Colombia’s recently-signed peace accords include a commitment to re-train coca farmers for other types of production. In Tumaco, however, farmers claim the programmes have not taken place, and they have little choice but to cultivate coca.
The Basilica of Sacré Coeur in Paris was bathed in red light – the colour of martyrs – last week to highlight attacks on religious freedom around the world. The evening illumination on 12 October was sponsored by Aid to the Church in Need, whose French chapter called it “a strong signal to pay homage to all those who have spilled their blood for their faith, and to pray for those who still today have to practise their religion in hiding, in the shadows”. ACN’s latest global report, “Persecuted and Forgotten?” says persecution of Christians is worse today than at any time in history. In Britain, it is calling on people to wear something red on 22 November to mark their solidarity with the hundreds of millions of persecuted Christians and the tens of thousands of Christians martyred each year.
Sweden-based group Civil Rights Defenders has called on Vietnam to free a Catholic woman imprisoned for her defence of human rights. Hanoi should “immediately and unconditionally release Nguyen Ngoc Nhu Quynh”, the international rights group said in a statement marking the first anniversary of her arrest and detention. A blogger and mother of two, known as “Mother Mushroom”, she was among a group arrested as they visited another human rights defender in prison last year. Ms Quynh was jailed for 10 years for “conducting propaganda against the state”.
Bishop’s resignation accepted
Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of an Indonesian bishop, accused by his own priests of having a mistress and of appropriating the equivalent of more than £92,000 in church funds. Aged 58, Bishop Hubertus Leteng, of Ruteng diocese, is leaving 17 years before the usual episcopal retirement age. Leteng said he had used the money to fund the education of poor youngsters. Indonesia is a majority-Muslim country. However, the island of Flores, where Ruteng is located, is largely Catholic.
Chile resettles Syrian refugees
Sixty-six Syrian refugees arrived in Santiago de Chile last week. The Archbishop of Santiago, Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati, the Chilean President Michelle Bachelet and representatives of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees welcomed them after their journey from a camp in Lebanon. Caritas Santiago will oversee a resettlement programme for the Syrians.
Fátima finale
The centenary celebrations of the apparitions in Fátima, Portugal, ended last week. Hundreds of thousands of people had visited the Marian shrine for Masses and candle-lit processions, which were presided over by Bishop António Marto of Leiria Fatima.
As part of the closing ceremonies, a video message from Pope Francis was played on large screens placed in the shrine. Speaking in his native Spanish, the Pope recalled his trip to Fátima in May and, pulling out a rosary from his pocket, urged pilgrims to pray the rosary daily. The final celebrations included a concert, attended by the Portuguese President, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, and Bishop Marto, featuring a piece, “The Sun Danced,” which the British composer Sir James MacMillan wrote for the occasion.
Meanwhile, Portuguese bishops are calling for a more public debate over proposed laws to regulate sex-change procedures. They said they were “concerned about the legislative proposal”, before parliament, to allow people as young as 16 to undergo medical gender reasignment and to have their resulting sex changed on official documents without parental approval. A Left Bloc proposal would allow children under 16 to go to court to overturn parental opposition.
New US ambassador
The Republican-led US Senate on Monday confirmed Callista Gingrich, wife of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, as the US ambassador to the Vatican.
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