Swede of the year
The Catholic Bishop of Stockholm, Cardinal Anders Arborelius OCD (above), 68, has been named “Swede of the Year 2017” by Sweden’s Fokus magazine for his example as leader of the tiny Catholic Church in the mainly secular and otherwise Lutheran country. The magazine, which makes the award annually, praised Arborelius for playing a decisive role in bringing native Swedes and immigrants together, which it said had changed Sweden for the better. He had also made history by becoming the first Swedish cardinal, the Fokus award committee declared. Arborelius is not only the first Swedish cardinal but the first one from any country in Scandinavia. Catholics make up just 1.2 per cent of the population of Sweden, numbering 116,000 out of 9.7 million people.
Let the church bells toll
Catholic bishops in DR Congo have instructed clergy to ring their church bells each week until fresh elections are held. A 13 December statement, signed by Fr Jean-Marie Bomengola, secretary of the Bishops’ Conference Commission for Social Communications, said bells will ring every Thursday at 9pm for 15 minutes.
The initiative comes on the first anniversary of last year’s New Year’s Eve Agreements, which the Church was involved in mediating. Last month, the bishops urged President Joseph Kabila not to run again as a presidential candidate and to apply the agreements by organising long overdue elections. The bishops were “deeply disappointed to find themselves in the same context of tensions as at the end of 2016”, they said. Kabila’s critics say he has delayed the poll so that he can remain in office, as the constitution bars him from running for a third term. Local conflicts in several parts of the country are continuing as a violent backdrop to the national crisis over elections. Catholic churches are sheltering some of the 1.7 million displaced people.
At least nine people were killed and 15 injured when heavily armed terrorists attacked a church in Quetta city, Pakistan, last Sunday. The assault during the midday service at Bethel Memorial Methodist Church targeted the minority Christian community just a week before Christmas. Quetta’s police chief, Moazam Ansari, said that 400 worshippers were present when the gunmen attempted to storm into the church. He said the policemen assigned to the church’s security had reacted in a timely manner and had averted a much larger tragedy.
Security plea
Bishop Oliver Dashe Doeme of Maiduguri, Nigeria, has appealed for more security for churches in his diocese, particularly during this Christmas season. He made the appeal after three catechists were murdered on Monday last week in north-east Nigeria when two female suicide bombers detonated their vests outside a church in Pulka. The bombs also injured several confirmation candidates, among dozens waiting inside the church.
The president of Croatia’s bishops’ conference has urged Catholics not to be downhearted over Christmas after the Hague tribunal sentenced six top Bosnian Croat military leaders for war crimes during the 1992-5 Bosnian war. “This is a difficult moment of our people – and the impression is widespread that Croatia was hated by the Hague tribunal,” Archbishop Zelimir Puljic of Zadar told clergy. “It’s uncomfortable for us to hear a verdict which, instead of relying on historical facts, reflects political motives and aims at equalising guilt between aggressors and victims. What we now need is peace, dignity and courage so we can continue bearing witness to the truth.”
The archbishop issued the message after 2,000 people, including two government ministers, attended a Zagreb rally in memory of General Slobodan Praljak, who committed suicide by drinking poison live on television after the Hague court upheld his 20-year sentence for war crimes, along with five other Bosnian Croat military, on 29 November.
Mali is the “epicentre of jihadist groups that rage in Sahel”, the General Secretary of the country’s Catholic Bishops’ Conference said, as he welcomed the deployment of a new multinational security force to flush out al-Qaeda-linked militants operating near the borders with Niger and Burkina Faso. Fr Edmond Dembele said extra troops from a coalition of five African countries – dubbed G5 Sahel – along with supporting French soldiers, was “a sign of hope not only for Mali but for the entire sub-Saharan region”.
Answering critics
The Polish Bishops’ Conference launched a glossy English-language Twitter feed, @ChurchinPoland, last week, partly in a bid to counter criticism of the Church, which has come into conflict with the EU on a number of issues. At the same time, its Catholic Information Agency (KAI) listed previous appeals for unity and harmony made by the president of the bishops’ conference, Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki of Poznan, and other Church leaders.
As Church and state representatives commemorated the 1981 imposition of martial law, which temporarily crushed Poland’s dissident Solidarity movement, Archbishop Gadecki called for a calming of “hatred and prejudice” in national life, warning that they risked damaging the country’s international image. He also criticised acerbic attacks on the centre-right government, headed by the new prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki.
Priest accuses diamond ‘crooks’
A prominent Catholic priest has blamed “crooks” in the government of the new president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, for $15 billion that has gone missing in Zimbabwe’s diamond revenue.
Speaking at a National People’s Convention Budget Review meeting in Harare on 12 December, Fr Edward Ndete, parliamentary liaison officer for the Catholic bishops, said the recent budget statement by Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa should have addressed the missing $15bn and plans to recover it. “The government is full of crooks and I say it openly because I want the issue to be addressed and I am saying the truth,” Fr Ndete said. Spoils from the hugely profitable Marange diamond mine are routinely shared between its Chinese “managers” and Zimbabwe’s military and political elite.
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