Coptic Leader Hospitalized in Ohio

The leader of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Egypt was being treated Tuesday at the Cleveland Clinic, where he had previously undergone surgery, a hospital spokeswoman said.

The clinic didn't plan to release any additional information about Pope Shenouda III, 84, said clinic spokeswoman Heather Phillips.

Pope Shenouda was scheduled to consecrate the church Tuesday at St. Mary's Coptic Church in Columbus, said Mary Sedarous, daughter of the Rev. Sedarous A. Sedarous, the church's pastor. She said he was taken to the hospital Monday night.

The cleric suffers from chronic cholecystitis, or stones in his gall bladder that cause a high fever and severe pain, and was hospitalized in November in Cairo.

He had spinal surgery at the Cleveland Clinic in October 2006.

The Coptic Church is the native Christian church of Egypt, and has a doctrine similar to the Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox churches.

Pope Shenouda has led the church since 1971. Copts are believed to be 10 percent of Egypt's 77 million population, making up the largest Christian community in the Middle East.

Under his leadership, the church has established congregations in the United States, South America, New Zealand and Australia.

It has more than 100 North American congregations, up from four in 1971.
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The Roman Curia Wakes Up and Strikes Three Blows

The general reform of the Roman curia that many were expecting to come as a "tsunami" has not happened – and will not happen. But proceeding in small steps, with a few carefully chosen appointments, Benedict XVI has nonetheless moved straight toward his goal.

Today the curia meets the pope's expectations, and it implements his directions more efficiently than it did a year or two ago.

The instrument through which the curia explains what it does is also new.

This instrument is "L'Osservatore Romano." For three months, since the pope's newspaper has been directed by professor Giovanni Maria Vian and has radically changed its appearance, nearly every day it publishes an interview with one or another of the Vatican's officials.

These interviews reveal not only what a particular office has done, but sometimes they announce beforehand what it will do – and why.

At this beginning of the new year, the curia has given at least three signals of effectively following through on the pope's instructions. One of these comes from the congregation for the clergy, another from the congregation for the causes of the saints, and another from the officials for the liturgy.

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1. In "L'Osservatore Romano" on January 5, cardinal Cláudio Hummes, prefect of the congregation for the clergy, announced that he had sent to bishops, pastors, religious superiors, and seminary rectors all over the world a letter to ask that in every diocese "cenacles" of perpetual Eucharistic adoration be established, with the aim of "sanctifying" priests through prayer.

Among the motivations for the initiative, Hummes explicitly referred to the sexual "sins" committed on the part of a "minimal" but still significant part of the clergy:

"We ask all to do Eucharistic adoration in order to make reparation before God for the grave injury that has been done, and to recover the dignity of the victims. Yes, we wanted to think of the victims, so that they might feel that we are near. They are uppermost in our thoughts; it is important to say this."

These statements echo the memorable mea culpa for the "filth in the Church, and precisely among those who, in the priesthood, should belong completely to Jesus" that then-cardinal Joseph Ratzinger included in the papal Via Crucis on Good Friday of 2005.

But there is also a practical application of the return to adoration of the Eucharist encouraged by Benedict XVI on various occasions, the first time with his silent prayer, on his knees, before the consecrated host at the World Youth Day in Cologne in August of 2005, and another time in Saint Peter's Square
with the children of Rome and Lazio who had recently received their First Communion, and most recently in Saint Peter's Basilica last October 31, when for the first time he added Eucharistic adoration and benediction to the year-end Te Deum.

Cardinal Hummes's letter has met with a concrete response in many places. In Italy, the first dioceses to institute cenacles of Eucharistic adoration "for the sanctification of priests" have been, in addition to Rome, those of Macerata, Turin, Syracuse, Ragusa, Oristano.

On the feast of the Epiphany, "Avvenire," the newspaper of the Italian bishops' conference, dedicated to Hummes's initiative a front page editorial written by the theologian PierAngelo Sequeri:

"It is time, finally, for a Christianity of adoration. It is time for a Christianity that believes in the body of the Lord, and relies entirely on the impassioned power of the Son, who precisely in his Body sustains history amid its powerlessness. [...] When the ecclesiastical minister, who is essentially ordered to the body of the Lord, culpably loses respect for the bodies of the children entrusted to his good faith, it is right that the scandal be acknowledged and that, accepting responsibility for the injury and our weakness and limitations, we call upon the Lord for help."

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2. In an interview with "L'Osservatore Romano" on January 9, and in an unsigned note published by the same newspaper four days later, cardinal José Saraiva Martins, prefect of the congregation for the causes of saints, announced that toward the end of February there will be the public presentation of the instruction "Sanctorum Mater," on the opening of causes of beatification, an instruction that until now was known only to those directly involved in the process.

The document – dated May 17, 2007, the Italian text of which was published in "Acta Apostolicae Sedis" issue no. 6, June 1, 2007, pp. 465-510 – translates into precise norms the guidelines that Benedict XVI gave to the congregation for the causes of saints in a message on April 27, 2006.

Caution and accuracy: these are the criteria that the pope and the congregation want to see more closely observed.

In particular, the instruction demands that "the seriousness of the investigations" into the alleged miracles "be safeguarded, [...] the procedures for the examination of which have, over the last twenty years, produced problematic elements."

Greater guarantees have also been established concerning the "reputation of sanctity." Without this – without, that is, an exemplary Christian life already recognized as such by a great number of the faithful, no process of beatification will be opened anymore. In other words: the pride and entrepreneurship of a religious order toward their founder or confrere are not enough.

Other stringent norms concern the gathering of documents and testimonies. Questions will be posed to the witnesses in a simple and concise manner, so as "to solicit answers that exhibit knowledge of concrete facts and the sources of this knowledge." This is meant to avoid formulations that are "insidious, deceptive, suggesting the desired answers."

It remains the case that, in order for the cause to proceed "there must emerge absolutely no element that goes against faith or good morals," so due emphasis must be given to "any findings that contradict the reputation of sanctity."

The document recommends moreover that the bishops avoid "any action that might induce the faithful to believe wrongly" that the investigation underway must necessarily lead to beatification or canonization. Before the conclusion of the diocesan cause, it must on the contrary be assured and certified that the servant of God "not be the object of undue devotion."

It is easy to read in these norms a correction of the tendency toward an "inflationary" approach toward beatifications and canonizations that had crept in during the past few decades.

One of the very first decisions of Joseph Ratzinger, following his election as pope, was that of reserving only the canonizations for himself and of delegating beatifications to others, generally in the country of origin of the new blessed.

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3. On Monday, January 14 "L'Osservatore Romano," in reporting on the Mass and baptisms celebrated by Benedict XVI in the Sistine Chapel the previous Sunday, the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, emphasized that "for the first time since the beginning of his pontificate," the pope "celebrated the Mass in public from the traditional altar".

And it explained:

"He decided to celebrate at the ancient altar in order not to alter the beauty and harmony of this architectural gem, preserving its structure from the viewpoint of the celebration and making use of a possibility provided for by the liturgical guidelines. At certain moments the pope thus found himself with his back to the faithful and his gaze upon the Cross, orienting in this way the attitude of the entire assembly."

A few days later, in a January 20 interview with Vatican Radio, the new master of ceremonies for the pontifical liturgies, Guido Marini, gave these additional explanations:

"I believe that it is important first of all to consider the orientation that the liturgical celebration is always called upon to display: I refer to the centrality of the Lord, the Savior crucified and risen from the dead. This orientation must determine the interior disposition of the whole assembly, and in consequence, the exterior manner of celebrating as well. The placement of the cross on the altar, at the center of the assembly, has the capacity to communicate this fundamental aspect of liturgical theology. There can also be particular circumstances in which, because of the artistic conditions of the sacred place and its singular beauty and harmony, it would be preferable to celebrate at the ancient altar, which preserves the precise orientation of the liturgical celebration. This is exactly what happened in the Sistine Chapel. This practice is permitted by the liturgical norms, and is in harmony with the conciliar reform."

As for the celebrant "turning his back to the faithful":

"In the circumstances in which the celebration takes place in this manner, this is not so much a question of turning one's back to the faithful, but rather of orienting oneself toward the Lord, together with the faithful. From this point of view, instead of being closed the door is opened for the faithful, to lead them to the Lord. In the Eucharistic liturgy, the participants do not look at one another; they look to the One who is our East, the Savior."

And about the motu proprio "Summorum Pontificum," which liberalized the use of the ancient rite of the Mass:

"The Church's liturgy, like all of its life, is characterized by continuity: I would speak of development in continuity. This means that the Church proceeds on its journey through history without losing sight of its own roots and its own living tradition: this can even require, in some cases, the recovery of valuable and important elements that have been lost and forgotten along the way, and the authentic meaning of which has been dimmed by the passage of time. It seems to me that the motu proprio moves in precisely this direction, reaffirming very clearly that in the Church's liturgical life there is continuity, without rupture. One must not speak, therefore, of a return to the past, but of a true enrichment for the present, in view of tomorrow."

In any case, an instruction on the motu proprio is being prepared "that soundly establishes the criteria of application": cardinal secretary of state Tarcisio Bertone announced this in an interview with "Famiglia Cristiana" on January 6.

Moreover, there will soon be published a new formulation of the prayer for the Jews contained in the rite for Good Friday in the 1962 "Tridentine" missal liberalized by the motu proprio. The references to the condition of "darkness" and "blindness" of the Jewish people will disappear, while the prayer for their conversion will remain. "Because in the liturgy we are always praying for conversion, of ourselves in the first place and then of all Christians and non-Christians," explained archbishop Angelo Amato, secretary of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith, in an interview with "Avvenire."

Returning to the orientation of the celebration, to understand to what extent the words of master of pontifical ceremonies Guido Marini reflect the thought of Benedict XVI, it is enough to note what the pope said in this passage from his last general audience on Wednesday, January 23:

"In the liturgy of the ancient Church, after the homily the bishop or presider of the celebration, the main celebrant, said: 'Conversi ad Dominum'. Then he himself and everyone else stood up and faced the East. Everyone wanted to look toward Christ."
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Vatican official defends Catholic Church's charity record

The Vatican's top official for charity services on Tuesday defended the Roman Catholic Church's aid activities while challenging international relief agencies to declare how much of their funds where used to pay staff salaries.

"The internal costs incurred by the church's aid agencies can be considered exemplary," Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes, who heads the Pontifical Council Cor Unum for Human and Christian Development, said.

He was speaking at a Vatican news conference to present Pope Benedict XVI's Lenten message which urges the faithful to do more to help the poor.

According to Cordes, in 2006 the administrative costs of foundations presided by his body only accounted for 3 per cent of their budget. Other Roman Catholic charities, including Caritas and Aid to the Church In Need, recorded similarly low administrative costs, meaning that the bulk of their funds went directly to the needy, Cordes said.

"Certain things in the aid world need to be clarified," said Cordes, adding that some agencies, which he did not name, registered "surprisingly high" internal costs.

"This is not the context in which to focus on some of these organizations and on the salaries of their employees. But those who try and examine certain figures, often well hidden in their (the agencies') annual reports will be astonished by the internal costs," Cordes said.

"It would be helpful if when appeals are launched in the media in the wake of calamities like the tsunami, not just the bank account number where donations can be made, but also the percentage that the agencies keep for themselves, should be indicated," Cordes said.

He was apparently referring to the unprecedented worldwide relief efforts triggered by the destructive earthquakes and tidal waves that struck South-East Asia in December 2004.
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British and Polish Catholics disagree over care of Polish migrants

Roman Catholic leaders in Britain and in Poland have publicly disagreed over how best to provide pastoral care for large numbers of Polish migrants currently living and working in the United Kingdom.

"It remains our position that Polish Catholics should look for their own priests and parishes," explained Bishop Ryszard Karpinski, the Polish church's delegate. "But we've no means of forcing anyone. If people want to come to Polish churches, they come," he said. "If they want to go to English-speaking services, they go."

The 72-year-old bishop was speaking following some strong reactions to a December interview by the head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, during which he said he was concerned Polish migrants were "creating a separate church in Britain".

More than two million Poles have left their country since it joined the European Union in May 2004, of whom at least half have gone to Britain and Ireland, according to EU data.

The Polish Catholic church runs a special mission, currently numbering 114 priests in 219 pastoral centres throughout England and Wales, which follows a programme set by Polish bishops.

Several British church leaders have called for greater efforts to integrate migrant Catholics, who have substantially boosted Mass attendance in British parishes. In a 12 December interview with Poland's Catholic information agency KAI, Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor said Polish Catholics could become "a major force" in local church life by helping to evangelise, but he added he was also concerned that "Poles are creating a separate church".

He said he hoped they would integrate with British parishes "as soon as possible when they learn enough of the language".

However, the call appeared to be contradicted in a Christmas message by Poland's Roman Catholic primate, Cardinal Jozef Glemp, who appealed to migrant Catholics to "seek out Polish pastors" and "find Polish church centres".

Several British-based Poles reacted sharply to Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor's appeal, including the Polish Mission's deputy rector, Grazyna Sikorska, who said she felt "spiritually raped".

A Polish school director in Oxford, Hanna Darowska, told ENI most Polish churches were already full. She added that Polish identity was strongly linked with Roman Catholicism both at home and abroad, and said Polish churches also played a key role in providing help and advice to migrants.

"You can't instruct people where to encounter God - you should let them choose," said the director, Hanna Darowska. "The English [Catholic] church should be pleased its parishioners have increased and not try to destroy Polish churches, which were built up with great difficulty over so many years."

Tadeusz Kukla, the rector of the Polish Mission, which described Britain in a recent statement as a "godless civilisation", told ENI only 8 percent of Polish migrants regularly attended Mass regularly in Britain. Integration is "a task for a whole generation", he stated.

Alexander Desforges, the director for news and information of the Bishops Conference of England and Wales, said the pastoral needs of migrants were the subject of "ongoing discussions" at diocesan level, but said there had been no "specific proposals" for revising a 1948 accord establishing the Polish Mission.
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Pope Benedict's 2008 Message for Lent

“Christ made Himself poor for you” (2 Cor 8,9)

Dear Brothers and Sisters!

1. Each year, Lent offers us a providential opportunity to deepen the meaning and value of our Christian lives, and it stimulates us to rediscover the mercy of God so that we, in turn, become more merciful toward our brothers and sisters. In the Lenten period, the Church makes it her duty to propose some specific tasks that accompany the faithful concretely in this process of interior renewal: these are prayer, fasting and almsgiving. For this year’s Lenten Message, I wish to spend some time reflecting on the practice of almsgiving, which represents a specific way to assist those in need and, at the same time, an exercise in self-denial to free us from attachment to worldly goods. The force of attraction to material riches and just how categorical our decision must be not to make of them an idol, Jesus confirms in a resolute way: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Lk 16,13). Almsgiving helps us to overcome this constant temptation, teaching us to respond to our neighbor’s needs and to share with others whatever we possess through divine goodness. This is the aim of the special collections in favor of the poor, which are promoted during Lent in many parts of the world. In this way, inward cleansing is accompanied by a gesture of ecclesial communion, mirroring what already took place in the early Church. In his Letters, Saint Paul speaks of this in regard to the collection for the Jerusalem community (cf. 2 Cor 8-9; Rm 15, 25-27).

2. According to the teaching of the Gospel, we are not owners but rather administrators of the goods we possess: these, then, are not to be considered as our exclusive possession, but means through which the Lord calls each one of us to act as a steward of His providence for our neighbor. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church reminds us, material goods bear a social value, according to the principle of their universal destination (cf. n. 2404)

In the Gospel, Jesus explicitly admonishes the one who possesses and uses earthly riches only for self. In the face of the multitudes, who, lacking everything, suffer hunger, the words of Saint John acquire the tone of a ringing rebuke: “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses to help?” (1 Jn 3,17). In those countries whose population is majority Christian, the call to share is even more urgent, since their responsibility toward the many who suffer poverty and abandonment is even greater. To come to their aid is a duty of justice even prior to being an act of charity.

3. The Gospel highlights a typical feature of Christian almsgiving: it must be hidden: “Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,” Jesus asserts, “so that your alms may be done in secret” (Mt 6,3-4). Just a short while before, He said not to boast of one’s own good works so as not to risk being deprived of the heavenly reward (cf. Mt 6,1-2). The disciple is to be concerned with God’s greater glory. Jesus warns: “In this way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven” (Mt 5,16). Everything, then, must be done for God’s glory and not our own. This understanding, dear brothers and sisters, must accompany every gesture of help to our neighbor, avoiding that it becomes a means to make ourselves the center of attention. If, in accomplishing a good deed, we do not have as our goal God’s glory and the real well being of our brothers and sisters, looking rather for a return of personal interest or simply of applause, we place ourselves outside of the Gospel vision. In today’s world of images, attentive vigilance is required, since this temptation is great. Almsgiving, according to the Gospel, is not mere philanthropy: rather it is a concrete expression of charity, a theological virtue that demands interior conversion to love of God and neighbor, in imitation of Jesus Christ, who, dying on the cross, gave His entire self for us. How could we not thank God for the many people who silently, far from the gaze of the media world, fulfill, with this spirit, generous actions in support of one’s neighbor in difficulty? There is little use in giving one’s personal goods to others if it leads to a heart puffed up in vainglory: for this reason, the one, who knows that God “sees in secret” and in secret will reward, does not seek human recognition for works of mercy.

4. In inviting us to consider almsgiving with a more profound gaze that transcends the purely material dimension, Scripture teaches us that there is more joy in giving than in receiving (cf. Acts 20,35). When we do things out of love, we express the truth of our being; indeed, we have been created not for ourselves but for God and our brothers and sisters (cf. 2 Cor 5,15). Every time when, for love of God, we share our goods with our neighbor in need, we discover that the fullness of life comes from love and all is returned to us as a blessing in the form of peace, inner satisfaction and joy. Our Father in heaven rewards our almsgiving with His joy. What is more: Saint Peter includes among the spiritual fruits of almsgiving the forgiveness of sins: “Charity,” he writes, “covers a multitude of sins” (1 Pt 4,8). As the Lenten liturgy frequently repeats, God offers to us sinners the possibility of being forgiven. The fact of sharing with the poor what we possess disposes us to receive such a gift. In this moment, my thought turns to those who realize the weight of the evil they have committed and, precisely for this reason, feel far from God, fearful and almost incapable of turning to Him. By drawing close to others through almsgiving, we draw close to God; it can become an instrument for authentic conversion and reconciliation with Him and our brothers.

5. Almsgiving teaches us the generosity of love. Saint Joseph Benedict Cottolengo forthrightly recommends: “Never keep an account of the coins you give, since this is what I always say: if, in giving alms, the left hand is not to know what the right hand is doing, then the right hand, too, should not know what it does itself” (Detti e pensieri, Edilibri, n. 201). In this regard, all the more significant is the Gospel story of the widow who, out of her poverty, cast into the Temple treasury “all she had to live on” (Mk 12,44). Her tiny and insignificant coin becomes an eloquent symbol: this widow gives to God not out of her abundance, not so much what she has, but what she is. Her entire self.

We find this moving passage inserted in the description of the days that immediately precede Jesus’ passion and death, who, as Saint Paul writes, made Himself poor to enrich us out of His poverty (cf. 2 Cor 8,9); He gave His entire self for us. Lent, also through the practice of almsgiving, inspires us to follow His example. In His school, we can learn to make of our lives a total gift; imitating Him, we are able to make ourselves available, not so much in giving a part of what we possess, but our very selves. Cannot the entire Gospel be summarized perhaps in the one commandment of love? The Lenten practice of almsgiving thus becomes a means to deepen our Christian vocation. In gratuitously offering himself, the Christian bears witness that it is love and not material richness that determines the laws of his existence. Love, then, gives almsgiving its value; it inspires various forms of giving, according to the possibilities and conditions of each person.

6. Dear brothers and sisters, Lent invites us to “train ourselves” spiritually, also through the practice of almsgiving, in order to grow in charity and recognize in the poor Christ Himself. In the Acts of the Apostles, we read that the Apostle Peter said to the cripple who was begging alms at the Temple gate: “I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, walk” (Acts 3,6). In giving alms, we offer something material, a sign of the greater gift that we can impart to others through the announcement and witness of Christ, in whose name is found true life. Let this time, then, be marked by a personal and community effort of attachment to Christ in order that we may be witnesses of His love. May Mary, Mother and faithful Servant of the Lord, help believers to enter the “spiritual battle” of Lent, armed with prayer, fasting and the practice of almsgiving, so as to arrive at the celebration of the Easter Feasts, renewed in spirit. With these wishes, I willingly impart to all my Apostolic Blessing.

From the Vatican, 30 October 2007

BENEDICTUS PP. XVI

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Candidacy of ex-bishop a “dagger thrust into the body of the Church” in Paraguay

Bishop Rogelio Livieres Plano of Alto Parana has strongly criticized suspended Catholic bishop Fernando Lugo for his decision to be a candidate in the upcoming elections and said it was “dagger thrust into the Church.”

In an interview with the Paraguayan daily ABC Color, Bishop Livieres said, “It is something bad for Catholic doctrine and for canon law for a bishop to abandon his ministry in order to devote himself to other matters, even though they may be as noble as politics.”

“To the bishops,” he continued, “it is sad that the means we use to improve the world, which are the preaching of the word of God and the sacraments, are insufficient in the eyes of a bishop for helping society and that he has to choose earthly means. It’s like underestimating the supernatural means that the Church has used for 2000 years,” he said.

Bishop Livieres noted that “priests and bishops are prohibited from entering politics” and that while in the past priests and religious, and even the Pope, held political power, “the Church went through a process of distancing herself from political activity and returning to her origins.”

He said that the problem of political involvement by the clergy in Latin America stems from “liberation theology. For 45 years that theology has held great influence and there are priests involved in politics, such Ernesto Cardenal in Nicaragua, who was a government minister, and who Pope John Paul II warned to abandon politics when he visited Nicaragua.”

“Lugo is surely the first bishop to abandon the priestly ministry in order to devote himself to politics. This is a very negative precedent. The Holy See suspended him a divinis,” the bishop said.

“Imagine if St. Paul or any of the apostles would have devoted themselves to politics instead of their priestly ministry. The Church would not exist.”

By devoting himself to politics, “it is as if Lugo were saying, ‘I have been wasting my time as a bishop. I am going to devote myself to something better.’ That is the impression one gets,” Bishop Livieres said.

“I know him personally and I appreciate him,” he went on. “I think he is a good person but that he is wrong. I really believe he can correct his attitude and return to the bosom of the Church. All of the bishops pray for this intention.”

He said Lugo’s decision was a “dagger thrust into the body of the Church. He will continue to hurt us as long as he is in this condition and is not a bishop. On the other hand, if Lugo returns to the priestly ministry, it will be a great joy for all,” Bishop Livieres said. “We will continue to repeat this before the elections and after the elections, whether or not he is elected president,” he stated.
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Cardinal formally opens sainthood cause for Paulist Fathers' founder

Paulist Father Isaac Thomas Hecker was "a real-life saint like you and me," Cardinal Edward M. Egan of New York said Jan. 27, describing the founder of the Paulist Fathers.

"He was a person who suffered, who made his way through life bearing crosses and who taught that sanctity can be captured in many different ways," the cardinal added.

He made the comments during a Mass that marked the opening of the cause for Father Hecker's canonization and the 150th anniversary of the Church of St. Paul the Apostle, the parish he established on Columbus Avenue in New York.

More than 1,000 people attended the bilingual Mass, concelebrated by several priests. Before the processional, Cardinal Egan blessed the tomb of Father Hecker, which is inside the church in the northeast corner.

In his homily, Cardinal Egan traced the "troubles and tribulations" that led Father Hecker to found the Paulists as a distinctly "American approach to announcing the Gospel."

He said the native New Yorker was born in 1819 to German immigrant parents. He escaped a yellow fever epidemic, nearly died of smallpox and carried its physical scars throughout his life. He worked with his older brothers in their successful bakery and flour business, but did not have an interest in commerce. He was disappointed with the outcome of political causes he supported.

"He had trouble finding his place and he didn't understand the mystical experiences he had," Cardinal Egan said.

Father Hecker was raised as a Methodist and explored several denominations before becoming a Catholic when he was 24 years old. Five years later, he was ordained a Redemptorist priest in Europe and preached well-attended missions in England and throughout the eastern United States.

Father John Duffy, president of the Paulist Fathers, said it was Father Hecker's "driving conviction that if the principles of freedom and democracy of this country were combined with the teachings of Jesus Christ as proclaimed by the Catholic Church then America could become a light to the nations."

Cardinal Egan recounted that Father Hecker's vision was incompatible with that of his religious superiors in Rome and he was dismissed from the Redemptorists. Fortunately, said Cardinal Egan, Father Hecker had the support of Pope Pius IX, who encouraged him to establish a congregation of priests dedicated to evangelizing North America.

In 1858, Archbishop John Hughes of New York gave a parish to Father Hecker and his fledgling order, formally known as the Missionary Society of St. Paul the Apostle. It was the first religious congregation of Catholic men established in the U.S.

The sainthood cause of Father Hecker was formally opened after the conclusion of the Mass.

The priest participants exchanged their liturgical vestments for clerical garb and returned to the sanctuary where Cardinal Egan sat at a large table adjacent to the altar. Paulist Father Gilbert Martinez, pastor of the Church of St. Paul the Apostle, explained that the ceremony to open a sainthood cause is "not usually done in public. It's more of an administrative procedure."

Paulist Father Paul Robichaud, postulator of Father Hecker's cause, officially requested that Cardinal Egan initiate the archdiocesan inquiry into "the life, service and holiness of this servant of God." With the formal opening of his cause, Father Hecker receives the title servant of God.

Cardinal Egan accepted Father Robichaud's request, declared he was initiating the inquiry and would consult with his brother bishops and petition the Holy See. Cardinal Egan took the first of several oaths promising to fulfill his duties for the archdiocesan inquiry.

Similar oaths were pledged by Father Robichaud; Msgr. William Belford, archdiocesan chancellor, who is the delegate instructor for the inquiry; Msgr. Douglas Mathers, vice chancellor, who is the promoter of justice for the inquiry; Paulist Father John Foley, notary for the cause; and Paulist Father Ronald Franco, vice postulator.

Father Duffy said Father Hecker was certain the Holy Spirit would guide the Paulists to meet the church's needs in the modern age.

He said that the present-day Paulist mission consists of "evangelization, proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ to the unchurched; reconciliation, reaching out to those who find themselves cut off from the community of faith and/or at the margins of society; seeking unity for the body of Christ and seeking dialogue with those of other world religions."

"With Father Hecker looking over our shoulders, I am reminded of what he would say: God is not finished with us yet. The Holy Spirit has so much more to bring forth!" Father Duffy said.

The cause for the German-American saint was kicked off by the Irish-American cardinal speaking in English and Spanish to a multicultural group that enjoyed Italian pastries from Brooklyn at the back of the West Side church after the ceremony.
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No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Why Easter is a moveable feast

The sight of chocolate eggs and pancakes on supermarket shelves in January is a little hard to stomach when you've barely had time to digest your Christmas pudding.

But this year, the vagaries of the Christian calendar have brought Easter to its earliest date in almost a century.

In 2008, the most important feast in Christianity falls on March 23, the earliest it has been since 1913 and one of the rare occasions when it occurs before the clocks have moved forward for summertime.

In just under a fortnight, the season of rationing and restraint will be upon us when Lent and Ash Wednesday land on an exceptionally early February 6, jeopardising the romantic indulgences of St Valentine's Day.

The very rare collision of St Patrick's Day and Holy Week has already forced the Catholic Church to switch our patron's feast day to March 15 although the parade will go ahead as usual on March 17.

Rome gave Irish church authorities permission to move the official celebrations two days back to March 15, which falls on a Saturday, after bishops felt that the party atmosphere created by the St Patrick's festival could overshadow the solemnity of Holy Week.

And while schoolchildren around the country are rejoicing at their early Easter holidays, they're sure to find the extra long summer term a bit of a drag. Schools will close on Friday March 14 and report back for business on March 31 leaving a lengthy stretch before they break up again in June.

The calculation of Easter's date has divided Christians for centuries. While most Western church festivals are held on the same date every year or at a fixed position such as the first Sunday of the month, Easter is a moveable feast that can fall on any date from March 22 to April 25, over a range of 35 days.

Now for the science. In the early church, Easter was celebrated on different days in different countries. But the problem for Christians, whose calendar is based on the solar calendar, is that the Resurrection of Jesus happened during the Jewish feast of Passover, which the Hebrew religion celebrates according to the lunar calendar and the changing shape of the moon.

Fixing the date of Easter in the Roman calendar would lead to the celebration of the feast on dates unrelated to the Jewish observance of Passover, which marks the liberation of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt.

In AD 325, church leaders at the Council of Nicaea agreed to keep the Christian feast linked to Passover and it was decided that Easter day should always fall on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal or spring equinox, which is usually March 21.

The equinox is one of two days in the year when daytime and night-time hours are equal in length -- each being 12 hours long. The autumn equinox occurs in September. The theological significance of this date is that it is a day of maximum light -- 12 hours of daylight followed by 12 hours of full moonlight.

For the early Christians, the correct calculation of Easter was vital, as they believed celebrating it too soon or too late was sacrilegious. In 1752, the Gregorian calendar was adopted in Britain and Ireland and Easter has been celebrated on the same day in the Western part of the Christian world ever since.

But through the centuries, there have been attempts to change the date away from the lunar calendar but these have met with little support.

In 1928, the British Parliament attempted to bring order to the Christian celebration and implemented the Easter Act, which said the feast should always fall on the first Sunday after the second Saturday in April. But this did not come into effect as the new law required a seal of approval from the Christian churches, who dismissed the idea outright.

Because Eastern Orthodox churches have an additional rule that Easter may not precede or coincide with the first day of the Jewish Passover, it means that the feast is marked at different times in some European countries.

A few years ago, the World Council of Churches suggested that Easter might be fixed by precise astronomical methods, to avoid the situation where the eastern Orthodox Easter, which is based on the Julian, rather than the Gregorian, calendar, can occur up to five weeks later.

But agreement has yet to be reached on the matter and so Easter continues to shift from year to year.

In 2005, Easter Sunday coincided with the changing of the clocks making it a 23-hour celebration. When Daylight Saving Time was introduced in the early part of the 20th century, a rule was introduced that it should begin on the day after the third Saturday in March unless it was Easter Sunday, in which case it should start a week earlier. This was to preserve the sanctity of a 24-hour Easter day. However, this was overruled in 2005 to keep Britain and Ireland in line with continental Europe.

In that year, there was another unusual alignment of dates when the Feast of the Annunciation on March 25 clashed with Good Friday for the first time in 73 years. The Annunciation, once known as Lady's Day, marks the announcement by the Angel Gabriel that Mary would give birth to Jesus, but when it coincides with the day of the crucifixion, it is considered very bad luck as it unites the day that marked the beginning of Christ's life with his death on the cross.

An early English saying goes "if Our Lord falls in Our Lady's lap, England will meet with a great mishap" and early Christians believed if the two days met it would bring about the end of the world.

The next time the dates coincide will be 2016 but when this occurs, the Catholic church moves the feast of the Annunciation to another day.

On a happier note, next year the calendar reverts to a more normal schedule with Easter arriving on April 12, but in 2011, it will be almost as late as it can possibly be, falling on April 24.

And who knows? This year we might even get a white Easter.
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Disclaimer

No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Spanish Bishop Angers Homosexuals by Mentioning Church Doctrine

Bishop Rafael Palmero of the Spanish diocese of Orihuela-Alicante has become the second bishop in recent weeks to enrage homosexual groups by reiterating the Catholic Church's perennial teachings on homosexuality.

"Biology says that normally it's an illness. What happens is that in some case there might be a concrete situation that has another explanation and such, but normally no one wants to be a homosexual," said Palermo to the Valencian daily Levante.

The bishop added that "same sex marriage" was unnatural and wrong. "One is born in a family of a man and a woman. In the human order this is required. One consults a dictionary to determine what a marriage is and it says that it is a stable and lasting union between a man and a woman."

"If we place ourselves within the Church we elevate the family to a category of sacrament: the Christian family is born in the reception of a sacrament on the part of a man and a woman. From that comes the family and whatever goes by another road isn't the fruit of a sacrament," Palmero said.

The bishop also reiterated the Catholic Church's teaching on abortion, as well as divorce and remarriage, denouncing both.

The State Federation of Lesbians, Gays Transsexuals, and Bisexuals (FELGTB) reacted negatively to the bishop's statements.

"The World Health Organization eliminated homosexuality from the Registry of Diseases in 1993, and we therefore don't understand why the Catholic Church insists on discourse that has been false for 15 years," said Juan José Broch, coordinator of religious issues for the FELGTB.

Broch added that his group is "as proud of being Christians as they are of being homosexuals" and that "it isn't acceptable to hear the hierarchy of the Catholic Church say that it wants to receive us in its bosom when it constantly publicly belittles our dignity as people."

The FELGTB made news in Spain recently when it filed charges against another Catholic bishop, Bernardo Álvarez of the diocese of Tenerife in the Canary Islands, for comparing homosexuality to pederasty. Álvarez ultimately retracted his statement.

The organization also filed a complaint against a protestant minister, Marcos Zapata, who conducts anti-drug programs in public schools, for giving a lecture in which he said that it was important to inculcate masculine virtues in boys to avoid homosexuality later in life.

In an interview with the gay publication AGMagazine, the coordinator of a local homosexual group Decide-T also denounced Bishop Palmero for trying to make gays into "second class citizens" with "fewer rights than others." He called the bishop's words "homophobic" and "rash".
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Disclaimer

No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Vatican cardinal sides with Denver archbishop in debate over Catholic Charities

At a press conference today on the Pope’s Lenten Message, Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes offered his support for Archbishop Charles Chaput’s recent stand against a potential Colorado law.

The bill would eradicate Catholic Charities’ ability to ensure its employees follow Catholic beliefs when working on state funded projects.

Last week, Chaput objected to a proposed measure before the Colorado legislature which would bar charitable agencies that receive state funding from discrimination on the basis of religion in personnel policies. Chaput argued that such a measure would compromise the Catholic identity of church-run charities, and that he would rather see those charities stop delivering services rather than comply.

“This is not idle talk,” Chaput added. “I am very serious.”

According to the National Catholic Reporter, this morning in Rome, Cardinal Cordes expressed support for Chaput’s position. In response to a reporter’s question, Cordes stated: “This bishop is doing the right thing.”

The president of the papal charity Cor Unum continued, saying, “Theologically, charitable activity and the good deeds of the faithful are always connected to the proclamation of the Word. Jesus performed his works because he was moved by mercy, but also to proclaim the gospel. Service is always tied to testimony to the Word of God, and no one must break this connection.”

“This points to a great contemporary problem. Thanks to the generosity of many donors, the charitable agencies of the church are able to do their work. But this carries a risk that the spirit of a Catholic agency can become secularized, doing only what the donor has in view.”

The cardinal also brought Pope Benedict XVI’s encyclical “Deus Caritas Est” to Chaput’s defense. “The pope’s encyclical was not just put together out of thin air. It was a response to a development in society. Catholic agencies have to be very careful not to lose their liberty, taking money from donors who later try to introduce a mentality that does not correspond to ecclesiastical objectives,” Cordes told the National Catholic Reporter.

To put his point into a sound bite, Cordes said, he wants the world to understand “that there’s a difference between Caritas and the Red Cross.”

Back in Denver, Colorado, Christopher Rose, the president of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Denver, published a letter to the editor in the January 30 issue of the Denver Catholic Register backing Chaput’s position.

“Helping the poor and suffering is not just the government’s business,” Rose stated. “In fact, government is the newcomer to this work. It’s been the business of religious communities for centuries.”

Hiring religious believers to operate charities with similar religious beliefs, Rose argued, is not discrimination, but rather “the legitimate practice of faith-based agencies seeking to hire people of like faith to ensure that their mission of serving the poor is faithfully undertaken.”
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Disclaimer

No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Priest accused of abuse removed from ministry

A Catholic priest accused of sexual misconduct with a 13-year-old boy in the 1980s has been permanently removed from the ministry after a diocesan investigation found the allegation credible, church officials announced Monday.

The Rev. Francisco Hernandez-Tovar, 59, will no longer be allowed to work as a priest in the Catholic Diocese of Sacramento or any other diocese. Bishop William Weigand barred Tovar from the ministry at the recommendation of a diocesan review board.

"Right now, we're in the process of looking for more victims if there are any," said Kevin Eckery, diocesan spokesman. "The person who came forward is a very brave man."

The alleged victim, now in his 30s, claims Tovar sexually abused him at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Colusa more than two decades ago. The man told church officials about the alleged sexual misconduct last summer. A church review board investigated the allegation and found it had merit after interviewing the man, according to Eckery.

Diocesan leaders have informed Colusa County law enforcement officials about the allegation. "There's nothing we can do because the statute of limitations has run out," said Sgt. Kevin Erdelt of the Colusa County Sheriff's Department. He said there have been no other complaints against Hernandez-Tovar.

Diocesan records show that he has served at a number of parishes since 1980, including St. John the Baptist in Chico (1980-86), Sacred Heart in Red Bluff (1980-86), Our Lady of Lourdes in Colusa (1986-88), Sacred Heart in Maxwell (1986-88), Assumption in Truckee (1988-99), Our Lady of Guadalupe in Sacramento (1999-2000), St. Peter in Sacramento (2000-02), St. Joseph in Rio Vista (2002), St. Catherine in Vallejo (2003), St. John in Sacramento (2003-07), St. Paul in Rancho Cordova (2003-07), Saint Isidore in Yuba City (2007) and Our Lady of Lourdes in Sacramento (2007).

Due to ill health, he has worked part time or on temporary assignment since 2002. Now he will no longer receive a salary or be allowed to live in residence at a church.

Hernandez-Tovar could not be reached for comment.
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The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Archbishop's canonization gets push from diocese

The Catholic Diocese of Peoria's part in the effort to have the late Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen recognized as a saint will be officially closed with a Mass of Thanksgiving at 10:30 a.m. Sunday at St. Mary's Cathedral, 607 NE Madison St.

The Bradley Chorale will join the Cathedral Choir for the Mass, which will be televised live on Eternal Word Television Network.

Documents in the investigation will be officially packed, sealed and notarized before being sent to the Vatican.

The documents include copies of Sheen's writings as well as thousands of pages of testimony attesting to his holiness, according to the diocese.

Sheen was born in 1895 in El Paso, Ill., and baptized in St. Mary's Church there. He graduated from Spalding Institute in Peoria and was ordained a priest in the cathedral in 1919. He served as assistant pastor at St. Patrick's Church on Peoria's south side.

The central Illinois native is best known for his television programs in the 1950s and 1960s.

Mayor Jim Ardis of Peoria has declared Sunday to be Archbishop Sheen Day in the city.
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No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Settlement tops $79 million in diocese suit

About 240 people have now been awarded more than $79 million in a class-action settlement between victims of sexual abuse at the hands of church officials and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Covington in Northern Kentucky.

Two special masters in the case reviewed claims from 400 people.

A statement Monday from plaintiffs' attorney Stan Chesley said the special masters approved 243 and rejected 157 claims, with 100 of those rejections being appealed to a judge.

The settlement, reached in February 2006, is between the Covington Diocese and more than 350 people who said they were abused by priests and diocese employees since the 1950s in 57 counties across a large swath of Kentucky.

Under the terms of the class-action settlement, victims were to receive $5,000 to $1 million based on the severity and duration of the abuse they suffered. Some money has also been set aside to pay for counseling for abuse victims.

The special masters, William Burleigh, chairman of the board of the E.W. Scripps Co., and Thomas D. Lambros of Ashtabula, Ohio, former chief judge in the Northern District of Ohio, awarded $62,881,500 to most members of the class-action case.

They awarded $16,200,000 in Extraordinary Injury Funds to 78 people considered to have faced extreme abuse, the statements said. Those awards have not been paid yet.

The settlement required 5 percent of the total settlement be set aside for a counseling fund, which has paid for and continues to pay for mental health treatment of victims, Chesley said. Another 5 percent was set aside to pay claims for victims born after Oct. 21, 1980.

Chesley said there are sufficient funds to pay the awards and counseling.

Covington Bishop Roger Foys met with abuse victims once the case was settled. As of July, Foys had met with 125 victims, said Tim Fitzgerald, a spokesman for the Covington Diocese.

Foys was unavailable for comment on Monday. Fitzgerald said Foys has continued to meet with victims at their request.

"I presume he's continuing to do that," Fitzgerald said.

The special masters will issue a final report on the settlement after the last checks have been mailed, Chesley said.

Covington is far smaller than Boston, the nation's fourth-largest diocese with about 2.1 million parishioners. The Boston Archdiocese settled two cases in 2002 and 2003 for a total of $95 million, one of the largest amounts paid by a diocese to settle sexual abuse allegations.

Covington is just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati. The Covington diocese now spans 14 counties and has 89,000 parishioners.

The lawsuit also covers some Kentucky counties that were part of the diocese until 1988, when a new diocese in Lexington formed.
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Disclaimer

No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, will not be deterred in Rosary row

Listeners to the Joe Duffy Liveline Show, RTE Radio show last Tuesday were perplexed when there was a tirade against the Dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral (CoI), Dublin for selling Rosary beads to tourists.

The caller who vehemently condemned this practice, claimed that it was idolatrous to honour the Virgin Mary, said the Mass was ’blasphemy’ and the Pope an anti-Christ, turned out to be Wallace Thompson, aide to Northern Ireland Enterprise Minister Nigel Dodds and a founding member of the DUP.

Mr Thompson is secretary to the Evangelical Protestant Society (EPS), which wrote some time ago to the Dean of St Patrick's, the Very Rev Dr Robert MacCarthy, demanding an end to the sale of Rosary beads in the cathedral shop.

Mr Thompson said he had been on a visit to the cathedral recently when he noticed the items. "I was really quite surprised," he said.

"I came home and thought I should write to the Dean to say we were concerned and ask him what his reaction was. He came back very quickly to me and his reaction was very clear."

Mr Thompson said he was "not at all" satisfied with the Dean's answer, which stated that the beads were sold because most of the visitors to St Patrick's were not Anglican.

"My argument is that it's a silly principle because if you pander to what people want it might not be what people need," Mr Thompson said. "In a Protestant church I don't think they should be selling things that are Roman Catholic,” he added.

"I think you need to give people what you believe is in their best interest. A Protestant church should stock Protestant literature, not things like that."

Speaking to the Belfast Telegraph last week, Dr MacCarthy pointed out that Rosary beads had been sold in the shop since 1970 and would continue to be sold there.

"We have done so for 37 years," he said. "They are obviously much in demand because we get €70,000 gross a year from the sale of Rosary beads.

"As far as I'm concerned the majority of visitors to the cathedral are not Anglicans, never mind Evangelical. We get about 320,000 visitors a year. If a large number of those want to use Rosaries as visual aids in their prayers, we're delighted."

He added that he only got about two letters a year complaining about the sale of the rosaries "usually from Northern Ireland addresses."

The EPS, which was founded in 1946, is described on its website as an "inter-denominational Protestant voice in the 21st Century" and counts around 3,000 supporters, most of whom are based in Northern Ireland.

Its aims are "to promote and defend the tenets of historic Biblical Protestantism and to fulfil the role of an umbrella organisation uniting Protestants of different churches and backgrounds".

Sinn Féin Assembly group leader, John O'Dowd, described Mr Thompson's comments as "deeply insulting to many, many people across this island".

On Wednesday a DUP official was at pains to emphasise that Mr Thompson was not speaking in a political capacity.
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The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Priest to propose reconciliation to St. Louis archbishop

The priest at a Roman Catholic parish in a long-running dispute with the St. Louis archdiocese will propose a plan of reconciliation at a meeting next week.

The Rev. Marek Bozek does not want to release details, but has also asked his supporters to pray outside archdiocesan headquarters during the meeting. He says he’ll provide more details then.

Archbishop Raymond Burke recently wrote to Bozek, saying he has started the process of stripping Bozek of his clerical status.

Bozek is pastor of St. Stanislaus church, which has fought with the archdiocese over control of its assets for years. Bozek also participated in an ordination ceremony of two Catholic women last year, though the Vatican does not permit female priests.
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The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Sentamu stands the Pope a beer

When meeting the Pope it is customary to offer him a gift, and Benedict XVI has amassed many tokens of esteem. Tony Blair gave him a painting of the Catholic convert Cardinal Newman and Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah presented him with a jewelled scimitar.

When the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, met the pontiff he gave him the Holy Grail, a beer brewed in Masham, North Yorkshire.

It was the highlight of the archbishop's first trip to Rome to celebrate the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and to cement cordial relations between the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches.

Following their 15-minute chat in the Basilica di San Paolo Fuori le Mura, believed to be the burial place of St Paul, Sentamu said: "I told the brewery I was meeting the Pope and they made a special brew for him. I heard he'd been given some Black Sheep ale and liked it. So I brought that and the Holy Grail."

The gifts pleased the Pope, who is Bavarian by birth and prefers beer to wine and water. That the tipple was a one-off would have also suited a pontiff with designer flourishes. During a two-hour service, which was peppered with incense, chanting, coughing and ringtones, his ruby-red Prada loafers peeped out from under his ivory robes.

"I was very impressed by the Pope," Sentamu said. "He cares about human beings. He is such a deep theologian, it drives him to compassion. He is not a starchy person, but people look at his writings, they are very precise, and think he is like that ... but he is very warm."

Squabbles over the ordination of gay bishops have alarmed the Vatican, which fears that there could be no further dialogue until the communion's future is secure. During a session with the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, the York delegation reassured Vatican officials that the Anglican communion remained healthy. They cited the forthcoming Lambeth conference, which will bring the world's Anglican bishops together, as an example.

The Rev Canon Robert Paterson, Sentamu's chaplain, said: "We said, 'Nothing is broken. Lambeth is going ahead, Rowan [the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams] is fine and it's steady as she goes'." Vatican insiders said Williams and the Pope bonded immediately when they met in 2006. Both academics, they had read each other's books before their private audience and the Pope was delighted that Williams addressed him in German. "They had a three-hour lunch," said one source. "The Pope never has a three-hour lunch with anyone."

Sentamu observed that while Williams may not be loved in the Anglican communion, he was held in high regard by the Vatican. "The Roman Catholic church has tremendous respect for Rowan. It's a bit sad when a son is loved by his neighbours but not by his father.

"Anglicans always carry out their quarrels in public. The danger is we look more divided than we are. The joy is we talk about everything. I'm amazed people call Britain a secular country when 70% of people identify themselves as Christian and 90% believe in God.

"Christianity has become part of the furniture ... like a grand piano nobody plays any longer. I want the dust to be taken off and people to play music. The Anglican church will survive, but not for its own sake. Africa, Aids and bad governance are rampant. If the church concentrates on doctrine we will be in the minority. If Jesus were around he'd say to the church, 'Look after the poor.'"

He praised the charitable work of the Sant'Egidio community, a lay group helping Rome's destitute and homeless. More than 20,000 people, mostly immigrants, have registered to use its facilities, including a soup kitchen and language school. "They give them education and understanding. I heard at least nine languages in that dining hall ... but we have a common tongue - humanity.

"Italy is the starting point for asylum seekers but the UK is their final destination. We're seen as a caring island. Britain should be proud that it can contain everyone. I never thought I would think this way because I have always criticised the government on its immigration policies. Now I know where the battle is. We have to bring other EU nations up to our standards."
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No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Liberia: gruesome murder of Catholic nuns explained

Nearly 16 years ago five Catholic nuns who were carrying out their unselfish work in Liberia were savagely murdered.

The impact of their labours was widely acknowledged but like other unfortunate citizens without firepower, theirs was the unfortunate fate of falling victims to death beyond the ordinary.

Now, almost 16 years after their gruesome killing, what appears to be the truth as to how and who killed the Catholic nuns has emerged with apparent fascinating precision.

Sr. Barbara Ann Muttra, ASC, Sr. Shirley Kolmer, ASC, Sr. Joel Kolmer, ASC, Sr. Agnes Mueller, ASC and Kachleen McGuire, ASC, lost their lives in the October 1992 "Operation Octopus" launched by disbanded National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL).

Following their gruesome murder, the leader of the defunct NPFL, Charles Taylor (pictured), dismissed the claims that his men who had then besieged Monrovia committed the act.

He blamed the incident on the peacekeeping forces that were helping the Liberian government to repel the Operation Octopus attack.

At the Public Hearings for the Truth & Reconciliation Commission which began in Monrovia some weeks ago, a man, Morris Padmore, who confessed to being a former general of the rebel faction, told the Commission hearing that NPFL rebel forces, under the command and supervision of Gen. Christopher "Mosquito" Vambo were responsible for the killing of the Catholic nuns in the Barnerville Junction.

The former NPFL General Morris Padmore alias 'Vision 38', said upon capturing Barnesville junction in the Garnerville area, all women were rounded up within that terrain by the first batch of NPFL fighters.

He said the fighters conducted house to house searches following a period of fierce fighting between the NPFL and ECOMOG aided by the defunct 'Black Berets', a unit of the Armed Forces of Liberia trained and constituted during the Interim Government of National Unity (IGNU) presided over by Dr. Amos Sawyer.

The NPFL ex-fighter, who claimed he was recruited in Kakata by the NPFL at the tender age of 15 in 1990, Morris Padmore disclosed that the NPFL fighters who arrived in the Barnerville, Gardnersville Junction area brought three white women, who were without clothes to the rest of the fighters.

He told the TRC public hearings that the three white women were ordered to be raped on the command of Gen. Christopher "Mosquito" Vambo, who was in charge of the octopus operation in 1992.

Those martyrs, according to Morris Padmore, were later killed with many fighters thrusting sticks and other objects into them.

When quizzed by the commissioners on what was the women dress code of the women, Gen. 'Vision 38' said the women were brought to his position naked as a result he could not identify them by any dress code.

It was in October 1992 that five nuns were trapped in the NPFL control area of Bardnerville Junction in the Gardnerville area during the 'octopus' on Monrovia. The operation began in Johnsonville, Diggsville and Bardnersville and Gardnersville.

During the incident, the Catholic Church of Liberia through Archbishop Michael K. Francis complained the killing of the nuns to the international community stating that five Catholic nuns had been inevitably trapped in that area that was under the control of NPFL forces for about two months.

Charles Taylor is now on trial in The Hague.
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Disclaimer

No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Kenya: Catholic priest Killed

A Catholic priest of the Diocese of Nakuru was killed as vicious inter-ethnic violence claimed more lives in the Rift Valley town.

Fr. Michael Kamau Ithondeka, 41, was killed Saturday morning at an illegal roadblock set up by armed youth on the Nakuru - Eldama Ravine Road.

He was vice- rector at St Mathias Mulumba Senior Seminary in Tindinyo.

According to Fr Simon Githara, the parish priest of Eldama Ravine, Fr Kamau was accosted by armed youths who claimed they were on a revenge mission after one of their own was killed in Nakuru. His pleas for mercy fell on deaf ears as the youths descended on him with crude weapons, killing him on the spot.

The news comes as other reports indicate that public mortuaries in Nakuru have received at least 51 bodies and police are still collecting more from around the town.

A local reporter in Nakuru, David Omwoyo, says the violence appears to be revenge against members of the Kalenjin, Luo and Luhyia communities following the recent killing of members of the Kikuyu community in the Rift Valley.

Suspected Kikuyu gangs have taken over the town, he says. There are about six groups of about 1,000 armed men conducting raids in various parts of the town. Businesses remain closed and there is no public transport.

Police and the military are evacuating non-Kikuyus from the town. Hundreds of newly displaced persons have sought refuge in four Catholic parishes.

Meanwhile, security sources say a group calling itself Kalenjin Land Defence Forces is distributing leaflets calling for continued violence against members of the Kikuyu community in the Rift Valley. Kikuyus will be attacked even in their homeland in Central Kenya, the group says.

In a Thursday report which accused the opposition Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) of helping to plan the chaos, Human Rights Watch collected accounts from several Kalenjin men present at community meetings where local elders and ODM mobilisers urged Kalenjins to contribute money to buy automatic weapons. Some communities had reportedly managed to obtain such weapons already.

The death of Fr. Kamau comes in the wake of threats to Kikuyu Catholic personnel working in the Rift Valley Province. In Eldoret. Two priests based at Moi University escaped death narrowly last week when their house was attacked at night.

One of the priests said that he and his colleague had received several threats after violence broke out following the disputed re-election of President Mwai Kibaki. The priests were successfully evacuated to Burnt Forest, a small town teeming with displaced people on the Eldoret-Nairobi highway.

The late Fr Kamau was born in Kiambu, near Nairobi, in 1966 and was baptized at Riara Parish in 1967.

He joined St Mary's Minor Seminary, Molo, in 1986 and later St Augustine's Seminary in 1987, before proceeding to St. Mathias Mulumba, 1989-1992

Kamau was ordained a priest of Nakuru Diocese on January 9, 1993, and sent to Lower Subukia Parish.

Between 1998 and 2002, Fr. Kamau studied scripture at the Biblicum (the Pontifical Institute for Biblical Studies) in Rome. Between 2003 and 2005, he served in Mwaragania Parish and as principal at Archbishop Ndingi Secondary School in Naivasha.

In 2005, he was posted to St Thomas Aquinas Seminary, Nairobi, before being moved to St Mathias Mulumba Seminary as Vice Rector.

Planned mediation talks led by the former UN secretary Kofi Annan are being complicated by the recent protests.

Negotiators led by Mr Annan have told the two rival camps to select four representatives each and study a blueprint for talks in the following 24 hours.

Mr Annan said on Saturday that the crisis in Kenya had gone well beyond an electoral dispute, and he denounced "gross and systematic" human rights abuses.

On Thursday, he brokered the first talks between President Mwai Kibaki and Opposition Mr Raila Odinga since the troubles began. But hopes of a quick solution evaporated hours later amid renewed verbal attacks by both camps, and violence continued. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

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Judge orders former priest to pay $4.2 million

A former Roman Catholic priest has been ordered to pay $4.2 million for allegedly sexually assaulting a boy in the late 1980s.

Superior Court Justice Joseph Jabar ordered Raymond Melville to pay $3.2 million in compensatory damages and $1 million in punitive damages to William Picher of Augusta.

Picher, 34, filed the lawsuit last February against Melville and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland claiming he was repeatedly abused by the Melville between 1986 and 1988 when he was a student at St. Mary's School in Augusta.

In his complaint, Picher said that a Maryland man wrote to the bishop in 1990 claiming he was abused when Melville was a seminarian. The diocese then sent Melville out of state for counseling, after which he returned to Maine and served in parishes in Lewiston, Rumford and Machias.

Melville, who left the priesthood in 1997, was served notice of the lawsuit while living in Oklahoma, but he never responded to the complaint. Jabar on Thursday entered an order holding Melville liable for all damages.

Another judge last month dismissed the claim against the diocese.

Picher's attorney, Walter McKee, said he intends to appeal that decision to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court.

Picher's suit was the second to be brought against Melville.

Michael Fortin of Sidney earlier won a $500,000 judgment against Melville. The diocese settled its case with Fortin in 2005, but terms of the settlement were not disclosed.
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Disclaimer

No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce

Time for church to show moral leadership: plaintiff

A plaintiff in one of six new $4.5-million lawsuits against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie is calling on the church to show leadership to ensure no other child suffers sexual abuse at the hands of clergy.

Sudbury businessman Thomas Miller, 59, was eight years old when he alleges he was sexually abused by Father Magnus J. Fedy at Scollard Hall, a then all-boy's Catholic school in North Bay.

Miller is one of the plaintiffs in seven new lawsuits in total launched by Ledroit Beckett Litigation Lawyers against two Roman Catholic dioceses and one religious order for historic cases of child sexual abuse by clergy.

Miller and the other plaintiffs, including one woman, sat before reporters at a news conference Monday morning at the Radisson Hotel and spoke about the abuse they said they suffered decades ago.

Miller had to stop speaking and take a sip of water to compose himself as he was overcome with emotion when he said he believed "this sort of thing still exists today."

He called on members of parishes in Sault Ste. Marie diocese to speak up and demand their church leaders stop "side-stepping" allegations of sexual misconduct by clergy.

"This shouldn't happen to a child," said Miller, his voice shaking.

Miller and several other plaintiffs would not allow photographs of them to be taken, but did display pictures of them at the ages at which they allege they were sexually abused.

Lawyer Robert Talach, of London, Ont.-based Ledroit Beckett, said the plaintiffs in the separate lawsuits did not know each other before, but, remarkably, were abused in similar ways, sometimes by the same priests.

The lawsuits are against the Roman Catholic dioceses of Sault Ste. Marie and London, and the religious order, the Congregation of the Resurrection in Ontario. That order had several priests at Scollard Hall at one time.

Six priests are named in the lawsuits, five of whom are dead. The only living priest, Father Gerald Roy, has already been convicted of sexually abusing four altar boys in the 1980s and was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in federal penitentiary.

He lives near Warren and is no longer serving a diocese, although he is still considered a Roman Catholic priest.

Several of the plaintiffs spoke at the news conference of how they came from devout Roman Catholic families and how their faith has been shaken - or destroyed - by the abuse they allege they suffered. Talach said the loss of their faith in the Roman Catholic faith was "devastating" for most of the plaintiffs.

"Where there was once colour, there is now darkness," he told an audience of reporters and friends and family members of plaintiffs at the news conference.

Plaintiff Anita Contant, 60, the only woman among them, said she questions herself daily as a mother and a sister, and suffers from poor self-esteem that has affected her family.

"It's difficult to keep this a secret."

Talach said priests tended to prey on young, smart, devout children. "The most concerning part is, what did the powers that be know at the time? And what did they do?" he asked.

Bishop Jean-Louis Plouffe, the spiritual head of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie, was a young priest when most of the alleged sexual abuse occurred.

Plouffe said Monday the church has to be "more transparent and up front" in dealing with such charges.

"I'm sure it's the way to go," said Plouffe.

Four similar civil suits, all for $4.5 million, have been filed by Ledroit Beckett against the Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie for plaintiffs alleging similar abuse. They are in various points of discovery in the legal process.

Plouffe said the church is embarrassed by the lawsuits, but added he is sure that is nothing compared to the hurt the plaintiffs and their families are experiencing.

"People in the pews are hurting" from the lawsuits, said Plouffe, and they have hurt the morale of the entire church.

"At least they (the new claims of sexual abuse) are not recent," said Plouffe.

Plouffe said he did not know that a news conference was being held Monday to announce the lawsuits, although Talach rejects that claim. He said the diocese and Plouffe were contacted about the event and invited to attend.

Plouffe said there is a protocol in the Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie relating to claims of sexual abuse by clergy. It has been revised recently. The policy is not posted on the diocese's website, as it is in many others throughout the province.

Plouffe also said his diocese offers counselling, without prejudice, to people who allege they were sexually abused by priests, provided those people ask for it.

The Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie also has a committee to look into complaints of sexual misconduct by clergy. It serves as an advisory board to him to suggest how sex abuse claims should be dealt with.

Miller said at the news conference that those committees should have sexual abuse victims among their membership.

Plouffe said the final decision for how such claims are dealt with is his to make.

Plouffe said he doesn't think people necessarily understand the legal process and what follows after someone is served with a civil lawsuit.

"The process is clearly defined" as to what you can and cannot do, said Plouffe.

When three plaintiffs came forward with similar claims almost a year ago, Plouffe wrote a letter to be read in all parishes in his diocese. He said he didn't issue a missive this time because there wasn't much more to say.

At the time, Plouffe said he was "deeply saddened" by news of the lawsuits.

"These situations do not leave me indifferent. They are most sensitive and painful for all involved and have an impact on the whole diocese. We will do what is necessary and within our power to see that light be shed on these allegations."

Plouffe said Gerald Roy, who has been convicted of sexual offences against boys and served federal time, has never been reappointed to another parish.

Nor has Father Thomas O'Dell who was convicted years ago and served time for the sexual abuse of a man who became known as John Doe in a multi-million lawsuit against Sault Ste. Marie diocese.

Doe won a settlement of $1.4 million in that case. He said afterward that what he wanted was an apology from Plouffe for the abuse inflicted on him by O'Dell.

Plouffe said Monday in an interview at diocesan headquarters that he has never apologized to Doe because O'Dell denies doing some of the acts for which he was convicted.

Plouffe said, ideally, both the priests who have been accused and their accusers could be present in the same room to discuss the allegations and to reach a point of "reconciliation."
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Disclaimer

No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.

The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.

Sotto Voce