(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis says we are loved by God in a way that no theologian can explain. He was speaking during morning Mass in the Casa Santa Marta. Taking his cue from the first letter of the prophet Isaiah in which the Lord says He is “about to create new heavens and a new…
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(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis received the bishops of Bosnia and Herzegovina on Monday, during the course of the bishops’ ad limina visits.
In remarks prepared for the occasion and delivered on Monday morning, Pope Francis focused on three specific points: meeting the challenge of emigration, with the attendant difficulties of family separations and desires for reunion – at home or abroad – often frustrated by persistent social ills and the still-raw wounds of conflict; the challenges of living in and ministering to a multiethnic and religiously plural population, in which the bishops are called at once to be fathers to all, and custodians of the traditions unique to the Catholic community; the pastoral, ecumenical and interreligious dimensions of leadership that constitute at once a delicate set of circumstances in which to be witnesses to the truth, and a powerful asset in the cause of the Gospel.
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The Holy Father also spoke of the need to cultivate relationships of mutual respect, support and collaboration among the diocesan and religious clergy, saying, “In this Year dedicated to Consecrated Life, we must evidence how all charisms and ministries are ordered to the glory of God and the salvation of all men, making sure that they are all effectively oriented to the up-building of the Kingdom of God.”
Pope Francis concluded his remarks with a look forward to his upcoming visit to the country. “Dear brothers,” he said, “as I wait expectantly to meet your people in Sarajevo, I desire to convey to you the charity, the attention and the closeness of the Church of Rome to you, who are the heirs to so many martyrs and confessors, who, all throughout the much-tried centuries of your country’s history, have kept the faith.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis received the bishops of Bosnia and Herzegovina on Monday, during the course of the bishops’ ad limina visits. In remarks prepared for the occasion and delivered on Monday morning, Pope Francis focused on three specific points: meeting the challenge of emigration, with the attendant difficulties of family separations and desires for…
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(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has made an appeal for peace in Pakistan and for solidarity with the country’s persecuted Christian minority, in the wake of a pair of terror attacks that left at least 14 people dead and scores of others wounded in the city of Lahore, and accused the world of, “trying to hide” the persecution of Christians.
“With pain, with much pain,” said Pope Francis to the crowd of pilgrims and tourists gathered for the Angelus peayer this Sunday in St. Peter’s Square, “I learned of the terrorist attacks today against two churches in the city Lahore in Pakistan, which have resulted in numerous deaths and injuries.”
The twin attacks took place on churches only a few hundred metres apart from one another in one of the largest Christian neighbourhoods of the city, Youhanabad. One of the churches was the Catholic church of St. John, the other was the Anglican Christ Church. The Holy Father went on to say, “These are Christian churches: Christians are being persecuted. Our brothers shed blood only because they are Christians. As I assure you of my prayers for the victims and their families, I ask the Lord, I beseech the Lord, source of all good, for the gift of peace and harmony to this country.
Concluding his appeal, Pope Francis prayed, “That this persecution against Christians, which the world tries to hide, might end, and that there be peace.”
“These attacks have led people into the thought that they are unsafe anywhere,” said Sadaf Saddique, who heads the Good Shepherd Ministry in Pakistan, an outreach to exploited and at-risk children. Speaking to Vatican Radio from Lahore, shortly after the attacks, Saddique, a lawyer, said, “We never thought that Youhanabad could be attacked, we never thought that people would dare to come into this place, and would attack such a big Christian town.”
Christians comprise roughly 2% of Pakistan’s more than 182 million people, and have been the target of increasingly intense and deadly violence in recent years.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has made an appeal for peace in Pakistan and for solidarity with the country’s persecuted Christian minority, in the wake of a pair of terror attacks that left at least 14 people dead and scores of others wounded in the city of Lahore, and accused the world of, “trying to hide”…
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