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Month: January 2021

Mexican bishops call for peace in the US after violence at the Capitol

Posted by | Jan 8, 2021 | , |

CNA Staff, Jan 7, 2021 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- The Secretary General of the Mexican Bishops Conference made a call on behalf of the Mexican episcopate for peace to prevail in the United States.

In a tweet from his official account, Bishop Alfonso Miranda Guardiola said that the Mexican bishops “regret the events and the deaths occurred at the United States Capitol,” and added that “democracy and the rule of law need to prevail over the acts of violence.”

“To the dead and infected by the pandemic, let’s not add more victims of riots, insurrections and wars,” he said.

Mexican media has been heavily covering the events at the US Capitol and the rocky transition of power from President Donald Trump to President-elect Joe Biden. With a heavy dependency on the U.S. economy and international politics, events in America have become regular top news in the country for the last two months.

https://twitter.com/monsalfonso/status/1347040096990720000

 

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1P5 Podcast Ep. #77 – What Happened in Washington?

Posted by | Jan 8, 2021 | , , , , |

Today Steve reviews what happened in Washington DC yesterday with the storming of the U.S. Capitol, and offers some thoughts on what we’ve seen since November 3rd, and what comes next. VIDEO: AUDIO ONLY: RELATED LINKS: Backdoor Santa – Cocktail […]

The post 1P5 Podcast Ep. #77 – What Happened in Washington? appeared first on OnePeterFive.

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How this Catholic group brought Christmas presents to Armenia

Posted by | Jan 8, 2021 | , |

Gyumri, Armenia, Jan 7, 2021 / 05:20 pm (CNA).- A Catholic non-profit has surprised hundreds of suffering Armenian families with Christmas presents following the problems of the coronavirus pandemic and the Nagorno-Karabakh war.

Gia Chacon, president of the organization For the Martyrs, returned Jan. 2 from a trip to Armenia, where the organization was able to deliver presents to over 1,000 children.

“Operation Christmas for Armenia was something that we started here … to bring toys and presents to children who may not otherwise have a Christmas experience,” she told CNA.

“Many [parents] were telling their families that Santa wasn’t going to be coming or they wouldn’t be exchanging Christmas presents this year. So we wanted to [find] a solution. We wanted to bring joy to these children.”

For the project, the organization partnered with Archbishop Raphaël Minassian, Ordinary of the Armenian Ordinariate of Eastern Europe, who is also the president of Caritas Armenia.

With his help, Gia said, the organization handed out presents to an between 1,200 to 1,500 children in three Armenian cities – Goris, Gyumri, and Artashat. She said the children included refugees from Artsakh, orphans, and people with disabilities. 

To help purchase presents, the organization received monetary donations from over 500 benefactors. The gifts were then wrapped by Armenian Catholics in California. Each present included the message “Shnorhavor Amanor yev Surb Tznund,” which is Armenian for “Merry Christmas.”

The presents included toys such as dolls, soccer balls, tools, tea sets, and candy. She said the organization tried to present a variety of toys for different age groups, also handing out purses for teenage girls and watches for the older boys.

Gia said several centers they visited had people dress up as Santa Claus, who then helped hand out the gifts. She said many of the children had never seen some of the American toys and it was beautiful to see the children light up when they opened their presents.

“We really wanted to make it personal for the children. We allowed some children to pick their toys,” she said. “That was cute too, seeing them look at the toys and figure out which one they connected with most and to pick it and see that excitement.”

“It was really beautiful to see the children open the presents and be so excited about it, but also see Merry Christmas in Armenian and have that personal touch.”

Gia launched For the Martyrs in December 2019. The organization helps raise persecution awareness, advocates for international religious freedom, and offers resources and humanitarian relief.

As a result of the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, she said, there were about 75,000 Christian Armenians who were displaced. She said 90% of these refugees are reported to be women and children.

She said Caritas Armenia has helped provide these families with food, housing, clothes, and other basic necessities. However, she said the situation is still problematic for many, and added that numerous families who received toys in Artashat did not have electricity to keep themselves warm throughout the winter.

She said Armenia, a largely Christian region, has faced political and religious persecution from neighboring Muslim countries. She also said the country’s economy has also taken a severe hit because of the pandemic.

“We still need the families to be taken care of, we still need to continue to support our brothers and sisters in Armenia that are suffering,” she said.

“What I was hearing from the families as I was speaking to them is that they feel that their brothers and sisters in the West have forgotten about them and that the issue of this work was not taken seriously by the international community.”

Gia said one of the major goals of the organization is to raise awareness about Christian persecution and remind Catholics that they are not divided from the suffering of Catholics in other countries.

“Scripture tells us that when one member of the body of Christ suffers, we all suffer. So we know that even when children are suffering in Armenia, the body of Christ is suffering, and we have an obligation with our platform … to raise awareness about the suffering of [others] but also how we can be a solution to their suffering,” she said.

She said that through her experience with international aid groups, she has witnessed how violence and persecution impacts children most of all. She emphasized the importance of not only providing humanitarian services but an experience of hope for children to reclaim their childhood.

“Children are the most innocent and most vulnerable when it comes to the situation of refugees for persecution. A lot of times we’re bringing food, we’re bringing clothing, we’re bringing humanitarian aid … but we’re often overlooking the hope factor … So really the goal of Operation Christmas is to bring that hope back to Children who have suffered so much.”

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#9923 Open Forum – Mark Brumley

Posted by | Jan 8, 2021 | |

Questions Covered:

04:29 – In the Lord’s prayer, it says, “forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” The problem is that we do not forgive people the way that God forgives. How can we reconcile this? 
12:28 –…

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#9922 Open Forum – Jimmy Akin

Posted by | Jan 7, 2021 | |

Questions Covered:

02:42 – My friend thinks the Catholic Church is apostate and the whore of Babylon. How can I respond to him? 
11:22 – Is there a way to bypass the Catechism in formation for children with a learning disability who can’t …

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After Secretariat of State shakeup, what’s next for Curia reform?

Posted by | Jan 7, 2021 | , |

Vatican City, Jan 7, 2021 / 03:33 pm (CNA).- The draft of the delayed document that will reform of the Roman Curia gives the Vatican’s Secretariat of State a more prominent place in the workings of the Church’s central governing bureaucracy. But during the year 2020, Pope Francis moved in the opposite direction.

In fact, within the span of a few months, the Secretariat of State has been gradually divested of all of its financial power.

In September, the Pope appointed the new commission of cardinals of the Institute for Works of Religion (IOR) – the also called “Vatican bank.” For the first time, the Secretary of State was not among the cardinal members. Nor is the Secretariat of State represented in the Commission on Reserved Matters that the Pope established in October via the first Vatican procurement law. In November, the Pope decided that the Secretariat of State should transfer all its funds to APSA, the equivalent of a Vatican central bank.

In December, Pope Francis spelled out how the handover should occur, clarifying that the Secretariat of State will be under the constant oversight of the Vatican’s leading financial operations watchdog, the Secretariat for the Economy, which has been renamed the “Papal Secretariat for Economic Affairs.”

These moves are in direct contrast with the Roman Curia’s draft constitution, Praedicate Evangelium, which continues to be revised by the Council of Cardinals.

Indeed, the document’s draft proposes the establishment of a real “papal secretariat” within the Vatican Secretariat of State, which would take the place of Pope Francis’s private Secretariat and coordinate the various bodies of the Roman Curia. The papal secretariat would, for example, summon the periodic interdicasterial meetings and even bring dicasteries together to work on specific tasks or projects when needed.

If Praedicate Evangelium remains essentially as it appears to be in the draft version that circulated last summer, then the piecemeal reforms that Pope Francis has introduced will make the new regulations old and outdated as soon as they are promulgated.

If, on the other hand, the draft is being heavily amended to match to what Pope Francis has been doing, then Praedicate Evangelium will not see the daylight any time soon. Instead, it will continue to be under examination for an even longer time, putting the Church in a state of “reform as you go.”

In other words, rather than setting reforms in stone with a binding document like Praedicate Evangelium, as previous popes have done, reforms will come via Pope Francis’ personal decisions, which several times have overturned his previous ones.

That is why the path of Curial reform has been characterized, until now, by many as back-and-forth.

First, it was the Secretariat for the Economy seeing its powers shrinking.

Initially, Pope Francis understood Cardinal George Pell’s reformist ideas and supported a significant recasting of financial control mechanisms. The first phase began with establishing the Secretariat for the Economy in 2014.

But by 2016, Pope Francis embraced the cause of the Secretariat of State, which argued that Cardinal Pell’s approach to financial reform did not take into consideration the Holy See’s particular nature as a State, not a corporation. The opposite views escalated into a fight when the Secretariat for the Economy signed a contract for a massive audit with Pricewaterhouse Coopers. The auditing contract was signed in December 2015 and scaled down by the Holy See in June 2016.

After reducing the scope of Cardinal Pell’s audit, the Secretariat of State regained its central role in the Roman Curia, while the Secretariat for the Economy was weakened. When Cardinal Pell had to take a leave of absence in 2017 to go back to Australia and face infamous allegations, of which he was later acquitted, the Secretariat for the Economy’s work got stalled.

Pope Francis appointed Fr. Juan Antonio Guerrero Alves to replace Cardinal Pell in November 2019. Under Fr. Guerrero, the Secretariat for the Economy regained power and influence. Simultaneously, the Secretariat of State got caught in the scandal that followed by the purchase of a luxury real estate in London.

With the decision to take any financial control from the Secretariat of State, the pope returned to his original vision of a strong Secretariat for the Economy. The Secretariat of State has lost any sense of autonomy since its financial operations are now transferred to APSA. Now, every financial move by the Secretariat of State falls directly under the Secretariat for the Economic oversight.

The transfer of funds to APSA seems to recall Cardinal Pell’s project for Vatican Asset Management. APSA, as the Vatican Central Bank, has been become the central office for Vatican investments.

So far, after the latest papal moves, the Secretariat of State is the only Vatican department with a former financial autonomy that has lost it. Pope Francis’ decision has not yet involved the Congregation for the Evangelization of People –which handles, among others, the massive funds of the World Mission Sunday- and the Vatican City State Administration, which also have financial autonomy.

But many Vatican observers agree that no dicastery can now consider itself safe from Pope Francis’ on-the-go reform, since the pope already proved himself ready to change direction unexpectedly, and to do it very quickly. In the Vatican, there is already talk of  “a permanent state of reform,” rather that the definitive one that should have come with Praedicate Evangelium.

In the meantime, the dicasteries’ activities are at a standstill, while Curia members wonders if the Curia reform document will ever be out. The Secretariat of State is the first victim of this situation. But most likely it won’t be the last.

 

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