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Month: October 2022

Vancouver rethinking homeless solutions

Posted by | Oct 29, 2022 | , |

The oft-told story of the child who throws starfish back into the ocean because “it matters to that one” is the kind of organic growth that Bob Buckham hopes to see when ministering to the homeless in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.

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Christmas 2022: Vatican to display hand-carved wooden nativity scene

Posted by | Oct 29, 2022 | , |


A Christmas tree in St. Peter’s Square. / Daniel Ibáñez/CNA.

Vatican City, Oct 29, 2022 / 08:55 am (CNA).

For Christmas 2022, the Vatican has commissioned a nativity scene made of life-sized figures hand carved out of alpine cedar trees.

The display will be unveiled in St. Peter’s Square on Dec. 3, during a lighting ceremony for the Vatican Christmas tree.

A second nativity scene, which will be displayed in the Paul VI Hall, was donated by the government of Guatemala.

The Holy Family and an angel were handmade by Guatemalan artisans in the local tradition, using wood and colorful decorations.

The Vatican has placed a nativity scene in front of St. Peter’s Basilica for the Christmas season since the 1980s. For about a decade, the Vatican has asked different countries or Italian regions to lend the nativity to be displayed. In 2021, the scene came from Peru.

Some Vatican manger scenes in recent years have come under criticism: The ceramic figures of the 2020 display elicited a lot of strong reactions on social media, many of them negative.

In 2022, the display will come from Italy’s northeastern-most region, Friuli-Venezia Giulia.

The life-sized wooden figures were carved in 2021 out of cedar tree trimmings. The Vatican said no trees were cut down solely for the purpose of making the nativity scene.

The scene will include a wooden grotto with an ox, donkey, angel, Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus. The wooden figures will also have tradesmen and tradeswomen typical of the area where the nativity was made, a shepherdess, and a family and children.

The Christmas tree is an almost 100-foot-tall white fir from Rosello, a mountain village with around 182 inhabitants in the central Italian region of Abruzzo.

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Broken bridges

Posted by | Oct 29, 2022 | |

In many ways Vatican II has remained only a pier; there is still an urgency for it to be transformed into a bridge

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Saturday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time

Posted by | Oct 29, 2022 | |

Reading 1 PHIL 1:18B-26

Brothers and sisters:
As long as in every way, whether in pretense or in truth,
Christ is being proclaimed, and in that I rejoice.

Indeed I shall continue to rejoice,
for I know that this will result in del…

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Archbishop Gomez condemns violence, prays for Paul Pelosi after attack

Posted by | Oct 29, 2022 | , |


Pope Francis speaks to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Paul Pelosi after Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica on June 29, 2022. / Vatican Media

CNA Newsroom, Oct 29, 2022 / 01:55 am (CNA).

The president of the United States bishops’ conference said he is praying for Paul Pelosi, the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, after he was attacked in his home in San Francisco on Friday morning.

Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles said Oct. 28 that he is offering prayers “for the full recovery of Paul Pelosi and comfort for his family.”

Pelosi, 82, was attacked with a hammer by a male assailant early on Friday morning, according to CNN. The assailant was reportedly looking for the speaker of the House, and also tried to tie Pelosi up.

“I am deeply grieved over this violence,” the USCCB president added, “which should have no place in our communities, our political process, or our great nation. May Our Lady of Perpetual Help intercede for us, provide healing, and guide us to paths of peace.”

Pelosi is expected to make a full recovery, according to doctors, after he underwent a “successful surgery to repair a skull fracture and serious injuries to his right arm and hands,” a spokesperson for Nancy Pelosi said early Friday evening.

The Catholic archbishop of San Francisco, Salvatore Cordileone, asked for prayers for Pelosi’s quick recovery and for comfort for his wife and family, in a post on Twitter on Friday.

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Vatican body, Italian bishops strike deal for safeguarding in global south

Posted by | Oct 29, 2022 | , , , , , , , , |

On Friday the Italian Bishops’ Conference signed an agreement with the pope’s Commission for the Protection of Minors to provide support for safeguarding initiatives, particularly in the global south, where funds for these efforts is often lacking.

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Rethinking Reformation

Posted by | Oct 29, 2022 | |

Some of the violent religious events of the last five centuries may have been prevented had the Church stayed united, or maybe not…

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