Catholic News
- Pope Leo assures Zelensky of prayer for people of Ukraine (@ZelenskyyUa)
President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine posted a message that Pope Leo XIV sent him for the nation’s independence day (August 24). “With a heart wounded by the violence that ravages your land, I address you on this day of your national feast,” Pope Leo wrote. “I wish to assure you of my prayer for the people of Ukraine who suffer from war—especially for all those wounded in body, for those bereaved by the death of a loved one, and for those deprived of their homes.” “May God Himself console them; may He strengthen the injured and grant eternal rest to the departed,” the Pope added. “I implore the Lord to move the hearts of people of good will, that the clamor of arms may fall silent and give way to dialogue, opening the path to peace for the good of all.” The Pontiff concluded by entrusting the nation to the Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of Peace. - Put Jesus, the only Savior, at the center of your life, Pope Leo tells French altar servers (CWN)
In an address to French altar servers in Rome for a jubilee year pilgrimage, Pope Leo XIV emphasized the importance of friendship with Christ, the only Savior. - 'Immense river of people' flees Islamist insurgency in Mozambique, Vatican newspaper reports (CWN)
A day after Pope Leo XIV appealed for prayer for the people of Cabo Delgado Province in Mozambique, the Vatican newspaper reported on the “immense river of people seeking safety from shootings, attacks, and kidnappings” associated with the Islamist insurgency there. - Ukrainian Catholic leader: 'We all want peace, but true peace is always just' (Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church)
Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, said in a television interview that “we all want peace, but true peace is always just.” In an apparent reference to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s proposal that Ukraine cede part of its territory to Russia, the Major Archbishop said, “It is obvious that we will never be satisfied if part of our people is once again enslaved. That would not be just.” “If money becomes more important than human life in all these processes, then democracy and peace in the world will come to an end,” the prelate added. “That is why Ukraine is today the pivot of these global changes.” - Papal message to Waldensians, Methodists calls for journey toward full communion (L'Osservatore Romano (Italian))
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State of His Holiness, sent a telegram in Pope Leo’s name to the Waldensian-Methodist synod, which is meeting from August 24-27 in Torre Pellice, Italy. “I assure you of my fervent remembrance in prayer so that all Christians may journey with sincerity of heart toward full communion, to bear witness to Jesus Christ and his Gospel,” stated the Pope. “We are called to cooperate in the service of humanity, particularly in defending the dignity of the human person, in promoting justice and peace, and in providing common responses to the suffering that afflicts the most vulnerable.” - Learn from St. Augustine's City of God, Pontiff tells Catholic lawmakers (CWN)
Pope Leo XIV received members of the International Catholic Legislators Network on August 23 and encouraged them to learn from St. Augustine’s The City of God, in which the “Church Father taught that within human history, two ‘cities’ are intertwined: the City of Man and the City of God.” - Pontiff recalls 400th anniversary of Lithuanian missionary's arrival in India (Vatican Press Office)
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State of His Holiness, sent a telegram in the Holy Father’s name to the cardinal archbishop of Goa, India, to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the first Lithuanian missionary’s arrival in India. In recalling Father Andrius Rudamina, SJ, the Pontiff “prays that the celebration of such generosity and courage in bringing the saving message of the Gospel to all peoples will encourage many in our own times to respond with similar patience and ingenuity to the task of evangelization,” Cardinal Parolin wrote. In its article on the papal telegram, Vatican News, the news agency of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication, erroneously reported that Father Rudamina’s 1625 arrival in India “marked the first time a son of St. Ignatius of Loyola set foot in the vast Indian subcontinent.” The first Jesuit missionary to arrive in India was not Father Rudamina, but St. Francis Xavier, who arrived in Goa in 1542. - Italian foreign minister, Leo XIV discuss commitment to peace, defense of Christian minorities (@Antonio_Tajani)
Pope Leo XIV received Antonio Tajani, Italy’s deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs, on August 25. Tajani tweeted that he and the Pontiff spoke about “commitment to peace and the defense of Christian minorities around the world.” “I spoke of our commitment to defending Christian minorities in Gaza and the West Bank,” added Tajani, in remarks reported by Agenzia Nova. - Ecumenical Patriarch calls for united Christian voice for peace (Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate)
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, who holds a primacy of honor among the Orthodox churches, told an ecumenical gathering in Stockholm that the world “hungers and thirsts for unity, solidarity, and integrity like never before.” “Never has the voice of a united Christianity been needed more than today,” he said. “Peacemaking is integrally and inseparably associated to the coexistence of all people and the survival of our planet ... We have it in our power to contribute either to the healing of our world or to its suffering. Dear friends, what will we choose?” The Ecumenical Patriarch made his remarks at the Ecumenical Week in Stockholm, to which Pope Leo XIV sent a message (full text). - Pope to inaugurate Laudato Si' Village (Vatican News)
Pope Leo XIV will inaugurate Borgo Laudato Si’ (Laudato Si’ Village) in Castel Gandolfo on September 4. The Centro Laudato Si’ described the 135-acre site as “not simply a place to visit but a place to live, to pray, to learn, and to grow in communion with God, with one another, and with creation.” The village is named after Pope Francis’s second encyclical (2015), dedicated to care for our common home. - Pope Leo: Jesus challenges the presumption of those who think they are saved (Dicastery for Communication)
Reflecting on the Gospel reading of the day (Luke 13:22-30), Pope Leo XIV said on August 24 that Christ’s image of the narrow gate is “meant primarily to challenge the presumption of those people who think they are already saved, who perform religious acts and feel that is all that is needed.” Jesus “tells us that it is not enough to profess the faith with words, to eat and drink with him by celebrating the Eucharist or to have a good knowledge of Christian doctrine,” Pope Leo told pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square for his Sunday Angelus address. “Our faith is authentic when it embraces our whole life, when it becomes a criterion for our decisions, when it makes us women and men committed to doing what is right and who take risks out of love, even as Jesus did.” “Jesus is the true measure of our faith; he is the gate through which we must pass in order to be saved (cf. Jn 10:9) by experiencing his love and by working, in our daily lives, to promote justice and peace,” the Pope continued. “There are times when this involves making difficult and unpopular decisions, resisting our selfish inclinations, placing ourselves at the service of others, and persevering in doing what is right when the logic of evil seems to prevail, and so on.” The Pontiff concluded, “Let us ask the Virgin Mary to help us find the courage to pass through the ‘narrow gate’ of the Gospel, so that we may open ourselves with joy to the wide embrace of God our loving Father.” - Cultivate the spirit of the Holy Family, Pope tells women religious (Dicastery for Communication)
On August 23, Pope Leo XIV received members of the general chapters of four women’s religious institutes: the Missionary Daughters of the Holy Family of Nazareth, the Daughters of Nazareth Institute, the Apostles of the Holy Family Institute, and the Sisters of Charity of St. Mary. “There is an aspect that unites many of you: the desire to live and to transmit to others the values of the Holy Family of Nazareth, the hearth of prayer, forge of love and model of holiness,” Pope Leo told the religious sisters, who had gathered in Consistory Hall of the Apostolic Palace. “More than ever, the family needs to be supported, promoted and encouraged, through prayer, example and attentive social action.” “Continue the works entrusted to you by ‘being family’ and by remaining close to those you serve—with prayer, listening, counsel, and assistance—so as to cultivate and spread, in the various contexts where you work, the spirit of the home of Nazareth,” the Pope added. - Amazon region's bishops lament clericalism, fear of synodality (CEAMA)
At the conclusion of a five-day meeting in Bogotá, Colombia, the bishops of the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon (CEAMA) issued a Spanish-language message entitled “CEAMA, a sign of hope: Five years after the Amazon Synod.” CEAMA stated that the bishops “pointed out certain resistances present in this process: fears of change towards a synodal Church, attitudes of clericalism, authoritarianism, or lack of missionary audacity. Faced with these challenges, they reaffirmed their desire to continue building a prophetic, close, and missionary Church.” “The meeting renewed CEAMA’s commitment to be a Church centered on baptism, walking alongside the peoples, listening to their ancestral wisdom, and decisively taking on the care of our common home in the face of the climate crisis,” CEAMA added. At the beginning of their meeting, the bishops had received pointed guidance from Pope Leo XIV, who asked them to announce Jesus Christ “with clarity and immense charity.” - Leo XIV marks day of fasting, prayer for peace (@Pontifex)
On August 22—the day on which he invited the faithful to pray for peace, justice, and the victims of war—Pope Leo XIV tweeted, “Today we celebrate the memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of Heaven, also invoked as Queen of Peace.” “Let us fast and pray to implore the Lord for the gift of peace,” Pope Leo continued. “Let us pray together that hearts may be freed from hatred, that we may move beyond the logic of division and retaliation, and that a shared vision inspired by the common good may prevail.” - US Catholic population shifting to south and west (National Catholic Register)
The Catholic population of the US, once heavily centered in the northeast and midwest of the country, has shifted south and west in the past generation. A National Catholic Register report on the trend notes that in 1980, 70% of the country’s Catholics lived in dioceses of the northeast or midwest. That figure is now below 50%, and evidently still falling. Of the American dioceses reporting the largest population gains in the past 20 years, six are in either Texas or California, and only one (New York) in the north. Of the ten dioceses that have lost the most, all are in the traditionally Catholic bastions of the northeast and midwest, with the single exception of Miami. - Papal prayer for peace in Mozambique, Ukraine (Dicastery for Communication)
At the conclusion of his August 24 Angelus address, Pope Leo XIV requested prayers for peace in Ukraine and in Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province, where a brutal Islamist insurgency began in 2017. “I express my closeness to the people of Cabo Delgado, Mozambique, who have become victims of an unsecure and violent situation that continues to cause death and displacement,” Pope Leo said to pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square. “In asking you not to forget these brothers and sisters of ours, I invite you to pray for them, and I express my hope that the efforts of the country’s leaders will succeed in restoring security and peace in that territory.” The Pope added: This past Friday, 22 August, we accompanied with our prayers and fasting our brothers and sisters who are suffering because of wars. Today, we join our Ukrainian brothers and sisters who, with the spiritual initiative “World Prayer for Ukraine,” are asking the Lord to grant peace to their tormented country. - Commission finds 'alarming rise of violence' against religious minorities in Pakistan (Human Rights Commission of Pakistan)
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan published Streets of Fear, a report on religious freedom in the Islamic republic. “The report highlights an alarming rise in violence against religious minorities, including targeted killings of Ahmadis and the demolition of protected places of worship,” according to the commission. “In a chilling development, two individuals accused of blasphemy were extrajudicially killed by the police while seeking protection from hostile mobs.” The report also highlighted “persistent forced conversions and underage marriages of Hindu and Christian girls in Punjab and Sindh, exposing the systematic failure to enforce child marriage restraint laws.” Islam is the official religion of the South Asian nation of 252 million (map), the fifth most populous in the world. 95% of Pakistan’s people are Muslim, 2% are Christian, and 1% are Hindu. - USCCB, CHA express 'strong support' for palliative care bill (USCCB)
The chairmen of two committees of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, joined by the president of the Catholic Health Association, expressed “strong support” for the Palliative Care and Hospice Education and Training Act, sponsored by Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI). “Despite growing recognition of the value of hospital-based palliative care, there remain three major barriers to broader access: a shortage of trained professionals in palliative care; limited research funding to advance best practices in symptom management, communication, and care coordination; and low public and professional awareness of what palliative care is and when it should be utilized,” Archbishop Borys Gudziak, Bishop Daniel Thomas, and Sister Mary Haddad wrote in a recent letter to the leaders of a senate committee. “Importantly, the bill includes essential language affirming that all supported programs must comply with the Assisted Suicide Funding Restriction Act of 1997 and may not be used to cause or assist in causing a patient’s death under any circumstance,” the signatories added. - Detention center must allow for pastoral care, Nebraska bishop says (CNA)
Responding to proposals for the establishment of a detention center in Nebraska for illegal immigrants, Bishop James Conley of Lincoln has insisted that the facility must allow for priests to provide sacramental care for those detained. “It will be of utmost importance that any person detained in the federal immigration detention center... can also access regular and ongoing pastoral care,” the bishop said, saying that access to pastoral care is “fundamental to the dignity of every human person.” - Cameroon prelate: priests are ready to die for the Gospel (Crux)
Archbishop Andrew Nkea Fuanya of Bamenda, Cameroon, tells Crux that the priests and religious of his archdiocese are “ready to die for the Gospel.” The Bamenda archdiocese covers the Anglophone regions of the African country, which have seen years of bloody ethnic conflict. But the archbishop emphasizes that the cause of separatism, and the dislocations caused by the conflict, are “not problems of evangelization,” and therefore do not change the essence of the Church’s mission. “They are social problems, but they don’t touch our spreading the Gospel,” he explains. - More...