Rome, Italy, May 6, 2018 / 04:12 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Love is not empty words or what is depicted in romantic films – it is action and service toward others, Pope Francis said in a homily at a Roman parish Sunday.
“Love is not what they sa… […]
London, England, May 6, 2018 / 04:01 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- London waste company discovers relic of St Clement in the trash
You know the old saying – one person’s trash is another person’s 2,000 year-old sacred bone fragment of an early pope.
An environmental waste company in London had a surprise discovery last week when they uncovered a reliquary in the garbage containing a bone of St. Clement, a Church Father and the fourth Pope.
The company, which posted about the discovery on their website April 25, said they could not pinpoint the exact location that the relic had come from, but they do know that it was collected in the garbage somewhere in central London.
“You can imagine our amazement when we realised our clearance teams had found bone belonging to a Pope – it’s not something you expect to see, even in our line of work,” James Rubin, owner of Enviro Waste, said in a statement on the company’s website.
“We often come across some weird and wonderful things on clearances, but we were definitely not expecting to find a bone fragment of an apostle,” he added.
St. Clement was a first-century Christian thought to have been a disciple of Sts. Peter and Paul.
It is believed that St. Clement converted from Judaism to Catholicism, and may have shared in some of the missionary journeys of St. Peter or St. Paul, and assisted them in running the Church at the local level.
Around the year 90, he was raised to the position of Pope, following Peter, Linus and Cletus. His writings reveal much about the early Church, but little about his own life.
According to one account, he died in exile during the reign of the Emperor Trajan, who purportedly banished Clement to Crimea and had him killed in retaliation for evangelizing the local people, around the year 100. He is among the saints mentioned in the Roman Canon.
In 868, the Greek missionary St. Cyril claimed to have recovered St. Clement’s bones.
So far, no one has reached out to claim the relic, Rubin told the Huffington Post. He added that he is seeking the help of a U.K. laboratory to have the relic carbon dated to test its authenticity. The bone fragment is encased in a wax-sealed case and includes an inscription that it is “from the bones of St. Clement, Pope and Martyr.”
On their website, Enviro Waste has set up an electronic suggestion box, asking the public where the final resting place of the relic should be.
“We know this is an important piece of history and are keen to find the most appropriate place for its final resting place, which is why we’re asking for help from members of the public,” Rubin said.
So far, suggestions have included the British Museum or the Church of St. Clement in Rome.
Vatican City, May 6, 2018 / 05:33 am (CNA/EWTN News).- God’s love requires that we give our best to each and every one of our brothers and sisters, even those who are in the final stage of their life, Pope Francis said during his Regina Coeli add… […]
Vatican City, May 5, 2018 / 03:45 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Chronic pain reduction. Improvement in paralysis. Restoration of sight amid macular degeneration. These are just some of the results being seen in experimental treatments using virtual reality technology.
And this technology could help answer Pope Francis’ call for doctors and scientists to collaborate in pursuing bold and creative approaches to medicine.
Stressing the importance of ethics and defense of human life, the pope at an April 28 conference called for an “open interdisciplinary approach that engages multiple experts and institutions,” which can lead “to a reciprocal exchange of knowledge.” He also encouraged “concrete actions on behalf of those who suffer.”
For at least one representative who was present at the conference, the future of medical care could rely significantly on the tech industry, using tools such as augmented and virtual reality as a treatment for certain conditions.
In an interview with CNA, Dr. David Rhew said virtual reality is already used in training scenarios for doctors and nurses, but is starting to be used to treat medical conditions as well.
Rhew is the chief medical officer, vice president and general manager of B2B Healthcare for Samsung Electronics America. He spoke at the Vatican’s April 26-28 “Unite to Cure” about the use of VR technology in medicine.
Virtual reality, he told CNA, is already used as a treatment in cases of pain relief, macular degeneration and spinal cord injury, and further research is being done in VR treatments for concussions, brain injury, post-traumatic stress disorder and strokes.
In aiding with pain management, Rhew said the aim of using virtual reality is to lessen dependence on narcotics and help patients deal with their discomfort in a more soothing, natural way.
Rhew said that patients underwent experimental treatment watched a calming video for 10-15 minutes through a VR headset, and afterward it took several hours or even days for the pain to come back, if it did at all.
In one randomized control trial conducted by Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, 120 patients were randomly selected. Half were given VR pain treatment, while the rest were shown content on a regular television set.
Doctors saw a 52 percent pain reduction in the patients who used VR versus those who watched regular television, which is a “dramatic, remarkable” outcome, Rhew said.
Results have even been seen in children who suffer chronic pain due to sickle cell anemia. In at least one case, he said, a person came in with pain and left with no medication after using the VR headset.
“We’ve actually now been starting to think how can we go beyond even acute hospitalization, and even start thinking about how this could be used in the ambulatory setting and potentially be used to address the opioid epidemic,” he said.
The hope is that virtual reality could be used as an alternative to opioid treatments, so patients never have to start on narcotics, or can stop if they are currently using them.
Macular degeneration – in which the central part of the eye is damaged, usually resulting significant vision loss – has also been successfully treated with virtual reality.
“Researchers have long known that despite the fact that you have injuries to [the macula], other parts of the retina are still in tact,” Rhew said, noting that opthamologists have used virtual reality to target an area of the eye called the “preferred retinal locus (PRL),” which is small and hard to locate, but which can lead to better vision if found and utilized.
“Using the VR headset with an eye-tracking software helps locate the PRL,” and the magnification ability on the camera helps zoom in on the area they are looking for.
In one study carried out by Johns Hopkins University, some patients walked in legally blind and left with 20/30 vision, rhew said. This allows people “to do things they were never able to do – they can now read a book, they can watch TV, they can even do gardening.”
VR technology is currently being used as a treatment by some 80 opthamologist centers across the United States, including UCLA, but not many people know about it, he said.
Spinal cord injuries have also been treated with virtual reality.
“What we’ve seen is that in patients who have injured the spinal cord, like we talked about with the eye, they may have lost some of the major components of the neuro-pathways, but some of the minor ones are still intact, and we in general have not figured out how to utilize those minor ones,” Rhew said.
The virtual reality “tricks” the brain by targeting and activating pathways in the brain and spine that might still be intact and could lead to eventual mobility.
In a case study of eight patients who suffered from chronic paraplegia from anywhere between 3-18 years, after undergoing a year of an intensive VR treatment with physical therapy, “all of them were upgraded from paraplegia to partial paralysis.”
“This can help us in managing patients and restoring function for those with disabilities,” but success depends on individual effort, Rhew said, explaining that “we have it within ourselves but we sometimes need that ability to go over that little hump, and technology can sometimes help us.”
Rhew said he believes the unanticipated rise in VR and digital treatments is due in part to the fact that devices have become more powerful, battery life has grown longer and storage has increased.
Increasing use of mobile phones is also a factor, since the technology can be accessed from anywhere. Additionally, VR can in many cases be significantly cheaper than typical medical equipment.
“We’re going to continue to learn more over the coming years, the technology is going to get better, we’re probably going to able to make further advancements, we’re going to improve the user experience” and will likely participate in more clinical trials, Rhew said.
Doctors will also likely become increasingly aware that they can “truly use this as an adjunct or alternative to things today that are major issues. So I see it improving the lives of people pretty dramatically, especially those with disabilities.”
An interview with Dr. Paul Kengor, author of Takedown: From Communists to Progressives, How the Left Has Sabotaged Family and Marriage. […]
Vatican City, May 5, 2018 / 12:55 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- As 33 new Swiss Guards prepare to take an oath Sunday, the entire army is preparing to expand its ranks by two dozen members to respond to increasing administrative demands while ensuring guards ar… […]
Rome, Italy, May 5, 2018 / 05:28 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Catholics have a mission to evangelize, teaching people that God never tires of loving them, Pope Francis said to members of the Neocatechumenal Way Saturday at a gathering for the 50th anniversary … […]
Pyongyang, North Korea, May 5, 2018 / 04:10 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The potential release of three American prisoners from North Korea’s labor camps – reported to be “imminent” – would be a unique success at the intersection … […]
Vatican City, May 4, 2018 / 04:46 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Prayer, poverty, and patience are essential to living religious life, Pope Francis said Friday to a gathering of consecrated men and women.
The pope set aside his prepared remarks and spoke extemporaneously May 4 at the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall to some 700 participants in a conference organized by the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.
He was reflecting on discernment and how to avoid losing oneself among worldliness and provocations.
The pope jokingly said the Holy Spirit “is a calamity, because he never tires of being creative.”
“Now, with the new forms of consecrated life, he is so creative, with the charisms … He is the author of diversity, but at the same time is Creator of unity. This is the Holy Spirit. And with the diversity of charisms and many things, he makes a unity of the Body of Christ, and also the unity of consecrated life. And this too is a challenge.”
Francis posited that the Holy Spirit wants prayer, poverty, and patience to stay strong in consecrated life.
For the consecrated person, prayer is “turning always to the first call … to that Person who has called me,” he said.
Consecrated life is a call to renounce all things for the sake of the gospel, and for the consecrated person “every prayer has to turn back to this … prayer is that which makes me work for the Lord, not for my interests or for the institution in which I work, no, for the Lord.”
Pope Francis reiterated that for the consecrated person prayer is a return to the meeting with the Lord in which they were called by him.
“And prayer, in the consecrated life, is the air which makes us breathe that call, renew that call. Without this air we could not be good consecrated persons. We would be perhaps good persons, Christians, Catholics who do many works in the Church, but consecration you must continually renew, in prayer, in an encounter with the Lord,” he said.
CNA contacted the Holy See Press Office about these unclear remarks concerning prayer and those living in the world, but did not receive a response by deadline.
The Pope went on to say that there are no excuses for not devoting time to prayer, including busyness, pointing to St. Teresa of Calcutta as an example. Someone might say: “But I’m busy, I’m busy, I have so many things to do,” he pointed out, stating “[prayer] is more important: Go pray.”
St. Teresa of Calcutta had concerns, he acknowledged, yet “the two hours of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, nobody took them away from her… Do as she did, do the same.”
Another reason prayer is so important for men and women in consecrated life, he said, is that it helps to direct action to the correct purpose, keeping the focus on God, instead of just serving an institution or one’s own interests.
“Search for your Lord, the one who called you… Not just in the morning,” he said. “Everyone must look for how to do it, where to do it, when to do it. But always do it, pray. One cannot live the consecrated life, one cannot discern what is happening without speaking with the Lord.”
Pope Francis then turned to poverty, which he noted St. Ignatius of Loyola called the mother of consecrated life.
“Without poverty there is no fecundity in consecrated life,” he said. The spirit of poverty is necessary for discernment, and is a defense against all that would destroy consecrated life.
Even in religious life there can be a worldliness, the Pope said, which comes from a lack of poverty; vanity; and pride.
Francis finally spoke about the quality of patience in consecrated life, which, he said, is not just about bearing patiently with those with whom we live and work – it is also about bearing patiently with the suffering of the world, “carrying [it] on the shoulders.”
“Enter into patience,” he said, because without patience “you cannot be magnanimous, you cannot follow the Lord.”
Internal struggles in a congregation and careerism at general chapters are attributable to impatience, the Pope said.
There must even be patience in the face of a lack of vocations, he added. Choosing to stop accepting members and to sell off the community’s property is a sign that the congregation “is close to death” and has become attached to money, rather than having the patience to pray for new vocations.
This “art of dying well” – a congregation choosing not to pursue prospective vocations – is a “spiritual euthanasia” which “doesn’t have the courage to follow the Lord … We follow [Jesus] to a certain point and by the first or second trial, goodbye.”
The pope concluded by telling the consecrated men and women that they will surely be fruitful if they are prayerful, poor, and patient.
Washington D.C., May 4, 2018 / 04:31 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The U.S. bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee Against Racism will have a new chairman, following Bishop George Murry’s resignation from the position after being diagnosed with acute leukemia.
“Our most heartfelt prayers are with Bishop Murry and his loved ones,” said Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. “We ask all people of faith to join us in praying for his full recovery.”
The cardinal has named Bishop Shelton J. Fabre of Houma-Thibodaux, La. to serve as the chairman until the end of the term, the U.S. bishops’ conference website reports.
“I am grateful to Bishop Fabre for his dedication and commitment to now lead the work of the Ad Hoc Committee,” Cardinal DiNardo said.
The ad hoc committee was established in August 2017 in the wake of increasing racial tensions and white nationalist activism. Its work has included a press conference last fall at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington, D.C., and the creation of resources for the Sept. 9 Feast Day of St. Peter Claver as an annual day of prayer for peace within communities.
The committee also promotes education, resources, communications strategies, and care for victims of racism. A pastoral letter from the committee is expected to be released later this year.
On Monday the Diocese of Youngstown, Ohio announced that Bishop Murry has been admitted to the Cleveland Clinic.
“He will undergo intensive chemotherapy for the next four weeks,” said the diocese’s statement, which called for prayer.
Murry also chairs the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Catholic Education, which provides guidance for all Catholic educational institutions in the country.
CNA contacted the U.S. bishops’ conference seeking information about whether the bishop would remain on this committee but did not receive a response by deadline.
Bishop Shelton Fabre was born October 25, 1963 in New Roads, La. He was ordained a priest in 1989 and became an auxiliary bishop of New Orleans in February 2007. In September 2013 he became Bishop of Houma-Thibodaux in southern Louisiana.
He is current chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Subcommittee on African American Affairs, on which he has served since 2010. Since 2013, he has served as a member of the Committee on Cultural Diversity in the Church.
The bishop is a Fourth Degree member of the Knights of Peter Claver, a historically African-American Catholic fraternal organization which he serves as national chaplain. He is also a Fourth Degree member of the Knights of Columbus.
© Catholic World Report