Sydney archbishop encourages relief donations amid Australia fires

Yangon, Burma, Nov 29, 2017 / 09:46 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The Catholic young people of Burma are “a welcome sound” of encouragement, Pope Francis told them Thursday at a Mass said at St. Mary’s Cathedral in Yangon.

“Dear young people of Myanmar … you are a beautiful and encouraging sight, for you bring us ‘good news’, the good news of your youth, your faith and your enthusiasm. Indeed, you are good news, because you are concrete signs of the Church’s faith in Jesus Christ, who brings us a joy and a hope that will never die,” Francis said Nov. 30 in the largest city of Burma (also known as Myanmar).

The Pope’s Mass with Burmese youth comes at the conclusion of his visit to the country, where he arrived Nov. 27. He also met with government officials, religious leaders, Buddhist monks, and the country’s bishops. The previous day, he said Mass in Yangon’s Kyaikkasan Ground, attended by much of the country’s Catholic population. From Burma, he will continue on to Bangladesh before returning to Rome.

“As my visit to your beautiful country draws to a close, I join you in thanking God for the many graces we have received in these days,” he stated.

“Some people ask how it is possible to speak of good news when so many people around us are suffering? Where is the good news when so much injustice, poverty and misery cast a shadow over us and our world?”

In the face of this suffering, he said it is important that the Burmese youth “are not afraid to believe in the good news of God’s mercy, because it has a name and a face: Jesus Christ. As messengers of this good news, you are ready to bring a word of hope to the Church, to your own country, and to the wider world.”

“You are ready to bring good news for your suffering brothers and sisters who need your prayers and your solidarity, but also your enthusiasm for human rights, for justice,” and for Christ’s love and peace.

The Pope’s words about solidarity, human rights, and justice come as international attention on Burma is focused on the Rohingya, a predominantly Muslim ethnic minority who have been denied citizenship and who face general persecution in the Buddhist-majority country. In recent months, more than 600,000 Rohingya have fled the country for Bangladesh amid state-sponsored violence against them.

At the same time, Pope Francis challenged his listeners with three conditions of salvation given in St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans which was proclaimed at the Mass, and which ask us “to think about our place in God’s plan.”

“In effect, Paul asks three questions, and I want to put them to each of you personally,” he said. “First, how are people to believe in the Lord unless they have heard about him? Second, how are people to hear about the Lord unless they have a messenger, someone to bring the good news? And third, how can they have a messenger unless one is sent?”

While wanting all of his listeners “to think deeply about these questions,” the Pope offered guidance to “help you to discern what it is that the Lord is asking of you.”

First, he said, it is important to listen for God’s voice: “Our world is full of many sounds, so many distractions, that can drown out God’s voice. If others are to hear and believe in him, they need to find him in people who are authentic. People who know how to listen … But only the Lord can help you to be genuine, so talk to him in prayer. Learn to hear his voice, quietly speaking in the depths of your heart.”

“But talk also to the saints,” he added, pointing to Saint Andrew, whose feast was celebrated at the Mass. “Andrew was a humble fisherman who became a great martyr … But before he became a martyr, he made his share of mistakes, and he needed to be patient, and to learn gradually how to be a true disciple of Christ. So do not be afraid to learn from your own mistakes!”

Pope Francis urged Burma’s youth to “let the saints lead you to Jesus and teach you to put your lives in his hands. You know that Jesus is full of mercy. So share with him all that you hold in your hearts: your fears and your worries, as well as your dreams and your hopes. Cultivate your interior life, as you would tend a garden or a field. This takes time; it takes patience. But like a farmer who waits for the crops to grow, if you wait the Lord will make you bear much fruit, a fruit you can then share with others.”

The Pope then turned to young people’s need to be “messengers of the good news of Jesus, above all to your contemporaries and friends. Do not be afraid to make a ruckus, to ask questions that make people think!”

“Don’t worry if sometimes you feel that you are few and far between,” he told them, in consideration of the fact that Catholics make up only about one percent of Burma’s population. “The Gospel always grows from small beginnings. So make yourselves heard.”

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet” data-lang=”en”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”><a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/Pope?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#Pope</a> to young people in Yangon: “Do not be afraid to make a ruckus, to ask questions that make people think!… Make yourselves heard. I want you to shout! But not with your voices. No! I want you to shout with your lives, with your hearts, &amp; in this way to be signs of hope…” <a href=”https://t.co/XvufBjwyhR”>pic.twitter.com/XvufBjwyhR</a></p>&mdash; Edward Pentin (@EdwardPentin) <a href=”https://twitter.com/EdwardPentin/status/936088670423019520?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>November 30, 2017</a></blockquote>
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“I want you to shout … with your lives, with your hearts, and in this way to be signs of hope to those who need encouragement, a helping hand to the sick, a welcome smile to the stranger, a kindly support to the lonely.”

Finally, Pope Francis discussed being sent forth at the conclusion of Mass “to take with us the gifts we have received and to share them with others. This can be a little daunting, since we don’t always know where Jesus may be sending us. But he never sends us out without also walking at our side, and always just a little in front, leading us into new and wonderful parts of his kingdom.”

To be sent by Christ is to follow him, the Pope added. “The Lord will invite some of you to follow him as priests … Others he will call to become religious or consecrated men and women. And yet others he will call to the married life, to be loving fathers and mothers. Whatever your vocation, I urge you: be brave, be generous and, above all, be joyful!”

Francis concluded by given Burma’s young people the example of Mary, who though young, “had the courage to trust in the ‘good news’ she had heard, and to express it in a life of faithful dedication to her vocation, total self-giving, and complete trust in God’s loving care. Like Mary, may all of you be gentle but courageous in bringing Jesus and his love to others.”

“Dear young people, with great affection I commend all of you, and your families, to her maternal intercession. And I ask you, please, to remember to pray for me. God bless Myanmar!”

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CNA Staff, Apr 17, 2020 / 07:00 pm (CNA).- Reports of an Indian hospital’s segregated wards for Hindu and Muslim coronavirus patients drew concern from the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, though Indian authorities strongly disputed the allegation.

“USCIRF is concerned with reports of Hindu and Muslim patients separated into separate hospital wards in Gujarat,” the commission said on Twitter and Facebook April 15. “Such actions only help to further increase ongoing stigmatization of Muslims in India and exacerbate false rumors of Muslims spreading COVID-19.”

The bipartisan U.S. federal government commission linked to a story in the Indian Express newspaper that cites a hospital official and a patient in the city of Ahmedabad in the western coastal Indian state of Gujarat.

India’s Ministry for External Affairs opposed the commission, saying it was spreading “misguided reports” and “adding religious color” that distracts from India’s efforts to combat the novel coronavirus.

“No segregation is being done in civil hospitals on the basis of religion, as clarified by the Gujarat government,” the ministry said April 15.

The reports concern Ahmedabad Civil Hospital, where there are some 1,200 beds prepared for patients suffering from the novel coronavirus.

Medical Superintendent Dr. Gunvant. H. Rathod described the hospital division to the Indian Express, saying “generally, there are separate wards for male and female patients. But here, we have made separate wards for Hindu and Muslim patients.”

“It is a decision of the government and you can ask them,” he said.

Deputy Chief Minister and Health Minister Nitin Patel said he was not aware of the situation and would make inquiries. Ahmedabad’s district magistrate, K.K. Nirala, also was not aware of any decision, the Indian Express reports.

However, the Indian Express cited a hospital patient who said the names of 28 men in a ward were called out, and they were moved to another ward.

“While we were not told why we were being shifted, all the names that were called out belonged to one community. We spoke to one staff member in our ward today and he said this had been done for ‘the comfort of both communities’,” the patient said.

The Gujarat Health and Family Welfare Department said the reports were “absolutely baseless.” Rather, it said, patients are treated based on symptoms and severity and “according to treating doctors’ recommendations.

As of Wednesday, new known cases of coronavirus in Gujarat rose by 127 to 766, with 88 cases in Ahmedabad. The death toll there totals 33, the Times of India reports.

The Indian newspaper The Week reported that the commission had previously criticized India’s Citizenship Amendment Act, which became effective in January 2020.

In December 2019 the commission expressed concern about the legislation, which enshrined a pathway to citizenship for immigrants but specifically excluded Muslims. The commission recommended U.S. sanctions on India as a possible response.

The U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom reviews alleged religious freedom violations and makes policy recommendations to the U.S. president, Secretary of State, and Congress.

The commission’s 2019 report said that religious freedom conditions in India “continued a downward trend” in 2018. It said India’s “history of religious freedom has come under attack in recent years with the growth of exclusionary extremist narratives—including, at times, the government’s allowance and encouragement of mob violence against religious minorities—that have facilitated an egregious and ongoing campaign of violence, intimidation, and harassment against non-Hindu and lower-caste Hindu minorities. Both public and private actors have engaged in this campaign.”

Mob violence against Christians by Hindus has been particularly acute.

In August 2019, six suspected members of a radical Hindu group were arrested after dozens of Catholics were attacked on a Marian pilgrimage from Karnataka to the Basilica of Our Lady of Good Health in Velankanni, a coastal town in south east India.

In September, around 500 armed Hindu extremists attacked a Jesuit mission in the Archdiocese of Ranchi. Armed with sticks, chains, iron bars, knives, and pistols, the mob beat tribal students including two who were seriously injured, and also seriously damaged the school’s facilities.

Archbishop Leo Cornelio of Bhopal has said numerous mob lynchings of Christians have occurred in which the victims are accused of eating beef or otherwise harming cattle, which are considered sacred in Hinduism.

Karnataka state suffered a wave of anti-Christian violence in 2008, when Hindu extremist groups led attacks on churches, schools and homes of Christians and physically beat hundreds of people. A 2011 independent report on the violence, known as the Saldhana Report, charged that attacks were pre-planned and backed by the state’s highest government authorities.

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The Vatican ambassador to Colombo, Archbishop Brian Udaigwe (third from left) and Sri Lanka’s Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith (fourth from left) take part in a remembrance service during the fifth anniversary of the Easter Sunday suicide attacks at St. Anthony Church in Colombo on April 21, 2024. / Credit: ISHARA S. KODIKARA/AFP via Getty Images

ACI Prensa Staff, Apr 23, 2024 / 16:05 pm (CNA).

More than 50,000 Catholics have asked the Church in Sri Lanka to recognize as martyrs the 171 victims of the 2019 Easter massacre in the island nation.

On April 21, 2019, Easter Sunday, eight suicide bombers attacked two Catholic churches, a Protestant church, and three luxury hotels, killing 269 people and leaving more than 500 injured.

Of the victims, 171 were Catholic faithful who were attending Mass at St. Sebastian and St. Anthony Churches in Colombo, the capital of the Asian country.

Five years after the tragedy, on Sunday, April 21, the local Church announced that it will begin the procedures to recognize the martyrdom of the 171 Catholics, who were remembered with various initiatives, including a petition with more than 50,000 signatures that was presented to the archbishop of Colombo, Cardinal Albert Malcolm Ranjith.

The Archdiocese of Colombo will now send an official request to the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints to proceed with the opening of the diocesan phase of the beatification cause.

“The collection of signatures and raising awareness among the faithful has been underway since the beginning of Lent. Among the people there is full awareness of the gift of faith of those innocent people, murdered in the church while celebrating the resurrection of Christ,” Father Jude Chrysantha Fernando, director of the archdiocese’s communications office, told the Vatican news agency Fides from Colombo.

The priest said that on Sunday “there was a large participation of the faithful in the celebrations: in the morning memorial Masses were held in all churches and a special ceremony was held in the presence of Cardinal Ranjith at St. Anthony Church in Colombo” as well as with other religious leaders and civil authorities.

In Colombo thousands of people observed “a solemn two-minute moment of silence, which was also observed in churches across the country, to honor and remember those who lost their lives” on Easter 2019.

“It was a moment of great spiritual intensity for the Catholic community of Sri Lanka: The memory of these ‘heroes of the faith’ is alive and a source of inspiration for many,” Fernando told Fides.

In the Mass held at St. Anthony Church, Ranjith noted that the Catholic Church in Sri Lanka has been asking for justice for five years and demanding that an international and independent investigation into the 2019 attacks be carried out.

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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