Pope Francis baptizes conjoined twins separated in Rome

Vatican City, May 20, 2019 / 11:19 am (CNA).- French bishops will meet with the children of priests in June to hear their testimonies of hidden suffering.

Monsignor Olivier Ribadeu Dumas, secretary of the French bishops’ conference, confirmed that three members of the French association Children of Silence will share their stories June 13 at the Bishops Conference of France headquarters in Paris, Le Monde reported.

The president of Children of Silence, Anne-Marie Jarzac, called the June meeting a welcome step. Jarzac met previously with Msgr. Dumas and Father Emmanuel Coquet in February in preparation for the June testimony.

“It was a very moving moment,” Jarzac told Le Monde. “For the first time, we felt that the Church opened its doors to us, that there was no more denial, but a listening and an awareness of what we have lived.”

Jarzac is the daughter of a priest and a nun. She leads the French association for children of priests with more than 50 members.

In February 2019, the Vatican confirmed the existence of an internal document from the Congregation of Clergy outlining criteria on the protection of children of priests. “Notes concerning the practice of the Congregation for the Clergy with regard to clerics with children” is a template document used to aid individual bishops dealing with these cases.

In many cases involving priestly paternity, priests either request dispensation or are dismissed from the clerical state because of the parental responsibility and obligation owed to the child.

“Each case is examined on its merits and its own particular circumstances,” Cardinal Beniamino Stella, prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy, told L’Osservatore Romano in an interview Feb. 27. Stella also noted that exceptions to the loss of the clerical state are rare.

“The child’s well-being and care of the child must be at the centre of attention for the Church, so that the child does not lack, not only the necessities of life, but especially the educative role and the affection of a father,” Cardinal Stella said.

The Prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy also responded to claims that the existence of children of priests somehow undermines the value of priestly celibacy in the Church.

“The fact that some priests have experienced relationships and have brought children into the world does not affect the theme of priestly celibacy, which represents a precious gift for the Latin church, the ever-present value of which has been expressed by the recent Popes, from St. Paul VI to Pope Francis,” he said.

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Vatican City, Aug 23, 2017 / 04:00 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Wednesday, Pope Francis said going through life downcast as if it has no meaning is not the attitude of a Christian, who has the assurance that even when things look grim, there is always new hope found in Christ.

“It is not Christian to walk with your gaze turned down, without raising your eyes to the horizon. As if our entire path expires here, in the palm of a few meters of the journey,” the Pope said Aug. 23.

To live “as if in our lives there was not destination and no landing, place, and we were forced to an eternal wandering, without any reason for our many labors; this is not Christian,” he said.  

Rather, as Christians “we believe and we know that death and hatred are not the final words pronounced in the parable of human existence,” he said, adding that to be a Christian “means a new perspective: a gaze full of hope.”

Pope Francis spoke to pilgrims in the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall for his weekly general audience, continuing his catechesis on Christian hope.

In his address, Francis turned to the day’s reading from Revelation, in which God, seated on his throne in heaven, says “I will make all things new.”

This passage, he said, is a reminder that “Christian hope is based on faith in God who always creates newness in the life of man, in history and in the cosmos. Newness and surprises.”

Turning to the last pages of the bible, the Pope said they show us the final goal for all believers, which is the heavenly Jerusalem, described as “an immense tent, where God will welcome all men to live with them permanently.”

“This is our hope,” Francis said, noting how the bible goes on to describe how God will “wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.”

He urged those present to reflect on the passage “not in an abstract way,” but in light of all the sad news published in recent days such as the terrorist attack in Barcelona and natural disasters – news “which we all risk becoming addicted to.”

Pointing to the many children who suffer from war, youth whose dreams are often destroyed and refugees who embark on dangerous journeys and who many times are exploited, Pope Francis noted that “unfortunately life is also this.”

However, returning to the day’s scripture passage, he stressed that “there is a Father who weeps with tears of infinite mercy toward his children.”

“We have a God who knows how to weep, who weeps with us,” he said, adding that he is also a Father “who waits to console us, because he knows our sufferings and has prepared for us a different future.”

God, the Pope said,  “did not want our lives by mistake, forcing himself and us to long nights of anguish.” Rather, “he created us because he wants us happy. He is our Father, and if we here, now, experience a life that is not what he wanted for us, Jesus guarantees us that God himself is working his ransom.”

Some people believe that all of life’s happiness lay in youth and in the past, and that living “is a slow decay.” Still others hold that the joys we experience “are only episodic and passionate,” and that the life of man “is writing nonsense,” the Pope noted.

But as Christians, “we don’t believe this. We believe instead that on man’s horizon there is a sun that illuminates forever. We believe that our most beautiful days are still to come.”

“We are people more of spring than autumn,” he said, and urged those present to ask themselves: “Am I a man, woman, child of the spring, or the fall? Is my spirit in the fall or the spring?”

“Don’t forget that question,” he said in off-the-cuff remarks, asking again “am I a person of the spring or the fall? The spring, which waits for flowers, fruit, the sun, which is Jesus; or the autumn, which is always looking down, embittered, with, as sometimes I’ve said, a face like peppers in vinegar.”

There are always problems in life, such as gossip, war or illness, but in the end “the grain grows and in the end, evil is eliminated,” he said.

Pope Francis closed his address saying Christians have the knowledge that in the Kingdom of God, grain grows “even if in there are weeds in the middle.”

“In the end evil will be eliminated,” he said. “The future does not belong to us, but we know that Jesus Christ is the greatest grace of life: he is the embrace of God who waits for us at the end, but who already accompanies us and consoles us on the journey.”

After greeting groups of pilgrims from various countries around the world, Pope Francis offered prayers for the victims of a 4.0 level earthquake that rocked the Italian island of Ischia, roughly 88 miles off the coast of Naples, Monday, killing two and injuring at least 39 others.

Francis expressed his “affectionate closeness” to the many who are suffering as a result of the quake, and offered prayers “for the death, the wounded, for their families and for the people who have lost their homes.”

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Vatican City, Dec 23, 2018 / 05:47 am (CNA/EWTN News).- After a deadly tsunami struck Indonesia Saturday night, killing more than 200 people and injuring hundreds more, Pope Francis has asked for everyone to join him in prayer for the suffering victims this Christmas.

“My thoughts go out right now to the populations of Indonesia, affected by violent natural disasters, which have caused serious losses in human lives, numerous people missing and homeless, and extensive material damage,” Pope Francis said after his Angelus prayer Dec. 23.

“I invite everyone to join me in prayer for the victims and their loved ones,” he said, calling for solidarity and support from the international community.

The tsunami left at least 222 people dead and more than 840 injured, according to Sutopo Purwo Nugroho from Indonesia’s disaster management agency.

Researchers suspect the destructive waves were triggered by a volcanic eruption in the Sunda Strait between two Indonesian islands.

Pope Francis expressed his wish to be “spiritually close” to the displaced and “to all the people who are imploring God for relief in their suffering.”
 
The pope reflected on the importance of families being together at Christmas, but said he understood that “many people do not have this possibility, for different reasons.”

To people apart from their families at Christmas, Pope Francis extended an invitation to find a “true family” in the Catholic Church.

“Our heavenly Father does not forget you and does not abandon you. If you are a Christian, I wish you to find in the Church a true family, where you can experience the warmth of fraternal love,” he said.

Francis stressed that the doors of the Catholic community are open to Christians and non-Christians alike this Christmas. “Jesus is born for everyone and gives everyone the love of God,” he said.

The pope encouraged people preparing for Christmas to fix their gaze on Mary, who spent her months of waiting for Christ’s coming in service to her elderly relative, Elizabeth.

“The Gospel of Mary’s visit to Elizabeth prepares us to live Christmas well, communicating to us the dynamism of faith and charity,” Pope Francis said.

“A dynamism full of joy, as seen in the meeting between the two mothers, which is all a hymn of joyous exultation in the Lord, who does great things with the little ones who trust Him,” he continued.

May the Virgin Mary obtain for us the grace of living a Christmas centered, not on ourselves, but on Jesus and our brothers and sisters in need, Pope Francis prayed.

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