Fire damages historic Catholic church in Ukraine

The historic Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. / Credit: Norman Servais/EWTN Great Britain

London, England, Sep 25, 2023 / 14:30 pm (CNA).
The Rev. Dr. Robert Billing became the next rector of the National Shrine of Our Lady at Walsingham, the … […]

Pope Francis stands on an altar erected outside the Parliament Building in Budapest’s Kossuth Lajos’ Square during a public outdoor Mass on April 30, 2023. / Vatican Media

CNA Staff, Apr 30, 2023 / 05:47 am (CNA).

During an outdoor Mass in Budapest on Good Shepherd Sunday, Pope Francis called on Hungarians to be “open and inclusive,” reflecting on how Jesus wants his flock to share the abundant life they’ve received from him.

“Though we are diverse and come from different communities, the Lord has brought us together, so that his immense love can enfold us in one embrace,” the pope said in his April 30 homily, speaking in bright sunshine to more than 50,000 people gathered in and around the Hungarian capital’s picturesque Kossuth Lajos Square.

“[A]ll of us are called to cultivate relationships of fraternity and cooperation, avoiding divisions,” he said, “not retreating into our own community, not concerned to stake out our individual territory, but rather opening our hearts to mutual love.”

Prior to Mass, held outside the city’s majestic neo-Gothic Parliament building, the pope was transported in his wheelchair to a specially constructed altar platform flanked by banners in the colors of the Vatican and Hungarian flags and simply adorned with a towering wooden crucifix.

Cardinal Peter Erdő, the archbishop of Budapest, was the principal celebrant of the Mass; since the pope’s knee injury has impeded his mobility, he has called on cardinals to take his place at the altar.

In his homily, Francis zeroed in on “two specific things that, according to the Gospel, [the Good Shepherd] does for the sheep. He calls them by name, and then he leads them out.”

“The history of salvation does not begin with us, with our merits, our abilities, and our structures. It begins with the call of God,” the pope said.

“[T]his morning, in this place, we sense the joy of our being God’s holy people. All of us were born of his call.”

Pope Francis said he spoke especially “to myself and to my brother bishops and priests: to those of us who are shepherds.” He called on the faithful to be “increasingly open doors: ‘facilitators’ — that’s the word — of God’s grace, masters of closeness; let us be ready to offer our lives, even as Christ … teaches us with open arms from the throne of the cross and shows us daily as the living Bread broken for us on the altar.”

Seeing closed doors is “sad and painful,” the pope said. He referred specifically to the “closed doors of our selfishness with regard to others; the closed doors of our individualism amid a society of growing isolation; the closed doors of our indifference towards the underprivileged and those who suffer; the doors we close towards those who are foreign or unlike us, towards migrants or the poor.”

The pope’s plea was, “Please, let us open those doors! Let us try to be — in our words, deeds, and daily activities — like Jesus, an open door.”

As open doors, the Lord of life can enter our hearts, Pope Francis assured, with “words of consolation and healing.”

Speaking to his Hungarian hosts, he urged them to be “open and inclusive” and “in this way, help Hungary to grow in fraternity, which is the path of peace,” an apparent reference to the country’s contested migration policies.

While the pope has praised the country for being a leader in assisting persecuted Christians in other countries and welcoming more than a million war refugees from neighboring Ukraine, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s curbing of migrants from the Middle East and Africa is generally seen as being at odds with the pope’s call to openness. During the migrant crisis of 2015, Orbán sealed Hungary’s southern border with Serbia, closing off the main land route into Europe.

Pope Francis ended his homily with a reminder that Jesus “calls us by name and cares for us with infinitely tender love. He is the door, and all who enter through him have eternal life. He is our future, a future of ‘life in abundance.’

“Let us never be discouraged,” the pope said. “Let us never be robbed of the joy and peace he has given us. Let us never withdraw into our own problems or turn away from others in apathy. May the Good Shepherd accompany us always: with him, our lives, our families, our Christian communities and all of Hungary will flourish with new and abundant life!”

In his Regina Caeli reflection after the Mass, the pope referenced the ongoing fighting in Ukraine.

“Blessed Virgin, watch over the peoples who suffer so greatly. In a special way, watch over the neighboring, beleaguered Ukrainian people and the Russian people, both consecrated to you,” he said.

“You, who are the Queen of Peace, instill in the hearts of peoples and their leaders the desire to build peace and to give the younger generations a future of hope, not war, a future full of cradles not tombs, a world of brothers and sisters, not walls and barricades.”

Ending his three-day visit to Budapest, the pope is scheduled to deliver a speech on culture and academics Sunday afternoon at the Péter Pázmány Catholic University. He then will have a farewell ceremony at 5:30 p.m. local time before departing on his return flight to Rome.

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Rome Newsroom, Jan 12, 2021 / 12:00 pm (CNA).- For Catholic judge Rosario Livatino, to “render justice” was an act of prayerful self-dedication to God.

“To render justice is a fulfillment of oneself, it is a prayer, it is a dedication of oneself to God,” Livatino said in a lecture on faith and law on the southern Italian island of Sicily in 1986.

Livatino, whose first name means “rosary” in Italian, worked as a prosecutor in Agrigento dealing with the criminal activity of the mafia in the 1980s. He was murdered on his commute to work on Sept. 21, 1990, when he was 37 years old and serving as a magistrate. He was recently declared a martyr by Pope Francis and is expected to be beatified in Sicily this year. 

In an interview published Jan. 12, Fr. Giuseppe Livatino, postulator of the cause for Livatino’s beatification, said that the young Catholic judge provided a “credible witness” of coherence in his life of faith and his daily work.

“More than just ‘holy cards,’ Christians today urgently need credible witnesses. And that [is what] Rosario is,” his postulator said in an interview with ACI Stampa, CNA’s Italian-language news partner.

“Rosario knew well, thanks to his formative experience in Catholic Action, that the Christian is called to be ‘light of the world and salt of the earth,’ who must sanctify the world through one’s family and daily work,” Fr. Livatino said.

As postulator and cousin of the martyred judge, Fr. Livatino has spent years collecting testimonies, examining witnesses, and reading the judge’s personal writings to promote his cause for beatification and potentially canonization.

He said: “Among the testimonies collected, I was positively struck by the episode [recalled] by his former teacher, a priest, who asked him for a ‘small recommendation.’ Rosario felt deep respect and replied firmly: ‘When you offer confession, do you accept recommendations?’”

“Livatino drew directly from the experience of the saints, and in every dimension of his life he rejected any mediocrity … What he has to do, Rosario likes to do it right. He pursues that ‘perfection’ indicated by Jesus in the Gospel, to build the Kingdom of God.” 

“Rosario had drawn his profound wisdom from the Gospel and the Magisterium of the Church. He knows and lives the Gospel, knows and applies the reflections of the [Second Vatican] Council Fathers on the role of the lay faithful in today’s world,” he said.

While promoting Livatino’s cause, his cousin has received thousands of emails from all over Italy, other European countries, Latin America, and the Philippines.

“Many asked for the text of the prayer to ask for the glorification on earth of the Servant of God. Many others asked for information on his life,” he said. “But all showed great interest in this splendid figure of ‘credible witness.’ Many said that they had received spiritual graces through Rosario’s intercession.”

“This man, unknown to most when he was alive, has spoken and continues to speak effectively since Sept. 21, 1990.”

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