‘An untimely idea’: Ukrainian Catholic leader concerned by format of Pope’s Good Friday Via Crucis

Crowds exit Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Washington, D.C., after the June 14, 2023, "Pride Mass" with "Progress Pride" flags visible in the back of the church. / Peter Pinedo/ CNA

Washington D.C., Jun 15, 2023 / 12:35 pm … […]

Pope Francis waves at pilgrims from China at the general audience in St. Peter’s Square on Sept. 7, 2016. / Daniel Ibanez/CNA.

Vatican City, Jul 5, 2022 / 04:49 am (CNA).

Pope Francis said he hopes the Vatican’s provisional agreement with China on the appointment of Catholic bishops will be renewed for the second time in October.

In comments to Reuters published Tuesday, the pope said “the agreement is moving well and I hope that in October it can be renewed.”

The Vatican-China agreement was first signed in September 2018 and then renewed for another two years in October 2020. The terms of the agreement have not been made public.

Pope Francis spoke to Reuters about the China deal in a 90-minute interview which also covered his health, resignation rumors, and the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

In September 2021, the Vatican confirmed that the sixth Catholic bishop had been ordained under the agreement’s terms.

Seven bishops ordained before the 2018 agreement have also had their positions regularized by the Vatican.

Pope Francis said the appointment of bishops under the deal in China “is going slowly, but they are being appointed.”

The slow process, he said, is “‘the Chinese way,’ because the Chinese have that sense of time that nobody can rush them.”

Father Bernardo Cervellera, former editor-in-chief of AsiaNews, told CNA last year that the bishops who have been nominated and ordained are close to the Patriotic Catholic Association, “so this means that they are very near to the government.”

The Catholic Church is still in need of around 40 more bishops in China, according to Cervellera.

In the Reuters interview, Pope Francis said the Chinese “also have their own problems because it is not the same situation in every region of the country. [The treatment of Catholics] also depends on local leaders.”

He also defended the Vatican-China deal against its critics.

“Diplomacy is the art of the possible and of doing things to make the possible become a reality,” he said.

He compared today’s critics and those who spoke negatively of the Vatican’s diplomatic decisions during the Cold War, when the popes struck deals with Eastern European communist governments in an attempt to protect the interests of the Catholic Church.

“Diplomacy is like that. When you face a blocked situation, you have to find the possible way, not the ideal way, out of it,” the pope said.

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Brussels, Belgium, Oct 31, 2017 / 04:22 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A group of Catholics who were reciting the rosary were removed Saturday from the Brussels cathedral  on the grounds that they were disturbing a service celebrating the 500th anniversary of the Reformation.

The United Protestant Church in Belgium was hosting the event with the Cathedral of St. Michael and St. Gudula to commemorate the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther posting the 95 Theses to the door of Wittenberg Castle – a gesture which led to Luther’s eventual schism from the Catholic Church.

Steven Fuit, president of the UPCB, spoke at the event, saying it was an ecumenical service and noting that “our unity essentially derives from respecting differences.”

“Our individuality and our unity consist not in the passive acceptance of diversity,” Fuit said, according to the Catholic Herald.

“Without the other who is different, who thinks otherwise, who does otherwise, I do not exist, I am nothing. Differences are an inherent part of unity,” he continued.

However, approximately a dozen young Catholics made an appearance during the commemoration and began to recite the rosary with linked arms during the ceremony.

Police ultimately removed the group from the cathedral, as shown on a YouTube video.

The group of Catholics allegedly handed out a leaflet calling the ceremony a “profanation,” according to Media-Presse-Info, a French news website.

“Our Cathedral of St. Michael and St. Gudula is a Catholic building built by our fathers to be a House of God, for the celebration of holy Mass, for the praise of God and the saints,” read the leaflet.

“Indeed, the so-called Reformation was really a revolt: under the pretext of combatting abuses, Luther rebelled against the divine authority of the Catholic Church, denied numerous Truths of the Faith, abolished the Sacrifice of the Mass and the Sacraments, rejected the necessity of good works and the practice of Christian virtues. Finally, he attacked the veneration of the Virgin Mary and the saints, the religious life and monastic vows,” the leaflet continued.

“This terrible revolution was a great tragedy for Christian society and for the salvation of souls. And the Lutheran errors are still heresies today because the Truth is eternal.”

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