In BBC message, Pope Francis says UN climate summit must offer ‘effective responses’ to ecological crisis

Vatican City, Mar 7, 2018 / 05:17 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican announced Wednesday that Pope Francis has recognized a second miracle allowing five people on the path to sainthood to be canonized, the most prominent being Bl. Pope Paul VI and Bl. Oscar Romero.

With a second miracle approved, the path has been cleared for a date to be set for the canonization of each of the five candidates, allowing them to officially be declared a saint.

Though no date has yet been announced, both Paul VI and Oscar Romero are expected to be canonized together during the Synod of Bishops in October.

Born as Giovanni Montini in 1897 in the town of Concesio in the Lombardy region of Italy, the future Pope Paul VI was ordained a priest at the age of 22. He served as Archbishop of Milan prior to his election as Bishop of Rome in 1963.

As pope, he oversaw much of the Second Vatican Council, which had been opened by Pope St. John XXIII, and in 1969 promulgated a new Roman Missal. He died in 1978, and was beatified by Pope Francis Oct. 19, 2014.

Pope Francis himself unofficially confirmed the news of Paul VI’s canonization during his annual meeting with the priests of Rome Feb. 17. However, the Vatican’s announcement makes it official.

Apart from his role in the council, Paul VI is most widely know for his landmark encyclical Humanae Vitae, which was published in 1968 and reaffirmed the Church’s teaching against contraception in wake of the sexual revolution. This year marks the 50th anniversary the historic encyclical, making the canonization of the author all the more relevant.

Both miracles attributed to Paul VI’s intercession involve the healing of an unborn child.

Bl. Oscar Romero, who was beatified by Pope Francis May 23, 2015, in El Salvador, was the archbishop of the nation’s capital city of San Salvador. He was shot while celebrating Mass March 24, 1980, during the birth of a civil war between leftist guerrilla forces and the dictatorial government of the right.

An outspoken critic of the violence and injustices being committed at the time, Romero was declared a martyr who was killed in hatred of the faith for his vocal defense of human rights.

The Vatican made the announcement about the acceptance of the miracles March 7, following a meeting between Pope Francis and Cardinal Angelo Amato, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, the day before.

During the meeting, Francis advanced a total of 13 saints’ causes, recognizing at least one person as a martyr and allowing one religious sister to be beatified.

In addition to Paul VI and Oscar Romero, the Pope approved a second miracle for three other saints’ causes, allowing for their canonization. The new saints-to-be are: Bl. Francesco Spinelli, a diocesan priest and founder of the Institute of the Adorers of the Blessed Sacrament; Bl. Vincenzo Romano, a diocesan priest from Torre de Greco in Italy; and Bl. Maria Caterina Kasper, a German nun and founder of the Institute of the Poor Handmaids of Jesus Christ.  

Pope Francis also recognized a first miracle attributed to Maria Felicia di Gesu Sacramento, a Discalced Carmelite nun from Paraguay who died in 1959, allowing for her to be beatified and receive the title “blessed.”

Additionally, he recognized the martyrdom of Slavic laywoman Anna Kolesárová. Born in Vysoká nad Uhom, Slovakia in 1928, she was killed by a drunken Soviet soldier near the end of the Second World War in 1944 for refusing his sexual advances.

At the time, Soviet troops were passing through Kolesárová’s district, which was then a part of Hungary, and occupied her village on the way. When one soldier entered her home and found the family in hiding, he attempted to sleep with Kolesárová, threatening her with death if she did not.  

However, raised in a pious Catholic family, Kolesárová refused, and was shot in front of her family at the age of 16.

In addition to these causes, Pope Francis also recognized the heroic virtue of six people, allowing them to be called “venerable.”

Among these causes are: Polish Fr. Bernardo ?ubie?ski of the Congregation of the Holy Redeemer; Cecilio Maria Cortinovis, an Italian Franciscan religious; Italian Sisters Giustina and Maria Schiapparoli, who founded the order of the Benedictine Sisters of Divine Providence of Voghera; Italian laywoman Antonella Bordoni, founder of the Lay Fraternity of the Little Daughters of the Mother of God; and Italian laywoman Alessandra Sabattini.

[…]

Vatican City, Mar 29, 2019 / 08:01 pm (CNA).- President Andrés Manuel López Obrador of Mexico this week wrote to Pope Francis and the King of Spain, Felipe VI, asking for an apology for the conquest of Mexico by Spanish Catholics in the 16th century.

His demand for an apology comes at the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the conquest, and the 200th anniversary of Mexico’s independence.

“I have sent a letter to the Spanish king [Felipe VI] and another letter to the Pope so that the abuses can be acknowledged and an apology can be made to the indigenous peoples for the violations of what we now call human rights,” López Obrador said in video comments earlier this week.

“There were massacres…The so-called conquest was done with the sword and the cross. They raised churches on top of temples,” he said.

“The time has come to reconcile but first they should ask forgiveness,” he added.

The request generated criticism, and some agreement, in both Spain and Mexico.

According to the New York Times, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez dismissed the request, along with Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell, who said it was “weird to receive now this request for an apology for events that occurred 500 years ago.”

Sergio Sarmiento, a Mexican columnist, asked why the president was calling for an apology from the people who stayed in Spain, and therefore would not have been a part of the Spanish conquest. Others criticized the president for demanding an apology for a 500 year-old offense.

One voice of support for the request came from Ione Belarra, a politician with the far-left Spanish Podemos party, who said on Twitter that it was “very right” to demand an apology for the “abuses” of the conquest.

In 1519, Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés led a small army into the Aztec empire in Mexico, and within two years the Aztecs had fallen under European rule. The conquest led to a great loss of life among the indigenous peoples of Mexico, both in battle and from the introduction of foreign diseases, like smallpox.

At the time of Cortés’ arrival in Mexico, the Aztecs were practicing child sacrifice, as well as a ritual in which they pulled the still-pulsing heart out of the chest of sacrificial victims and offered it to the gods, letting the blood spill over the altars and throwing the dead bodies off the steps of the temple.

Towers and other structures found in the Aztec empire were also reportedly made entirely human skulls, and anthropologists have also found evidence of a type of ritual cannibalism that took place among the Aztecs.

In 1892, Leo XIII offered a defense of the conquest of the Americas, largely at the hands of Christians. In the native people of America, Pope Leo said, Christopher Columbus “saw in spirit a mighty multitude, cloaked in miserable darkness, given over to evil rites, and the superstitious worship of vain gods. Miserable it is to live in a barbarous state and with savage manners: but more miserable to lack the knowledge of that which is highest, and to dwell in ignorance of the one true God. Considering these things, therefore, in his mind, he sought first of all to extend the Christian name and the benefits of Christian charity to the West.”

The conquest of the Americas has also been addressed recently by St. John Paul II and Pope Francis.

In an address to native peoples during a visit to the United States in 1987, John Paul II acknowledged the pain caused by the encounter of Europeans with Native Americans, which “was an event of such significance and change that it profoundly influences your collective life even today. That encounter was a harsh and painful reality for your peoples. The cultural oppression, the injustices, the disruption of your life and of your traditional societies must be acknowledged,” he said.

However, he also defended the positive aspects of the work of the “many missionaries who strenuously defended the rights of the original inhabitants of this land,” who established missions and improved education standards while working to preserve the native language.

“Above all, they proclaimed the Good News of salvation in our Lord Jesus Christ, an essential part of which is that all men and women are equally children of God and must be respected and loved as such. This Gospel of Jesus Christ is today, and will remain forever, the greatest pride and possession of your people,” he said.

He recalled the example of St. Junipero Serra, who presented Mexican authorities with a “Bill of Rights” of sorts for indigenous peoples. He also recalled how in 1537, Paul III “proclaimed the dignity and rights of the native peoples of the Americas by insisting that they not be deprived of their freedom or the possession of their property.”

In 2015, Pope Francis also addressed the conquest of the Americas, during a meeting with native peoples in Bolivia.

He echoed the sentiments of St. John Paul II, asking forgiveness for the sins committed by some Christians at the time, while defending the actions of other Christians at the time, who chose peace over violence.

“I say this to you with regret: many grave sins were committed against the native peoples of America in the name of God. My predecessors acknowledged this, CELAM, the Council of Latin American Bishops, has said it, and I too wish to say it. Like Saint John Paul II, I ask that the Church – I repeat what he said – ‘kneel before God and implore forgiveness for the past and present sins of her sons and daughters,’” he said, quoting an address given by John Paul II in the year 2000.

“I would also say, and here I wish to be quite clear, as was Saint John Paul II: I humbly ask forgiveness, not only for the offenses of the Church herself, but also for crimes committed against the native peoples during the so-called conquest of America. Together with this request for forgiveness and in order to be just, I also would like us to remember the thousands of priests and bishops who strongly opposed the logic of the sword with the power of the Cross. There was sin, a great deal of it, for which we did not ask pardon. So for this, we ask forgiveness, I ask forgiveness. But here also, where there was sin, great sin, grace abounded through the men and women who defended the rights of indigenous peoples,” he said.

The Vatican has yet to officially respond to López Obrador’s recent request for an apology for the conquest of Mexico.

[…]

Vatican City, Mar 27, 2019 / 07:20 am (CNA).- The ‘daily bread’ asked of God in the ‘Our Father’ is for everyone, and Christians will be judged by how well they shared their gifts with those in need, Pope Francis said Wednesday…. […]