Pope Francis praying and working from hospital

Vatican City, Jun 8, 2017 / 04:14 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After a last-minute meeting with Pope Francis Thursday to discuss the dire situation of their country, Venezuela’s bishops said they have his full support in facing the trials of a regime they say oppresses its people to maintain power.

“The government has as a goal to maintain power at the cost of the life of any person at all costs,” Archbishop Diego Padrón Sanchez of Cumana told journalists June 8.

Not only this, but the government “has the desire, the will, the scope, to have a submissive, silent people that doesn’t protest,” he said. And to ensure that this happens, society must be made up of a people who have “no food, no medicine (and) which spends every moment trying to resolve daily problems.”

“A people that is oppressed, suffering and sick doesn’t have the strength to raise itself in revolt against anyone,” he said.

Archbishop Padrón spoke to a group of journalists after the leadership of the Venezuelan bishops conference met with Pope Francis and other Vatican officials earlier that morning.

The meeting was not planned in advance, and was not included in the weekly schedule sent out by the Vatican’s Secretariat for Communications. Announced just days before, the conversation was squeezed into the Pope’s agenda before his meeting with the Panamanian bishops, who are in Rome for their ad limina visit, and a meeting with Nigeria’s bishops.

During the meeting, Archbishop Padrón said they discussed the ongoing crisis in the country, and that the conversation was very “cordial, very simple, fraternal” and relaxed. The Pope asked questions, and the bishops were able to answer freely.

The Pope is “very well informed” on the situation, the archbishop said, explaining that Francis himself said he receives a daily update on what is going on.

Francis voiced his closeness to the bishops and the “people who are suffering,” the archbishop said, recalling that Francis was “very moved” by the description of some of the cases they’ve witnessed in recent days.

Venezuela is currently undergoing a humanitarian emergency in which fundamental necessities are inaccessible and many, including children, die due to the lack of basic foods and medicines.

The country has been ruled by a socialist government since 1999. In the wake of Nicolas Maduro succeeding Hugo Chavez as president in 2013, Venezuela has been marred by violence and social and economic upheaval. Poor economic policies, including strict price controls, coupled with high inflation rates, have resulted in a severe lack of basic necessities such as toilet paper, milk, flour, diapers and medicines.

The socialist government is widely blamed for the crisis. Since 2003, price controls on some 160 products, including cooking oil, soap and flour, have meant that while they are affordable, they fly off store shelves only to be resold on the black market at much higher rates.

The Venezuelan government is known to be among the most corrupt in Latin America, and violent crime in the country has spiked since Maduro took office.

The regime is known to have committed gross abuses, including violence, against those who don’t share their political ideologies, and are accused of taking many political prisoners.

Archbishop Padrón said that for the bishops, their “Magna Carta” on how to move forward in the crisis is the letter Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin sent them in December, in which he indicated the conditions under which dialogue with the Maduro regime ought to be carried out.

The four conditions listed by Cardinal Parolin are: the assurance of a humanitarian corridor for food and medicine; respect for and the re-establishment of the National Assembly; the release of political prisoners; and the guarantee of elections.

While Venezuelans had been protesting many of  Maduro’s moves for some time, the final straw for many was when in late March the president announced his decision to call a constitutional assembly and and to revoke the power of the National Assembly, which had been in the hands of the opposition since 2015.

Part of Maduro’s guarantee was that after the constitutional assembly takes place July 30, elections will finally be held in December.

However, Archbishop Padrón said he doesn’t have faith in the regime, and believes the deal is “a trap” for the people, because during the July assembly “you can easily vote to annul or not the elections in December. So the December date is just an imaginary figure for the people.”

But even though they have very real problems with Maduro, Archbishop Padrón said this doesn’t mean that the bishops are on the side of the opposition.

“We don’t represent any party, and we don’t want to be on the side of the government or the opposition,” he said. “We want to help the people.”

The bishops came “to present to the Holy Father the situation of the Venezuelan people, whether they are those people who are close to the government, or those who feel far from the government. We don’t have any preference in this sense.”

During the meeting, the prelates gave the Pope two dossiers, the first containing a list of some 70 people, mostly youth, who have been killed during protests in Caracas and other cities throughout Venezuela. The second document was a detailed outline of the work the bishops conference has done so far to help alleviate the crisis.

After meeting with the Pope, who gave the bishops his “full support” and “total confidence” in their efforts, the six prelates present for the encounter then met with Cardinal Parolin, who before becoming Secretary of State was the apostolic nuncio to Venezuela for four years.

They later met with officials of the Vatican’s charitable organization Caritas Internationalis, which is offering concrete support to needy families on the ground in Venezuela.

Pope Francis specifically told the bishops to “reinforce” the work that Caritas does, not only for the Venezuela branch, but the international organization as a whole, because they are “ready to help” in acquiring and distributing food and mostly medicines to the people.

However, the bishops conference still faces issues when it comes to getting medicines to the people, Archbishop Padrón said. Even though the government technically gave them permission to distribute medication a few weeks ago, the conditions outlined in the fine print make it nearly impossible to do.

The government does this, he said, because they don’t want to appear “insensitive” or as “a needy country.”

“The international image of the government must be maintained,” he observed.

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Protesters at a school boycott rally in Hong Kong’s Central District, Sept. 2, 2019. / Chris McGrath / Shutterstock.

Denver Newsroom, Feb 10, 2022 / 16:12 pm (CNA).
Speaking anonymously during an online discussion, a Christian cleric in Hong Ko… […]

Pope Francis greets newly married couples at the general audience in the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall on Aug. 30, 2023. / Adi Zace/CNA

Vatican City, Aug 30, 2023 / 05:23 am (CNA).

St. Kateri Tekakwitha teaches us to live an ordinary holiness and to confront the suffering of life with patience, Pope Francis said on Wednesday.

At his weekly public audience Aug. 30, the pope spoke about the Native American saint in his continuing series of talks on apostolic zeal.

“Kateri Tekakwitha’s life shows us that every challenge can be overcome if we open our hearts to Jesus, who grants us the grace we need: patience and a heart open to Jesus. This is a recipe to live well,” he said in the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall.

Francis described the intense difficulties the saint faced — including the loss at age four of her parents and brother from smallpox, and persecution after her baptism and conversion to Christianity — and the way Kateri responded.

“All this gave Kateri a great love for the Cross, the definitive sign of the love of Christ, who gave himself to the end for us,” he said. “Indeed, witnessing to the Gospel is not only about what is pleasing; we must also know how to bear our daily crosses with patience, trust, and hope.”

The pope emphasized that “patience is a great Christian virtue” needed to be a good Christian.

“May we too, like St. Kateri Tekakwitha, draw strength from the Lord and learn to do ordinary things in extraordinary ways, growing daily in faith, charity, and zealous witness for Christ,” he said.

St. Kateri Tekakwitha was the first native North American woman to be canonized in the Catholic Church.

In his catechesis at the general audience, Pope Francis recounted a little bit about her life.

“Born around the year 1656 in a village in upstate New York, she was the daughter of an unbaptized Mohawk chief and an Algonquin Christian mother, who taught Kateri to pray and sing hymns to God,” he said.

The pope pointed out that mothers and grandmothers are often the first people to introduce their children and grandchildren to the faith.

“Evangelism often begins this way: with simple, small gestures, such as parents helping their children learn to talk to God in prayer and telling them about His great and merciful love. The foundation of faith for Kateri, and often for us as well, was laid in this way,” he said.

While still a young child, a smallpox outbreak killed Kateri’s little brother and parents, and left the girl with scars and vision problems.

She was baptized a Catholic on Easter Sunday in 1676, at around 19 years old.

Due to persecution and death threats after her baptism, “Kateri was forced to take refuge among the Mohawks in the Jesuit mission near the city of Montreal,” Francis said.

“There she attended Mass every morning, devoted time to adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, prayed the Rosary, and lived a life of penance,” he continued. “These spiritual practices of hers impressed everyone at the Mission; they recognized in Kateri a holiness that was appealing because it stemmed from her deep love for God.”

Kateri also taught the children of the mission to pray and cared for the sick and elderly.

“Here we see how a vital relationship with the Lord bears fruit in the commitment to perform simple, daily works of mercy, both material and spiritual, toward one’s brothers and sisters, especially the poor and neediest,” he said.

“Faith,” he added, “is always expressed in service.”

Pope Francsis said Kateri’s life shows that apostolic zeal must include “a vital union with Jesus, nourished by prayer and the sacraments, and the desire to spread the beauty of the Christian message through fidelity to one’s particular vocation.”

He also pointed out the beauty of her final words before death: “Jesus, I love you.”

“Let us not forget: each of us is called to holiness, to everyday holiness, to the holiness of the common Christian life,” he encouraged. “Each of us has this call: let us go forward on this path. The Lord will not fail us.”

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