Europe

Stockholm, Sweden, May 17, 2018 / 04:54 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A town in southern Sweden granted permission this week to allow Islamic calls to prayer for the local mosque – a move some are calling controversial in light of the town’s previous denial of the use of bells by the Catholic parish.

Local police approved the mosque’s adhan – or call to worship – in the town of Vaxjo, more than 250 miles southwest of Stockholm, on Tuesday. The May 15 permit requires that the Islamic call to prayer, which is recited by the muezzin, does not exceed a certain level of decibels, so as not to disturb residents, and will take place every Friday for almost four minutes.

The permit will be valid for one year.

The allowance has drawn questions from the local Catholic church, St. Michael’s, whose pastor Fr. Ingvar Fogelqvist said that previous requests to ring the church bells were denied in both the 1990s and the 2000s. The Catholic church is less than a mile from Vaxjo’s mosque.

“It is a matter of fairness and with the decision granting the mosque permission to do a call to prayer, we have discussed the possibility of applying again,” Fogelqvist said, according to the Local.

Fr. Fogelqvist further noted that church’s bells are small and “would make the Catholic Church a bit more visible here in the community,” although there is a long process of seeking permission for such a request. He additionally remarked that the church may reapply for an approval of church bells to mark Sunday Masses and special occasions, such as funerals.

The permit allowing Islamic calls of prayer in Vaxjo comes just months ahead of Sweden’s September general elections, and some politicians are speaking out on the matter.

Prime Minister Stefan Lofven of the Social Democrats party stated that “society in Sweden is built on having different religions,” and saw the permit as a step toward ending segregation.

However other politicians, such as Ebba Busch Thor of the Christian Democrats, said that “people shouldn’t have to hear it [calls to prayer] in their homes.”

Other local politicians have found the move controversial, including Vaxjo’s conservative moderate’s city council, Anna Tenje, who said the permit “will not strengthen integration,” but would rather “risk pulling the city further apart,” according to TT news agency.

One spokesman from the local Muslim community in Vaxjo, Avdi Islami, viewed the call of prayer as a way of celebrating differences, saying that it is “better to think of the differences as making us stronger.”

Two other towns in Sweden have made similar allowances for mosques’ call to prayer, including Botkyrka, a suburb of Stockholm, and Karlskrona, a town in the southeast.

However, a poll found that 60 percent of its participants wanted to prohibit Islamic calls of prayer at mosques in Sweden, according to research conducted by the social research company SIFO.

According to the Swedish Agency for Support to Faith Communities, there are approximately 400,000 Muslims in Sweden. There are a little more than 113,000 Catholics, and most Swedes are Lutheran.

[…]

Dublin, Ireland, May 17, 2018 / 12:36 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Eliminating Ireland’s constitutional protection of life inside the womb would have negative consequences on not only the unborn, but on women and society, said an Irish bioethicicst and m… […]

Dublin, Ireland, May 17, 2018 / 03:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- With a referendum vote that could legalize abortion in Ireland just days away, the country’s clergy and Church leaders are asking the world for prayers.

In a video message posted to YouT… […]

London, England, May 15, 2018 / 05:07 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Caps on Catholic enrollment in government-funded Catholic schools in England and Wales will continue, despite the ruling party’s campaign pledge to end the limits.

Catholic leaders react… […]

Dublin, Ireland, May 15, 2018 / 05:00 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Less than two weeks before a historic vote on whether to allow increased access to abortion in Ireland, thousands of people gathered on Saturday for a final pro-life rally in the capital city o… […]

Rome, Italy, May 14, 2018 / 03:07 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis said Monday he is worried that youth are too enmeshed in a virtual world of cell phones and other technology, separated, in particular, from the real human contact experienced by perfo… […]

Muenster, Germany, May 14, 2018 / 02:28 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The unresolved debate over a proposal to allow Protestant spouses of Catholics to receive communion in German dioceses under some limited circumstances has gathered steam after the country’s president waded into the debate at the major national Catholic conference in the town of Münster.

The planned proposal has been championed by  Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich and Freising, president of the German bishops’ conference, who announced in February that the conference would publish a pastoral handout for married couples that allows Protestant spouses of Catholics “in individual cases” and “under certain conditions” to receive Holy Communion, provided they “affirm the Catholic faith in the Eucharist”.

Subsequently, seven German bishops, led by Cardinal Rainer Woelki of Cologne, ask the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for clarification, asking whether the question of Holy Communion for Protestant spouses in interdenominational marriages can be decided on the level of a national bishops’ conference, or if rather, “a decision of the Universal Church” is required in the matter.

Speaking in an interview with EWTN this week, Cardinal Woelki reaffirmed his position, calling for all parties to “consider and recognize that the Eucharist is ordered to the unity of the creed”.

The Katholikentag event drew several tens of thousands of Catholics from German-speaking Europe to Münster May 9-11, and saw not only politicians and Cardinals Marx and Woelki restating and clarifying their respective positions, but provided a stage to Germany’s president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, saying, in the keynote speech that opened the event: “Let us seek ways of expressing the common Christian faith by sharing in the Last Supper and Communion. I am sure: Thousands of Christians in interdenominational marriages are hoping for this”.

Similarly, Cardinal Marx stated that he hoped there soon would be a solution to the Communion debate, declaring May 9: “When someone is hungry and has faith, they must have access to the Eucharist. That must be our passion, and I will not let up on this.”

A peculiarly polemical form of this “hunger” caused something of a public scandal shortly after, when an official panel discussion played host to one celebrity’s demand to be “handed that wafer [the Most Blessed Sacrament]” since he pays for it with his Church tax.

Speaking on stage with Cardinal Woelki, the comedian and TV personality Eckart von Hirschhausen sharply criticised the Catholic Church’s teaching – to applause from the predominantly Catholic audience – saying, “I don’t see the point of a public debate about wafers” since climate change, on his view, was a “far more serious” issue.

Since he, as a Protestant spouse to a Catholic, pays Church tax and thus considered himself “a major sponsor”, the Church had “better happily hand out a wafer for it, or give me back my money!”, demanded von Hirschhausen, to an applauding crowd.

The crowd’s mood notwithstanding, Cardinal Woelki politely but firmly disagreed. “As a Catholic, I would never speak of a wafer. Using this concept alone demonstrates that we have a very different understanding” of what the Archbishop of Cologne then reminded the audience “is the Most Blessed Sacrament”, in which “Catholics encounter Christ Himself”.

With CNA’s German edition, CNA Deutsch, covering the diatribe, Catholics on social media quickly reacted with outrage to Hirschhausen’s pronouncements, triggering an apology on the following day, which in turn was widely discussed.

In an interview with EWTN’s German edition, Cardinal Woelki noted “he ecclesiological import of the Eucharist: “The Eucharist constitutes the ecclesial community of the Church. The Eucharist and the Church’s community are very, very close to one another.”

“Now, of course I understand that this constitutes a certain challenge, and that people may experience it as a form of suffering, in particular in the case of interdenominational marriages, that they may not be able to receive the Eucharist together.”

At the same time, the Archbishop of Cologne said, “it is of vital importance for us to recognize that whoever says ‘yes’ to the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, acknowledging that Christ is indeed really present, thereby naturally also says ‘yes’ to the Papacy, and the hierarchical structure of the Church, and the veneration of the saints and much, much more”.

Any solution found in Germany could also not constitute some form of exceptionalism, but would have to be fully compatible with the universal Church, Woelki told EWTN’s Christina Link-Blumrath, again making an ecclesiological point: “As the Catholic Church, we also have to point out that we are a part and parcel of the universal Church. There can be no German exceptionalism.”

Just before these latest developments, on May 3, seven German bishops attended an inconclusive meeting at the Vatican to discuss prospective guidelines allowing non-Catholic spouses of Catholics to receive the Eucharist in certain “limited circumstances”, with the Vatican sending the Germans back, saying Pope Francis wants the bishops to come to an agreement among themselves.

Rudolf Gehrig contributed to this report.

[…]

Dublin, Ireland, May 11, 2018 / 09:49 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Internet giant Google has decided to bar all ads related to a fast-approaching referendum on legalizing abortion in Ireland. The decision drew much fire from pro-life critics, and some observer… […]

Lublin, Poland, May 11, 2018 / 10:36 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Archdiocese of Lublin has launched a campaign urging Catholics to take to social media in defense of the unborn, using selfies as a way to voice gratitude for one’s life and the right to be born.

“When we take a selfie we show ourselves, but in this case, we give a sign that we are committed to defending life and the family,” Archbishop Stanislaw Budzik of Lublin said in a May 10 statement coinciding with the launch of the campaign.

“We want to show gratitude to God for the gift of life, to our parents for letting us come to this beautiful world and to all those who defend life, who speak with joy and gratitude about life,” he said, adding that “it is worth devoting all our strength” to defending life and family.

The campaign, titled “Selfie for Life,” was launched by the Lublin archdiocese ahead of Poland’s national March for Life and Family June 10, and is intended to rally a worldwide defense of life and marriage. Marches will take place in 160 cities throughout Poland.

Participants are asked to take a selfie either alone or with a group, and post it to their social media accounts with the hashtag “#DziekujeZeZyje”, roughly translating as “Thankful for my life.”

Archbishop Budzik kicked off the campaign himself May 10 by posting a selfie on Twitter with the hashtag.

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet” data-lang=”en”><p lang=”pl” dir=”ltr”>Zapraszam i zachęcam do akcji &quot;Selfie dla życia&quot; <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/dzi%C4%99kuj%C4%99%C5%BCe%C5%BCyj%C4%99?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#dziękujężeżyję</a> . <a href=”https://t.co/EacqgeYArI”>pic.twitter.com/EacqgeYArI</a></p>&mdash; Stanisław Budzik (@StanislawBudzik) <a href=”https://twitter.com/StanislawBudzik/status/994510485755179008?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>May 10, 2018</a></blockquote>
<script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>

Each photo published with the hashtag will draw a donation of one Polish zloty (USD 0.28) to a fund called “It’s good that you’re alive.”

At the end of the campaign, which will close with the June 10 march, a virtual heart will be created from all the photos published with the hashtag.

Fr. Pawel Rytel-Andrianik, spokesman for the Polish bishops’ conference, said, “we use selfies to promote ourselves, while in this case it’s about to promote the essential values” of marriage, family and the right to life, and that “everyone is invited to take part.”

[…]

Barletta, Italy, May 11, 2018 / 12:16 am (ACI Prensa).- The investiture of Sister Maria Vittoria della Croce last month marked the first ceremony of its kind to be held in the Italian city of Barletta since the 1940s.

“The monastery of San Ruggero [in Barletta] had been reduced to a very few elderly nuns, but three years ago it was re-founded with the arrival of several young sisters, which revitalized it in terms of vocations,” explained Deacon Riccardo Losappio, head of communications for the Archdiocese of Trani-Barletta-Bisceglie.

Losappio told ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language sister agency, that these new religious, including the current abbess, come from the Santa Maria delle Rose (Saint Mary of the Roses) Benedictine monastery located in the town of Sant’Angelo in Pontano in the Marche region in eastern Italy.

Now, with the admission of Sister Maria Vittoria della Croce, “the Benedictine monastic community of San Ruggero is comprised of six nuns that have made solemn vows, four nuns who have made temporary vows, two novices and one postulant,” he said.

Sister Maria Vittoria della Croce – whose baptismal name is Carmen D’Agostino – is 27 years old.

Her induction ceremony into the San Ruggero Benedictine monastery took place April 27 in the co-cathedral Basilica of Saint Mary Major and was presided by the Archbishop of Trani-Barletta-Bisceglie, Leonardo D’Ascenzo.

The photographs of the event were posted by the archdiocese on its Facebook page, where they reached more than 2 million users and drew more than 11,000 shares, 3,700 “likes” and 650 comments.

Losappio explained that “for Benedictine nuns, presenting oneself dressed as a bride is part of the rite of investiture for the religious.”

“They always enter dressed that way because they are spouses of Christ who are going out to meet him and they become brides to anticipate in time what one day will be in the fullness of God.”

During the investiture ceremony, novices who were previously dressed in a wedding gown “have their hair cut, put on the Benedictine habit and receive the crucifix to indicate their joyful renunciation of all that is vain and ephemeral.”

<iframe src=”https://www.facebook.com/plugins/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Farcidiocesitrani%2Fposts%2F1882608005124535&width=500″ width=”500″ height=”683″ style=”border:none;overflow:hidden” scrolling=”no” frameborder=”0″ allowTransparency=”true” allow=”encrypted-media”></iframe>

During the ceremony, Archbishop D’Ascenzo wished the new religious “the great beauty of this presence of Jesus maturing more and more in you and to express it as a witness to the outside world through the relationship with the Church and with your community. May you have a blessed path to holiness and I hope that you can be ever more beautiful in the sense of this witness to the Church and with your sisters.”

Sister Maria Vittoria della Croce shared her testimony in the archdiocesan newspaper “In Comunione.”

The new nun was born in January 1991 in the Italian town of Melfi and finished her studies in nursing at the University of Foggia in 2014. She grew up in a strong Catholic family belonging to the Neocatechumenal Way and has three siblings.

“When I was 15, my mother went to heaven after a long illness which she endured with faith. It was not easy for me, but I can bear witness that the Lord has always provided for my family and me,” she stated.

“Thinking about my mother made me look to heaven, to paradise. More than having made a choice, I was chosen by him: at a youth encounter, and then also through others, I felt the love of Christ manifested on the cross,” she said.

“I simply accepted this love, this call to fight for the kingdom of heaven, and with the help of the Church to discern this call, I entered the monastery,” she said.

For Sister Maria Vittoria della Croce, this vocational call “opened heaven to me” and she is certain that God “loves me as I am, and I am for him a precious pearl.”
 

[…]