Middle East – Africa

Mosul, Iraq, Jun 5, 2017 / 12:00 pm (CNA).- As government forces pry apart the Islamic State’s three yearlong grip on Mosul, Muslims and Christians have united to rebuild a damaged monastery.

A Facebook page called “This is Christian Iraq” – dedicated to connecting Iraqi Christians and maintaining the faith amid ISIS threat – recently posted a series of photos showing the joint effort.

The May 27 post said that young Muslims from the northern neighborhood joined Christians at the Monastery of Saint George, participating in cleaning and repairs.

The monastery belongs to the Chaldean Catholic tradition, an Eastern Catholic rite in full communion with the Vatican. ISIS militants vandalized the monastery – smashing windows, damaging the church’s dome, and discarding its cross.

Although still in need of repairs, the17th century monastery gathered Chaldeans for Easter celebration this year, according to the Irish Times.

“God willing, the celebration of the resurrection of Christ will also mark the return and rising-up of the Christians in Iraq,” Kyriacos Isho, an attendee of the service, told the newspaper.

A new cross has now replaced the old one, and the coming together of Christians and Muslims marks a promising time for both religions as reports announce a final push against the Islamic terrorists.

Residents have seen U.S.-backed Iraqi forces gathering around the local Grand al-Nuri Mosque in the 48 hours leading up to May 31, in what Reuters reports to be a “final showdown.”

The nearly 1000 year old mosque has flown the terrorist’s black flag since the group captured the capital city in 2014. The site is where Islamist caliphate was declared by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, announcing the reign of a new Muslim leader.

Three years ago the Islamic State made roads into the Iraqi’s Nineveh Plain, and since then over 3.3 million Iraqis have been displaced internally. Christians and moderate Muslims were also subject to persecution. They were often forced to pay heavy taxes or even offered a choice of conversion or death.

Over 2016, internal and international forces reclaimed parts of the city, and Eastern Mosul had been retaken in early January of this year.

The government forces are now focusing on Western Mosul, where the mosque is located at the Old City center, and the three districts near the Western side of the Tigris River.

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Yaounde, Cameroon, Jun 2, 2017 / 02:45 pm (CNA).- The body of Cameroon Bishop Jean-Marie Benoît Balla, who has reportedly committed suicide, has been found, African sources have reported.

The Bishop of Bafia in Cameroon had been declared missing earlier this week when his car was spotted on Wednesday near the Sanaha river, near the nation’s capital, Yaoundé.

A note was reportedly found in his car, which read: “Do not look for me! I am in the water.”

While many believe this was the bishop’s suicide note, others believe he may have been murdered, due to other unsolved murders of priests in the country. Boko Haram has been accused of kidnapping priests and nuns in the country.

The La Croix newspaper in its edition for Africa reported that the Cameroonian Bishops’ Conference had issued a communique asking for prayers to find the Bishop, in whose car “the police have not found any sign of violence or blood.”

Obianuju Ekeocha, founder of Culture of Life Africa, posted a series of photos of the Bishop’s car and pleas for prayers early in the morning on Friday, June 2.

2 Days ago Catholic Bishop of Bafia Cameroon ????????- Msgr Jean Marie Benoit BALLA was reported missing
2/7 pic.twitter.com/bWgL1suq7G

— Obianuju Ekeocha (@obianuju) June 2, 2017

Yesterday, fishermen discovered the body of the bishop underneath a bridge. He was 58 years old.

Investigations into his death are ongoing.

Bishop Balla was born on May 10, 1959. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Yaoundé on June 20, 1987.

He was appointed Bishop of Bafia on May 3, 2003 and consecrated on July 12 of that same year. The Diocese of Bafia has more than 200,000 Catholics.

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Cairo, Egypt, May 26, 2017 / 09:56 am (CNA/EWTN News).- An attack on a bus carrying Christian pilgrims in Egypt on Friday killed at least 28 people, including children, and injured at least 22 more.

The AP reported that, according to the Egyptian gove… […]

Karamlesh, Iraq, May 23, 2017 / 12:05 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Martin Baani was just 24 years old when he risked his life as a seminarian to rescue the Blessed Sacrament from the imminent invasion of Islamic State terrorists in his hometown.

Now, he is returning to his native village as a priest, ready to serve the people through the Eucharist.

On August 6, 2014, Baani received a call from a friend who warned that a nearby village had fallen into the hands of ISIS, and that his hometown of Karamlesh would be next.

Baani promptly headed to the San Addai church and took the Blessed Sacrament, to prevent the jihadists from desecrating it. That day, he fled in a car along with his pastor, Fr. Thabet and three other priests.

“I was the last one to leave Karamlesh, with the Blessed Sacrament in my hands,” he told the pontifical foundation Aid to the Church in Need.

Despite threats from ISIS, Baani chose to stay in Iraq instead of fleeing with his family to the United States. He continued his studies at Saint Peter’s Seminary in Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan.

In September 2016, Baani was ordained a priest along with six other men.

Around 500 people attended the ordination, which was presided over by the Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church, Louis Raphael Sako.

A few months before his ordination, Baani told Aid to the Church in Need: “Every day I go to the refugee camps to accompany the families. We are Christian refugees. ISIS wants to eliminate Christianity from Iraq but I have decided to stay. I love Jesus and I don’t want our history to disappear.”

Almost a year later, following the liberation of the villages of the Plain of Nineveh from ISIS control, Fr. Banni confirmed his decision to stay in Iraq in order to “serve my people and our Church.”

“Now I am happy to celebrate Holy Mass in Iraq,” he said.

Aid to the Church in Need has currently planned the reconstruction of about 13,000 Christian homes that were destroyed by ISIS.

Several weeks ago, the foundation held an “olive tree ceremony” where they delivered an olive plant to the homeowners of 105 Christian homes in the villages of Bartella, Karmalesh and Qaraqosh as a symbol of peace and reconciliation.

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Washington D.C., May 19, 2017 / 12:05 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Catholic Church will speak out against injustice and avoid any attempt to normalize the “festering wound” of the Israeli-Palestinian situation, a commission from the region&rsqu… […]

Aleppo, Syria, May 17, 2017 / 12:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Still reeling from the Syrian civil war, the city of Aleppo saw a ray of hope this weekend with a consecration to Our Lady of Fatima on May 13.

The Mass of Consecration took place in Saint Francis of Assisi Roman Rite Cathedral, which is also known as the Latin Church of the Franciscans. It was presided over by the pastor, Fr. Ibrahim Alsabagh, and concelebrated by the bishops and priests of the city.

The consecration of Aleppo took place on the 100th anniversary of the first Marian apparition at Fatima, the same day that Pope Francis celebrated the Mass of canonization of the shepherd children Francisco and Jacinta Marto at the Fatima Shrine in Portugal.

Present at the Mass of Consecration, according to the Facebook page for the Cathedral of Saint Francis of Assisi, was a statue of Our Lady of Fatima that was sent directly from the shrine in Portugal.

After the Eucharist, the statue was carried in procession through the Christian al-Azizieh neighborhood, which has suffered numerous attacks in recent years.

On their Facebook account, SOS Christians in Syria said that the church was full of the faithful and that a number of them were joyful and were moved to tears because for many years, a procession with the statue of Our Lady of Fatima had not been held.

“Let us give thanks to God for this heavenly day that was ours to experience, and let us entrust the Christians of Aleppo to our Blessed Mother. May she, the Queen of Peace, since she gave to the world the Prince of Peace, grant to us the much longed for peace in the Middle East and the entire world,” they said.

The consecration of Aleppo was part of a program of activities organized by the Latin Cathedral of Saint Francis of Assisi on the occasion of the centenary of the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima.

The cathedral stated on its Facebook page that the celebrations began on May 11 with a community prayer and a procession with the statue of the Virgin sent from Fatima.

“Many of us cried because after six years we’re able to again organize the procession through the streets of Aleppo without the fear of missiles. With emotion we welcome the Virgin of Fatima to Aleppo and with the hope that the Virgin Mary will pray for peace for all of Syria,” they said.

On October 13, 2016, at the close of the last international pilgrimage of the year at the Fatima Shrine, the Bishop of Leiria-Fatima, Antonio Marto, blessed a statue that would be sent to the “martyr diocese” of Aleppo.

Currently living conditions in the city are still very hard because there is a shortage of food, medicine, and other supplies, and because electric and water services have not yet been restored.

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Mosul, Iraq, May 9, 2017 / 10:07 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- With the blessing of the cross raised up in the city of Bakhdida May 2, the reconstruction of the towns in the Plain of Nineveh in Iraq destroyed by the Islamic State officially began.

Syrian Catholic Archbishop Youhanna Boutros Moshe of Mosul blessed the cross on a joyous morning with emotive dances by Christians. There are 13,000 damaged houses – 669 of which were completely destroyed by the Islamists – which will be rebuilt in three towns on the Plain of Nineveh: Bartella, Karemlesh, and Bakhdida.

The pontifical foundation Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), which is collaborating on the reconstruction, estimated the total cost of the program to be in excess of $250 million.

To date ACN has provided around $500,000 to the Nineveh Reconstruction Commission.

Work has already begun on the rebuilding of 100 Christian homes in the communities, and during a May 8 ceremony the owners of each of the homes were given olive trees to be planted as symbols of peace and reconciliation.

Speaking to CNA Fr. Luis Montes, a missionary priest of the Institute of the Incarnate Word In Iraq, said that “Christians are very hopeful with the beginning of the reconstruction of the cities of the Plain of Nineveh.”

“Most of those who have remained in Iraq – some estimate that they are half of those that originally fled from ISIS more than two years ago, the other half have probably already left the country – want to stay and return to their cities,” he said.

However, he pointed out, “you can’t say the drama is over for several reasons, including the fact that the community has been greatly reduced and that is cause for sadness and for greater weakness both now and especially for the future.”

“In addition recovering all the territories that ISIS has taken doesn’t mean defeating them, because they will continue on as a clandestine group with attacks, just like the other terrorist groups,” he pointed out.

According to the research firm RAND, the Islamic State has lost about 60 percent of the territory it controlled at the height of its power in late 2014.

The largest offensive against the Islamist group conducted since in October 2016 by combined groups of the Iraqi army and the Kurdish Peshmerga militia, recovered villages in the Plain of Nineveh. Currently, the combined groups are fighting for control of Mosul.

Fr. Montes noted that “Iraq has had dozens of attacks a month for more than ten years and that will continue. And you mustn’t forget that once the battle for Mosul is over tensions between the central government in Baghdad and the Kurdistan autonomous region will sharply pick up again.”

“Nevertheless, this doesn’t mean that this reconstruction process and the soon return of Christians to their homes isn’t big news. Very big news! But we must keep praying because it’s still a very long road,” he urged.

Fr.  Andrzej Halemba, head of ACN’s Near East division, said that with the start of reconstruction work in Bartella, Karemlesh, and Bakhdida, “we want to send a clear signal to the thousands of Christian families driven from their homes in the Plain of Nineveh who now are living in an improvised and provisional way in Erbil, and other localities in Iraqi Kurdistan.”

“This is a decidedly historic moment. If we now miss the opportunity to help Christians return to their homes in the Plain of Nineveh, these families could make the decision to leave Iraq forever, and this would be a huge tragedy.”

For Fr. Halemba “the presence of Christians in this region is of vital importance, but not just from the historical point of view, but also from the political and cultural stance,” since “Christians represent a bridge of peace between the different Muslim groups at odds with each other; they make a crucial contribution to the education system and are respected by all the moderate Muslims.”

The priest appealed for both financial aid and prayers for the Christians in Iraq.

“From all our brothers and sisters in the West we are not just asking for financial aid, but also prayers with which to support the courage of thousands of Iraqi Christians who have made the decision to return to their towns and remain in Iraq.”

By the end of June 2017 ACN, which says it is the only international organization to consistently support the Christian exiles from the Nineveh plain since its capture by the Islamic State, will have spent more than $35 million in supporting the 12,000 Christian internally displaced persons in Kurdistan. Assistance has come in the form of monthly food aid, money for rent, medical help, the construction of schools, and the support of displaced clergy and women religious.

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Abuja, Nigeria, May 8, 2017 / 05:01 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Another of the young women abducted from their school by Boko Haram militants have been freed, with more than 100 still missing.

The Nigerian government announced the release of the girls, who … […]

Cairo, Egypt, Apr 29, 2017 / 12:58 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- As Pope Francis returns from his April 28-29 trip to Cairo, Egyptians of all faiths were pleased by his visit and his message – one that filled them with hope for the future, they said.

Mus… […]

Cairo, Egypt, Apr 28, 2017 / 12:56 pm (Church Pop).- During his two-day trip to Egypt, Pope Francis  met with Coptic Orthodox Patriarch Tawadros II, telling him their Churches are bonded by the blood of their martyrs, and are called to further cem… […]