Vatican

Vatican City, Nov 9, 2017 / 11:16 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Meeting with the community of a Ukrainian Greek Catholic seminary in Rome on Thursday, Pope Francis encouraged them build up justice and peace in their homeland.

“Today the world is wounded by wars and violence,” the Pope reflected Nov. 9 during his meeting at the Vatican’s Clementine Hall with the community of the Ukrainian Pontifical College of Saint Josaphat.

“In particular, your beloved Ukrainian nation, whence you came and where you will return at the end of your Roman studies, is experiencing the drama of war, which generates great suffering.”

He added that “strong is the aspiration to justice and to peace, which bars any form of prevarication, social or political corruption, realities for which the poor always pay the price. God sustains and encourages those who are committed to realizing a society characterized ever more by justice and solidarity.”

Pope Francis’ meeting with the college, which serves seminarians and priests of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, comes 85 years after its present building as opened on Rome’s Janiculum Hill, at the request of Pius XI.

Francis recalled his predecessor’s particular concern for the faithful living in areas of suffering and persecution; at the time of the college’s founding, Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union.

“In the years of his pontificate, Pius XI always and firmly raised his voice in defending the faith, the freedom of the Church, and the transcendent dignity of every human person,” Francis said. “He clearly condemned, through speeches and letters, the atheistic and inhumane ideologies that bloodied the twentieth century. He brought to light their contradictions by indicating the Church as the high road of the Gospel, and also putting into practice the search for social justice, an indispensable dimension of the fully human redemption of peoples and nations.”

He invited the seminarians “to study the social doctrine of the Church, so as to mature in discernment and judgement of the social realities in which you are called to operate.”

While the call to peace may seem unreachable, Pope Francis said that “by loving and anouncing the Word, you will become true pastors of the communities entrusted to you, and it will be the lamp that illuminates your heart and your home, whether you prepare for the celibate or married priesthood, according to tradition of your Church.”

Considering the war, corruption, and strife among Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches which Ukraine is facing, Francis told the seminarians “to ensure your heart lies always in wide horizons, which have the measure of the whole world … love and care for your traditions, but avoid any form of sectarianism.”

He recalled the rainbow as a sign of God’s covenant with humanity which calls man “to learn to love and respect each other, to abandon their weapons, to reject war and all kinds of abuse.”

“If you walk this way and teach others to do the same, especially in the fundamental ecumenical dialogue, I am certain that from the heavenly homeland all the bishops and priests – some formed at your college – who have given their lives or have suffered persecution because of their fidelity to Christ and to the Apostolic See will smile at you and support you.”

Pope Francis also recalled his relationship with Fr. Stefan Czmil, from whom he came to appreciate the Divine Liturgy of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.

Fr. Czmil was born in Sudova Vyshnia in what was then Austria-Hungary in 1914 and grew up in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.

Drawn to the example of St. John Bosco and his work, he decided to join the Salesians in order to educate poor young people in Ukriaine.

In 1930 Pope Pius XI granted permission for Eastern rite candidates to the Salesians to retain their rite and Church traditions and Fr. Czmil was sent to northern Italy for formation. He was professed as a member of the Salesians in 1935.

He studied for the priesthood in Italy during World War II and was ordained a priest of the order in 1945. While in Italy he helpd many Ukrainian refugees to find new homes.

In 1948 he was sent to Argentina to serve Ukrainian immigrants, where he met a young Jorge Bergoglio.

“This was good for me, because the man spoke of persecutions, of sufferings, of ideologies that were persecuting Christians,” Pope Francis told the seminarians. “And he taught me to open myself to a different liturgy, which I keep always in my heart for its beauty.”

Fr. Czmil was later sent back to Rome, where he was secretly consecrated a bishop in 1977. He died the following year.

Francis recalled that while he was in Buenos Aires, Major Archbishop Shevchuk had asked him for testimonies with which to open the cause for canonization of Fr. Czmil.

“I wanted to remember him today because it is just to give thanks before you for the good he did me,” the Pope told the seminarians.

“I accompany you with my blessing, invoking peace and ecumenical harmony for Ukraine.”

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Vatican City, Nov 9, 2017 / 06:52 am (CNA/EWTN News).- In a move likely to have some Vatican employees fuming, Pope Francis has decided to ban the sale of cigarettes inside the City State on the grounds that the Holy See cannot profit from a proven health hazard.

In a Nov. 9 statement, Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said the reason for the decision “is very simple: the Holy See cannot contribute to an activity that clearly damages the health of people.”

Available for sale exclusively at “Palazzo della Stazione,” the building that sits in front of the Vatican’s small train station, the cigarettes have until now been sold at a lower price than in tobacco stores around Rome, making it an ideal place for smokers holding a Vatican employee card to pick up their next pack.

However, citing numbers from the World Health Organization, Burke noted how each year some seven million people throughout the world die due to smoking-related causes.

Despite the fact the cigarettes sold to Vatican employees and pensioners has been a source of revenue for the Holy See, “no profit can be legitimate if it puts lives at risk,” Burke said.

The sale of cigarettes inside the Vatican will officially cease as of 2018, but the sale of larger cigars, with which smoke is not inhaled, was not mentioned in the statement.

While Pope Francis himself doesn’t smoke, the habit is practically considered a national vice in Italy, and many even within the Vatican can be found to have a pack or two on hand.

However, the Pope’s decision to crack-down on cigarette sales in the Vatican brings him on par with other European countries who have enforced comprehensive smoke-free laws, the most strict being found in Ireland, the UK, Greece, Bulgaria, Malta, Spain and Hungary.

[…]

Vatican City, Nov 9, 2017 / 02:22 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican on Thursday announced that Albino Luciani – better know as Pope John Paul I – has moved forward on the path to sainthood, and can now officially be called “Venerable” by faithful around the world.

Announced in a Nov. 9 communique from the Vatican, the Pope’s decision to green light the cause was made the day before, during a Nov. 8 meeting with Cardinal Angelo Amato, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

With Francis’ approval of his heroic virtue, “Papa Luciani,” who until now has held the title “Servant of God,” can now be called “Venerable,” which is the step before beatification.

In addition to John Paul I, other causes to move forward are the martyrdom of Giovanni Brenner, a diocesan priest killed in Hungary in 1957 and the martyrdom of Sr. Leonella Sgorbati, killed in hatred of the faith in Somalia in 2006.

Other causes approved of heroic virtue are Bernard of Baden; Fr. Gregorio Fioravanti; Fr. Tommaso Morales Perez of Venezuela; Italian layman Marcellino da Capradosso and American Sr. Teresa Fardella, foundress of the Daughters of Mary of the Most Holy Crown.

Born Oct. 17, 1912, in Italy’s northern Veneto region, Albino Luciani made history when he was elected Pope Aug. 26, 1978, and took a double name after his two immediate predecessors, St. John XXIII and Bl. Paul VI.

He sent shock waves around the world when he died unexpectedly just 33 days later, making his one of the shortest pontificates in the history of the Church.

The first Pope to born in the 20th century, he is also the most recent Italian-born Pontiff and is often referred to as “the Smiling Pope” by those who knew him or remember his election.

Despite living in relative poverty, he entered the minor seminary in Feltre in 1923, when he was just 11 years old, and entered the Gregorian Seminary at Belluno five years later, in 1928.

He was ordained a priest July 7, 1935, and after serving in a parish for a few months, in December of that year he was named instructor of religion at the Technical Institute for Miners in Agordo. He became vice-rector of the Belluno seminary just two years later, in 1937 – a position he would hold for the next 10 years.

At the same time, he also became an instructor at the seminary and continued to pursue his own studies in theology. When his time as vice-rector was complete in 1947, he obtained a docorate degree in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome.

That same year, at just 36 years of age, he was named chancellor of the diocese of Belluno and given the title “Monsignor.” That year he was also nominated secretary for the diocesan synod of bishops.

A year later, in 1948, he was named Pro Vicar General of the Belluno diocese and director of their office for catechesis. He was named Vicar General of Belluno six years later, in 1954.

In 1958, Luciani was named Bishop of the Vittorio Veneto diocese by St. John XXIII, and was consecrated by the Pope himself in St. Peter’s Basilica.

Luciani was among the bishops present from around the world for the opening of the Second Vatican Council in 1962, and he attended each of the four sessions before the Council’s close in 1965.

In 1969 he was named Patriarch of Venice by Bl. Pope Paul VI, one of the few patriarchates in the Latin Church. The Archbishop of Venice is typically made a cardinal, and Luciani received his red hat from Paul VI in 1973.

He participated in the 1971 Synod of Bishops on “The Ministerial Priesthood and Justice in the World” in 1971, and in 1972 was elected Vice President of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, a position he held until 1975.

The last year of his life was a whirlwind in which he participated in the Sept. 30-Oct. 29 1977, Synod of Bishops on “Catechesis in Our Time” and voted in the August 1978 conclave that elected him as Pope after the death of Paul VI.

He had hardly given four general audiences when he died just 33 days into his pontificate – 34 including the day of his election, which counts canonically.

The sudden nature of his death gave rise to various theories of foul play at the time of his passing. However, a book published Nov. 7 by Italian journalist Stefania Falasca, the vice-postulator of his cause, has debunked the conspiracies and insinuations of murder.

In her book, released in Italian and titled “John Paul I: the Chronicle of a Death,” Falasca provides both documentation and testimony indicating that the late Pope suffered a brief, unknown cardiac episode the night before he died, which was likely linked to a previous heart problem he thought had been resolved, but was most likely the cause of his death.

Although the cause for canonization of a Pope is typically opened by Rome, in 2003 the Bishop of the Belluno diocese, Vincenzo Savio, requested to have the cause opened there, since Luciani had spent the majority of his ministry there, and was only in Rome for a month before his death.

The request was accepted, and Diocese of Belluno officially opened John Paul I’s cause in November 2003. The lengthy document detailing the late Pope’s life and virtues was submitted to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints on his birthday, Oct. 17, 2016.

With the approval of his heroic virtue, the path is now open for Pope John Paul I’s beatification, which requires that there be miracles attributed to his intercession. One miracle is needed for him to be beatified and declared “Blessed,” and two are needed for his canonization as a Saint.

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Vatican City, Nov 9, 2017 / 12:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis praised St. Frances Cabrini in the preface to a book about her life for her foresight in addressing the needs of migrants, saying she’s an example of how to treat people with both charity and justice.

The saint combined “great charity with a prophetic spirit,” the Pope noted. “Frances Cabrini, precisely for this reason, is very present today and teaches us the way to deal with the momentous phenomenon of migration by combining charity and justice.”

Not only did she realize that mass migration “was not a temporary phenomenon,” he continued, she also saw “the emergence of a new historical era” in which modern transport would allow easier movement of large populations.

“Frances understood that modernity would be marked by these immense migrations and uprooted human beings, in a crisis of identity, often desperate and lacking resources to face the society in which they would have to enter,” he said.

In the face of this crisis, she established hospitals, convents, and schools for poor Italian immigrants to the US, to help them learn the rules and laws of their new society while retaining their dignity and their religious roots.

“These were the goals that she wanted to achieve for all migrants,” Pope Francis said. “Goals that are still valid today, and which pass through the recognition and respect of one’s own and others’ religious roots.”

Now the sisters in her religious order have continued her work, even if the country of origin of immigrants to the U.S. has changed, he pointed out.

This December marks the 100th anniversary of the death of St. Frances Cabrini.

Pope Francis wrote the preface to a new edition of a Cabrini biography called Tra terra e cielo (“Between heaven and earth”), issued for the centennial of her death.

Pope Francis frequently invokes the 20th century saint in his speeches for her example of how to welcome and care for migrants while also helping them integrate with the culture of their new country.

He most recently spoke about her legacy and its relevance in a September letter to the order she founded, the Institute of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, saying the centennial of her death is “one of the main events marking the journey of the Church.”

“Both because of the greatness of the figure commemorated and because of the contemporary nature of her charism and message, not just for the ecclesial community but for society as a whole.”

With the “inevitable tensions” caused by the high levels of migration around the world today, Mother Cabrini becomes a contemporary figure, he continued.

An Italian missionary, St. Frances Cabrini died Dec. 22, 1917 after spending much of her life working with Italian immigrants in the United States.

She spent nearly 30 years traveling back and forth across the Atlantic Ocean as well as around the United States setting up orphanages, hospitals, convents, and schools for the often marginalized Italian immigrants. Her feast is celebrated Nov. 13.

[…]

Vatican City, Nov 8, 2017 / 04:35 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Wednesday a fiery Pope Francis chastised those who spend Mass talking to others, looking at their phone or even taking pictures during papal liturgies, saying these are distractions that take focus away from the “heart of the Church,” which is the Eucharist.

“The Mass is not a show: it is to go to meet the passion and resurrection of the Lord,” the Pope said Nov. 8. “The Lord is here with us, present. Many times we go there, we look at things and chat among ourselves while the priest celebrates the Eucharist… But it is the Lord!”

In particular, Francis condemned the use of cell phones to take photos at papal Masses. At one point during the Mass the priest says, “we lift up our hearts,” he said. “He does not say, ‘We lift up our phones to take photographs!’”

“It’s a bad thing! And I tell you that it gives me so much sadness when I celebrate here in the Piazza or Basilica and I see so many raised cellphones, not just of the faithful, even of some priests and even bishops.”

“But think: when you go to Mass, the Lord is there! And you’re distracted. (But) it is the Lord!”

During the general audience, Pope Francis said the Eucharist would be the new focus of his weekly catechesis for the year, because “it is fundamental for us Christians to understand well the value and meaning of the Holy Mass to live more and more fully our relationship with God.”

In the Eucharist we rediscover, through our senses, what is essential, he said. Just as the Apostle Thomas asked to see and touch the wounds of Jesus after his resurrection, we need the same thing: “to see him and touch him to be able to recognize him.”

In this way, the Sacraments meet this very “human need” of ours, he said. And in the Eucharist, in particular, we find a privileged way to meet God and his love.

The Second Vatican Council was inspired by the desire to help Christians understand the beauty of the encounter in the Eucharist even better, he continued. This is why “it was necessary first to implement, with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, an adequate renewal of the liturgy.”

A central theme emphasized at Vatican II was the liturgical formation of the faithful, which Francis said is also the aim of the series of catechesis he began today: to help people “grow in the knowledge of this great gift God has given us in the Eucharist.”   

As a side note, Francis asked if people had noticed the chaotic way children make the sign of cross at Mass, moving their hand all over their chest, and asked people to teach children to make the sign of the cross well.

“We need to teach children to do the sign of the cross well,” he said, noting that this is how Mass begins, because just as Mass begins this way, “so life begins, so the day begins.”

Concluding his reflection on the Mass and the Eucharist, Pope Francis said that he hopes that through these brief weekly lessons everyone will rediscover the beauty “hidden in the Eucharistic celebration, and which, when revealed, gives a full meaning to the life of everyone.”

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Vatican City, Nov 7, 2017 / 11:52 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican is preparing for a conference on nuclear disarmament this week in the wake of an international effort to ban nuclear weapons.

Hosted by the Dicastery for the Promotion of Integral Human Development, the Nov. 10-11 conference will explore solutions and prospects for a world free of nuclear weapons and integral disarmament, in cohesion with Pope Francis’ emphasis on promoting peace.

In a Nov. 7 Vatican communique Cardinal Peter Turkson, prefect of the dicastery, said the event “responds to the priorities of Pope Francis to take action for world peace and to use the resources of creation for a sustainable development and to improve the quality of life for all, individuals and countries, without discrimination.”

At the International Atomic Energy Agency conference in Vienna in September, department secretary Msgr. Bruno Marie Duffé also emphasized the importance of the “moral responsibility of the States” and the challenge of a “common strategy of dialogue” invoked by Pope Francis.

The international symposium represents “the first global gathering on Atomic Disarmament” after the approval of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons was passed in New York July 7.

Until the treaty, nuclear weapons were the only weapons of mass destruction not explicitly banned by any international document.

The treaty passed with 122 votes in favor and one abstention, Singapore. However, 69 countries – all the nuclear weapon states and NATO members except the Netherlands –  did not take part in the vote.

One of the conference’s speakers Saturday will be Masako Wada, one of the last survivors of the Hiroshima nuclear attack and an assistant secretary general of Nihon Hidankyo, a confederation of nuclear weapons and experiments victims.   

Other attendees include 11 Nobel Peace Laureates, representatives from the United Nations and NATO, diplomats from Russia, the United States, South Korea, and Iran, experts on armaments and weapons and leaders from foundations engaged in the topic.

There will also be representatives of bishops’ conferences and other Christian organizations and a delegation of professors and students from US and Russian universities.

Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, as well as the leadership of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, will deliver speeches on behalf of the Holy See; Pope Francis will meet with participants and give an address Nov. 10.

The conference builds on a conference held in New York in March to negotiate the Nuclear Weapons Ban Treaty.

Pope Francis sent a message to that conference saying the doctrine of nuclear deterrence has become ineffective against 21st century threats like terrorism, asymmetrical conflicts, environmental problems, and poverty.

These threats, the Pope stressed, are “even greater when we consider the catastrophic humanitarian and environmental consequences that would follow from any use of nuclear weapons, with devastating, indiscriminate and uncontainable effects, over time and space.”

[…]

Vatican City, Nov 7, 2017 / 07:16 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Tuesday the Vatican announced Pope Francis’ appointment of two lay women – experts in bioethics and canon law – as the first two under-secretaries of the mega-dicastery for Laity, Family and Life.

The appointment of Dr. Gabriella Gambino for the section on life and Dr. Linda Ghisoni for the section on laity was announced in a Nov. 7 Vatican communique, bringing the leadership of the dicastery more clearly into shape after it’s establishment in 2016.

The Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life officially began its work Sept. 1, 2016, replacing the former Pontifical Council for the Laity and Pontifical Council for the Family, which were dissolved.

The department is responsible for projects relating to the apostolate of laity, families, and the institution of marriage, within the Church, and is responsible for the organization of events such as the World Meeting of Families, which will take place in Dublin in August 2018.

Both Gambino and Ghisoni join dicastery secretary Fr. Alexandre Awi Mello and prefect Cardinal Kevin Farrell, in leading the department. However, the appointment of a third under-secretary for the section on family is still forthcoming.

Gambino, 49, is currently a professor at the John Paul II Pontifical Theological Institute for Marriage and Family Sciences, is a professor of bioethics at the Faculty of Philosophy, and a researcher and associate professor in the philosophy of law at the University of Rome “Tor Vergata.”

Originally from Milan, she holds a doctorate in bioethics from the Institute of Bioethics at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Rome.

From 2001-2007, she taught and did research at the Institute of the Methodology of Social Sciences of the LUISS-Guido Carli University in Rome, and in 2002 was appointed scientific expert of the National Committee for Bioethics at the Presidency of the Council of Ministers.

Gambino collaborated with the former Pontifical Council for the Laity and the Pontifical Academy for Life from 2013-2016.

She is married with five children, and has written numerous publications on the themes of life, family and marriage. In addition to Italian, she speaks five other languages.

Dr. Linda Ghisoni, 52, works as a judge at the First Instance Court of the Vicariate of Rome, as a professor of canon law at the Pontifical Gregorian University, and as a professor of law at Roma Tre University.

She is from the town of Cortemaggiore in the north of Italy and studied philosophy and theology at the Eberhard-Karls-University in Tübingen, Germany.

In 1999 she received a doctorate in canon law from the Pontifical Gregorian University, and in 2002 she received the diploma of Rotary Attorney at the Studium rotale of the Tribunal of the Roman Rota.

Since 1997 Ghisoni has held various positions at the Tribunals of First Instance and Appeal of the Vicariate of Rome, including Notary, Defender of the Bond, Auditor and Judge.

She has also served as Judicial Counselor at the Tribunal of the Roman Rota from 2002-2009, and Commissioner of the Congregation for the Divine Worship and the Discipline of Sacraments for the Defense of the marital bond in causes for the dissolution of the marriage “ratum sed non consummatum” (ratified but not consummated).

Since November 2011, she has also worked at the Tribunal of the Roman Rota. From 2013-2016, she collaborated with the former Pontifical Council for the Laity in the field of specialist laity studies in the Church. She is married and has two daughters.

[…]

Vatican City, Nov 7, 2017 / 06:15 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Tuesday Pope Francis voiced his sorrow after 26 people were killed at a Baptist Church in Texas over the weekend, offering his support and praying that such acts of meaningless violence would come to an end.

In a Nov. 7 telegram signed by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Pope Francis said he was “deeply grieved by news of the loss of life and grave injuries” caused in Sunday’s shooting at a Baptist church in Texas.

Francis condemned the “senseless violence” and offered his “heartfelt condolences” to the families of the victims and wounded, members of the congregation and the local community.

He closed the letter, addressed to Archbishop Gustavo Garcia-Siller, Archbishop of San Antonio, by praying that the Lord would “console all who mourn and to grant them the spiritual strength that triumphs over violence and hatred by the power of forgiveness, hope and reconciling love.”

The Pope’s telegram comes just two days after at least 26 people were killed when a gunman opened fire at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas. Sutherland Springs is a small town located about 35 miles southeast of San Antonio.

At least 20 others were taken to the hospital after the shooting, which police believe was motivated by a domestic dispute.

After the shooting, the gunman fled the scene, and was later found dead in his car by police. The shooting marked the latest in a series of similar incidents throughout the United States in recent months, and is the deadliest on record in the State of Texas.

In a message after the event, Archbishop Garcia-Siller offered his condolences and support, saying “We need prayers! The families affected in the shooting this morning at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs need prayers.”

“The evil perpetrated on these who were gathered to worship God on the Lord’s Day – especially children and the elderly – makes no sense and will never be fully understood,” he said, adding that there are no adequate words for the “disbelief and shock” produced by the deadly affair.

“There can be no explanation or motive for such a scene of horror at a small country church for families gathered to praise Jesus Christ,” he said, adding that “these Baptist brethren are our family, friends and neighbors who live among us in the archdiocese … We are committed to work in unity with all our brothers and sisters to build peace in our communities; to connect in a more direct and substantial way. The Catholic Church in Texas and across the United States is with you.”

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Vatican City, Nov 6, 2017 / 03:21 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A Vatican workshop this past weekend drew attention to the vast challenges faced by victims of human trafficking when reintegrating into society, suggesting concrete steps for helping victims.

One of the first challenges faced by trafficking victims upon being freed is recourse to legal aid and restitution, attorney Jami Solli told CNA Nov. 6.

Founder of the Global Alliance for Legal Aid, an association of jurists who provide legal aid in developing countries, Solli participated in the Vatican workshop.

She said that when it comes to legal aid, the challenges are complex.

“If they’re coming from overseas, they don’t speak the language, they don’t know the law,” she said. In addition to this, many countries do not offer any financial compensation to trafficking victims, and it can be hard to find quality lawyers who are willing to help them.

Unfortunately, Solli said, prosecution rates for human trafficking crimes are very low.

According to U.S. reports, there are about 10,000 prosecutions of trafficking perpetrators globally each year, while the number of trafficked people is estimated to be around 40 million.

What does prosecution of perpetrators actually achieve for victims? It can bring significant peace of mind, Solli said, allowing victims to know that the person who trafficked them is in jail.

However, victims are still left with a “slew of problems,” including mental suffering, a lack of skills, education and a job.

“How is this person going to restart their life?” Solli reflected, noting that restitution money is one way to recognize the immense harm that victims have suffered, and while it will not solve all of their problems, it can help them get a fresh start.

The Nov. 4-6 workshop, “Assisting Victims in Human Trafficking – Best Practices in Resettlement, Legal Aid and Compensation,” addressed these challenges and others.

The workshop’s focus was on how to better provide legal aid and restitution for trafficking victims, not only to try to achieve justice for the crimes committed against them, but to support their reintegration into society and help with necessities such as food, housing and education.

Critical to this reintegration is the broad cooperation of different entities, including the Church’s vast network of parishes, said Dr. Margaret Archer, president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, in a press conference Monday.

“If we can turn passive parishes into active parishes for this cause, we’ll have made a giant step forward,” she said.

Dr. John F. McEldowney, a law professor at the University of Warwick and a newly appointed member of the Academy of Social Sciences, agreed with Archer. He told journalists that he thinks the next step is “very much a collaborative effort throughout the world.”

The hope is to bring together not just government entities and NGOs, but also the “smallest communities, in the smallest parts of the world,” such as parishes and small villages.

One of the big projects to come out of the weekend, still a work in progress, is a document to define the rights of victims and the resources available to them.

McEldowney told CNA that this “victims’ charter” would work as a sort of map to help people get from point A to point B to point C.

The document would connect information and resources from all the different areas in which victims likely need assistance – including legal aid, housing assistance, education, and mental and spiritual guidance. Together, these resources would help trafficking victims answer the question, “Where do I go from here?”

It is also hoped that the act of compiling the charter will draw attention to those areas which are lacking adequate, or perhaps any, resources. For example, it can be difficult for trafficking victims to know how to apply to a university if they are not a citizen of the country or don’t have the correct documentation.

“It’s an ambitious project,” McEldowney noted in his comments to journalists. “It requires patience and dedication. And education, knowledge, information is at the heart of this, so that people know that slavery has not been abolished.”

[…]

Vatican City, Nov 6, 2017 / 11:45 am (CNA/EWTN News).- As the Church prepares to celebrate the first World Day of the Poor, an event announced by Pope Francis last year, one Vatican official said the event will be an opportunity to grow in mercy and charity, shaping attitudes toward the poor and needy.

The World Day of the Poor, which was announced in Pope Francis’ closing letter for the Jubilee of Mercy, is founded on “this whole notion of reciprocity, of sharing with each other of what each other has,” Msgr. Geno Sylva told CNA in an interview.

It’s also based on “our understanding that each of us is poor in some way, and that we need to empty ourselves of certain things so that God’s grace can fill us, God’s mercy can fill us,” he said, adding that “there’s so much we can learn from those who are poor as we try to provide.”

An English-language official of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, Msgr. Sylva spoke ahead of the first-ever World Day of the Poor, which is titled “Love not in word, but in deed,” and is set to take place exactly one year after the close of the Jubilee of Mercy.

The event, Sylva said, is “so beautiful and so powerful as a perpetual fruit of the jubilee of mercy.”

World Day for the Poor “ties perfectly in with the New Evangelization,” he said, “because the New  Evangelization is able to engage people by presenting the mercy of God and seeing people in that mercy.”

Pope Francis has announced the World Day for the Poor as an annual observance on the Thirty-Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, a week before the Solemnity of Christ the King.

“This would be the worthiest way to prepare for the celebration of the Solemnity of our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, who identified with the little ones and the poor and who will judge us on our works of mercy,” he said, adding that the event would also “represent a genuine form of new evangelization which can renew the face of the Church as She perseveres in her perennial activity of pastoral conversion and witness to mercy.”

In Rome, the event will begin with a Nov. 18 prayer vigil and solemn vespers for all those who volunteer in organizations or associations that care for the poor.

The vigil, which will be presided over by Archbishop Rino Fisichella, President of the Council for the New Evangelization, will be held at the Roman Basilica of St. Lawrence Outside the Walls, a venue symbolically chosen in honor of the saint who once said that “the treasure of the Church are the poor.”

The following morning, local poor and needy people will be bused to the Vatican for Mass with Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Basilica, and will be offered a celebratory lunch afterward in different locations around Rome, including the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall.

In addition, the council has arranged for Italian doctors, nurses and specialists from varying practices to provide free medical care to the poor and needy attending the World Day of the Poor. They will set up tents and offer free services to attendees the week prior.

The council is expecting around 3,000 people to participate in the event. Since not everyone will be able to fit in the Vatican’s hall, other organizations and institutions have offered to host groups of the poor for lunch, such as the Pontifical North American College, which will serve around 200 people.

The meal, Syvla said, is meant to show attendees “that they are really special, and that we’re honored to be with them.”

Flowers will be placed on all the tables, multiple courses will be served, and a group of children will come into the Paul VI Hall to sing, while a band plays outside.

Those serving lunch will include a group of deacons from the Diocese of Rome, which Sylva said is a “very symbolic” gesture.

The World Day of the Poor will also be celebrated in dioceses and parishes “around the world,” Sylva said.

To this end, he said the council has developed a pastoral aid for parishes and schools, available on the council’s website, which has already been given to bishops’ conferences and nunciatures around the world.

Available in seven languages, the aid includes, among other things, prayer vigils, lectio divina prayers and the stories of Saints associated with the poor, “so it really will give priests and laypeople involved with leadership a concrete pastoral resource they can use with the people to whom they minister.”

Pointing to the logo for World Day of the Poor, Msgr. Sylva said the essence of the event can be summed up in the design, which portrays two people reaching toward each other – one from a doorway and the other from the outside – with a road in between.

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet” data-lang=”en”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>If you haven't seen it yet, here's the logo for the World Day of the Poor (Nov. 19) <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/Catholic?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#Catholic</a> <a href=”https://t.co/ma1fWx99jo”>pic.twitter.com/ma1fWx99jo</a></p>&mdash; Michelle Bauman (@Michelle_Bauman) <a href=”https://twitter.com/Michelle_Bauman/status/927613427542925312?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>November 6, 2017</a></blockquote>
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“It’s so beautiful because you almost don’t know who’s the one asking for assistance and who’s the one giving assistance, but what we see is that this reciprocity, this shared essence in being in that the one on the outside realizes that to get in he’s got to hold that hand out, and the one on the inside realizes that he or she has to go out in order to encounter one another,” he said.

The image, he said, is a reminder that “everybody has something to share, everybody has something to give, and everybody is poor in some way.”

“So how do we hand-in-hand, heart-in-heart reach out to one another, and again to not only welcome each other into the doorway of the Church, into the heart of each believer, but also along that road in which we also accompany each other closer toward heaven?”

Pointing to Pope Francis’ message for the World Day of the Poor, published in June, Sylva noted that the Pope had said care for the poor shouldn’t be limited to occasional offerings that appease our consciences, but that charity must be a true encounter that shapes our daily lives.

As Christians, we are called to love everyone simply because “he or she has a need,” he said, explaining that the World Day of the Poor event “expands the notion of what ‘neighbor’ means.”

Christian charity, Sylva explained, is “not just for one day to put a coin in, but it’s an attitude towards the other that needs to change in each one of us, that we need to see each other as brothers and sisters, and that’s the real profundity of what our experience can be.”

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