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News Briefs
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NEWS BRIEFS Nov-30-2007
By Catholic News Service
U.S.
Big, open spaces not an option for Washington, New York papal events
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI's trip to the U.S. next spring brings a different kind of pope to a different environment in terms of security than when millions of people were able to participate in Masses celebrated by Pope John Paul II on his U.S. visits. When Pope John Paul visited the United States in 1979, his weeklong trip included huge, open public Masses attended by hundreds of thousands of people at each venue, ranging from an Iowa farm field to Washington's National Mall. The scenes were repeated when Pope John Paul returned for a multicity tour in 1987, celebrating liturgies in the New Orleans Superdome, a California racetrack, an empty San Antonio field and other huge spaces. When Pope Benedict makes his first trip to the United States as pope April 15-20, the opportunities for the public to see him will be limited to Masses at two baseball stadiums in Washington and New York, with a capacity of probably no more than 45,000 and 65,000, respectively, and a rally for perhaps 15,000 youths and seminarians. Other events in both cities are invitation-only. One reason the liturgies with Pope Benedict won't be on the National Mall or in Central Park is simply that neither locale was available, according to communications officials with the Washington and New York archdioceses.
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Put your stamp on it: Holiday postage avoids seasonal sticking point
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- During the Christmas season, when Christmas displays and the public outcry against them get almost equal billing, the tiny postage stamp dares to push the envelope, so to speak. While some towns are battling over the use of red and green lights on city buildings, Nativity scenes in parks and what to call holiday evergreen trees, the tiny adhesive squares on billions of letters and packages this December will subtly remind postal workers and mail recipients about Christmas and other religious holidays. This year the Postal Service has issued more than 2.6 billion holiday stamps. The majority of them are called "holiday knits" featuring Christmas images that look like hand-knit evergreens, snowmen, deer and teddy bears. The rest of the seasonal stamps feature the Madonna and Child and commemorate Kwanzaa, Hanukkah and Muslim festivals. According to a 2007 press release by the Postal Service, the Madonna and Child stamp has been a U.S. tradition since 1978.
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Report examines retailers' marketing practices on violent video games
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- An analysis of major nationwide retail chains' marketing practices for violent video games shows the stores are at least behaving better than the characters in those games. The eight major national video-game sellers -- Best Buy, Blockbuster Video, Circuit City, Game Stop, Sears/Kmart, Target, Toys "R" Us and Wal-Mart -- all have policies in place against selling M-rated (for mature) video games to those under age 17, according to a report from the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility issued Nov. 21. "It is estimated that 80 percent of all video games sold are done so during the holiday season," said Nadira Narine of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility in a Nov. 21 letter to member institutions. "We ask parents, grandparents and consumers to be extremely careful when selecting video games as gifts." The center is a coalition of 275 faith-based institutional investors that has followed the issue of marketing practices for video games for the past five years.
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Catholic university offers online courses in genocide, Holocaust
GREENSBURG, Pa. (CNS) -- A new program at Seton Hill University in Greensburg allows students to pursue a graduate program certificate or an undergraduate minor in genocide and Holocaust studies. The new program, which began with the 2007-08 academic year, is offered entirely online to allow international access for students, professors and scholars. "It is important to offer a program like this now," said Terrance DePasquale, dean of graduate and international programs at Seton Hill. "The whole world community is trying to understand how to manage this issue." James Paharik, associate professor of sociology and director of the new program, said it "will provide a valuable resource for teachers, professors, students -- anyone interested in the causes and consequences of genocide." Information about the program and an application are available online at www.setonhill.edu, by clicking on "Academics" to get to "Graduate Program, Genocide and Holocaust Studies." The Web page also includes information about an undergraduate minor.
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WORLD
People need God to have hope, pope says in new encyclical
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- In an encyclical on Christian hope, Pope Benedict XVI said that, without faith in God, humanity lies at the mercy of ideologies that can lead to "the greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice." The pope warned that the modern age has replaced belief in eternal salvation with faith in progress and technology, which offer opportunities for good but also open up "appalling possibilities for evil." "Let us put it very simply: Man needs God, otherwise he remains without hope," he said in the encyclical, "Spe Salvi" (on Christian hope), released Nov. 30. The 76-page text explored the essential connection between faith and hope in early Christianity and addressed what it called a "crisis of Christian hope" in modern times. It critiqued philosophical rationalism and Marxism and offered brief but powerful profiles of Christian saints -- ancient and modern -- who embodied hope, even in the face of suffering.
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Christians must respond to challenges with 'united voice,' pope says
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI told Ecumenical Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople that Christians must "respond with a united voice and with conviction" to the challenges modern men and women are facing. "Our work toward unity is according to the will of Christ Our Lord," the pope said in the letter, released at the Vatican Nov. 30, the feast of St. Andrew, the Constantinople patriarchate's patron. The letter was delivered to the patriarch and read during the feast day celebration by Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. Pope Benedict said his visit to Turkey last year to participate in the feast day celebration and the tradition of the pope and patriarchate sending delegations to each other's celebrations "represent authentic signs of the commitment of our churches to an ever-deeper communion, strengthened through cordial personal relations, prayer and the dialogue of charity and truth."
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With rituals but no pomp, Jesuit election not unlike papal conclave
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- While lacking the media attention and the pomp of a papal conclave, the election of the superior general of the Jesuits, known as the black pope, has its own rigid rules and ritual. Father Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, 79, superior general of the Society of Jesus, has called for a general congregation of the 19,200-member order. The meeting will begin Jan. 7 at the Jesuit headquarters in Rome, one block away from St. Peter's Square. While Jesuit superiors general are elected for life, the first order of business in January will be a formal vote on accepting Father Kolvenbach's resignation, a novelty personally approved by Pope Benedict XVI. As with a papal election, politicking is banned, there are no nominees going into the congregation and voting is preceded by formal presentations on the current state of affairs and future challenges and possibilities. But unlike the cardinals in a papal election, the Jesuits had almost two years' notice that they would be meeting to elect the 29th successor to St. Ignatius of Loyola.
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Israelis, Palestinians not getting hopes up after Annapolis summit
JERUSALEM (CNS) -- Media in the Holy Land showered attention on the Middle East peace conference in Annapolis, Md., but Israelis and Palestinians, jaded from years of failed talks, were not getting their hopes up too high. "Everybody has been following it, but the results are ambiguous," said Boutros Fawadleh, a 37-year-old English teacher at Our Lady of Seven Sorrows Latin Patriarchate School in the West Bank village of Aboud. "I think Palestinians are hopeful that this conference will be different. They hope the situation will be better for (us) but from past experience (these conferences) have just been words," he said. Though most of his acquaintances were supportive of the late-November conference, Fawadleh said, people still are not convinced that the meetings of political leaders will bring an end to the bloodshed. In Gaza and the West Bank, the militant Islamic Palestinian faction Hamas held protests against the conference, and Palestinian police killed one Hamas protester in Hebron, West Bank.
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War might have caused end of Christianity in Iraq, says bishop
LONDON (CNS) -- The war in Iraq might have caused the end of Christianity in the country, said a Chaldean Catholic bishop. Bishop Antoine Audo of Aleppo, Syria, said that the hundreds of thousands of Christians who had fled their homes in the aftermath of the 2003 U.S.-led invasion were still too scared to go home. He told Catholic News Service in a Nov. 28 interview in London's Church of the Immaculate Conception that unless security improved in Iraq the Chaldean diaspora may become permanent. "They love their country, but at the same time it is impossible for them to go back to this situation," said Bishop Audo, who ministers to approximately 60,000 Iraqi Christian refugees in Syria. During a Nov. 29 press conference, Bishop Audo said that prostitution among desperately poor Iraqi Chaldean female refugees had emerged as a "serious problem" for the church in Syria. The bishop visited London Nov. 28-29 as a guest of Iraqi Christians in Need, a British-based group set up this year to provide displaced or persecuted Christians with money for food, medicine and an education.
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L'Osservatore: Papal invite to Muslims opens door to higher dialogue
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- By inviting a varied group of Muslim scholars to meet with him, Pope Benedict XVI has opened the possibility for a higher-level dialogue between Catholic and Muslim leaders, the Vatican newspaper said. The newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, commented Nov. 30 on a letter to the pope from 138 Muslim scholars and the pope's invitation in response. The newspaper quoted German Jesuit Father Christian Troll, a scholar of Islam, who said that the 138 scholars represent a wide and diverse portion of the world's Muslim community, and the fact that they were able to write to the pope together is important. The letter, Father Troll said, is an initiative "which the church can only look favorably upon because it needs a skilled dialogue with the non-Christian world." L'Osservatore said, "The pope's response opens concrete horizons for this hope." The pope's invitation, released Nov. 29 at the Vatican, included a suggestion that the scholars hold a working meeting with the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and with experts from Rome's Pontifical Institute for Arabic and Islamic Studies and from the Pontifical Gregorian University.
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Indian bishops protest discrimination against Christian dalits
NEW DELHI (CNS) -- More than three dozen Indian bishops joined priests, nuns and church activists at a sit-in to demand an end to the decades-old discrimination against Christian dalits, or members of India's low castes. "This is denial of freedom of religion," said Archbishop Stanislaus Fernandes of Gandhinagar, secretary-general of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India. The archbishop addressed the crowd Nov. 29 in New Delhi near the Indian Parliament. "Dalit," which means "trampled upon" in Sanskrit, refers to low castes who are treated as untouchables under India's caste system. The title allows them to perform jobs such as scavenging. Christian dalits, who account for at least 60 percent of the 25 million Christians in India, are denied the 15 percent of spots reserved for Hindi, Sikh and Buddhist dalits in educational institutions and government jobs, and Christian dalits do not get the free education that other dalits receive. Muslim dalits face the same discrimination.
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While some stats show success, Latin America's poverty persists
SANTA ROSA, Peru (CNS) -- On a stifling morning a handful of people stand in the shady doorway of the health center, watching the occasional cargo truck lumber through this village of about 200 people. A typical day might bring half a dozen people to the health center in the southeastern Peruvian rain forest. Many of them are children with diarrhea from parasites -- a sign of persistent poverty in a village that has no running water or sanitation system. The world is halfway to the 2015 deadline set by the United Nations in 2000 for cutting poverty in half. Overall, Latin America is more than halfway to that goal, with Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Ecuador having made the greatest progress in the past seven years, according to the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. However, 194 million people in the region still live in poverty, 71 million in extreme poverty. And despite their progress, Mexico and Ecuador still have poverty rates of about 40 percent. Experts say that while poverty worldwide has decreased dramatically since 1990, in many regions assistance is not reaching the poorest of the poor. In Latin America, those people are most likely to be indigenous or live in remote rural areas like the Andes, the Amazon or the mountains of Guatemala.
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PEOPLE
Pope names Irish priest as secretary of communications council
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI has named Msgr. Paul Tighe, director of public affairs for the Archdiocese of Dublin, Ireland, to be secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. Msgr. Tighe, 49, fills a post left vacant since February 2005 when Bishop Renato Boccardo was named secretary-general of Vatican City State by Pope John Paul II. The Irish cleric, who was ordained in 1983 after seminary studies in Rome, has a background in civil law and in moral theology, particularly regarding bioethics. In addition to serving as a pastor and a professor of moral theology, Msgr. Tighe established the Dublin archdiocesan Office for Public Affairs in 2004. The public affairs office, which works with the archdiocesan communications office, monitors public debates and policy development in Ireland, especially regarding health care, immigration, bioethics, education and the family.
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Vatican spokesman says encyclical on faith cannot be ruled out
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- After Pope Benedict XVI's encyclicals on love and hope, could one on faith be next? "We're all asking ourselves whether there will be a third encyclical on faith. It cannot be excluded, but it's not yet on the agenda," Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, said Nov. 30. The three theological virtues -- faith, hope and love -- are considered the foundation of Christian moral activity. Pope Benedict's first encyclical was "Deus Caritas Est" ("God Is Love"), and his second was titled "Spe Salvi," which means "saved in hope." Father Lombardi, speaking at a press conference to present "Spe Salvi," said the pope had surprised his aides earlier in the year when he told them he was writing an encyclical on Christian hope. The pope was already working on a separate encyclical on social justice issues, but he finished the one on hope first, Father Lombardi said. He worked on the text last spring and summer, doing most of the writing at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo, outside Rome.
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Victims of past clergy sex abuse in Alaska speak at press conference
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (CNS) -- Anger, betrayal and embarrassment are powerful emotions that James Niksik and Peter Kobuk say plague them every day. Both men say the late Joseph Lundowski, a lay missionary at a Jesuit-run parish, abused them when they were young boys in the western Alaskan village of St. Michael. The men shared their thoughts and feelings at a Nov. 19 Anchorage press conference after officials of the Oregon province of the Society of Jesus confirmed a $50 million settlement between the Jesuits and more than 100 native Alaskans. The attorney for plaintiffs in more than 100 claims of clergy sex abuse announced Nov. 18 a $50 million settlement with the Society of Jesus for cases involving more than a dozen Jesuits posted in Alaska between 1961 and 1987. The order also had lay missionaries serving in remote parishes it administered. However, Jesuit Father John D. Whitney, superior of the Jesuits' Oregon province, said in a statement many issues still "need to be finalized before it is appropriate to make an official announcement about a settlement." The Portland, Ore.-based province covers Alaska, Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Montana.
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Retired U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde, known for pro-life efforts, dies at 83
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Henry J. Hyde, the former Republican congressman from Illinois whose name became synonymous with efforts to limit federal funding of abortion, died Nov. 29 at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. Hyde's death was announced in Washington by House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio. The 83-year-old Catholic political figure, who underwent quadruple bypass surgery in July, died of a fatal arrhythmia, a hospital spokeswoman said. Hyde retired from politics in 2006 after 32 years in Congress and eight years in the Illinois Legislature. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, from President George W. Bush Nov. 5 but was too ill to attend the White House ceremony. At the ceremony, Bush described Hyde as a "commanding presence" and "a man of consequence," who impressed colleagues with his "extraordinary intellect, his deep convictions and eloquent voice." He was named a Knight of St. Gregory by Pope Benedict XVI in 2006 in recognition of his longtime fight for life.
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Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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