Mexican priest moved to intermediate care after stabbing attack

Santiago, Chile, Mar 21, 2018 / 03:12 am (ACI Prensa).- Although he died in 1853, the legacy of Friar Andrés Garcia Acosta is as alive as ever in Santiago, Chile, through a soup kitchen bearing his name that feeds 150 people per day.

This outreach is part of the “Spoon Trail,” a Franciscan ministry where those in need can stop at different locations to receive breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Following the friar’s example, dozens of volunteers at “Friar Andresito’s Soup Kitchen” help feed the poor and homeless, including those facing addictions and prostitution.

For volunteers, the work is more than just an act of charity.

“This has meant everything to me,” volunteer Magdalena Urquhart told the postulator of the friar’s cause.

She said working with the poor has changed the way she viewed them. “Although in the beginning one has a certain amount of fear because there are a lot of alcoholics, a lot of drug addictions, they’re people who need a lot of love, for someone to listen to them.”

Rogelio Caroca, who has volunteered for seven years, considers Friar Andresito to be his friend and admires him because of his witness as “a simple man who generously practiced charity across the board.”

Andrés Garcia Acosta, known as Friar Andresito, was born in the Canary Islands on Jan. 10, 1800. He became acquainted with the Franciscan Order during his childhood and youth.

In 1832, he embarked for the Americas, in one of the great waves of migration from the island caused by famines, lack of employment, and droughts.

He arrived in Montevideo, Uruguay, and in 1834, he entered the Franciscan Order. In 1838 the government expelled the Franciscans from the country, and he traveled to Chile when he learned that the Franciscans of the Strict Observance had been reestablished there.

Friar Andresito was assigned to the Franciscan Church of the Strict Observance from 1839 to 1853. He served as almoner and helped out in the kitchen. As almoner he got to know the physical and spiritual needs of both the wealthy and the poor.

Friar Andresito was beloved and renowned by the people of his time. Besides being almoner, he visited jails and hospitals, attended to the sick and gave spiritual advice. He was known for his humility, dedication and joy.

On Sundays, he would distribute fruit and bread to the poor, an activity that today inspires “Friar Andresito’s Soup Kitchen.”

On Jan. 9, 1853, Friar Andresito came down with pneumonia. He died Jan. 14 and hundreds of people came to pay their respects.

On July 10, 1855, the friar’s remains were exhumed, and his body was found incorrupt.

In 1927, the “Friar Andrés Brotherhood” was founded and spread throughout Chile. In 1977, the “Friends of Friar Andresito” society was established, with devotees in Chile, Argentina, Bolivia and the United States.

Pope Francis recognized Friar Andresito’s heroic virtues June 8, 2016 and he was declared venerable.

This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

[…]

Pro-life supporters march in this year’s March for Life in Ottawa, Canada, May 9, 2024. / Credit: Peter Stockland

Ottawa, Canada, May 10, 2024 / 16:00 pm (CNA).

Thousands of pro-lifers packed onto Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Canada, and spilled out onto Wellington Street on May 9 for the 27th annual National March for Life.

The diverse crowd gathered on the Hill at noon with its members bearing both homemade and professionally crafted signs pledging them to stand fast for the unborn and vulnerable.

The march’s theme, “I Will Never Forget You” was taken from the prophet Isaiah’s poignant question: “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast?”

The rally and march were broadcast live by the U.S. cable network EWTN. (Editor’s note: EWTN is the parent company of Catholic News Agency.)

This year’s speakers included pro-life speaker and author Abby Johnson, President of 40 Days for Life Shawn Carney, and Campaign Life Coalition Vice-Chair Jeff Gunnarson.

The opening prayer was led by Father Daniel Szwarc, OMI, who traveled to Ottawa from the Arctic Circle together with three young women engaged in pro-life activities in their small Inuit village of Naujaat.

Diana Kringayark told the crowd that every week she and the other women buy baby products to distribute to 40 village families to show that “every baby is important.”

Ottawa Archbishop Marcel Damphousse encouraged the marchers to act with “courage, compassion, and conviction.”

Conservative members of Parliament Cathay Wagantall and Arnold Viersen were the only federal politicians to address the crowd.

In her brief speech, Wagantall emphasized that advocating for the unborn and the vulnerable is particularly difficult for Canadian politicians. But she hailed the number of young people in the crowd as a sign of hope.

“If you think it is a battle out here, you know it is a battle in there,” the Saskatchewan member of Parliament said, indicating the Houses of Parliament behind her.

Angelina Steenstra of the Silent No More Awareness Campaign introduced Nathalia Comrie, a young woman who, at 17, was pregnant and felt that “abortion was the only choice my family would accept.” She said she was told that “everything would go back to normal after the abortion.”

“That was a lie,” Comrie said. After years of depression and substance abuse, she was introduced to the Sisters of Life, and through them to other women who, like her, had suffered as the result of abortion.

“I will never forget my son Kaeden. He is why I am silent no more,” Comrie said.

In the crowd of clergy, habited religious sisters, elderly, schoolchildren, and loud teenagers were women who had found themselves, like Comrie, in situations where they felt pressured and alone.

Christa Ranson came to the March for Life from Montreal because she knew what it was to have considered abortion.

Ranson had been scheduled to undergo an abortion on two separate occasions. The first time she was actually on the table being prepped for the abortion when she decided not to go through with it. The second time, after hearing her son’s heartbeat by ultrasound, Ranson decided she “just couldn’t do it.”

Ranson said she now tells her son: “I loved you when you were just a heartbeat.”

When asked why it was important for her to come to the March for Life, she told Canada’s The Catholic Register that it was to let women know there is a choice other than abortion.

“What a lot of people don’t realize is that, when you are on that table, those babies are living, they have a heart, they have feelings.”

“I want other women to know that even if it is difficult, it will be okay and it is worth it. If women are making the decision because of health reasons, or financial reasons, they should reach out. There are resources out there, there are doctors out there who will help.”

This article was originally published by Canada’s The Catholic Register and is reprinted here with permission. 

[…]

Cathedral of San Gil / Oscar Espinosa/Shutterstock

ACI Prensa Staff, Jun 24, 2021 / 15:01 pm (CNA).
An LGBT activist danced and stripped to scanty underwear in the atrium in front of the cathedral in the town of San Gil, Colombia this week.&nbsp… […]