Cardinal Pell begins hearing in Australia over abuse charges

Canberra, Australia, Jun 18, 2018 / 12:53 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- As Australian states and territories pass and consider laws requiring priests to break the seal of confession to report cases of child sex abuse, Catholic priests are saying they would go t… […]

Beijing, China, Jul 24, 2019 / 12:15 pm (CNA).- An article published Wednesday in a state-run paper from mainland China repeated government talking points regarding the situations of the Uighurs, a Muslim ethnoreligious group in the country’s northwest.

Some 1 million Uighurs have been detained in re-education camps for Muslims in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Inside the camps they are reportedly subjected to forced labor, torture, and political indoctrination. Outside the camps, Uyghurs are monitored by pervasive police forces and facial recognition technology.

Uighurs can be arrested and detained under vague anti-terrorism laws. Violence in the region escalated in the 1990s and again in 2008.

In August 2014 officials in Karamay, a city of Xinjiang, banned “youths with long beards” and anyone wearing headscarves, veils, burqas, or clothes with the crescent moon and star symbol from using public transit. That May, universities across the region banned fasting during Ramadan.

The Chinese government has said reports on the camps by Western governments and media are unfounded, claiming they are vocational training centers and that it is combatting extremism.

Li Yang, an author at China Daily, an English language daily owned by the Communist Party of China, wrote July 24 that “Western critics of China’s policies on human rights and religious freedom in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region seem to be divorced from the realities of the situation.”

Li’s piece focused on “Uygur separatists” who try “to brainwash the other Uygurs with extremism and terrorism.”

He said that “all the measures that Beijing has taken to fight separatism, extremism and terrorism in Xinjiang are part of the global anti-terrorism campaign, as well as an integral part of China’s efforts to boost local development.”

Li noted that the Chinese government has set up “vocational educational centers” in Xinjiang, as well as “installing surveillance systems and deploying security forces.”

He also pointed out that 150 million tourists visited Xinjiang last year, and that the autonomous region’s economy has risen 40 percent over the past five years.

According to Li, “the religious freedom of all ethnic groups … is strictly protected by law.”

Li focused on the diversity of Xinjiang, saying that separatists ignore the interest of the region’s other ethnic groups. Uighurs make up about 46% of the region’s population; Han Chinese 39%, Kazakhs 7%, and Huis 5%. A large number of minorities make up the remaining 3%.

Attention was drawn to the human and religious rights situation in Xinjiang at the recent Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom held by the US State Department last week.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said July 18 at the gathering that survivors of the detention camps have described “a deliberate attempt by Beijing to strangle Uighur culture and stamp out” Islam.

In response, Chinese officials have been outspoken in defense of policies in the region.

A letter signed by Chinese scholars and religious officials posted July 19 by the Xinjiang government said Pompeo should “stop fabricating lies and slander about Xinjiang.”

An editorial published in the People’s Daily July 20 claims that China actually respects religious rights, and said that the United States has an “ulterior motive” to criticize China’s treatment of religious minorities.

“They even use so-called freedom of religious belief as an excuse to undermine China’s national harmony and interfere in China’s internal affairs,” the editorial said.

And the Chinese State Council Information Office released a white paper July 21 that claimed, among other things, that Xinjiang is a region where religious freedom is respected, and that the Uighur population did not choose to become Muslim.

In June, Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) told a congressional hearing that China’s campaign to “sinicize” religion is proceeding with brutal efficiency. “Under ‘sinicization,’ all religions and believers must comport with and aggressively promote communist ideology — or else,” Smith said.

“It’s never been worse than it is right now.”

“Religious believers of every persuasion are harassed, arrested, jailed, or tortured. Only the compliant are left relatively unscathed. Bibles are burned, churches are destroyed, crosses set ablaze atop church steeples,” Smith said.

[…]

Kochi, India, Jan 9, 2019 / 02:37 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The superior general of the Franciscan Clarist Congregation issued last week a letter of warning to Sister Lucy Kalapura, who has been accused of several acts of disobedience, including a protest of the handling of another nun’s accusation that a bishop serially raped her.

Sr. Ann Joseph sent the Jan. 1 letter to Sr. Kalapura asking that she appear before her Jan. 9 to explain the alleged disobediences, or face expulsion from the congregation.

“I have received many allegations against you and have witnessed some of them,” Sr. Ann Joseph wrote, according to The News Minute. The allegations include leading a life “against the principles of religious life” and “against the rule and constitution of the Franciscan Clarist congregation.”

Sr. Kalapura is accused of disobeying a transfer order, publishing poems after having been denied permission to do so, buying a vehicle, withholding her salary from the congregation, and participating in a protest against Bishop Franco Mulakkal of Jullundur.

Bishop Mulakkal has been accused by a nun of the Missionaries of Jesus of sexually assaulting her 13 times between 2014 and 2016. He was arrested Sept. 21, 2018, but was released on bail. A police investigation is ongoing, and the bishop has been temporarily removed from his responsibilities as Bishop of Jullundur.

Several nuns began protesting in Kochi Sept. 8, 2018 how both police and the Church had responded to the accusation against Bishop Mulakkal.

Sr. Ann Joseph’s letter says that Sr. Kalapura joined the Kochi protest Sept. 20 “without the permission of your superior. You have published articles in some non-Christian newspapers and weeklies … gave interviews to ‘Samayam’ without seeking permission from the provincial superior. Through Facebook, channel discussions and the articles, you belittled the Catholic leadership by making false accusations against it and tried to bring down the sacraments. You tried to defame FCC also. Your performance through social media as a religious sister was culpable, arising grave scandal.”

The letter also says Sr. Kalapura has failed to obey a transfer order given her in 2015 by her provincial superior, and that she published a book of poems despite being denied permission to do so, and used 50,000 Indian rupees ($700) from the congregation’s account “without proper permission” to do so.

Sr. Kalapura is also accused of buying a car for about $5,670 and learning to drive without permission, and failing to entrust her salary from December 2017.

Sr. Ann Joseph called these acts “a grave infringement of the vow of poverty.”

The superior general added that Sr. Kalapura has been corrected and warned several times by her provincial over her “improper behaviour and violations of religious discipline.”

“Instead of correcting yourself, you are simply denying the allegations against you stating that you have to live your own beliefs, ideologies and conviction. You are repeatedly violating the vows of obedience and poverty. The evangelization and social work you do should be according to the FCC values, principles and rules. The present mode of your life is a grave violation of the profession you have made,” Sr. Ann Joseph wrote.

The News Minute reported that Sr. Kalapura has responded to the letter by claiming it intends to silence her: “The church leadership has been trying to silence whoever questions their actions.”

With regard to her book of poems, she said that “after repeatedly asking for permission, since 2016, they refused to consider my request.”

She also stated: “I have always wholeheartedly offered my salary to the Congregation. However, when I requested the Superior for some money to buy a car to travel for my social works, they denied it. When I was completely denied my benefits, I was determined to take a loan and buy the car. I do not consider it as a violation. In fact, the congregation has violated my rights.”

Sr. Kalapura told The Indian Express: “I don’t think my acts, as mentioned by the Catholic Church in its notice, are wrong. If I’d known they were wrong, I would have never committed them. I did them knowing fully well that they are right. I have no clarification to give regarding that matter. We will see what happens.”

Fr. Augustine Vattoly, another protester against Bishop Mulakkal, has also been warned over his participation.

He prohibited in November for organizing and attending a dharna, or non-violent sit-in, by Bishop Jacob Manathodath, in his capacity as Apostolic Administrator of the Syro-Malabar Archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly.

“I am told that such actions by a priest will seriously injure the good of the church in public and will cause scandal among the faithful,” Bishop Manathodath wrote, according to Indian magazine The Week.

“It is reported that you celebrate Holy Qurbana (Mass) only rarely and your public expression of priestly prayer life and faith is in question. Daily celebration of Divine office and Qurbana is strongly encouraged by ecclesiastical norms… It is reported that you are not commemorating the name of the Major Archbishop in the Divine Liturgy and in the Divine praises. Its violation is punishable in accordance with the Canon Law,” the letter continued.

Cardinal George Alencherry, Major Archbishop of the Syro-Malabar Archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly, has been accused of receiving the nun’s complaint against Bishop Mulakkal in March 2018, and failing to report it to the police.

On Oct. 22, Fr. Kuriakose Kattuthara, who testified in support of the nun’s claims, was found dead under mysterious circumstances. Foul play has been alleged by members of the priest’s family, but a final autopsy report has not yet been reported.

[…]