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Vatican City, Apr 14, 2020 / 04:00 am (CNA).- In uncertain times, our ultimate goal should be to remain faithful to the Lord rather than to seek our own security, Pope Francis said at his morning Mass Tuesday.
Speaking from the chapel of his Vatican residence, the Casa Santa Marta, April 14, the pope said: “Many times when we feel secure we begin to make our plans and slowly move away from the Lord; we do not remain faithful. And my security is not what the Lord gives me. It is an idol.”
To Christians who object that they do not bow before idols, he said: “No, perhaps you do not kneel, but that you seek them and so many times in your heart you worship idols, it is true. Many times. Your own safety opens the door to idols.”
Pope Francis reflected on the Second Book of Chronicles, which describes how King Rehoboam, the first leader of the Kingdom of Judah, became complacent and departed from the law of the Lord, taking his people with him.
“But is your own safety bad?” the pope asked. “No, it’s a grace. Be secure, but also be sure that the Lord is with me. But when there is safety and I am at the center, I turn away from the Lord, like King Rehoboam, I become unfaithful.”
“It is so difficult to remain faithful. The whole history of Israel, and then the whole history of the Church, is full of infidelity. Full. Full of selfishness, full of its own certainties that make the people of God move away from the Lord, lose that fidelity, the grace of fidelity.”
Focusing on the day’s second reading (Acts 2:36-41), in which Peter calls people to repentance on the day of Pentecost, the pope said: “To convert is this: to return to being faithful. Fidelity, that human attitude which is not so common in people’s lives, in our lives. There are always illusions that attract attention, and many times we want to hide behind these illusions. Fidelity: in good times and bad times.”
The pope said that the day’s Gospel reading (John 20:11-18) offered an “icon of fidelity”: the image of a weeping Mary Magdalene keeping vigil beside Jesus’ tomb.
“She was there,” he said, “faithful, faced with the impossible, faced with tragedy … A weak but faithful woman. The icon of fidelity of this Mary of Magdala, apostle to the apostles.”
Inspired by Mary Magdalene, we should pray for the gift of faithfulness, the pope said.
“Let us ask the Lord today for the grace of fidelity: to give thanks when He gives us certainties, but never think that they are ‘my’ certainties and always, look beyond one’s own certainties; the grace of being faithful even before the tombs, before the collapse of so many illusions.”
After Mass, the pope presided at adoration and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, before leading those watching via livestream in a prayer of spiritual communion.
Finally, the congregation sang the Easter Marian antiphon “Regina caeli”.
At the start of Mass, the pope prayed that the challenges of the coronavirus crisis would help people to overcome their differences.
“Let us pray that the Lord will give us the grace of unity among us,” he said. “May the difficulties of this time make us discover the communion among us, the unity that is always superior to any division.”
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CNA Staff, Apr 13, 2020 / 12:00 pm (CNA).- Sri Lanka’s Catholics have forgiven the bombers who struck their churches last Easter, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith has said.
Speaking at an Easter Sunday Mass April 12, the archbishop of Colombo said: “Last year some misguided youths attacked us and we as humans could have given a human and selfish response. But we meditated on Christ’s teachings and loved them, forgave them and had pity on them.”
The cardinal, who livestreamed the Mass from his residence due to the coronavirus crisis, added: “We did not hate them and return them the violence. Resurrection is the complete rejection of selfishness.”
Nine suicide bombers targeted two Catholic churches, one evangelical church and three hotels on April 19, 2019, killing an estimated 259 people and injuring more than 500. The bombers belonged to an Islamist group known as the National Thowheeth Jama’ath and were all Sri Lankan citizens.
Cardinal Ranjith, 72, has repeatedly accused the authorities of failing to give a clear account of how the terrorists were able to carry out the attack despite alleged intelligence that attacks were imminent.
In March, he said he would lead public protests if the government failed to produce a credible report on the bombings.
The faithful had hoped to attend Easter services at the bombed churches, but government measures to combat COVID-19 meant they had to celebrate Easter at home.
According to Vatican News, Masses were celebrated behind closed doors at the two Catholic churches attacked by the bombers: the Shrine of St. Anthony in the capital, Colombo, and St. Sebastian’s Church in Negombo. A total of more than 150 people were killed at the two sites.
Catholic leaders are planning to hold a private ceremony marking the anniversary on April 21, reported Vatican News.
More than 217 people have contracted COVID-19 in Sri Lanka and seven have died as of April 11, according to Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center.
CNA Staff, Apr 13, 2020 / 12:00 pm (CNA).- Sri Lanka’s Catholics have forgiven the bombers who struck their churches last Easter, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith has said.
Speaking at an Easter Sunday Mass April 12, the archbishop of Colombo said: “Last year some misguided youths attacked us and we as humans could have given a human and selfish response. But we meditated on Christ’s teachings and loved them, forgave them and had pity on them.”
The cardinal, who livestreamed the Mass from his residence due to the coronavirus crisis, added: “We did not hate them and return them the violence. Resurrection is the complete rejection of selfishness.”
Nine suicide bombers targeted two Catholic churches, one evangelical church and three hotels on April 19, 2019, killing an estimated 259 people and injuring more than 500. The bombers belonged to an Islamist group known as the National Thowheeth Jama’ath and were all Sri Lankan citizens.
Cardinal Ranjith, 72, has repeatedly accused the authorities of failing to give a clear account of how the terrorists were able to carry out the attack despite alleged intelligence that attacks were imminent.
In March, he said he would lead public protests if the government failed to produce a credible report on the bombings.
The faithful had hoped to attend Easter services at the bombed churches, but government measures to combat COVID-19 meant they had to celebrate Easter at home.
According to Vatican News, Masses were celebrated behind closed doors at the two Catholic churches attacked by the bombers: the Shrine of St. Anthony in the capital, Colombo, and St. Sebastian’s Church in Negombo. A total of more than 150 people were killed at the two sites.
Catholic leaders are planning to hold a private ceremony marking the anniversary on April 21, reported Vatican News.
More than 217 people have contracted COVID-19 in Sri Lanka and seven have died as of April 11, according to Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center.
Washington D.C., Apr 13, 2020 / 10:00 am (CNA).- The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it will hear oral arguments by phone next month. Justices will hear arguments from lawyers remotely across six dates in the first two weeks of May in an effort to keep the business of the court moving during the coronavirus outbreak.
A statement from the Supreme Court, released April 13, said that ten cases would be assigned dates in the first two weeks of May.
“The Court will hear oral arguments by telephone conference on May 4, 5, 6, 11, 12 and 13,” the statement said. “The following cases will be assigned argument dates after the Clerk’s Office has confirmed the availibility of counsel.”
“In keeping with public heath guidance in response to COVID-19, the Justices and counsel will all participate remotely. The Court anticipates providing a live audio feed of these arguments to news media,” said the court’s release.
Among those cases included in the revised schedule are the Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania and Trump v. Pennsylvania.
Those cases were originally slated to be heard April 29, but the court announced April 3 that they would be postponed, along with the other cases due for hearings across a two week window, “in keeping with public health guidance in response to COVID-19.”
The cases concern action by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to end the religious order’s exemption to the Department of Health and Human Services so-called contraception mandate.
In 2017, the Trump administration issued a rule exempting the Little Sisters and other religious entities from the mandate. State attorneys general for Pennsylvania and California then challenged the exemption in court.
The Little Sisters lost their case against Pennsylvania at the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in July of 2019, and lost their case against California at the Ninth Circuit Court in October. They appealed to the Supreme Court, which agreed in January to hear their case.
The release from the Supreme Court on Monday said that live audio of the arguments would be made available to media. Dates for hearing arguments in individual cases have not yet been assigned, the court said, and would be announced after lawyers in different cases have confirmed their availability.
The Little Sisters of the Poor have spent years in litigation related to the mandate. The 2010 Affordable Care Act mandated certain preventive coverage in health care, and the Obama administration interpreted the mandate to include coverage for contraceptives and sterilizations.
Religious institutions, including the Little Sisters and Catholic dioceses, said that a government “accommodation” still forced them to violate their religious beliefs in the provision of morally-objectionable procedures in employee health plans.
The Little Sisters’ case has already been heard by the Supreme Court in in 2016, when justices sent the case back down to lower courts, instructing the religious entities and the government to come to an agreement whereby the wishes of both parties could be attained. The Trump administration issued the exemption following that instruction, resulting the lawsuits by Pennsylvania and other states.
On April 8, Mark Rienzi, president of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty which represents the sisters, said that religious order had been dragged through the courts for years.
“This, frankly silly, saga has gone on for eight or nine years with, at times, the federal government, and with, at times, state governments pretending that they need nuns in order to give people contraception, which has always been a whacky argument and a bad position for the government to take,” he said.
Also among the cases due to be heard remotely are Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrissey-Berru and St. James School v. Biel— both of which involve the “ministerial exception.” The cases focus on whether or not two Catholic schools in California are free to fire religion teachers without interference from the courts, due to the “ministerial exception” which exists under the First Amendment.
Becket, which also represents the schools, is arguing that the courts and government cannot “second-guess” the employment decisions of religious institutions on staff members who provide religious instruction to children.
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