Pope Benedict XVI at the World Family Meeting in Milan with Cardinal Angelo Scola on June 4, 2012. / Credit: CNA/World Meeting of Families 2012
CNA Newsroom, Jun 20, 2023 / 12:30 pm (CNA).
A pectoral cross bequeathed by the late Pope Benedict XVI to a parish in his native Bavaria has been stolen from the church where it was on display.
According to CNA Deutsch, CNA’s German-language partner news agency, unknown perpetrators broke open a display case on the wall of St. Oswald’s Church in the city of Traunstein during daylight hours Monday.
Police said cash was also stolen from the cash register of a literature stand in the church.
The value of the cross to the Catholic Church is “not quantifiable,” the police said. Authorities are asking anyone who saw anyone suspicious near St. Oswald’s on Monday or has any other information to come forward. The Traunstein district attorney’s office is leading the investigation.
Pope Benedict XVI bequeathed a pectoral cross to St. Oswald’s Church in the city of Traunstein in Bavaria after his retirement in 2013. The cross was stolen June 19, 2023, from the church. Credit: Bavarian Police/CNA Deutsch
Former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was born in the small Bavarian community of Marktl am Inn. When Joseph was 2 years old, his father moved the family to Traunstein, where he studied at the seminary.
According to a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising, the late pontiff celebrated his first Mass as a newly ordained priest at St. Oswald’s in 1951. After the renovation in 2020, the cross was exhibited in the now-broken display case.
On Tuesday the Traunstein Regional Court was scheduled to hear the case of a plaintiff who is suing the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising and Benedict’s heirs for damages. The man says he was sexually abused by Father Peter Hullermann during the time the future pope was archbishop of Munich.
In February 2022, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI personally asked for forgiveness from abuse survivors in a letter responding to a report that faulted his handling of cases during his tenure.
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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?”
Participants in the Ottawa, Canada, March for Life on May 9, 2024, sing the national anthem. Credit: Peter Stockland
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.”
Diana Kringayark shares about her pro-life ministry in Naujaat, Nunavut, at the Ottawa March for Life on May 9, 2024. Credit: Peter Stockland
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.”
Nathalia Comrie shares the story of her abortion and the support she received from Silent No More Awareness Campaign and the Sisters of Life at the Ottawa, Canada, March for Life on May 9, 2024. Credit: Peter Stockland
“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.
Thousands gather to hear opening speeches at the 27th annual National March for Life in Ottawa, Canada, on May 9, 2024. Credit: Peter Stockland
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.
Thousands gather on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Canada, for the 27th annual National March for Life on May 9, 2024. Credit: Peter Stockland
“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.”
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1 Comment
I will sound like a broken record. Pastors, wake up. You MUST invest in security systems these days. Alarms and good quality cameras. Between theft of sacred objects and vandalism by nut jobs on the left, you have no choice. Refusing to do so invites attack and the loss of sacred objects which cannot be replaced. What are you waiting for? The cost to protect the church is cheaper and less harmful than desecration.
I will sound like a broken record. Pastors, wake up. You MUST invest in security systems these days. Alarms and good quality cameras. Between theft of sacred objects and vandalism by nut jobs on the left, you have no choice. Refusing to do so invites attack and the loss of sacred objects which cannot be replaced. What are you waiting for? The cost to protect the church is cheaper and less harmful than desecration.