Month: December 2023

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News Briefs

Pope Francis at Sunday Angelus: ‘Only in God do we find the light of life’

December 17, 2023 Catholic News Agency 1
A member of the crowd in St. Peter’s Square holds up a baby Jesus figure for a blessing by Pope Francis at his Sunday Angelus Dec. 17, 2023. / Credit: Vatican Media

Rome Newsroom, Dec 17, 2023 / 12:00 pm (CNA).

Pope Francis reflected on St. John the Baptist as a luminous figure who testifies to the light and teaches us that “only in God do we find the light of life” during his Angelus address Dec. 17 on the third Sunday of Advent, or Gaudete Sunday.

Observing this as the first lesson that we can learn from John the Baptist, the Holy Father told pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican that the second is that “through service, consistency, humility, witness of life” we “can be a lamp that shines and helps others find the way on which to meet Jesus.”

Today’s message built upon the Holy Father’s Angelus message from the previous Sunday, where he highlighted John’s ministry as a voice that “is linked to the genuineness of his experience and the clarity of his heart.”

Pope Francis waves to pilgrims in St. Peter's Square on Dec. 17, 2023. Credit: Vatican Media
Pope Francis waves to pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square on Dec. 17, 2023. Credit: Vatican Media

Expanding on this observation, the pontiff noted that John’s mission is characterized by his “frank language” and is underscored by his “sincere behavior, his austerity of life.” Thus it is through his example that the Holy Father suggested we look to John the Baptist as a figure who “motivate[s] us to rise above mediocrity and to be in turn models of good living for others.”

Expanding upon this point, the pope noted that we can see John as a “luminous” figure not only because he is “upright, free, and courageous” but because he submitted himself to God’s will, to carry out a mission to pronounce the light that is “Jesus, the Lamb of God” who “redeems, frees, heals, and enlightens.”

To that end, the luminosity of John is not self-aggrandizing, but instead he is at the service of others, a voice “who accompanies his brothers and sisters to the Word; he serves without seeking honors or the spotlight.” In this way the pope encouraged the faithful to look at John as a counterpoint to “other famous and powerful people” who “invested a lot in appearances.”

Drawing a connection between the biblical context and today, the pope noted that “in every age the Lord sends men and women like this,” but he asked the faithful: “Do we know how to recognize them? Do we try to learn from their witness, allowing ourselves to be challenged? Or rather, do we allow ourselves to be bedazzled by fashionable people?”

Pilgrims gather in St. Peter's Square for Pope Francis' Angelus message on Dec. 17, 2023. Credit: Vatican Media
Pilgrims gather in St. Peter’s Square for Pope Francis’ Angelus message on Dec. 17, 2023. Credit: Vatican Media

Following the recitation of the Angelus prayer, the Holy Father noted that on Saturday, Dec. 16, Argentine Cardinal Eduardo Francisco Pironio was beatified. The pope described Pironio as a “humble and zealous pastor, witness of hope, defender of the poor” who “collaborated with St. John Paul II in the promotion of the laity and in the World Youth Days.”

“May his example help us to be an outgoing Church, which becomes a traveling companion for everyone, especially the weakest,” the pope added.

The Mass of beatification was presided over by the 78-year-old Spanish Cardinal Vérgez Alzaga at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Luján in Argentina, where Pironio is buried.

Also after the Angelus the pope sharply condemned the reported killing of two women outside a Catholic church in Gaza City on Saturday, allegedly by an Israeli sniper.

“I continue to receive very serious and painful news from Gaza,” the pope lamented. “Unarmed civilians are subjected to bombings and shootings. And this even happened inside the parish complex of the Holy Family, where there are no terrorists but families, children, sick and disabled people, nuns.”

“Someone says, ‘It’s terrorism, it’s war.’ Yes, it’s war, it’s terrorism. This is why Scripture states that ‘God stops wars … breaks bows and breaks spears,’” the pope said. “Let us pray to the Lord for peace.”

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No Picture
News Briefs

Pro-life group Live Action offers ‘window to the womb’ in new online experience

December 17, 2023 Catholic News Agency 1
Live Action’s new website on the development of a child through pregnancy, windowtothewomb.app. / Credit: windowtothewomb.app

CNA Staff, Dec 17, 2023 / 10:00 am (CNA).

Have you ever wondered what it’d be like to have a window into the womb?

Well, that’s exactly what the pro-life group Live Action has attempted to provide with its new interactive website windowtothewomb.app.

The website launched Dec. 14 walks users through each trimester of pregnancy, day by day, by presenting an animated baby’s development starting from conception.

“The main idea behind the web app was to present something groundbreaking and something that was medically accurate,” Live Action spokeswoman Christina Bennett told CNA Friday. 

Users can either watch an animated video that progresses through each day of development or they can click through each week at their own speed. When clicking through the weeks, users will be able to read notes on the screen that describe certain aspects of the child’s development. 

At the eight-week stage, one note says: “At eight weeks, (six weeks from fertilization) brain waves can be recorded.”

At the 15-week stage, another note says: “Teeth! At 15 weeks, tooth development begins.”

Bennett said the website was made with the help of medical doctors and other medical professionals. She added that its production was in response, in part, to the misinformation about life in the womb that often circulates, such as the idea that a preborn baby is just a “clump of cells.”

“So we really wanted to combat this misinformation with groundbreaking, medically accurate, beautifully animated images of the baby growing in the womb to educate people, but also to give them an eye-opening, enlightening experience where they get to see what is really going on,” she said.

“That’s why we call it a window to the womb,” she said.

The website also includes a button that says “Pregnant & Need Help?” Clicking that link takes users to Live Action’s website where it offers several options to women who are either considering abortion, have had an abortion, have taken the abortion pill, are employed as an abortion worker, or are interested in adoption. 

When entering the website, users can choose a name and the biological sex of the baby they are seeing develop. 

Bennett said Live Action’s goal is for “everyone” to use the website, including those who work in pro-life pregnancy centers, which are institutions that help pregnant women in need of support. 

Diane Ferraro, CEO of Save The Storks, a large network of pro-life mobile medical clinics, said in an article on Live Action’s website: “Sharing Window to the Womb with women who board our mobile medical clinics will provide another compelling reason to make the decision for life for their babies.”

Another pro-life leader, president of Heartbeat International Jor-El Godsey, said: “It’s well said that ‘people perish for lack of knowledge.’ This is no more true than with the knowledge of fetal development.” 

“Live Action’s Window to the Womb is a visually powerful tool in ministering to those who are unexpectedly pregnant and need to know what is actually happening with the life developing within them. From the sidewalk to the center or from the church to the kitchen table, this is a tool for anyone to champion life,” he said.

The website can be accessed here.

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The Dispatch

BREAKING: Vatican court convicts Cardinal Becciu, sentences him to 5 years in jail for embezzling funds

December 16, 2023 Catholic News Agency 21
Italian Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu (right) waits prior to the start of a consistory during which 20 new cardinals are to be created by the Pope, on Aug. 27, 2022 at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. ( / Photo by ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP via Getty Images

CNA Staff, Dec 16, 2023 / 11:49 am (CNA).

Judges delivered a verdict in the Vatican’s financial corruption trial on Saturday sentencing Cardinal Angelo Becciu to more than five years in prison and convicting five other defendants.

Becciu, the pope’s former chief of staff, is the highest ranking Vatican official ever to face a trial in the Vatican’s criminal court. The 75-year-old Italian cardinal was found guilty of several counts of embezzlement. 

The cardinal was sentenced to five and half years in prison, a permanent disqualification from holding public office, and a fine equal to more than $8,000.

The Vatican court’s president, Giuseppe Pignatone, read aloud the verdict on Dec. 16 in the culmination of the nearly two-and-a-half-year-long saga of the Vatican’s “Trial of the Century,” which sat for 86 sessions.

Becciu’s lawyer, Fabio Viglione, told journalists on Saturday that the cardinal “will certainly appeal” the ruling.

Five other defendants were also sentenced to jail time, including Fabrizio Tirabassi, a former Vatican employee, and Enrico Crasso, a financial consultant for the Vatican, who were each given seven years in prison.

Italian businessman Gianluigi Torzi, who brokered the final stage of the London property at the center of the Vatican trial, received a six-year sentence, and Raffaele Mincione, the investment manager who owned the property, was given five years.

Cecilia Marogna, a Sardinian woman who was employed by Becciu as a security consultant, was sentenced to three years in prison.

Monsignor Mauro Carlino, a former official in the Vatican Secretariat of State, was acquitted in the trial. 

Two other defendants, René Brülhart and Tommaso Di Ruzza, received fines of less than $2,000 and Italian lawyer Nicola Squillace received a suspended sentence of one year and 10 months. 

Historic Trial of the Century’

The historic trial centered on what happened in and around the Secretariat of State’s 350 million-euro purchase of an investment property in London between 2014 and 2018.

The Vatican maintained that the deal was problematic and designed to defraud the Secretariat of State, the powerful curial department at the center of the investigation of financial malfeasance, of millions of euros.

The defendants in the trial were adamant that their actions were above board and that Vatican authorities were in the know.

Becciu, who used to work as the second-ranking official in the Vatican’s Secretariat of State, was charged with embezzlement, abuse of office, conspiracy, and witness tampering. Prosecutors asked for a prison sentence of seven years and three months, a fine of 10,329 euros ($11,236), and a ban from holding public office.

The cardinal has always denied all wrongdoing and claimed the financial deal was managed by his successor at the Secretariat of State, Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra.

Others involved also claimed there was no criminal liability in what took place — or they pointed the blame at parties whose names came up in investigations but who were never charged.

Defense lawyers were critical of the Vatican’s investigation and trial, calling it chaotic and lacking in respect for human rights and due process. One lawyer called for a mistrial.

Many of the 10 defendants, who maintained their innocence throughout the trial, will likely lodge appeals, so this may not be the final word in a trial that has seen a cardinal tried by lay judges for the first time.

This is a developing story.

[…]