Rome Newsroom, Feb 15, 2021 / 08:30 am (CNA).- The president of the national bishops’ conference has welcomed Italy’s new government with a message to Prime Minister Mario Draghi, who was sworn in Saturday.
Cardinal Gualtiero Bassetti said the bishops are sure Draghi “will want to give priority attention to the people and families most marked by suffering, precariousness and the economic crisis.”
Draghi, an economist and banker, has formed a national unity government in Italy after being called in by President Sergio Mattarella following the collapse of the previous coalition last month.
Mattarella officially appointed Draghi prime minister in a ceremony Feb. 13. The new government is a mix of technocrats and politicians.
The Italian bishops watched the developments of the political crisis with “trepidation and concern,” Bassetti stated, emphasizing the importance of unity as the country faces “the heavy, even tragic, fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic,” including “new and widespread poverty.”
Bassetti added that “the Church in Italy will be an attentive and collaborative interlocutor, as has always been the case, in respect of mutual competences.”
Earlier this month, Italy’s national statistics office Istat reported that the country’s economy shrank by an estimated 8.9% last year, its biggest contraction since the end of World War II.
With over 420,000 jobs lost from February to December 2020, the Church in Italy has warned about the increasing number of “new poor” in the country.
The John Paul II National Anti-Usury Council has identified that in Italy, 3 million households, including families and family businesses — about 7.5 million individuals — are insolvent, and that 350,000 families are at risk of usury, especially by criminal organizations.
There is hope that the 73-year-old Draghi, president of the European Central Bank from 2011 to 2019, can save Italy’s economy, like he saved the failing euro during the Eurozone crisis.
“Super Mario,” as some have hailed the technocrat, was also formerly president of the Bank of Italy. Last year, Pope Francis named him to an honored position at the Vatican as one of 26 ordinary academicians of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.
In his message, the president of the bishops’ conference praised the new prime minister’s emphasis on European politics “with an eye to solidarity between nations, peace, sustainable development and social justice.”
“I would like to offer you my best wishes for the important and delicate task that awaits you and the new government in such a complex phase for the history of our country, of Europe and of the whole world,” Bassetti said.
He closed the message by saying “we accompany you with prayer.”
If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!
Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.
Religious sisters of the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles, sing as the process with the body of their late foundress, Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster, on May 29, 2023, at their abbey near Gower, Missouri. The sisters exhumed the nun’s body on May 18 and discovered that it was apparently intact, four years after her death and burial in a simple wooden coffin. / Joe Bukuras/CNA
Gower, Missouri, May 29, 2023 / 20:02 pm (CNA).
The body of Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster, an African American nun whose surprisingly intact remains have created a sensation at a remote Missouri abbey, was placed inside a glass display case Monday after a solemn procession led by members of the community she founded.
About 5 p.m., dozens of religious sisters of the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles, carried their foundress on a platform around the property of the Abbey of Our Lady of Ephesus, reciting the rosary and singing hymns. Some of the thousands of pilgrims who visited the abbey over the three-day Memorial Day weekend followed behind.
Beautiful procession of the remains of Sr. Wilhelmina Lancaster, a Benedictine nun who died in 2019 and now appears to be in an unexpected state of preservation. Her new resting place is inside the church at the sisters’ monastery in Gower, MO. pic.twitter.com/Ax9uYPKXYv
The procession, held in bright, late-afternoon sunshine, culminated inside the abbey’s church, where the nun’s body was placed into a specially made glass case. Flowers surrounded her body and decorated the top of the case, where there is an image of St. Joseph holding the Child Jesus. The church was filled with pilgrims, including many priests and religious sisters from other orders.
Sister Wilhelmina, who founded the Benedictine order in 1995 when she was 70 years old, died in 2019. Expecting to find only bones, her fellow sisters exhumed her remains on May 18 intending to reinter them in a newly completed St. Joseph’s Shrine, only to discover that her body appeared astonishingly well-preserved.
The sisters say they intended to keep their discovery quiet, but the news got out anyway, prompting worldwide media coverage and a flood of pilgrims arriving at the abbey in Gower, a city of 1,500 residents about an hour’s drive from Kansas City, Missouri. A volunteer told CNA that more than 1,000 vehicles came onto the property on Monday but no official count was available.
There has been no official declaration that Sister Wilhelmina’s remains are “incorrupt,” a possible sign of sanctity, nor is there a formal cause underway for her canonization, a rigorous process that can take many years. The local ordinary, Bishop Vann Johnston of the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, has said that a “thorough investigation” is needed to answer “important questions” raised by the state of her body, but there has been no word on if or when such an analysis will take place.
Sister Wilhelmina’s body was reinterred in a glass display case inside the church of the Abbey of Our Lady of Ephesus in Gower, Missouri, on May 29, 2023. Joe Bukuras/CNA
Before Monday’s procession, pilgrims again waited in line throughout the day for an opportunity to see and touch Sister Wilhelmina’s body before its placement in the glass case, where it will remain accessible for public viewing.
Among those who came on Monday were Tonya and William Kattner, of Excelsior Springs, Missouri.
“You’ve got to experience the magic and the miracle of it,” Tonya Kattner said.
“It’s a modern-day miracle and it was just something we had to come to,” William Kattner said. “Especially with everything going on in the world today, something like this brings hope.”
Kate and Peteh Jalloh of Kansas City, Missouri, said it was a “blessing” to view the apparently well-preserved body of Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster at her abbey in Gower, Missouri, on May 29, 2023. Joe Bukuras/CNA
Kate and Peteh Jalloh, of Kansas City, Missouri, also didn’t want to pass up the chance to see Sister Wilhelmina.
“I strongly believe in the Catholic faith. I believe in miracles and I have never seen anything like this before. I’ve got a lot going on in my life and this is the best time to get that message from a nun,” Kate Jalloh said.
“It could take another hundred years for us to see something like this,” she added.
Janie Bruck came with her cousins, Kristy Cook and Halle Cook, all from Omaha, Nebraska.
“I came to witness the miracle. I believe we’re in a Jesus revolution and he’s sending us lots of signs,” Bruck said. Kristy Cook, a former Omaha police officer, said she was surprised that Sister Wilhelmina’s body had no odor of decay.
The body of Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster, OSB, lies in the basement of the church of the Abbey of Our Lady of Ephesus outside Gower, Missouri, on May 28, 2023. Joe Bukuras/CNA
The sisters have publicly thanked the many local law enforcement officers, medical personnel, and volunteers who helped manage the influx of pilgrims over the holiday weekend.
Among the volunteers was Lucas Boddicker, of Kearney, Missouri, who joined members of his Knights of Columbus council based at St. Anne’s Catholic Church in nearby Plattsburgh, Missouri, to guide visiting vehicles to a makeshift parking lot in an open field. Other knights from local parishes helped set up tents and handed out free hamburgers, fruit, and bottles of water.
“That’s one thing the Knights do pretty well,” Boddicker said. “They get the word out when we need manpower.”
Priests heard confessions in a large grass field for hours, some using trees for shade, as young children played on the abbey grounds.
Three religious sisters from the Poor of Jesus Christ order, based in Kansas City, Kansas, said they were inspired by seeing Sister Wilhelmina’s body.
One of the religious, Sister Azucena, said she “wanted to cry,” while praying at the nun’s side. “I just had this feeling of peace and love. We share a vocation. Her fidelity to the Lord and her love, I could feel that there,” she said.
Jason and Jessica Ewell were excited to coincidentally be in town visiting Trish Bachicha (far right) when they heard about the discovery of Sister Wilhelmina’s surprisingly intact remains. Joe Bukuras/CNA
A married couple, Jason and Jessica Ewell, both of whom are blind, were visiting Kansas City, Missouri, from Pennsylvania when they heard Monday morning about Sister Wilhelmina’s body.
“It’s just kind of a neat thing to be a part of the beginning of this story,” Jessica Ewell said.
“I was asking for her intercession for children for our marriage,” she said. “A lot of people think ‘Oh, it’s the blindness,’ but no, it’s not that at all,’” she said.
“Yesterday I was kind of in a place where I said, ‘God, I need something right now,’” she said. “We always hear about these miracles. But they’re long ago and far away and always happen to other people.”
Trish Bachicha, Jessica’s mother, said she believes that God is sending a message.
“He saying ‘I’m alive and well and I haven’t forgotten you,’” she said.
Vatican City, Aug 6, 2017 / 06:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- As young people gathered in Indonesia for the 7th Asian Youth Day prepare to head home, Pope Francis sent a message encouraging them to be courageous, and to turn to Mary as a model of what it means to be a missionary.
In an Aug. 6 telegram signed by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the prelate extended “warm greetings and prayerful best wishes” to all participating in the event on behalf of Pope Francis.
The Pope, he said, “prays that young people from across Asia will listen ever more attentively to God’s call and respond with faith and courage to their vocation.”
Looking ahead to the global World Youth Day gathering in Panama in 2019, Francis invited the youth to turn to Mart, the Mother of God as “ a model of missionary discipleship, to speak to her as they would to a mother, and to trust always in her loving intercession.”
“In this way, as they seek to follow Christ Jesus more closely, they too, like the young woman of Nazareth, can truly “improve the world and leave an imprint that makes a mark on history,” he said, giving his blessing and entrusting the youth and their families to Mary’s intercession.
Pope Francis’ message was sent on the final day of the Aug. 2-6 Asian Youth Day gathering in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, holding the theme: “Joyful Asian Youth: Living the Gospel in Multicultural Asia.”
More than two thousand young Catholics from all over Asia took part in the gathering, which came a year after the international WYD gathering in Krakow, Poland last summer, attended by Pope Francis.
The Pope was also present during the last Asian Youth Day, which coincided with Pope Francis’ Aug. 13-18, 2014, visit to South Korea, and centered on the theme: “Asian Youth! Wake up! The glory of the martyrs shines upon you!”
This year’s event in Indonesia featured talks and workshops on aimed at building mutual respect in Asia’s diverse, multicultural population, caring for the environment and learning how to be missionaries in a digital world.
As part of the multicultural aspect and in an effort to address growing fundamentalism in the area, the event hosted several encounters between Christian, Islamic and other religious leaders.
Among the Asian Catholic leaders who attended the event were Cardinal Oswald Gracias, Archbishop of Bombay and a member of the Pope’s “C9” council of cardinal advisers, and Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, Archbishop of Manila and President of the Caritas Internationalis aid organization.
Indonesia’s Vice President, Muhammad Jusuf Kalla, was present at the closing ceremony Aug. 6, when it was announced that India will be the location of the next Asian Youth Day.
The main celebrant at the closing Mass was Archbishop Ignatius Suharyo Hardjoatmodjo of Jakarta, who at the end of his homily noted that attendees come from all over Asia.
“We do realize our differences: we are of different nationalities, different languages, different cultures, and so on,” he said.
“However, in this event, we do realize and experience that those differences cannot separate us, but the differences show the richness of the united humanity instead. It proves that the power of faith, hope and love unites us.”
Suharyo closed by voicing his hope that the event would help the youths to “diligently and faithfully live out Gospel so that we may be filled with the joy of the Gospel. Thus, our life could mirror the glory of the Lord, which changes our lives.”
Leave a Reply