Participants at the outdoor Mass in Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan, on Sept. 14, 2022 / Rudolf Gehrig / CNA Deutsch
Washington D.C., Sep 15, 2022 / 12:33 pm (CNA).
When Pope Francis arrived in Kazakhstan earlier this week, he was welcomed by a devout community of Catholics full of love for the faith — especially toward the Blessed Mother.
Alexey Gotovskiy, EWTN News In-Depth producer and a native of Kazakhstan, in a recent report introduced viewers to the Asian country, whose diverse culture is made up of a multitude of languages, faiths, and breathtaking natural vistas.
Despite making up only 1% of the country’s population, Catholics in Kazakhstan are devoted to the Virgin Mary. This is most evident when visiting the town of Ozernoe, which is home to the only Marian shrine in the country.
Father Mariusz Stawasz, rector of the Shrine of Our Lady of Peace, said that the source of the town’s devotion to Our Lady stems from a perceived miracle that occurred during the Great Famine of World War II.
“Here, the people were praying through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary for help,” Stawasz said. “And on March 25, 1941, a miracle occurred: the temperature rose … the snow melted, and [formed] a lake.”
Stawasz noted that, while the appearance of the lake may be attributed to a naturally occurring phenomenon, the lake was seemingly miraculously filled with an abundance of fish.
Additionally, the village houses a Carmelite monastery founded only 15 years ago — an example of Ozernoe’s present devotion to the faith. There, five sisters live and pray in solitude with Our Lord. One of these, Sister Elizabeth, gave insight into the Carmelite community and how its members view the importance of their faith.
“You could say that we are sheltered with Jesus in the tabernacle,” Sister Elizabeth said. “It gives us a chance to be close to the heart of Jesus … Together with him, we pray for all peoples.”
Sister Elizabeth also revealed that the miracle of the fish in Ozernoe occurred again during the 100th anniversary of Our Lady’s apparition in Fatima. For Sister Elizabeth, it was a reminder that Our Lady dwells in Kazakhstan.
While Pope Francis was not able to visit Ozernoe during his papal visit, he blessed the newest icon in the shrine — Mother of the Great Steppe.
During his papal visit, Pope Francis also emphasized the urgent need for interreligious dialogue among the many faiths in Kazakhstan — calling the journey to this goal “a shared path to peace and for peace; as such, it is necessary and irrevocable.”
For more details on the Catholic faith in Kazakhstan, see the full story below:
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A close-up of the copy of Michelangelo’s Vatican Pietà, usually kept at the Vatican Museums. / Ela Bialkowska/OKNO studio.
Rome Newsroom, Mar 7, 2022 / 04:00 am (CNA).
As war rages in Ukraine and the pandemic lingers, Michelangelo’s celebrated Vatican Pietà — and two lesser-known figures he also sculpted — can be deeply meaningful to a pain-wracked world, says a priest and art historian.
Michelangelo Buonarotti’s Pietà depicts a larger-than-life Virgin Mary as she mourns her crucified Son, Jesus, lying limp in her lap. The masterpiece, carved out of Carrara marble, was finished before the Italian artist’s 25th birthday.
Over the course of more than 60 years, Michelangelo created two more sculptures on the same theme — and a new exhibit in the Italian city of Florence brings the three works together for the first time.
The Three Pietà of Michelangelo exhibit at Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
The exhibit opened at the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo on Feb. 24, and includes the Florentine Pietà, also called the Deposition, which Michelangelo worked on from 1547 to 1555, and exact casts, or copies, of the Vatican Pietà and Milan Pietà — which could not be moved from their locations.
Msgr. Timothy Verdon, the director of the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, told CNA by phone that the gallery wanted to do something to show its solidarity with a Feb. 23-27 meeting of mayors and Catholic bishops.
“The images of suffering that the Pietà always implies I think will deeply touch people. I think that visitors will be moved to see these works,” he said. The image of the Pietà evokes “the personal suffering of mothers who hold their children not knowing if their children will survive.”
A close-up of the copy of Michelangelo’s Vatican Pietà, usually kept at the Vatican Museums. Ela Bialkowska/OKNO studio.
The 75-year-old Verdon is an expert in art history and sacred art. He was born in Hoboken, New Jersey, but has lived in Italy for more than 50 years.
“So many of the issues that face the Mediterranean world today are forms of suffering,” he said, “and so this ideal series of images of the God who becomes man [and] accepts suffering, and whose Mother receives his tortured body into her arms, these are deeply meaningful.”
“All human situations of suffering and exclusion invite a comparison with the suffering of Christ, the death of Christ. And [the Pietà] condenses and concentrates a devout reflection on that,” the priest said.
The lesser-known Pietàs
Many years after Michelangelo completed the Pietà displayed in St. Peter’s Basilica, he began his Florentine Pietà, which depicts Nicodemus, Mary Magdalene, and the Virgin Mary receiving the body of Christ as it is removed from the Cross.
The 72-year-old Michelangelo worked on the sculpture for eight years before eventually abandoning it in 1555.
Michelangelo’s Florentine Pietà, part of the permanent collection at the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy.
He probably began the Rondanini Pietà, which is in Milan, in 1553. Michelangelo continued to work on the piece until just days before his death in 1564.
According to a press release from the city of Florence, “near his own death, Michelangelo meditated deeply on the Passion of Christ.”
One way this is known is because shortly before his death, Michelangelo gave a drawing of the Pietà to Vittoria Colonna, the Marquess of Pescara, on which he wrote: “They think not there how much of blood it costs.”
The line, from Canto 29 of Paradiso, one of the books of Dante’s “Divine Comedy”, is also the subtitle of the Florence exhibition.
A perfect cast of Michelangelo’s unfinished Rondanini Pietà, on display at the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
Bringing the three Pietàs together into one exhibit gives the viewer the chance to see “the full range of Michelangelo’s reflection on this subject across 60-some years,” Verdon explained.
Not only is the Renaissance artist’s stylistic evolution on display, but also his spiritual development.
“We know that [Michelangelo] was a religious man,” Verdon said. “His interpretation of religious subjects, even in his youth, is particularly sensitive and well informed.”
According to the priest, Michelangelo seems to have had a range of theological influences.
“His older brother was a Dominican friar and in Michelangelo’s old age we’re told that he could still remember the preaching of Savonarola,” Verdon said.
Girolamo Savonarola was a popular Dominican friar, preacher, and reformer active in Renaissance Florence. He spoke against the ruling Medici family and the excesses of the time, and in 1498 he was hanged and his body burned after a trial by Church and civil authorities.
According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, “In the beginning Savonarola was filled with zeal, piety, and self-sacrifice for the regeneration of religious life. He was led to offend against these virtues by his fanaticism, obstinacy, and disobedience. He was not a heretic in matters of faith.”
“That’s an interesting page in cultural history,” Verdon said, “because the early Pietà is done in effect shortly after the Savonarola period, or in the Savonarola period.”
“So we’re talking about an artist to whom this subject means a great deal, and which he is also equipped to treat.”
The Three Pietà of Michelangelo exhibit at Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
The artist’s last Pietàs were created, instead, in the context of the Counter-Reformation.
The council, he explained, “had to rebut the heretical ideas of Protestant reformers, and so it insists, in a decree on the Eucharist published in 1551, that indeed in the bread and wine, Christ’s Body and Blood are truly present.”
“So Michelangelo, who was personally religious, and who, especially in his later period, worked exclusively for the Vatican, was therefore very close to the changes occurring in Catholic thought, Catholic theology, Catholic devotion,” Verdon said.
The exhibit “really gives us the opportunity to gauge the evolution of a theme from one time to a very different one, from the end of the 15th, to the mid- 16th century.”
The St. Peter’s Basilica Pietà
Verdon said that the Vatican Pietà is the only one of the three to remain in the place it was intended for — above an altar in St. Peter’s Basilica.
The sculpture was originally created for the 4th-century Constantinian basilica, the “Old St. Peter’s Basilica,” which was replaced by the Renaissance basilica standing today.
In Michelangelo’s Pietà, the Virgin Mary holds her Son as she did at his birth. . Paweesit via Flickr.
Viewing art in a church is not the same as viewing it in a museum, the art historian noted.
“Obviously it is different, especially for the fact that the Vatican Pietà has remained on an altar, above an altar, and so the body of Christ depicted by Michelangelo would have been seen in relation to the sacramental body of Christ in the Eucharist.”
“This was true of the first situation in the Old St. Peter’s, the work was on an altar, and it’s true of the present collocazione [position],” he said.
“And actually,” the priest continued, “the same thing was true of both of the other Pietàs. They were intended by Michelangelo to go on an altar in a chapel in a Roman church where he expected to be buried. We think the church was Santa Maria Maggiore.”
“So the relationship of the image of Christ’s body with the Eucharistic Corpus Christi is very important,” he said.
The Three Pietà of Michelangelo exhibit at Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
The copies of the Vatican and Milan Pietàs are on loan from the Vatican Museums, and will be in Florence for the Three Pietàs exhibit through Aug. 1.
“And in our museum, in the Florence Opera del Duomo Museum, we have put the Pietà, our Pietà, on a base that evokes an altar, as the very specific Church meaning [of an altar] has to do with the Sacrament,” Verdon said.
Liverpool, England, Apr 14, 2018 / 06:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Amid a tense battle over medical care for gravely ill toddler Alfie Evans, hundreds of protestors crowded outside Alder Hey Children’s Hospital this week in support of the child and his parents.
Evans, who is 23 months, suffers from an unidentified degenerative neurological condition, has been under continuous hospitalization since December 2016.
His parents wish for him to continue receiving care and to take him to the Bambino Gesu hospital in Rome, but officials at Alder Hey have gone to court to argue that continuing treatment is not in his best interest, and that his life support should be switched off. Several judges have ruled in the hospital’s favor.
Alfie’s case has garnered international attention, and drew hundreds of protesters to the Liverpool hospital on Thursday night. Local police said the protests were “peaceful,” although they did cause some inconvenience for traffic and others accessing the hospital, according to the BBC.
On Friday supporters again gathered outside of the hospital in solidarity with Alfie and his parents.
His parents, Kate James and Tom Evans, have been fighting to transfer their son to another hospital for further diagnosis and treatment. However, their attempts have been futile, losing cases in both the High Court and Court of Appeal, having their pleas also rejected by the Supreme Court and the European Court of Human Rights.
In February, the court ruled that Alder Hey could legally stop treatment for Alfie, against his parent’s wishes.
Evans and James are now launching a new legal challenge, asking the Court of Appeal judges to continue life support and treatment for Alfie. The court officials posted their hearing for Monday, saying that a court judge has decided that Alfie could continue treatment, pending the hearing.
The High Court recently set a date to officially turn off life support for Alfie, although the details of the end of life plan are not public.
However, his parents said that they have an alternative plan. Since the court order would allegedly end when the hospital removes life support from Alfie, the parents believe they can take custody of Alfie and fly him to Rome to pursue alternative treatments.
James and Evans told the BBC that they had a private ambulance and jet on stand-by which would make this transfer possible.
“There’s no court order to say Alfie has to stay in this hospital right now,” said Evans.
“The truth behind the matter is that me and Kate hold full responsibility and we can take him to our transportation van with full equipment with the doctors who have got full duty of care,” he continued.
Alfie’s parents plan to fly him to the Vatican-linked Bambino Gesu Pediatric hospital in Rome. However, Evans said on Friday that police officers have been posted to the Alder Hey hospital to ensure that Alfie is not removed by his parents.
Pope Francis recently tweeted about Alfie, saying it was his “sincere hope that everything necessary may be done in order to continue compassionately accompanying little Alfie Evans, and that the deep suffering of his parents may be heard.”
Earlier this month, Alfie’s parents said that their son has recently shown signs of improvement, noting that he has grown “stronger and more responsive,” and could take breaths on his own. They also said he was stretching, coughing, swallowing, and yawning.
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