Bishop Michael Burbidge of the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, this week announced that his diocese is willing to help with the burial of the body of an unborn baby discovered in a local pond.
Police in Leesburg, Virginia, announced this week the “discovery of a deceased late-term fetus in a pond” about 20 miles outside of Washington, D.C.
“The investigation is being treated with the utmost seriousness and sensitivity,” the police said, with Leesburg Police Chief Thea Pirnat calling the discovery “a deeply tragic situation.”
In a statement on the Diocese of Arlington’s website, Burbidge said it was “with great sorrow that I learned today of the unsettling discovery of the body of an unborn baby described by police as a ‘late-term fetus,’ found in a pond in Leesburg.”
“The Diocese of Arlington has made it known that we are willing to assist with the proper burial and committal of the remains,” Burbidge said.
The bishop “urge[d] the faithful of the diocese and all people of goodwill to join me in prayer for the child’s mother and for anyone involved in this incident.”
Burbidge said the Diocese of Arlington “encourages all women who find themselves in unexpected or difficult pregnancies to seek assistance” through Catholic Charities or the Gabriel Project, a pregnancy support group.
The Leesburg police department did not immediately respond to a query on Friday regarding the status of the investigation.
Burbidge, who was installed as the bishop of Arlington in 2016, is also the chairman of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities.
(This story was updated to clarify that the Diocese of Arlington has offered to assist in the burial of the infant’s body.)
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Denver Newsroom, Jun 8, 2020 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- A community of Dominican nuns in Hawaii is shaken but hopeful after a burglar broke into their convent last week and stole a minivan that the nuns use for their ministry.
“It was still a good running car, even if it was 13 years old,” Sister Bernarda Sindol told CNA.
Donations have poured in from far and wide to help the nuns replace the stolen vehicle.
“It’s a blessing in disguise, because now we’re going to buy a new car,” she laughed.
The sisters awoke May 30 to find their convent had been broken into during the night.
No one was hurt in the robbery; the nuns live on the upper floor, and for their safety have a heavy gate on the door leading upstairs.
In addition to stealing most of the nuns’ food from the kitchen, the assailant took the keys to their minivan— which were hanging on a bulletin board downstairs— and made off with the vehicle.
Six Dominican Sisters of the Rosary live at the convent, which is located behind St. Elizabeth Catholic Church and School in Aiea, about 10 miles northwest of Honolulu on Oahu.
The police are still investigating and have not yet located the stolen vehicle.
The minivan was important for the nuns’ ministry, Sister Bernarda said, because many of them teach at the school adjacent to the convent— which the order has managed since the 1960s— and also at other schools around town.
Having the car made it easier for the nuns to get around, for their ministry and also for things like shopping and errands, without them having to rely on public transportation.
Sister Bernarda said the robber must have known which windows and areas of the convent were not alarmed, and broke in with relative ease.
The thief removed a painting of the Last Supper hanging in the nuns’ dining room, apparently hoping to find a wall safe.
The town lies on Pearl Harbor in a relatively safe area, Sister Bernarda said, so they never really expected a break-in like this.
“Some people just don’t have any respect for the Church. And those are the people we have to pray for,” she said.
Sister Bernarda said donations have poured in from all over— the last one she saw was from a trucker in Nebraska, who donated $20.
“Twenty dollars is twenty dollars. It’s from people’s hearts, and we appreciate it. People are just so generous,” she said.
Sister Bernarda asked for prayers for an end to the pandemic, as she suspects the thief likely broke into their convent out of desperation.
“People are frustrated, they’ve lost their jobs, they have to feed their families. So we just pray that this coronavirus will go away so that people can live more normally,” she said.
Pope Francis greets Archbishop Rino Fisichella in the Vatican’s Clementine Hall, Sept. 17, 2021. / Vatican Media.
Vatican City, Sep 17, 2021 / 07:30 am (CNA).
Pope Francis said on Friday that he instituted the new ministry of catechist with the hope that it would help to “awaken this vocation.”
Addressing participants in a meeting organized by the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization on Sept. 17, the pope referred to his decision to formally institute the new lay ministry in May.
Vatican Media.
He said: “We must insist on indicating the heart of catechesis: the risen Jesus Christ loves you and never abandons you! We can never tire or feel we are being repetitive about this first proclamation in the various stages of the catechetical process.”
“This is why I instituted the ministry of catechist. They are preparing the rite for the, I quote, ‘creation’ of catechists. So that the Christian community may feel the need to awaken this vocation and to experience the service of some men and women who, living the celebration of the Eucharist, may feel more vividly the passion to transmit the faith as evangelizers.”
Vatican Media.
The pope established the new ministry through the apostolic letterAntiquum ministerium (“Ancient ministry”) on May 11.
While catechists have served the Church since New Testament times, an instituted ministry is a type of formal, vocational service within the Catholic Church.
Vatican Media.
The newly instituted ministry of catechist is for lay people who have a particular call to serve the Catholic Church as a teacher of the faith.
In the apostolic letter, the pope said that the Vatican Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments would “soon publish” the Rite of Institution of the new ministry.
Vatican Media.
In his address, the pope noted that last Sunday he celebrated the closing Mass of the International Eucharistic Congress in Budapest, Hungary.
He said that catechesis “can be effective in the work of evangelization if it keeps its gaze fixed on the Eucharistic mystery.”
“We cannot forget that the privileged place of catechesis is precisely the Eucharistic celebration, where brothers and sisters come together to discover ever more the different forms of God’s presence in their lives,” he said.
Vatican Media.
Speaking in the Vatican’s Clementine Hall to Catholics responsible for catechesis in Europe, the pope fondly recalled the two catechists who prepared him for First Communion.
“I felt a great respect, even a feeling of thanksgiving, without making it explicit, but it felt like veneration,” he said.
“Why? Because they were the women who had prepared me for my First Communion, together with a nun. I want to tell you about this experience because it was a beautiful thing for me to accompany them to the end of their lives, both of them. And also the nun who prepared me for the liturgical part of Communion: she died, and I was there, with her, accompanying her. There is a closeness, a very important bond with catechists…”
Referring to the Directory for Catechesis, released in June 2020, he said that catechesis should not be understood as “an abstract communication of theoretical knowledge to be memorized as like mathematical or chemical formulas.”
“It is rather the mystagogical experience of those who learn to encounter their brothers and sisters where they live and work, because they themselves have met Christ, who has called them to become missionary disciples,” he said.
He then referred to his address on Monday in St. Martin’s Cathedral, Bratislava, in which he encouraged Slovakian Catholics to draw inspiration from Sts. Cyril and Methodius, who translated the Bible into the Slavonic language.
He told catechists in Rome: “They beat new paths, invented new languages, new ‘alphabets,’ to transmit the Gospel, for the inculturation of the faith.”
“This requires knowing how to listen to the people, to listen to the peoples to whom one is proclaiming: listening to their culture, their history; listening not superficially, already thinking of the pre-packaged answers we carry in our briefcase, no! To truly listen, and to compare those cultures, those languages, even and above all the unspoken, the unexpressed, with the Word of God, with Jesus Christ, the living Gospel.”
“And I repeat the question: is this not the most urgent task of the Church among the peoples of Europe? The great Christian tradition of the continent must not become a historical relic, otherwise, it is no longer ‘tradition.’”
He continued: “Tradition is either alive or it is not. And catechesis is tradition, it is trador [in Latin], to hand down, but as living tradition, from heart to heart, from mind to mind, from life to life. Therefore: passionate and creative, with the impetus of the Holy Spirit.”
“I used the word ‘pre-packaged’ for language, but I fear catechists whose heart, attitude, and face are ‘pre-packaged.’ No. Either the catechist is free, or he or she is not a catechist. The catechist lets herself or himself be struck by the reality he or she finds, and transmits the Gospel with great creativity, or is not a catechist. Think about this well.”
“The Appearance of Christ to Mary Magdalene” by Alexander Ivanov, 1834-1836. / Credit: Alexander Ivanov, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
CNA Newsroom, Jul 22, 2025 / 04:00 am (CNA).
Not much is known about the life of St. Mary Magdalene, w… […]
1 Comment
Semantics may seem beside the point in a tragic story, but words do matter. An unborn baby or fetus cannot be found in a pond, since both terms signify that the child is in the womb. This child was either newborn or stillborn, but certainly not unborn.
Semantics may seem beside the point in a tragic story, but words do matter. An unborn baby or fetus cannot be found in a pond, since both terms signify that the child is in the womb. This child was either newborn or stillborn, but certainly not unborn.