News Briefs

Quito, Ecuador, Dec 4, 2017 / 01:00 pm (CNA).- A Catholic wedding planner has encouraged married women in Ecuador to “put a smile on the face of a poor bride” by donating their wedding dresses this Christmas.

“The goal is to have women give up their wedding dresses, since they don’t have a real use for them  anymore. What’s better than keeping them is to give them to someone who needs one,” Maria Alejandra Guerra told ACI Prensa.

Guerra explained that the idea came to her Nov. 26, when she went with a group of missionaries from the Bonds of Marian Love Movement to St. Arnoldo Janssen Parish, located in a poor section of Guayaquil, to coordinate a Christmas campaign for the children there.

She said that the pastor, Fr. John Codjoe, told them that one of the parish’s ministries was marriage preparation, and that because “most of these women don’t have wedding gowns,” that he was looking for  dresses to be donated.

“So that little light went on, because that was something I wanted to do for some time, and so I said to him ‘Father, I’m a wedding planner, I’m going to help you and I’m going to promote this for your parish,” Guerra related.

Fr. Codjoe “was thrilled” with the proposal and told her about 19 couples who would soon be getting married in the parish.

“That’s why I decided to launch this campaign on my social media. I didn’t think I was going to get a good reception because some time ago I did a poll and most women told me they preferred to sell their wedding dresses. But it turned out just the opposite and now seven women have offered to give me their dresses,” she said.

“I’m going to go pick up the dresses and I’ll bring them over to St. Arnoldo Janssen parish. I even told Fr. Codjoe that I wanted to attend the couples’ weddings,” she commented.

On her Instagram account where she launched the campaign, Maria Alejandra Guerra said  that Christmas is a “joy, it’s giving something to someone you don’t know but who needs it more…’giving without remembering and receiving without forgetting,’ because that bride you give the dress to will be immensely grateful.”

She hopes that “we can put smiles on the faces of the brides most in need.”

Guerra said that “if I succeed in coming up with the dresses that Fr. Codjoe needs for next year and I continue to get more dresses, then I’ll be looking for other parishes that will want to receive them as  donations.”

She also invited married women from other Latin American countries to look for churches where they could give their wedding dresses to low-income couples who are preparing for marriage.

For women who live in Mexico, Guerra suggested they give their gowns to the charitable initiative called “Brides with a Cause”  which collects dresses throughout the country to give them to needy young women.

This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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Vatican City, Dec 4, 2017 / 11:59 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Do not wait to begin living out your vocation, Pope Francis said on Monday, encouraging people to stop making excuses for not answering God’s call to share in his mission in a particular way…. […]

Vatican City, Dec 4, 2017 / 10:14 am (CNA/EWTN News).- In his prayer video for the month of December, Pope Francis prays for grandparents and the elderly, urging people to respect and support them, that their wisdom may continue to be passed down to ne… […]

Vatican City, Dec 4, 2017 / 05:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Monday the Vatican announced Pope Francis’ appointment of Oratorian Fr. Mario Alberto Aviles as auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Brownsville.

He joins Bishop Daniel E. Flores, who has served as the sixth bishop of Brownsville since February 2010.

Aviles, who has served as Procurator General of the Confederation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri since 2012, has also been appointed the titular bishop of the See of Cataquas in modern-day Algeria.

The Oratory of St. Philip Neri is a pontifical society of apostolic life made up of Catholic priests and lay-brothers. There are 86 congregations around the world, including several in the United States.

The Procurator General acts as the representative of the congregations to the Holy See, usually residing in Rome.

Aviles, 48, was born in Mexico City on Sept. 16, 1969. In 1986 he entered the Oratory of St. Philip Neri in Mexico City, two years later moving to the Pharr Oratory in the Diocese of Brownsville.

He first attended the Catholic Panamerican University in Mexico City, then transferred to Rome to study philosophy and theology at the Pontifical Athenaeum Regina Apostolorum University.

He received a master’s of divinity at the Holy Apostles Seminary in Cromwell, Conn. in 2000. He also has a master’s degree in Educational Leadership from the University of Phoenix.

On July 21, 1998 he was ordained a priest for the Confederation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri.

From his ordination he was Parochial Vicar of the parish of St. Jude Thaddeus in Pharr, Texas until 2002, he then served as parish priest of Sacred Heart parish in Hidalgo.

He was Dean of the Oratory Academy and Oratory Athenaeum in Pharr from 2005-2012 and a member of the Diocesan Pastoral Council at Brownsville since 2011.

He has been Procurator General of the Confederation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri since 2012 and speaks Spanish, English and Italian.

The Diocese of Brownsville, formed in 1965, encompasses the counties of Willacy, Cameron, Hidalgo and Starr at the southern border of Texas. Cameron, Hidalgo and Starr also border the Rio Grande River, which divides the Diocese of Brownsville from the dioceses of Matamoros and Nuevo Laredo in Mexico.

The diocese is 4,226 square miles in area with a population of approximately 978,369 inhabitants, of which 831,613 are Catholic.

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Vatican City, Dec 3, 2017 / 04:30 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Sunday Pope Francis kicked off the Church’s Advent season saying it is a time to let go of the worldly distractions that take us away from God, and focus on growing closer to him through prayer and concern for others.  

Referring to the day’s readings, which stress the importance of being vigilant, the Pope said “the watchful person is one who, in the noise of the world, does not let themselves be overwhelmed by distraction or superficiality, but lives in a full and conscious way, with a concern above all for others.”

With this attitude, we quickly become aware “of the tears and necessity of our neighbor and we can also welcome the human and spiritual qualities and capacities,” he said, adding that an attentive person, “also turns to the world, trying to counteract indifference and the cruelty of it, rejoicing in the treasures of beauty that also exist and must be preserved.”

Pope Francis spoke to pilgrims present in St. Peter’s Square for his Angelus address, which took place on the first Sunday of Advent.

He focused his address on the day’s Gospel reading from Mark, in which Jesus tells his disciples to “Be watchful! Be alert!,” because “you do not know when the time will come.”

Advent, he said, is a time given to us “to welcome the Lord who comes to meet us, to verify our desire for God, to look ahead and prepare ourselves for the return of Christ.”

Christ will return again at Christmas, when we remember how he came to us “in the humility of the human condition.” However, Christ also comes to each of us “every time we are disposed to receive him,” Francis said, and “he will come again at the end of time to judge the living and the dead.”

“Because of this, we must always be watchful and attentive to the Lord with the hope of meeting him.”

Turning to the Gospel, when Jesus urges his disciples, and each of us, to “be watchful and alert,” Francis said the person who is vigilant and alert is the one “who welcomes the invitation to watch, that is, not to let themselves be overwhelmed by the sleep of discouragement, the lack of hope, or by delusions.”

At the same time, this person also rejects “the solicitation of the vanities of which the world overflows and behind which, at times, personal and familiar serenity are sacrificed.”

Pope Francis then turned to the day’s first reading from the Book of Isaiah, in which the prophet described how for the people of Israel, it seemed that God had left them alone to wander on paths that were far from his own.

However, “this was an effect of the infidelity of the people themselves,” he said, explaining that we often find ourselves in the same state of infidelity to God’s call: “he shows us the good path, the path of faith and love, but we look for our happiness somewhere else.”

So to be watchful and alert, then, “are the presuppositions” to stop wandering on paths that are far from God, “lost in our sins and in our infidelity.”

“They are the conditions that allow God to interrupt our existence, to restore meaning to it and to value his presence, full of goodness and tenderness,” he said, and closed his address praying that Mary, the model and icon of vigilant expectation, would guide us to an encounter with her son Jesus, “reviving our love for him.”

After reciting the traditional Angelus prayer, Francis noted how just yesterday he returned from a six-day visit to Burma – also called Myanmar – and Bangladesh, and voiced his gratitude for being able to meet the people in both countries, especially the small Catholic populations of each.

The Pope said he was “edified” by their witness, and the many faces “tried by life,” but who were still “noble and smiling,” made a big impression.  

He also voiced concern and prayer for Honduras, praying that the country would be able to “peacefully overcome” a recent escalation of political unrest and violent protests surrounding the country’s elections after a key candidate was accused of voter fraud.

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Vatican City, Dec 2, 2017 / 04:30 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Aboard his flight from Bangladesh to Rome on Saturday, Pope Francis said that the destructive potential of nuclear weapons is so great that humanity has reached the limit of morally possessing them or using them as deterrents.

“In the nuclear field…today we are at the limit,” the Pope said Dec. 2. “This can be a matter for discussion, it’s my opinion, but I am convinced of my opinion: we are at the limit of liceity to have and use nuclear arms.”

The Pope’s comments were made during an in-flight press conference during his return flight from an apostolic trip to Burma, also known as Myanmar, and Bangladesh from Nov. 27-Dec. 2.

Asked if something has changed since the time of the Cold War, when many world leaders considered nuclear weapons a useful and ethically acceptable deterrent to war, Francis stated that he thinks the rationality of the claim has changed.

He also noted that the number of nuclear arms continues to grow, becoming more sophisticated and more powerful, and those factors change the consideration.

“I ask myself this question,” he said, “Today, is it licit to maintain the arsenal of nuclear weapons as they are? Or today, to save creation, to save humanity, is it not necessary to go backward?”

The Pope’s words aboard the papal flight echoed a statement made in a message to United Nations members last March, when he said that while eliminating nuclear weapons may be a challenge, there is still a “moral and humanitarian imperative” to do so.

He also expressed skepticism that nuclear deterrence is “an effective response” to the world’s security challenges, echoing decades of previous statements by the Holy See on the perilous potential of nuclear weaponry.

Francis most recently spoke on the topic during an address to participants in a Vatican symposium on nuclear disarmament Nov. 10, stating his hope for the elimination of nuclear arms, and pointing to an international treaty to ban nuclear weapons, which was passed by the UN in July, as a positive step.

The Holy See actively took part in the treaty negotiations, and is among the three nations that have ratified the treaty.

The Holy See has a “Permanent Observer” status at the UN, although with “enhanced powers.” That means that the Holy See can take part in the negotiations of treaties, but does not usually have the right to vote.

For the July 7 vote on the nuclear treaty, the Holy See was allowed to participate in negotiations as a full member, and was permitted to vote on the matter before the adoption of the treaty, showing the strength of the Holy See’s commitment to nuclear disarmament.

This was the first time the Holy See has been afforded such a status at the UN, which Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, the Vatican’s “foreign minister,” described as a milestone during the treaty ratification ceremony Sep. 20.

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Vatican City, Dec 2, 2017 / 04:24 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- On his return flight from Bangladesh to Rome, Pope Francis offered journalists an insight into his communication strategy, saying that when it comes to a sensitive topic, at times he prefers to hold his tongue publicly so that his message gets across, but is more open in private conversations.

“For me, the most important thing is that the message arrives and in order to do this I try to say things, step by step, and listen to the answers, so that the message may arrive,” the Pope said on his Dec. 2 flight from Dhaka to Rome.

He was returning from a Nov. 27-Dec. 2 visit to south Asia, which took him to both Burma and Bangladesh.

A major underlying theme of the trip was crisis surrounding the Rohingya, a largely Muslim ethnic group who reside in Burma’s Rakhine State, who have faced levels of state-sanctioned violence so drastic that the United Nations has called their plight “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”

Of particular concern was whether or not Pope Francis would use the term “Rohingya” in his public speeches, because despite widespread use of the word in the international community, the term is controversial within Burma. The Burmese government refuses to use the term, and considers the Rohingya to be illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. They have been denied citizenship since Burma gained independence in 1948.

Given the delicate political situation, Pope Francis had been advised by local Church leaders in Burma to avoid using the word during official speeches, which he did. However, after meeting with a group of 18 Rohingya Muslims at an interreligious encounter in Bangladesh, he decided to drop the phrase publicly, breaking with his previous protocol.

During an hour-long press conference with journalists on board the flight, which consisted of 12 questions focused primarily on the visit, Francis was asked if he regretted not using the word “Rohingya” publicly while in Burma.

In his answer, the Pope noted that he has used the term publicly several times in different audiences and speeches, so “it was already known what I thought about this thing and what I had said.”

However, he said the question made him reflect on “how I try to communicate,” and the most important goal is always to ensure that his message gets across.

Using the image of a teenager as an everyday example, he said that if they are in a crisis, they “say what they think by throwing the door in the face of the other…and the message doesn’t arrive. It closes.”

When it came to using the word “Rohingya,” Francis said he realized that if he used it in the official speeches, “I would have thrown the door in a face,” implying that the term would have prevented Burmese officials from hearing his message.

Instead, he said he chose to describe the situation and the lack of human rights, and to advocate for inclusion and citizenship in public. In private conversations, however, the Pope said he allowed himself to “go beyond.”  

While in Burma, also called Myanmar, the Pope met privately with officials, including General Min Aung Hlaing, the military’s commander-in-chief and a powerful political figure in the nation.

“I was very, very satisfied with the talks that I was able to have,” he said, explaining that while he didn’t have “the pleasure of throwing the door in the face, publicly, a denouncement,” he was able to have “the satisfaction of dialoguing and letting the other speak and to say my part.”

In the end, Pope Francis said his message got across, and that “this is very important in communications, the concern that the message will arrive.”

The Pope told journalists that he didn’t know whether he would have the opportunity to meet with Rohingya representatives while in Bangladesh. He thanked the Bangladeshi government for allowing the Rohingya to join him for the Dec. 1 interreligious encounter, saying the country is a good example of what it means to welcome and to have open doors.

Many of the 18 Rohingya present at the meeting didn’t know they would meet him either, Francis said, explaining that they were taken from the crowd and told to get in line to greet him, but not to say anything.

“I didn’t like that,” he said. And when the organizers tried to usher them off stage right away, “I got mad and a chewed them out a bit,” he said, confessing that “I’m a sinner.”

After hearing each of them share their stories, Francis said he was moved and wanted to say something to them spontaneously, so he offered a brief prayer in which he asked for forgiveness on behalf of all who harmed them.

“In that moment I cried. I tried not to let it be seen. They cried too,” he said, noting that the other religious leaders who came up to greet them were also moved.

By doing things in this way, Pope Francis said he felt that “the message had arrived. Part was planned, but the majority came out spontaneously.”

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