Europe

Brentwood, England, Nov 4, 2019 / 05:19 pm (CNA).- After 39 people were found dead in a semi trailer in eastern England last month, a Catholic priest has joined efforts to identify these victims.

On Oct. 23, the bodies of eight women and 31 men were found in a refrigerated lorry trailer at an industrial site in Grays, fewer than 15 miles south of Brentwood in Essex.

A number of victims have yet to be identified, but all of them are now believed to be Vietnamese. The causes of death have also yet to be discovered, but post-mortem examinations are underway.

A Catholic priest in the UK is also working with some of the victims’ families to discover these people’s identities. Father Simon Nguyen, a priest at the Church of the Holy Name and Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, has worked with two of the victims’ families, who are too scared to bring their information directly to the police.

“I asked them if you find it very difficult to contact the police, could you please pass [on details of] your relatives and friends in the container, their identities,” he told ITV News.

“They gave me the names and all the pictures and all the marks on the body.”

Nguyen spoke at a memorial service Nov. 2 at the Church of the Holy Name and Our Lady of the Sacred Heart in east London attended by more than 100 people.

“We show our condolences and sympathies for the people who have lost their lives on the way to seeking freedom, dignity and happiness,” he said, according to BBC.

“We ask God to welcome them into his kingdom even though some of them were not Catholic but they strongly believed in eternal peace, so we pray for them.”

On the following day at the same church, Auxiliary Bishop Nicholas Hudson of Westminster encouraged people attending Mass to pray for those affected by the event.

St. Thomas of Canterbury Catholic Church in Grays also established a memorial in honor of the victims, according to a Nov. 2 tweet from the Diocese of Brentwood.

The British and Vietnamese governments have arrested or held more than ten suspects, and have begun efforts to identify these victims. Essex Police said it was working with the Vietnamese government and some of the victims’ families in the United Kingdom and Vietnam, the BBC reported.

In the UK, two people connected to the incident have been arrested – Maurice Robinson, the semi-truck driver, and Eamonn Harrison, a 22-year-old from Ireland. Both of them have been charged with a slew of offenses including conspiracy to commit human trafficking and 39 accounts of manslaughter.

Ronan and Christopher Hughes – two Northern Ireland brothers who have links to the shipping industries – are wanted for these same charges.

A spokeswoman for Vietnam’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs described the incident as a “serious humanitarian tragedy.” The country’s governments is working to uncover the identities of the victims and perpetrators.

The Vietnamese government has arrested eight suspects for smuggling offenses. They said the suspects are part of a criminal ring that deals in illegal immigration. The country’s authorities have also collected DNA samples to cross-reference with the victims in the UK.

“Based on what we learn from the suspects, we will actively launch investigations to fight and eradicate these rings which bring people illegally to Britain,” said Nguyen Huu Cau, the Nghe An province police chief, according to The Guardian.

“The best thing to do now is to deal with the consequences of the incident and help family members receive the bodies,” he added.

Since the incident, Catholic and secular groups have expressed a need for better migration policies. Maurice Wren, chief executive of the Refugee Council, described the incident as deplorable but preventable.

“This is truly tragic news, but depressingly predictable and avoidable news,” said Wren.

“If you deny people safe and regular travel routes to find safety, you are leaving them with no choice but to risk their lives on utterly perilous journeys and in the hands of criminal gangs.”

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Valletta, Malta, Oct 31, 2019 / 04:39 pm (CNA).- Catholic Voices Malta issued a position paper Thursday on proposed human trafficking reform in the island nation, saying that while prostitutes should be decriminalized, those who work with trafficked pe… […]

Lourdes, France, Oct 26, 2019 / 03:33 pm (CNA).- As reports of theft are on the rise at a famous Marian shrine in France, Lourdes authorities have increased security and encouraged pilgrims to be more aware of their belongings.

Pierre Aurignac, a loca… […]

Brentwood, England, Oct 26, 2019 / 06:01 am (CNA).- In the wake of the discovery of the bodies of eight women and 31 men inside a semi trailer in eastern England on Wednesday, Catholics are calling for prayers for the victims and their families, as well as safer means for immigrants and asylum seekers in Europe.

‘We are praying for the thirty-nine women and men who died, for their families, and for all those across the world who have lost their lives while trying to reach a better future,” Bishop Paul McAleenan, Auxiliary Bishop of Westminster and lead bishops for migration and asylum in the English and Welsh bishops’ conference, said Oct. 25.

“This tragedy underscores the urgent need to redouble our efforts in establishing safe passages and combatting criminals who exploit desperate people,” McAleenan said.

Police have not yet released details about whether the people who died were migrants, or seeking asylum, and the nationalities of the victims has not been officially confirmed, though Essex police initially reported that all 39 of them were Chinese nationals.

Jesuit Refugee Service UK called for policies for safe and legal migration, including a widening the definition of family members eligible to reunite under refugee family reunion rules, in response to the discovery of the bodies.

“This is devastating news. We know very little about the people who lost their lives at this point, but they are someone’s son, daughter, brother, sister, father, mother, friend or neighbour. We pray for those who died and for their families and friends,” said Sarah Teather, JRS UK’s Director, Oct. 23.

“This is truly tragic news, but depressingly predictable and avoidable news,” said Maurice Wren, Chief Executive of the Refugee Council.

“If you deny people safe and regular travel routes to find safety, you are leaving them with no choice but to risk their lives on utterly perilous journeys and in the hands of criminal gangs.”

Despite the police’s initial report on the victims’ nationalities, at least three of those on board may have been from Vietnam. Several Vietnamese people, who fear that their family members were on board and among the dead, have confided to the BBC.

“Our thoughts are with the 39 victims in #Essex, no matter where they are from,” Liu Xiaoming, the Chinese Ambassador to the UK, said in a tweet Friday.

“This has again drawn world attention to the issue of illegal immigration. The world should join hands and take resolute measures to prevent such tragedy from happening again.”

GPS data from the trailer, which had been leased from Global Trailer Rentals, shows that it left the Republic of Ireland Oct. 15, crossed into the UK and made its way to the port of Dover before crossing into mainland Europe. There it moved among several cities in France and Belgium before crossing the channel again to the town of Purfleet on the Thames.

A man and a woman, both 38, from a town near Liverpool, have been arrested and are being held on suspicion of manslaughter and conspiracy to traffic people, The Times reports. On Wednesday a truck driver from Northern Ireland was arrested on suspicion of murder.

The Times also reports that the arrests come after port authorities and police were accused of failing to act on repeated warnings about migrant activity near the docks.

The BBC notes that this is not the first time that the bodies of people believed to be migrants have been found in England; in June 2000, the bodies of 58 Chinese people who had suffocated to death, along with two survivors, were discovered in a semi truck at Dover.

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Belfast, Northern Ireland, Oct 25, 2019 / 05:05 pm (CNA).- A priest in Northern Ireland has exhorted pro-choice politicians not to receive Holy Communion, and Catholic voters not to vote for pro-choice candidates or parties, after legislation expanding abortion access in the region took effect this week.

“To be publicly pro choice-abortion is irreconcilable with being a faithful Catholic. Therefore, such persons should not approach the Holy Eucharist. If they do so, they are committing the mortal sin of sacrilege,” Fr. Patrick McCafferty, parish priest at Corpus Christi in Belfast, said in an Oct. 21 Facebook post.

“The Word of God calls everyone to be in the state of grace when they approach the Lord’s Table,” added the priest of the Diocese of Down and Connor.

Northern Ireland’s devolved legislature failed Monday to block a change to the region’s law imposed by the British parliament, which expands access to abortion. Previously, abortion was legally permitted in Northern Ireland only if the mother’s life was at risk or if there was risk of permanent, serious damage to her mental or physical health.

The British parliament passed the Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Act 2019 in July. The act took effect Oct. 22 because the Northern Ireland Assembly, which has been suspended the past two years due to a dispute between the two major governing parties, was not able to do business by Oct. 21.

Pro-life members of the Northern Ireland Assembly, largely comprised of members of the Democratic Unionist Party recalled the assembly Monday for the first time since January 2017 in order to block the relaxed abortion restrictions.  

However, in order for the assembly to make any binding changes, the election of a speaker of the assembly with cross-party support was required. This proved impossible when the Social Democratic Labour Party walked out of the Oct. 21 meeting.

Members of the assembly from Sinn Fein, the Green Party, and People Before Profit did not participate in the Oct. 21 session.

“We were betrayed today at Stormont,” Fr. McCafferty wrote in another Facebook post, on Oct. 21. “I implore all faithful Catholics, faithful Christians and all good people who value human life and true (not fake) human rights, to withdraw all support from pro abortion-choice politicians and political parties.”

“For Catholics and nationalists/republicans, in particular, Sinn Fein and the SDLP have betrayed us in a most hideous fashion,” he said.

Sinn Fein supports abortion rights, while the SDLP allows their Members of the Legislative Assembly a conscience vote on the topic. Fr. McCafferty noted that “Sinn Fein is avowedly pro abortion,” and charged that “The SDLP is infected with influential pro abortionists.”

And Fr. McCafferty wrote Oct. 22 on Facebook that “We have been failed miserably by politicians – all of them.”

He noted that the Northern Ireland Assembly collapsed because of the Renewable Heat Incentive scandal, saying some of the politicians and officials of the DUP “are at the heart of this scandal.”

“The collapse of the Northern Ireland Assembly, due to the RHI Scandal, has left the door wide open for a phalanx of determined and fanatical pro abortion MPs in Westminster, led by Stella Creasy – unelected by the people of Northern Ireland – but aided and abetted by pro abortion-choice politicians in Sinn Fein, the SDLP, Alliance, PBP and the Green Party – to railroad through, at Midnight last night, one of the most extreme abortion regimes in the world,” the priest lamented.

Fr. McCafferty wrote that “The SDLP, once a party that Catholics could trust and vote for with confidence, is no longer such a party. There are now a significant and influential number of SDLP MLAs and councillors, who are pro abortion-choice. Catholics voting in the future, for SDLP candidates, need to carefully determine their stance on abortion before giving that candidate their vote.”

Dolores Kelly, an MLA from the SDLP who told the Belfast Telegraph she is “a pro-life politician”, said that “many people who are pro-life and practising Catholics will also be very alarmed and angry about Fr McCafferty’s comments” regarding not approaching Holy Communion.

“I don’t know much about canon law, but I know that such a decision would have to come from Rome,” Kelly stated.

Canon 916 of the Code of Canon Law states that “anyone who is conscious of grave sin may not celebrate Mass or receive the Body of the Lord without previously having been to sacramental confession”; and the previous canon notes that those “who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion.”

Fr. McCafferty noted, “I have the utmost regard and respect for those persons who, knowing they are living in an irregular situation, present themselves at Mass, during Holy Communion, for a blessing,” saying that “such persons are real men and women of Faith.”

He reiterated that pro-choise politicians “should not receive Holy Communion … until they sincerely repent, seek reconciliation with the Lord and renounce their pro abortion-choice positions.”

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Madrid, Spain, Oct 24, 2019 / 05:01 pm (CNA).- The prior of the Benedictine Abbey at the Valley of the Fallen, whence the body of Francisco Franco was exhumed Thursday, has written that the exhumation fails to respect the inviolability of the abbey as a sacred place.

Fr. Santiago Cantera, prior of the Abbey of the Holy Cross, sent a message to Pope Francis; the abbot of Solesmes Abbey; and Cardinal Carlos Osoro Sierra of Madrid noting the violation.

Franco’s body was exhumed from the Basilica of the Holy Cross at the Valley of the Fallen Oct. 24. It was re-interred in Madrid’s El Pardo cemetery.

Franco was Spain’s head of state from 1939, at the end of the Spanish Civil War when the Nationalist forces he led defeated the Republican faction, until his death in 1975. During the war, Republicans martyred thousands of clerics, religious, and laity; of these, 11 have been canonized, and 1,915 beatified.

The Valley of the Fallen is a monumental complex near Madrid which includes an abbey and basilica, the construction of which Franco ordered to honor the fallen of both sides during the civil war. The bodies of more than 30,000 victims of the war are buried in the complex.

The prior of the Abbey of the Holy Cross also filed a complaint in a Spanish court over the “non-consensual” access by the Civil Guard to the church.

“We want it to be on record that the actions of the Security Forces and the workers have been and are totally incompatible with the principle of the inviolability of places of worship and the rights of this Benedictine community; which we have made known also to the ecclesiastical hierarchy,” according to a statement released Oct. 23 by the Benedictine community.

Europa Press said that the Benedictines have conveyed this complaint to the Archdiocese of Madrid, the Spanish bishops’ conference, Solesmes Abbey (their mother house), and the Holy See.

Fr. Cantera filed a complaint Oct. 21 with the Guardia de San Lorenzo Court of El Escorial for “preventing access by the monks” to the basilica.

In the statement the Benedictines said that since Oct. 11, after the agreement by the Council of Ministers which decreed the closure of the Valley of the Fallen, “the Civil Guard, without judicial authorization to allow it, accessed and wandered about the premises of the abbey and, what is more serious, accessed and wandered about the basilica.”

According to the religious, the Civil Guard “without any ecclesiastical authorization and occupying it 24 hours a day, violated thus both the right to the inviolability of domiciles and the right to religious freedom.”

The complaint also states that on Oct. 20 the passage of the monks was prevented, since “chains and padlocks were placed on the access door between the abbey and the basilica,” despite the fact that the monks are “the sole owners and custodians of the church.”

However, third parties in fact have been allowed to enter the basilica and abbey “without the least supervision,” and so the Benedictines said that they are not sure if these people have not contravened “the sacred character of the church, not knowing if actions incompatible with worship, piety, or religion have taken place.”

Of the members of the abbey, the government allowed only Fr. Cantera to be present at the exhumation.

The government of Pedro Sanchez, secretary-general of the Spanish Socialist Worker’s Party, had pledged to exhume Franco’s body.

It is spending some $70,000 on the exhumation and re-burial, the BBC reported.

About 100 supporters of Franco protested the exhumation outside El Pardo cemetery Thursday.

Franco’s grandson, Francisco Franco y Martinez-Bordiu, told Reuters that “I feel a great deal of rage because [the government] has used something as cowardly as digging up a corpse as propaganda, and political publicity to win a handful of votes before an election.”

Spain is due to hold a general election Nov. 10.

Franco’s family tried to block the exhumation in court, but lost its appeal. They also asked that if his body were re-interred, it be moved to Almudena Cathedral in Madrid, but this, too, was rejected.

Fr. Ramon Tejero said Mass at the Franco family mausolum in El Prado cemetery after the re-burial.

In January, Alessandro Gisotti, then-interim director of the Holy See press office, said that the exhumation of Franco is a “matter that concerns his family, the Spanish government, and the local Church.”

Bishop Luis Javier Argüello Garcia, Auxiliary Bishop of Valladolid and secretary general of the Spanish bishops’ conference, said on numerous occasions that the Church “is not opposed” to the exhumation of the remains of  Franco according to the ruling of the Supreme Court, but asked that the country “look forward” and not “reopen wounds.”

Numerous leftist groups have proposed demolishing the 150 meter high cross that presides over the Valley of the Fallen, to make it a “memorial.” Some have also called for the site to be deconsecrated and the abbey closed.

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Belfast, Northern Ireland, Oct 24, 2019 / 03:41 pm (CNA).- A Northern Ireland doctor opposed to abortion said he collected the signatures of 911 health care professionals in the region who will refuse to perform abortions under a new measure that legalized the procedure.

Dr. Andrew Cupples, a general physician in Northern Ireland, collected the signatures for a letter he sent to the Northern Ireland Secretary last month. The letter, signed by doctors, nurses and midwives, stated their opposition to the new abortion laws and called for strong conscientious objection protections that would ensure that those opposed to abortion may opt out of performing or assisting with the procedure, The Independent reported.

“Hundreds of healthcare professionals in Northern Ireland will refuse to be involved in abortion services. There are even people who are planning to walk away from the healthcare service if they are forced to participate in abortion services,” Cupples told The Independent.

“There are also people in obstetrics and gynecology and midwives who are worried if they do not agree to be trained in abortion they could be forced to do so or reprimanded by their employers or a professional body,” he said.

Earlier this week, Northern Ireland’s devolved legislature failed to block changes to their abortion and gay marriage laws passed by the British Parliament, which has the authority to govern the area in the absence of a functioning local assembly.

A last-ditch effort to recall Northern Ireland’s assembly and block the new laws did not gain necessary cross-party support, and as a result, abortion and same-sex marriage are now legal in Northern Ireland.

Previously, abortion had only been permissible in the region in cases in which the mother’s life was in danger, or if there was serious risk of permanent damage to her physical or mental health if she brought her pregnancy to term.

Abortion has been legal in the rest of the UK up to 24 weeks since 1967. Pressure to legalize abortion in Northern Ireland increased after a 2018 referendum legalized abortion in the Republic of Ireland. The law in the Republic of Ireland permits medical professionals who conscientiously object to abortion to refrain from participation in the procedure; however, doctors who object to abortion must refer women to doctors who will perform them.

Documents from the Republic of Ireland’s health department earlier this year showed that abortion services are limited at nine of the country’s 19 maternity hospitals, in part due to conscientious objectors.

At least 640 general practitioners in Ireland signed a petition last November objecting to the new obligation of referring patients to other doctors for abortions.

The majority of the Reppublic of Ireland’s 2,500 GPs are unwilling to perform abortions. Only between 4-6% of GPs have said they would participate in the procedure.

Cupples told The Independent that he was most worried for midwives and other professionals who have “no protection” under the new abortion law in Northern Ireland.

Guidelines issued by Britain’s Parliament to health care professionals in Northern Ireland regarding the new abortion regulations state that “anyone who has a conscientious objection to abortion may want to raise this with their employer,” the BBC reported.

They also note that in England and Wales, medical professionals may object to participating in an abortion in a “hands on” capacity but they are still required to participate in any related administrative or health care tasks.

These guidelines apply until the end of March, by which time a 12-week public consultation will have concluded and the Northern Ireland government will have issued official protocols for health care professionals regarding abortion in the region.

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Poznan, Poland, Oct 22, 2019 / 04:07 pm (CNA).- The Polish Bishops’ Conference has asked Pope Francis to name St. John Paul II a patron of Europe and doctor of the Church.

Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki of Poznan, president of the Polish Bishops C… […]

Warsaw, Poland, Oct 22, 2019 / 11:22 am (CNA).- Venerable Stefan Wyszyński, Archbishop of Gniezno and Warsaw from 1948 to 1981, will be beatified in Warsaw June 7, 2020, the city’s archbishop announced Monday.

“We have to put the main emphasis on his spirituality, because we know a lot more about Cardinal Wyszyński as a statesman and someone who defended man, the Church, and his homeland,” Cardinal Kazimierz Nycz of Warsaw said Oct. 21.

The beatification will take place in Warsaw’s Piłsudski Square.

“Cardinal Wyszyński was the rock around which Polish Catholicism rallied during the worst periods of communist oppression,” George Weigel told CNA Oct. 22.

Wyszyński “also designed the ‘Great Novena,’ the re-catechesis of the entire country between 1957 and 1966, which laid the religious and moral foundations on which the Solidarity movement was later built,” he said.

Wyszyński was instrumental in the appointment of Karol Wojtyla as Archbishop of Krakow in 1964.

“Wyszyński and Wojtyla had different visions of the Church – Wojtyla was much more the man of Vatican II – but as Archbishop of Kracow Wojtyla was completely loyal to Wyszyński, never letting the communists play divide-and-conquer,” Weigel said.

“And there is no doubt that Wojtyla shared Wyszyński’s view that the Vatican ‘Ostpolitik’ strategy of accommodating communist regimes was serious foolishness,” he added.

Wyszyński is credited with helping to conserve Christianity in Poland during communist rule.

He was placed under house arrest by communist authorities for three years for refusing to punish priests active in the Polish resistance against the government.

“The fear of an apostle is the first ally of his enemies,” Wyszyński wrote in his notes while under arrest. “The lack of courage is the beginning of defeat for a bishop,” he wrote.

The Vatican announced approval of a miracle attributed to Wyszynski’s intercession Oct. 3.

The miracle involved the healing of a 19 year-old woman from thyroid cancer in 1989. After the young woman received the incurable diagnosis, a group of Polish nuns began praying for her healing through the intercession of Cardinal Wyszyński, who had died of abdominal cancer in 1981.

Born in the village of Zuzela in what was then the Russian Empire in 1901, Wyszyński was ordained a priest of the Diocese of Włocławek at age 24, celebrating his first Mass at the Jasna Gora Shrine in Czestochowa. He served as a military chaplain during the Warsaw uprising against the Germans in 1944, and was made Bishop of Lublin in 1946.

In 1948 he was appointed Archbishop of  Gniezno and Warsaw, and he was elevated to cardinal in 1953.

Wyszynski died 15 days after Pope John Paul II was shot in an assassination attempt in 1981. Unable to attend the funeral, John Paul II wrote in a letter to the people of Poland, “Meditate particularly on the figure of the unforgettable primate, Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski of venerated memory, his person, his teaching, his role in such a difficult period of our history.”

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Rome, Italy, Oct 22, 2019 / 03:30 am (CNA).- The writings of newly-canonized St. John Henry Newman offer important reflections for contemporary society on freedom of conscience and the duty to search for truth, said a leading figure in international re… […]