Middle East – Africa

Tehran, Iran, Jan 2, 2018 / 04:08 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Ongoing protests in Iran could be a sign of hope for repressed religious minorities, if protesters demand that conscience rights be respected, said an Iranian-born journalist who converted to Catholicism in 2016.

Although most of those protesting in the streets of Iran were born after the 1979 revolution that led to the current Islamist regime, “many of them are chanting nostalgic slogans about the pre-revolutionary era,” noted Sohrab Ahmari.

“At the time Iran was no democracy,” he said, but the pre-revolution regime “was far less repressive and people retained many personal and social liberties, if not political ones.”

Ahmari was born in Tehran. He has lived in the United States for two decades and worked for the Wall Street Journal for several years before becoming a senior writer for Commentary magazine.

Ahmari spoke to CNA on Jan. 2, as Iranians protesting economic and social grievances flooded the streets of the Middle Eastern country.
 
Since the current round of protests erupted on Dec. 28, at least 21 people have died and 450 been arrested, CNN reports.

The protests are the largest in the country since the 2009 Green Movement, when thousands rallied in opposition to a presidential election they claimed was fraudulent.

The Iranian government has responded to the current demonstrations by sending out riot police and restricting access to internet and social media.
The protests began over economic issues. A year after sanctions against Iran were lifted by the United States, United Nations, and European Union, citizens of the Middle Eastern nation have yet to see the economic recovery that many had expected. Unemployment among the youth is high, and food and gasoline prices have risen significantly.

However, as the protests have grown, so have the grievances, with signs and slogans opposing what many see as a corrupt regime that suppresses the civil rights of its people.

“I don’t think you can separate the economic from the political,” Reza Marashi, research director for the National Iranian American Council, told CNN.

Ahmari agreed that the nation’s unrest shows a deep-seated discontent.

“The Iranians who are pouring into the streets have had it with an ideological regime that represses them and can’t even delivery basic economic security,” he said.

And while life is difficult for every Iranian, the situation for Christians and other religious minorities is particularly perilous, Ahmari told CNA.

“They are systematically discriminated against, are barred from various public offices and military posts, are prohibited by law from proselytizing, and so on.”

The regime does grant Christians and Jews a certain level of “second-class protection” as “People of the Book,” Ahmari said, but even this “limited protection only applies to the likes of Armenians and Assyrians, who are considered indigenous Christians.”

Converts are not protected, he said, because Sharia law – which is the foundation of Iran’s penal code – views apostasy from Islam as a crime punishable by death.

While the regime generally does not formally charge Christian converts with apostasy, Ahmari said, “it routinely harasses them, monitors and raids their house churches, and arrests and imprisons their pastors on trumped-up ‘national-security’ charges.”

Nearly a week after the start of the protests, it remains to be seen what effect they will have, if any. But Ahmari is hopeful that any changes in the government will include a greater respect for religious minorities.

Life before the 1979 revolution that brought Sharia law to the country “wasn’t ideal,” he acknowledged.

“(B)ut minorities thrived, and there was a sense that Iranian-ness wasn’t just about Shiite Islam but also incorporated pre-Islamic elements. Jews, Christians, Baha’i and others belonged to this identity. They were tolerated and even celebrated,” he said.

“If the protesters can recover something of that inclusive nationalism, then Christians and other ethnic and sectarian minorities will be better off than they are now.”
 

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Jerusalem, Dec 14, 2017 / 04:11 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- An arson attack on the church complex at the site of Christ’s multiplication of loaves and fish on the Sea of Galilee has resulted in prison time for the perpetrator.

Yinon Reuveni, 23, was se… […]

Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dec 8, 2017 / 03:49 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Every day, thousands of people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are forced to flee their homes.

In recent months, violent clashes have escalated, creating a massive refugee crisis that has gone largely unnoticed in much of the Western world.

“Political and ethnic tensions have forced millions of Congolese to leave their homes in the past year alone. The vast majority of these people are internally displaced within the country, while a minority have become refugees upon fleeing to neighboring countries,” said Amakala Constantin Sodio, the Kinshasa-based Catholic Relief Services country representative in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Congo-Brazzaville.

Sodio told CNA Dec. 8 there has been a “rapid escalation” of conflicts in the regions of Kasaï, Tanganyika and South Kivu in 2016 and 2017. This has put 4.3 million people into a crisis situation, facing emergency levels of food insecurity.

More than 1.7 million people have fled their homes this year alone. The U.N. has classed the country refugee situation as Level 3, equal to Syria, Iraq and Yemen in its humanitarian need.

The situation is far from stabilizing. At least 14 U.N. peacekeepers and five Congolese soldiers were killed in an attack in North Kivu province Thursday night, believed to have been carried out by a rebel group.
 
“It’s a mega-crisis. The scale of people fleeing violence is off the charts, outpacing Syria, Yemen and Iraq,” said Ulrika Blom, the country director for the Norwegian Refugee Council, according to the BBC.

“If we fail to step up now, mass hunger will spread and people will die. We are in a race against time,” Blom added.

New armed conflicts, an intensification of current conflicts, and the delay in elections has helped drive the crisis, according to a report from the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre.

Lambert Mende, the country’s minister of information, disputed the report and said that displaced people number less than 1 million. He said displaced people were in fact returning from nearby countries, the BBC reports.

About 5,500 Congolese people flee their homes each day, the report said. There are 4 million displaced people in the country and over 7 million who lack adequate food.

The average life expectancy in the country is under 60 years old, and more than 75 percent of the population lives on less than $2 per day.

Amid the current crisis, Catholic Relief Services aims to provide a rapid response to aid at-risk communities.

“With an initial focus on emergency response, CRS also carries out development programs focused on health, hygiene, nutrition, and agricultural interventions,” Sodio said. “CRS’ local partnerships and staff presence across the country ensures our ability to rapidly start up projects and reach people in remote areas.”

The Catholic relief agency has 182 staffers in the country and aided 1.3 million people with $27 million in resources programming in 2017, in collaboration with its partners.

The humanitarian emergency is complex and there are no simple solutions, Sodio said.

“Improvements to the quality of life of people displaced will happen slowly as countrywide efforts are made to strengthen local systems, so they may safely return home to rebuild dignified lives,” he said.

CRS has been in the country since 1961 and has maintained a continuous presence since 1993.

Sodio cited the words of Barbara Forbes, a DRC-based International Development Fellow at Catholic Relief Services, who noted that many Congolese refugees are expected to be among the 45,000 people resettled in the U.S. in 2018.

“Personally meeting refugees in the community is a great way for Americans to maintain perspective on this issue,” Forbes said.

“Americans can help these refugees thrive by offering them jobs and volunteering to drive them to medical appointments or explain their household bills,” she added. One refugee in the U.S. had told her of her dreams to go to college on a basketball scholarship and study law.

Such personal connections with refugees make clear the importance of advocacy for increased acceptance of refugee resettlement in the U.S., according to Forbes.
 

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Jerusalem, Dec 7, 2017 / 11:34 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Christians leaders in Jerusalem have voiced fear over the repercussions of America’s recognition of the city as Israel’s capital, asking that international law be respected in the interest of maintaining peace.  

According to Fr. David Neuhaus, a priest in the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem and former Parochial Vicar for Hebrew-speaking Catholics in the city, the first reaction to the decision was fear.

“You touch Jerusalem, things explode,” he said, explaining that for people on the ground, there are three primary concerns over the move, the first of which is “how many people are going to die? … To what extent is there going to be violence and loss of life?”

Speaking to CNA over the phone from Jerusalem, he said on a second level, there is also concern over the fact that the U.S. has strayed from a position that has been a widely accepted in international law, and to which the Holy See has also “very, very strenuously and strictly” stuck.

“The Holy See has remained very strictly within that discourse, and the kind of upset that it causes now to think that one of the strongest countries in the world doesn’t seem willing to stay within a discourse that we have been using and that has been very useful in trying to find a solution to the problem of Jerusalem,” is concerning, Neuhaus said.

A third immediate concern, which the Church itself has taken a particular interest in, is over the character of Jerusalem itself, he said, explaining that to drag the city into a contentions political debate “is endangering the character of the city as a holy city.”

There is real concern not just for the preservation of the holy sites in Jerusalem – which holds special religious significance for Jews, Christians and Muslims – but also for the people who visit them, the priest said.

The people, he said, “always kind of vanish from this kind of politicized discourse, because we talk about protecting stones, and our fear is yes, you can wonderfully keep a museum, but there aren’t people there anymore.”

“If violence breaks out, pilgrimages will stop and pilgrims will be in danger because when countries take positions like this, which seem to be positions that exclude someone else, yes the people are in danger,” he said, adding that this concern is also just as valid for the people who live in the city.

Jerusalem is a place where certain groups of people “feel more and more alienated” and excluded, and who feel “that one narrative is being preferred over other narratives, one religious tradition is triumphing over others,” he said, so in this sense, the Trump decision could alter the character of the city itself.

While right-wing Israelis have been celebrating the decision, likening it to the 1917 Balfour declaration announcing British support for the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people,” for Palistinians, both Christian and Muslim, “there is despair.”

In general, Neuhaus said the feeling is that the move betrays what had previously been decided by the international community, who recognized the “special status” of Jerusalem and tried to protect it from becoming the center of conflict.

However, rather than doing this, the Trump administration’s announcement “is very clearly putting Jerusalem right in the middle,” the priest said, adding that there is also confusion over what this will mean in the long run.

Trump never said what Jerusalem is, so in terms of a two-state solution, which has been supported by the U.N. and the wider international community, “what are these two states?”

Neuhaus said the “bravado” with which Trump made the announcement was “kind of spitting in the face of the rest of the world, which is saying this might not be the most prudent thing to do.”

“This kind of discourse does not prevent division it provokes division,” he said, and while they are hoping for the best, the future is unclear.

Many Israelis, he said, are asking themselves the question: “is Israel going to have to pay a price for this American gift? … Is this part of something bigger that we can’t see right now?”

“These things will become clear in the months to come,” he said, but noted that “something has changed, and that change is not going to be for the good.”

Neuhaus’ concerns echoed those of the patriarchs and heads of Churches and ecclesial communities in Jerusalem.

On Dec. 6, 13 of these leaders signed an open letter to Trump saying they have followed the news of his decision “with concern.”

“Jerusalem, the city of God, is a city of peace for us and for the world,” however, unfortunately, “our holy land with Jerusalem the Holy city, is today a land of conflict.”

Recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, they said, will only lead to “increased hatred, conflict, violence and suffering in Jerusalem and the Holy Land, moving us father from the goal of unity and deeper toward destructive division.”

Peace in the area “cannot be reached without Jerusalem being for all,” the signatories said, and urged the United States “to continue recognizing the present international status of Jerusalem.”

“Any sudden changes would cause irreparable harm,” they said, and voiced their confidence that with adequate support, both Israelis and Palestinians “can work towards negotiating a sustainable and just peace” that is beneficial for all sides.

“The Holy City can be shared and fully enjoyed once a political process helps liberate the hearts of all people that live within it from the conditions of conflict and destructiveness that they are experiencing,” they said, and asked that as Christmas approaches, Trump would join them in their quest to build “a just, inclusive peace for all the peoples of this unique and Holy City.”

The 13 signatories of the letter included six Catholic officials, as well as representatives of Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, Anglicanism, and Lutheranism.

Israel has traditionally recognized Jerusalem as its capital. However, Palestinians claim East Jerusalem for the capital of the Palestinian state. In recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, the U.S. is the first country to do so since the state was established in 1948. East Jerusalem was annexed by Israel after is victory in the Six Day War of 1967.

Debate on this particular issue has in many ways been the crux of the conflict between Israel and Palestine, which is backed by Arab leaders and the wider Islamic world.

According to the 1993 Israel-Palestinian peace accords, the final status of Jerusalem is to be discussed in the late stages of peace talks. Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem has never been recognized by the international community, and all countries with diplomatic relations have their embassies in Tel Aviv. However, under Trump’s new plan, the U.S. embassy is to be relocated from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, then, is likely to increase tension, particularly in regards to the 200,000-some settlements Israel has built in East Jerusalem, which are considered illegal under international law, though Israel disputes this stance.

After news of the decision broke, Pope Francis during his general audience also voiced “deep concern” over the move, and issued a “heartfelt appeal” to the international community to ensure that “everyone is committed to respecting the status quo of the city, in accordance with the relevant Resolutions of the United Nations.”

More than 30 Palestinians have been injured in clashes across the West Bank and the Gaza Strip amid protests against Trump’s decision.

The position of the U.N. on the Jerusalem issue is that East Jerusalem is occupied Palestinian territory, and that the city should eventually become the capital of the two states of Israel and Palestine.

The Vatican has long supported a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, and on a diplomatic level recognizes and refers to both “the State of Israel” and “the State of Palestine.”

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Abuja, Nigeria, Dec 6, 2017 / 11:23 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Church’s intellectual and moral truth is the key to a peaceful, free, and developing nation, Nigerian bishops have said at a conference attended by the country’s political and spiritual leaders.

Their remarks came a conference on “Peace and National Development,” hosted Nov. 19-22 by Veritas University, the Catholic university of Nigeria.

“The leaders of our future must be formed with a mentality that only the truth sets a people free,”  said Archbishop Augustine Akubeze, during remarks at the conference.

“Corruption will be eradicated if the students begin to learn that only money that accrues to a person as a result of hard work can be enjoyed.”

“The dream of the CBCN [Catholic Bishop’s Conference of Nigeria]… must always be the search for truth,” Akubeze, Vice President of CBCN, said, according to the Catholic News Service of Nigeria.

Marking the university’s 10th anniversary, the event was held at the Chelsea Hotel in Abuja, Nigeria, and included addresses from Archbishop Akubeze, Bishop Matthew Kukah of Sokoto, and the school’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Mike Kwanashie.

The conference was also attended by Yakubu Dogara, the Speaker of Nigeria’s House of Representatives; former President Olusegun Obasanjo; and John Cardinal Onaiyekan, Archbishop of Abuja and the university’s chancellor.

While speaking about Nigeria’s future development, Bishop Kukah lamented that Nigeria has “remained permanently on top of the league of most vile and corruption in the international reports of the world institutions.”

The bishop asked on whether Nigeria could really be considered a “developing country,” because it lacks advancements in health, security, human rights, and the rule of law.
    
Archbishop Akubeze also mentioned that corruption exacerbated other severe challenges faced by Nigeria, pointing to events of terrorism, kidnappings, robberies, political violence, and tensions between religious and ethnic groups.

“These can result in disunity, instability, and if not curtailed, disintegration,” he said. “[Truth is] that fundamental value without which freedom, justice and human dignity are extinguished.”

The archbishop encouraged the university to form future leaders to search for truth and contribute to the common good, noting that some of the university’s students would likely become senators, governors, and maybe even Nigeria’s president.

He drew attention to the importance of the university’s name, “Veritas,” which is Latin for truth. He said the school, and every educational institution, should make the pursuit of truth their top priority.

He emphasized the need for human, spiritual, and moral formation at the university.
“As you know, education is not just about academic certificate. It also involves human formation. It involves character formation. In the process of your education in this institution, I want to encourage you, the staff, to help the students to have a wider horizon of life.”

Biahop Kukah stressed the importance of developing a strong moral compass among Africa’s political leaders, especially through the Catholic formation of university students.  

“I want to focus on the Catholic Church and argue that perhaps, with some level of robustness, it could provide this moral compass drawing extensively from its rich history and culture,” he said.

He pointed to the richness of Catholic social teaching, which, he said, is rooted in the mission of Christ, namely the proclamation of salvation.

The Church’s social encyclicals have identified concrete challenges and proffered solutions in the past, he said, noting that the documents would be a powerful resource developing political solutions to Nigerian and African issues.

Although the school welcomes students from all faiths, Veritas University has a strong ecclesiastical identity and has a particular focus Catholic social teaching.

Archbishop Akubeze applauded the success of Veritas University in forming its students, but challenged the school to strive further, until it becomes a reference point for other educational institutions.

The university was founded by the bishops of Nigeria in 2002. It was officially accredited by the Nigerian government in 2007, and began admitting students thereafter.  Its mission is to “provide its students with an integral and holistic formation that combines academic and professional training with physical, moral, spiritual, social and cultural formation together with formation of Christian religious principles and the social teachings of the Catholic Church.”

Nigeria, a country of 170 million people, has a Catholic population of nearly 23 million, according to the Pew Research Center.

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Jerusalem, Nov 30, 2017 / 10:33 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Following the recent restoration of the Holy Sepulchre, archaeologists have confirmed the construction dates of the structure surrounding what is believed to be the tomb of Jesus.

Having undergone renovations in 2016, the tomb was opened for first time in centuries last October. Archeologists were able to test samples of the mortar near the cave’s southern wall and the entrance, according to National Geographic. The sediment in the samples was was measured for its most recent exposure to light using a process called optically stimulated luminescence.

They found that the mortar and marble slab covering the original burial bed dated back to about 345 AD. This coincides with the time period that Constantine was believed to have built the shrine around the tomb, and refutes claims by many researchers that the shrine was built only 1,000 years ago, during the Crusades.  

Veneration of Christ’s burial place dates back to the fourth century, when St. Helena is believed to have discovered and identified the tomb. St. Helena’s son, Emperor Constantine, is believed to have built the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 326 and enshrined the tomb.

The shelf on which Christ’s body was laid is the central point of veneration, which has been encapsulated by a 3-by-5 foot marble structure – the Edicule – since at least 1555.

Since its construction, the church has been built and rebuilt several times, repairing destruction caused by fires, earthquakes, and religious conflicts.

A year-long restoration of the site was recently completed, and scientists are looking into additional restoration work on the foundation.

Scientists also found that in between the burial bed and the most recent marble covering was a broken slab marked by a cross and words “burial tomb,” belonging to the original shrine.

The tests performed on the tomb samples also provided evidence for the historical restorations of the Crusades and the 16th century Franciscans.
 

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Vatican City, Nov 28, 2017 / 08:00 pm (CNA).- The first cardinal to be officially invited to visit Saudi Arabia, Cardinal Bechara Boutros Rai, Maronite Patriarch of Antioch, has begun a strategic call for religious tolerance among the Saudi Arabian roy… […]

Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo, Nov 28, 2017 / 02:00 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Catholic bishops of the Democratic Republic of Congo have requested that President Joseph Kabila affirm that he will not claim a third term of presidency at the conclusion of… […]

Juba, South Sudan, Nov 27, 2017 / 07:00 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The Catholic bishops of South Sudan urged Catholics to join Pope Francis in a prayer for peace in the newest African country, which has been entrenched in a three yearslong civil war.

On Nov… […]

Ismailia, Egypt, Nov 24, 2017 / 11:25 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Terrorists attacked a mosque on Egypt’s Sinai peninsula during Friday prayers, killing 235 people. The incident was condemned by Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, president of the US bishops’ conference.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the Nov. 24 attack on al-Rawda mosque in Bir al-Abed, located about 75 miles northeast of Ismailia.

Cardinal DiNardo stated that “I join with my brother bishops in unequivocally condemning the monstrous terrorist attack on innocent people at prayer in Egypt. Terrorist acts can never be justified in the name of God or any political ideology, and the fact this attack took place at a Mosque, a place of worship, is especially offensive to God.”

The Church in the US “mourns with the people of Egypt at this time of tragedy, and assures them of our prayerful solidarity,” he added.

“We join with all those of good will in prayer that these acts of terror and mass killings – these acts of grave evil – will end and will be replaced with genuine and mutual respect for the dignity of each and every person.”

The mosque, associated with Sufis – followers of a form of Islamic mysticism – was bombed and hit with gunfire. Hundreds more were wounded in the attack.

The Sinai peninsula has been the site of an Islamist insurgency since 2013, when the Egyptian military ousted President Mohamed Morsi, who was backed by the Muslim Brotherhood.

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