Rome, Italy, Apr 16, 2020 / 09:06 am (CNA).- Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI celebrated his 93rd birthday Thursday at his Vatican residence during Italy’s coronavirus lockdown.
The retired pope, who lives in the Mater Ecclesia monastery on Vatican gr… […]
Vatican City, Apr 16, 2020 / 03:12 am (CNA).- Joy is a grace and a gift of the Holy Spirit, not just positive emotions or feeling cheerful, Pope Francis said at Mass at the Vatican Thursday.
Joy “is not the consequence of emotions that burst for… […]
Vatican City, Apr 15, 2020 / 10:00 am (CNA).- The Vatican is creating a commission to provide local aid and tackle issues related to the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, according to a statement released Wednesday.
The group, created at the requ… […]
Vatican City, Apr 15, 2020 / 09:05 am (CNA).- The Vatican has named a new director for its internal financial watchdog.
In a statement April 15, the Holy See press office said that the Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin had appointed Giuseppe Schlitzer as director of the Financial Intelligence Authority (AIF). He succeeds Tommaso Di Ruzza, who completed his five-year term of office January 20, according to the Vatican.
Cardinal Parolin also named a new vice-director, Federico Antellini Russo.
The two men will run the watchdog, which combats money laundering, along with AIF President Carmelo Barbagallo, who was appointed after the departure of René Brülhart in Nov. 2019. A Vatican statement at the time said that Brülhart was leaving at the end of his five-year term, but the Swiss lawyer told Reuters that he had resigned from the post.
Schlitzer has held positions at Banca d’Italia, Italy’s central bank, the International Monetary Fund in Washington, D.C., and the General Confederation of Italian Industry. He has served as managing director of AITEC, an association of cement producers, and vice-president of the Jacques Maritain International Institute.
Antellini Russo has worked at the AIF since 2015. He served as an economist in the research and development section of the joint-stock company Consip from 2008 to 2013. He then moved to the research department of the Italian investment bank Cassa Depositi e Prestiti, before joining the AIF.
Pope Benedict XVI founded the AIF in 2010 to oversee Vatican financial transactions. It is charged with ensuring that internal banking policies comply with international financial standards.
In 2013 the AIF became a full member of the Egmont Group, a global network of financial intelligence units. But the Egmont Group suspended the AIF on Nov. 13, 2019, after Vatican gendarmes raided the offices of the Secretariat of State and the AIF. It reinstated the AIF on Jan. 22 this year.
After the raid on the AIF on Oct. 1, 2019, a total of five employees and officials were suspended and blocked from entering the Vatican, including AIF director Tommaso Di Ruzza.
On Oct. 23, the AIF’s board of directors issued a statement expressing “full faith and trust in the professional competence and honorability” of Di Ruzza, but no announcement was ever made by Vatican authorities regarding the results of any investigation into Di Ruzza or his return to work.
During an in-flight press conference after his trip to Japan on Nov. 26, Pope Francis said that Di Ruzza had been suspended “because there were suspicions of poor administration”.
“Let’s hope he is innocent,” he said, “I would like it to be so because it’s a good thing that a person be innocent and not guilty, I hope so.”
Following the raids, the Egmont Group suspension and the exit of René Brülhart, two high-profile figures, Marc Odendall and Juan Zarate, resigned from the AIF’s board of directors. Odendall said at the time that the AIF had been effectively rendered “an empty shell” and that there was “no point” in remaining involved in its work.
Moneyval, the Council of Europe’s anti-money laundering watchdog, is expected to carry out an inspection of the Vatican this spring.
ACI Stampa, CNA’s Italian-language partner agency, quoted outgoing director Di Ruzza as saying: “I thank the Holy Father for the opportunity he has granted me to serve the Holy See. I am confident that in these years AIF has done its best to build a solid and credible anti-money laundering system at the international level.”
Vatican City, Apr 15, 2020 / 08:05 am (CNA).- Pope Francis prayed for the elderly who are afraid of dying alone at his morning Mass on Wednesday.
“Let us pray today for the elderly, especially for those who are isolated or in nursing homes. They are afraid, afraid of dying alone,” Pope Francis said before Mass on April 15.
The pope said that the elderly are “our roots, our story, our history,” and asked the Lord to be close to them as the world faces the coronavirus pandemic.
As COVID-19 has led to the deaths of more than 125,000 people worldwide, dioceses have sought creative solutions to bring the sacraments to the elderly and the dying. In Chicago, a team of 24 priest volunteers — all under age 60 — administer sacramental anointing of the sick to Catholics with the coronavirus.
In his homily, Pope Francis said that God is faithful to his promises. “Our faithfulness is nothing but a response to God’s faithfulness,” he said.
“Our God is a God who works overtime,” the pope said. “Like that shepherd who, when he returns home, realizes that he is missing a sheep and goes, goes back to look for the sheep that has been lost there.”
“God’s faithfulness always precedes us, and our faithfulness is always the answer to that fidelity that precedes us,” he said.
Speaking from the chapel of his Vatican residence, Casa Santa Marta, the pope said that God is patient with his people, as he was with the two disciples walking on the road to Emmaus in the Gospel of John.
“God’s faithfulness is a patient faithfulness: he has patience with his people, listens to them, guides them,” the pope said.
At the end of the Mass, Pope Francis dedicated a moment of prayer to Mary as the “Regina Coeli” Marian antiphon for the Easter season was sung in Latin:
“Queen of heaven, rejoice, alleluia.
For he whom you did merit to bear, alleluia,
Has risen, as he said, alleluia.
Pray for us to God, alleluia.
Rejoice and be glad, O Virgin Mary, alleluia.
For the Lord has truly risen, alleluia.”
Vatican City, Apr 15, 2020 / 07:25 am (CNA).- Pope Francis Wednesday accepted the resignation of Bishop Arthur J. Serratelli, appointing Brooklyn pastor Fr. Kevin J. Sweeney to be his successor as head of the Diocese of Paterson, New Jersey.
Serratell… […]
Vatican City, Apr 15, 2020 / 04:30 am (CNA).- Peace is often misunderstood today as a subjective psychological idea, Pope Francis said Wednesday, stressing that true peace is found in Christ’s sacrificial love.
“Those who have learned and exercise the art of peace are called children of God, they know that there is no reconciliation without the gift of one’s own life, and that peace must always be sought,” Pope Francis said April 15.
The pope said that there is a widespread sense today that “peace” means “a sort of inner tranquility,” but this idea is deficient and can hinder personal growth.
“This is a modern, psychological and more subjective idea. Peace is commonly thought to be quiet, harmony, internal balance. This … meaning is incomplete and cannot be absolutized, because restlessness can be an important moment of growth in life,” he explained.
“Many times it is the Lord himself who sows uneasiness in us to go to meet him, to find him,” he said.
“It can happen that inner tranquility corresponds to a domesticated conscience and not to a true spiritual redemption,” he warned.
Speaking via livestream due to the coronavirus pandemic, Pope Francis quoted Christ’s words in the Gospel of John: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you.”
“Many times the Lord must be a ‘sign of contradiction’, shaking our false certainties, to bring us to salvation,” Francis said.
“And at that moment there seems to be no peace, but it is the Lord who puts us on this path to reach the peace that He himself will give us,” he added.
Jesus is the prince of peace, who fulfilled the Hebrew concept of shalom by reconciling all things and making “peace with the blood of his cross,” the pope said.
Pope Francis explained that the biblical notion of shalom means “abundance, prosperity, well-being.”
“When in Hebrew we wish shalom, we wish for a beautiful, full, prosperous life, but also according to truth and justice, which will be fulfilled in the Messiah, prince of peace,” he said.
He said that peace is not “the fruit of one’s own abilities,” but a “manifestation of the grace received from Christ.”
Pope Francis’ meditation on peace was a part of an ongoing weekly catechesis on the Beatitudes.
This week, the pope focused on the seventh Beatitude given by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount in chapter five of the Gospel of Matthew: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”
The pope said that this beatitude, the seventh one, is the most active.
“Love by its nature is creative — love is always creative — and seeks reconciliation at any cost,” he said.
In his message to Polish pilgrims, the pope noted that next weekend is Divine Mercy Sunday, and quoted St. Faustina’s diary: “Humanity will not find peace until it turns to the source of my mercy.”
“True shalom and true inner balance flow from the peace of Christ, which comes from his Cross and generates a new humanity, embodied in an infinite host of inventive and creative saints, who have always devised new ways to love,” the pope said.
“The saints build peace. This life as children of God, who because of the blood of Christ seek and find their brothers, is true happiness. Blessed are those who go this way,” Pope Francis said.
Vatican City, Apr 14, 2020 / 06:19 pm (CNA).- Pope Francis phoned Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York Tuesday to express his concern for the people of New York during the coronavirus pandemic. More than 10,000 deaths in the city are being attributed to … […]
Vatican City, Apr 14, 2020 / 04:00 am (CNA).- In uncertain times, our ultimate goal should be to remain faithful to the Lord rather than to seek our own security, Pope Francis said at his morning Mass Tuesday.
Speaking from the chapel of his Vatican residence, the Casa Santa Marta, April 14, the pope said: “Many times when we feel secure we begin to make our plans and slowly move away from the Lord; we do not remain faithful. And my security is not what the Lord gives me. It is an idol.”
To Christians who object that they do not bow before idols, he said: “No, perhaps you do not kneel, but that you seek them and so many times in your heart you worship idols, it is true. Many times. Your own safety opens the door to idols.”
Pope Francis reflected on the Second Book of Chronicles, which describes how King Rehoboam, the first leader of the Kingdom of Judah, became complacent and departed from the law of the Lord, taking his people with him.
“But is your own safety bad?” the pope asked. “No, it’s a grace. Be secure, but also be sure that the Lord is with me. But when there is safety and I am at the center, I turn away from the Lord, like King Rehoboam, I become unfaithful.”
“It is so difficult to remain faithful. The whole history of Israel, and then the whole history of the Church, is full of infidelity. Full. Full of selfishness, full of its own certainties that make the people of God move away from the Lord, lose that fidelity, the grace of fidelity.”
Focusing on the day’s second reading (Acts 2:36-41), in which Peter calls people to repentance on the day of Pentecost, the pope said: “To convert is this: to return to being faithful. Fidelity, that human attitude which is not so common in people’s lives, in our lives. There are always illusions that attract attention, and many times we want to hide behind these illusions. Fidelity: in good times and bad times.”
The pope said that the day’s Gospel reading (John 20:11-18) offered an “icon of fidelity”: the image of a weeping Mary Magdalene keeping vigil beside Jesus’ tomb.
“She was there,” he said, “faithful, faced with the impossible, faced with tragedy … A weak but faithful woman. The icon of fidelity of this Mary of Magdala, apostle to the apostles.”
Inspired by Mary Magdalene, we should pray for the gift of faithfulness, the pope said.
“Let us ask the Lord today for the grace of fidelity: to give thanks when He gives us certainties, but never think that they are ‘my’ certainties and always, look beyond one’s own certainties; the grace of being faithful even before the tombs, before the collapse of so many illusions.”
After Mass, the pope presided at adoration and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, before leading those watching via livestream in a prayer of spiritual communion.
Finally, the congregation sang the Easter Marian antiphon “Regina caeli”.
At the start of Mass, the pope prayed that the challenges of the coronavirus crisis would help people to overcome their differences.
“Let us pray that the Lord will give us the grace of unity among us,” he said. “May the difficulties of this time make us discover the communion among us, the unity that is always superior to any division.”
Vatican City, Apr 13, 2020 / 01:00 pm (CNA).- Pope Francis made a surprise phone call after the Easter Vigil to a religious sister treating coronavirus patients as a doctor on call in the hard-hit Italian region of Bergamo.
Dr. Angel Bipendu, a member… […]
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