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Ecological ritual performed in Vatican gardens for pope’s tree planting ceremony

October 4, 2019 CNA Daily News 18

Vatican City, Oct 4, 2019 / 10:30 am (CNA).- Pope Francis witnessed an indigenous performance at a tree planting ceremony in the Vatican gardens Friday during which people held hands and bowed before carved images of pregnant women. 

A group of people, including Amazonians in ritual dress, as well people in lay clothes and a Franciscan brother, knelt and bowed in a circle around images of two semi-naked pregnant women in the presence of the pope and members of the curia.

After witnessing the ritual, Pope Francis set aside his prepared remarks, opting instead to offer the Our Father without comment. 

The ceremony in the Vatican gardens — organized by the Global Catholic Climate Movement, Pan-Amazonian Ecclesial Network, and the Order of Franciscan Friars Minor — was described as a celebration of the feast of St. Francis and the opening of the Synod of bishops on the Pan-Amazon region Oct. 6-27.

Participants sang and held hands while dancing in a circle around the images, in a dance resembling the “pago a la tierra,” a traditional offering to Mother Earth common among indigenous peoples in some parts of South America. No explanation was provided by the event organizers as to why the dance was performed for the Feast of St. Francis or what it symbolized. 

Pope Francis remained seated in a chair outside the group throughout the ceremony. 

A representative from the Vatican Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development said after the event that the dicastery’s officials were invited to attend the event, but neither orgnized nor promoted it.

People carried bowls of dirt from different places around the world, each symbolizing a different issue from ecological devastation to migration. The dirt was placed around a tree from Assisi, which was planted as a “symbol of integral ecology.”

After what appeared to be the offering of prayers by participants, who prostrated themselves on the grass around a blanket upon which fruit, candles, and several carved items were set, an indigenous woman approached the pope and presented him with a black ring, which appeared identical to the one she was wearing.

The ring appeared to be a tucum ring — a black ring worn in Brazil and Latin America as a sign of dedication to certain social causes, and often associated with liberation theology advocate Bishop Pedro Casaldáliga.

The Vatican declined to comment on the ring. 

Prior to the pope’s decision not to offer his prepared remarks, Cardinal Peter Turkson, Prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, spoke about Francis’ environmental encyclical Laudato Si.

“Not only is our environment deteriorating globally, little effort is also made to safeguard the moral conditions for an authentic human ecology,” Turkson said.

“God’s Word transformed ‘chaos’ at the dawn of creation into a ‘cosmos,’ an ordered world system, capable of supporting human life, and suitable to be home for man. And the lesson here is simple: ‘Chaos’ with the Word of God becomes ‘Cosmos.’ Conversely, ‘Cosmos’ without God’s Word turns into ‘chaos,’” he said.

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US ambassadors: Religious groups provide aid where governments cannot 

October 3, 2019 CNA Daily News 0

Vatican City, Oct 3, 2019 / 01:37 pm (CNA).- U.S. diplomats asked the Holy See to join the multilateral International Religious Freedom Alliance Wednesday, underscoring the contributions of faith-based organizations to flourishing and free societies around the world.

Faith-based institutions unleash “spiritual capital into a society,” Ambassador-at-large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback told CNA. He said these non-governmental organizations “bring the heart and hands,” helping the parts of society where governments or big institutions cannot reach.

“Governments are not real good about ‘Hey, let us help you get out of alcoholism,’ but churches are. That is just one quiet example,” Brownback said.

A symposium held at the Vatican Oct. 2 focused on the unique role that faith-based organizations play in providing humanitarian aid, combatting human trafficking, and advancing religious freedom in different parts of the world.

“Faith communities have been foundational, that is, fundamental to our work,” U.S. Ambassador-at-large to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons John Cotton Richmond said at the symposium.

“Governments are limited by borders. They are limited by jurisdictions, election cycles, political will, and sometimes their self-imposed political struggles. But faith communities are not similarly bound,” Richmond said.

The ambassador said that faith-based organizations have the advantage of being able to “operate through networks that extend beyond any government or regime.”

“They do not last for just a cycle … They can build and plant for the long term,” he said.

“Faith-based communities with their contributions to philosophy have contributed to the foundation of the modern human rights movement. Faith-based groups have advanced the idea that all people have inherent value and intrinsic worth regardless,” Richmond said.

Representatives from Aid to the Church in Need, Caritas, Talitha Kum, the Community of Sant’Egidio, AVSI, Adyan Foundation, and the Vatican Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development participated in the symposium, “Pathways to Achieving Human Dignity,” co-hosted by the Holy See’s Secretariat of State and the U.S. Embassy to the Holy See.

The U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See Callista Gingrich announced at the symposium that the embassy will be awarding financial grants to each of the faith-based organizations that participated in the event.

“There has never been a more critical time to work with and to support faith-based organizations,” Gingrich said in her opening address Oct. 3.

“Today, religious freedom is under attack in nearly every part of the world. Faith-based organizations, through their unique ability to build trust and encourage dialogue, can play a critical role in turning the tide,” Gingrich said.

“Faith-based organizations are advocates for the most vulnerable among us, including those enslaved by human trafficking. They are also providers of humanitarian assistance, helping governments deliver aid effectively and honestly to those most in need,” she said.

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Burkina Faso Jesuit is the first African to win prestigious Ratzinger Prize

October 2, 2019 CNA Daily News 1

Vatican City, Oct 2, 2019 / 03:00 pm (CNA).- A Jesuit priest from Burkina Faso has made history as the first African to win the prestigious Ratzinger Prize, which honors the work and academic contribution of theologians and other Catholic intellectuals.

“I am very surprised to have been awarded this prize, and I am very grateful to the scientific committee for this honor of being at the forefront of Africa for this prize,” Fr. Paul Béré, SJ told Vatican News shortly after the announcement.

“I think this is an encouragement for all theological work done in Africa.”

African Catholic theology is “attentive to what the Christian community is living in our territory,” the priest added.

The president of the Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI Foundation, Fr. Federico Lombardi, along with the president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, Gianfranco Cardinal Ravasi announced the winners of the 2019 Ratzinger Prize earlier this week.

The honorees are chosen by Pope Francis, based upon the recommendations of a committee composed of five cardinals who are members of the Roman Curia.

The Ratzinger Prize was begun in 2011 to recognize scholars whose work demonstrates a meaningful contribution to theology in the spirit of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the Bavarian theologian who became Benedict XVI.

Béré, who is a lecturer at the Pontifical Biblical Institute, explained that he received the award for his work on the figure of the prophet Joshua.

“As an African Biblical scholar, I worked on the figure of Joshua,” he said

The priest explained that the prophet Joshua, who was formed through his relationship with his predecessor Moses, is a source of inspiration for the Church in Africa, especially regarding the transmission of values from one generation to another.

“This is also an inspiration that can help the Church in Africa to work towards the transmission from one generation to another of the mission that we received from the Lord in the ecclesial and political spheres,” he said.

Beré, who is a member of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) spoke last month on the need for an “Africanness” within the Catholic approach to addressing regional problems.

“Africa can find a solution to all its problems within, what we (Africans) simply need is the slightest desire to share the solutions across the continent,” Beré told ACI Africa at the Nairobi tri-party conference on the status of the evangelization mission in Africa .

Béré will be awarded the Ratzinger Prize on Nov. 9, 2019 at the Vatican Apostolic Palace from Pope Francis. The philosopher Charles Taylor, a Canadian Catholic intellectual, will be awarded the Ratzinger prize on the same day.

A version of this story was first published by ACI Africa, CNA’s partner news agency in Africa. It has been adapted by CNA.

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At Vatican, Secretary Mike Pompeo highlights Chinese religious freedom violations 

October 2, 2019 CNA Daily News 1

Vatican City, Oct 2, 2019 / 06:00 am (CNA).- U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo spoke out Wednesday about China’s religious freedom violations during a visit to the Vatican.

“When the state rules absolutely, God becomes an absolute threat to authority … human dignity is trampled … moral norms are crushed completely,” Pompeo said Oct. 2 in Vatican City’s Old Synod Hall.

The U.S. Secretary of State said this is why “China has put more than a million Uighur Muslims … in internment camps” and “why it throws Christian pastors in jail.”

Pompeo was at the Vatican Oct. 2 for the symposium “Pathways to Achieving Human Dignity: Partnering with Faith-Based Organizations,” co-hosted by the Holy See’s Secretariat of State and the U.S. Embassy to the Holy See.

An embassy source told CNA that Secretary Pompeo will meet Pope Francis on Oct. 3 in the Vatican library.

Pompeo’s speech at the Vatican began and ended with an example of a Uyghur Muslim who experienced persecution from the Chinese government in Xinjiang. 

The Holy See marked last week the one year anniversary of a provisional agreement with the People’s Republic of China on the appointment of bishops.

Secretary Pompeo said that countries around the world should “follow the wisdom of Jesus: ‘Be not afraid’” in defending religious freedom where it is under threat.

Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback said that the US is calling on the Chinese government to “move away from this war on faith.”

“We are deeply concerned about what China is doing,” Brownback told CNA.

Brownback said that the State Department is particularly concerned with the Chinese government’s use of advanced technologies, like facial recognition and a social credit score system, to marginalize people of faith in the society.

“That system is starting to be exported to other places, other authoritarian repressive regimes … I think that is why the secretary talks about it, and it is certainly why I talk about it,” Brownback said.

Pompeo also singled out the governments of Iran, Myanmar and Syria for their repression of religious freedom, and denounced Cuba’s cancellation of National Catholic Youth Day this year.

The symposium was convened at the Vatican to highlight the world of faith-based organizations in advancing religious freedom, combatting human trafficking, and providing humanitarian aid.

“The stakes today are arguably higher than they were even during the Cold War,” Pompeo said.

“More than 80% of mankind lives in places where religious freedom is threatened or entirely denied. Approximately 71 million people around the world are displaced as refugees, roughly 25 million people are caught in human trafficking situations, and it is not coincidence that this has happened as unfree societies have proliferated,” he said.

The US Department of State this year launched the International Religious Freedom Alliance, a multilateral organization to advance religious freedom issues worldwide. “We humbly ask the Holy See to join us,” Pompeo said. “What could be more powerful than our voices all together calling for the freedom to worship God?”

Archbishop Paul Gallagher, Vatican Secretary for Relations with States spoke at the symposium opening about the need to “promote peaceful coexistence and peaceful societies.” He highlighted Pope Francis’ joint declaration on human fraternity signed in Abu Dhabi, and said that the Holy See seeks to develop an international network of religious leaders to promote “healthy pluralism.”

Pompeo commended Pope emeritus Benedict XVI and Pope Francis for speaking out in defense of Asia Bibi, the Pakistani Catholic woman whose life was threatened under a blasphemy law.

As U.S. Embassy to the Holy See marks its 35th anniversary this year,  Pompeo spoke fondly of St. John Paul II and US President Ronald Reagan’s partnership during the Cold War.

“Think of the millions of believers who can live with dignity and purpose, who can now worship without fear, thanks to the joint efforts of a pope and a president,” Pompeo said.

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