Pope/Vatican

http://www.cubaheadlines.com/2010/06/19/22178/pope_benedict_may_make_visit_cuba_%E2%80%9912.html

Cuba’s Roman Catholic leadership hopes Pope Benedict XVI can visit in 2012, a bishop said Thursday, in what would be the first papal trip to Cuba since John Paul II came in 1998.

Monsignor Emilio Aranguren, bishop of the eastern province of Holguin, said, “It’s our hope, our interest, that the pope comes to Cuba in the year 2012,” the 400th anniversary of the discovery of Cuba’s patron saint.

“It’s up to the Holy See,” he said. The Vatican had no immediate comment.

In 1612, three men from the eastern copper mining town of El Cobre found a diminutive wooden statue floating off the coast bearing the label, “I am the Virgin of Charity.” She was declared patron saint in 1916.

Aranguren’s comments came at a briefing on the activities of Archbishop Dominique Mamberti, the Vatican’s foreign minister, who is in Havana to mark Catholic Social Week. He said Mamberti’s visit has nothing to do with a possible papal visit.

The Catholic Church has recently become a major political voice on the island. In May, Cuban Cardinal Jaime Ortega negotiated an end to a ban on marches by a small group of wives and mothers of political prisoners known as the Ladies in White.

The cardinal and another church leader subsequently met with President Raul Castro for four hours. Church officials then announced the government would transfer political prisoners held far from their families and give better access to medical care for inmates who need it. It also freed prisoner Ariel Sigler for health reasons.

In 1998, John Paul II made the first papal trip to Cuba. The Vatican’s No. 2, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, visited the island a decade later.

Cuba never broke ties with the Vatican, even when the island was officially atheist after the 1959 revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power.
The government removed references to atheism in the 1991 constitution and allowed religious believers to join the Communist Party.

Bishop Offers Healing Prayer for Earth's Water Systems
By Joel Hood

11:03 p.m. CDT, June 20, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-met-global-waters-0621-20100620,0,2160230.story

Holy water, meet Lake Michigan.

As work crews on Sunday once more tried to stem the flow of oil in the Gulf of Mexico, Bishop James Wilkowski and a small contingent from the Evangelical Catholic Diocese of the Northwest stood at the end of a pier in Chicago's Rogers Park neighborhood and offered a simple prayer to heal the sick.

Then he grabbed a wand from an ornate gold bucket and sprinkled holy water into the lapping waves. Behind him, sunbathers looked upon the spectacle with their mouths open and a dog chased tiny sticks tossed into the lake.

What kind of ritual was this? "Grabbed a wand"..... sounds a bit like some sort of black magic trick!

snip
The bishop, donning a white ceremonial smock, a pink skullcap and long, embroidered stole around his neck, gazed out over the open water.

"If BP can't plug the leak, maybe God can," he said.

In a brief and windswept afternoon ceremony at the edge of the pier at Jarvis Beach, Wilkowski prayed for the good health of the Great Lakes and for all of the waters on Earth. It was a blessing, he said, built out of frustration as he and millions of Americans have watched the unsuccessful attempts to stop the flow of oil off the Gulf Coast.

Intrigued wrote:"If BP can't plug the leak, maybe God can," he said.

Only God does it anyways. If it is good, then it is always of God. Isn't this bishop humble enough to recognize this simple insight that nothing good happens without God's grace? Even if BP did it, and it was good, then a bishop would surely give full credit to God?

something doesn't smell good about that comment of his. I pray that it is due to the ineptness of language and not being present with the bishop, in order to get a feel for what he really meant. His intentions might have been very good in what he said.


- thanks Intrigued

thx Seek for the post about Cuba
thx Intrigued
Prayer does work so kudos to the Bishop for trying even he use all the weird props lol

thx Wilderness for the beautiful and wise words as always
"Only God does it anyways"

a "wand" hmm :/

Pope appoints NCBC president to governing council of the Pontifical Academy for Life



VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI has appointed the leader of a prominent United States bioethics think tank to the board of the Pontifical Academy for Life, a Vatican statement said June 22.

John Haas, president of the Philadelphia-based National Catholic Bioethics Center, was one of five new members named to sit on the board of the academy that studies and advises the Pope on questions regarding abortion, euthanasia, stem-cell research, health care and other issues.

Dr. Haas, also a professor of moral theology at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary, has served as an ordinary member of the academy since 2006.

The Pontifical Academy for Life was established by Pope John Paul II in 1994. The principal objective of the academy is the study of problems of biomedicine and of law relative to the promotion and defense of life and especially the direct relation that they have with Christian morality and the teachings and directives of the Church's Magisterium.

http://www.catholictranscript.org/component/content/article/1-latest/1475-pope-appoints-ncbc-president-to-governing-council-of-the-pontifical-academy-for-life.html

Here is the Board of Directors to the National Catholic Bioethics Center
http://www.ncbcenter.org/NetCommunity/Page.aspx?pid=267

Tony Tersigni is on the Legatus Board of Governors

tersigni..yeah i remember that name..good catch nik!

Pope creates Vatican office for "new evangelisation"

Pope Benedict on Monday announced the creation of a new Vatican department dedicated to rekindling the Catholic faith in rich, developed countries that are threatened with "the eclipse of a sense of God."

The pope said he made his decision, which had been rumoured for weeks, to try to stop the "eclipse of God" in countries where a once deep-rooted faith was weakened by secularisation.

"Secularisation has produced a grave crisis in the sense of the Christian faith and of belonging to the Church," he said, adding that the purpose of the new council would be to "find the right means to re-propose the perennial truth of the Gospel.

The new department will concentrate on efforts to re-awaken the faith in countries in Europe and North America where the Church attendance and the number of vocations to the priesthood has dropped dramatically in the past 50 years.

The new department is expected to be called "The Pontifical Council for New Evangelisation" and is expected to be headed by Italian Archbishop Rino Fisichella.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE65R50O20100628

US court clears way for Pope sex abuse lawsuit

The United States' highest court has cleared the way for a lawsuit against Pope Benedict by refusing to entertain Vatican immunity in a case involving an Irish priest.

The Irish government is studying the landmark decision by the US Supreme Court which could have major implications for Ireland's relations with the Vatican in the cover-up of paedophile clerics.

In Washington, the Supreme Court refused to consider whether the Vatican enjoyed legal immunity over the sexual abuse of minors by priests in the US, therefore allowing a lawsuit filed in 2002 to proceed.

This decision could set a precedent for Irish courts to give the go- ahead to hear claims against priests ordained in Ireland but who served in the US.



Read more: http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/world-news/us-court-clears-way-for-pope-sex-abuse-lawsuit-14858307.html#ixzz0sCb9aTkG

It would almost seem as if this church is either so arrogant as to start this big campaign now, or they too need a debasement.
But, their marketing guys have to be pulling their hair out!

things are looking ugly in belgium atm

http://blog.nj.com/njv_editorial_page/2010/06/pope_benedicts_complaint_is_of.html

It was disappointing to hear Pope Benedict XVI lash out at Belgian police Sunday after they raided church offices in a search for hidden evidence of child sexual abuse.
The pontiff called the action “surprising and deplorable” and stressed the church’s “autonomy” to conduct its own investigations.

That claim of autonomy is especially troubling. The fact that the Roman Catholic Church has failed to adequately investigate these cases and protect children from repeat offenders is now beyond dispute. The horrifying pattern first revealed in Boston has now played itself out over and over, across the globe.

Given that, how can civil authorities be expected to respect the church’s autonomy? We are not talking about spiritual or religious matters. We are talking about violent crime against children.

February 19, 2011

http://indonesiakatakami.wordpress.com/2011/02/19/pope-john-pauls-coffin-to-be-exhumed-for-faithful/

VATICAN CITY (KATAKAMI / Reuters) – Faithful attending the beatification of Pope John Paul in Rome on May 1st, will be able to pray before his coffin, which will be exhumed for the event, the Vatican said on Friday.

John Paul’s wooden coffin will be exhumed from its current place in the crypts below St Peter’s Basilica.

The night before the beatification ceremony, a prayer vigil will be held at Rome’s massive Circus Maximus, the oval shaped field which was a racing track in ancient times.

praying to dead humans..doesnt sound very "christian"

Vatican introduces new security measures after Vatileaks scandal
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/vaticancityandholysee/9717310/Vatican-introduces-new-security-measures-after-Vatileaks-scandal.html

Much tighter controls have already been introduced for anyone seeking access or photocopies of the Holy See's archives, dossiers and documents.
The Papal Apartments, which include the living quarters of Pope Benedict XVI and the offices of his personal staff inside the Apostolic Palace, are totally off limits to anyone without strict authorisation.
Slovenian priest, Mitja Leskovar, an anti-espionage expert nicknamed 'Monsignor 007', is in charge of implementing the new security procedures with the identity cards expected to be introduced from January 1.

You just can't make this stuff up..lol