NEWS ABOUT THE CHURCH & THE VATICAN

Dear Father Fuchs, You are with the Lord now. Please watch over your 'fellow German' and pray the Lord that He may also give him the gift of long life (and apparent good health) that he gave you. You have our prayers, too.

One of those silly glitches where you end up having a double post. Sorry.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 04/12/2006 18.40]

No Catholic change on celibacy,
says Brazil cardinal
By Philip Pullella



VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - A Brazilian cardinal recently named to head the Vatican department overseeing the world's Catholic priests on Monday played down a remark he made suggesting the Church might review its insistence on celibacy.

"I have no new doctrine on priestly celibacy. I just say what the doctrine of the Church says. Obviously, it is the Pope who guides the Church," said Cardinal Claudio Hummes.

Hummes was talking to reporters at Rome airport after comments on celibacy he made at the weekend in Brazil caused a stir in the Italian media, major newspapers putting them on their front pages.

"Even though celibates are part of Catholic history and culture, the Church can reflect on the issue because celibacy is not a dogma but a form of discipline," he was quoted as saying in an interview with a Brazilian newspaper.

But at the airport and later in a statement issued by the Vatican press office, Hummes played down the interview, saying the Church was not considering any change for the time being. Hummes is the former archbishop of Sao Paolo.

"It is also clear that the celibacy norm for priests in the Latin (Western) Church is very ancient and rests on a consolidated tradition with strong motivations of both a theological-spiritual nature and a practical and pastoral one that has been reaffirmed by the popes," he said.

"Therefore, the issue is not right now part of the agenda for Church authorities ..." his statement said.

Priests were permitted to marry during the first millennium, but marriage was condemned by the Church at the Second Lateran Council in 1139.

The Roman Catholic Church insists that its priests remain celibate and has ruled out letting them marry, which advocates say would make some men more willing to join the priesthood and ease the shortage of priests in many parts of the world.

Last month the Vatican reaffirmed celibacy for priests after Pope Benedict and top aides held a special meeting to discuss requests by married priests to return to the active ministry.

Celibacy has re-emerged as a hot issue in the Church in the past few months, since African Archbishop Emanuel Milingo founded a movement of men who left the active ministry to wed and want to return as married men.

Milingo, a former Vatican official, raised the specter of a modern schism when he ordained four married men as priests in Washington D.C. in September. The Vatican excommunicated him.

Milingo rejects his excommunication and is planning a convention for more than 1,000 married priests - and their wives - in New York for December 8-10.

Pope Benedict appointed Hummes in October to head the Congregation for the Clergy, which oversees matters regarding the 400,000 Catholic priests and some aspects of religious education.

(additional reporting by Andrei Khalip in Rio de Janeiro)
===============================================================


Vatican not revising
celibacy rule
By FRANCES D'EMILO
Associated Press Writer

VATICAN CITY - A Brazilian cardinal who appeared to suggest the Vatican was open to revising its celibacy requirement for priests stressed Monday the question was not on the Holy See's agenda and contended that allowing them to marry wouldn't solve the clergy shortage.

Cardinal Claudio Hummes issued a statement on the day he arrived in Italy to take up a senior Vatican post in charge of priests worldwide.

On Friday, in an interview with a Brazilian newspaper, Fohla de S. Paulo, Hummes noted that celibacy was not church dogma but a rule, sparking some speculation, including in the Italian media which the Vatican closely follows, that the Holy See might relax its requirement that Latin rite priests be celibate.

The Vatican press office's release of the statement as Hummes was heading to the his new post indicated that the Holy See wanted to dampen any more such speculation.

Revising the requirement of celibacy "is not currently on the agenda of church authorities, as recently restated after the last reunion of (Vatican) department heads with the Holy Father," Hummes said in his statement.

He was referring to a summit, led by Pope Benedict XVI two weeks earlier, which reiterated the value of the requirement of celibacy for priests and made clear the policy wasn't about to be changed.

The Vatican summit was a response to former Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, a renegade married clergymen from Zambia who is leading a high-profile crusade in the United States for the Roman Catholic Church to allow priests to wed.

Men in the Eastern rite of the Catholic church who are married can become priests, and the Vatican has accepted into the priesthood some married Anglican priests who converted to Catholicism.

In the statement issued by the Vatican, Hummes that it was "clear that the rule of celibacy for priests in the Latin church is very ancient and is based on a consolidated tradition and strong motivations ... reiterated by popes as well."

The cardinal described the motivations as theological, spiritual, pastoral and practical.

Hummes said that among a recent gathering of bishops, "the most widely held opinion was that loosening the rule on celibacy would not be a solution, not even to the problem of the scarcity of vocations, which is to be linked, rather, to other causes, starting with the modern secularized culture."

In the newspaper interview, Hummes said: "Certainly, the majority of the apostles were married. In this modern age, the church must observe these things, it has to advance with history."

Married priests were permitted in the church in its early centuries.

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So, Cardinal Hummes has had his Regensburg moment. It's a lesson he will not soon forget!

There are issues that are so 'hot' that advocates pro and con are always ready to interpret general statements about the issue their way.

Making an open-ended statement like "Celibacy is not Catholic dogma', even if it is a statement of fact, left Hummes wide open for the liberal press to pounce, "Aha! Here's the Pope's own hand-picked prefect for the clergy saying this! Does this mean he's in favor of married priests? What a headline!"

Well, let's hope it is a two-day wonder. But it will problably go on a bit more because of Milingo's announced 'national convention' of married priests.

One thing I noticed - it had been announced this convention would be held in New York, implying New York City, of course. But a report now says it will be held in Parsippany, NJ. It's a town that's about 40 minutes by bus from Manhattan, but it's not the Big Apple.

I would take it as an indication that Milingo's group does not have the wherewithal to stage their affair in Manhattan, so they'll do it near enough but for far less expense.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 04/12/2006 18.38]

Vatican spokesman says pope did not ask Kissinger to be his adviser

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI does not have a foreign affairs advisory board, and he has not asked former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to become one of his advisers, the Vatican spokesman said.

Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi said it is true that Kissinger met privately with the pope Sept. 28 and that Mary Ann Glendon, a U.S. law professor and president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, has invited Kissinger to speak to the academy at the Vatican in late April.

"Those are the only two concrete facts," Father Lombardi told Catholic News Service.

Articles in Italian and U.S. newspapers reporting that the pope had asked Kissinger to become an adviser or consultant "are without any foundation," he said Dec. 4.

A New York-based correspondent for the Italian newspaper La Stampa wrote Nov. 4 that Kissinger had told an "important member of the Italian government" of the papal offer and that "a diplomatic source" at the Vatican had confirmed that "an important dialogue is under way" between the pope and Kissinger.

The rumor has been circulating in newspapers and on the Internet since the newspaper article was published.

Italian comic chides Vatican on response to papal satires

Rome, Dec. 4, 2006 (CWNews.com) - During a weekend appearance on the Italian state television network Rai3, comedian Adriano Celentano joined the public debate over broadcast satires of Pope Benedict XVI.

Celentano argued that Vatican officials had made a tactical error with their public protests of the satires aired on a popular television program, Crozza Italia. The angry response from some clerics, he said, was damaging because the satires were “a great message of irony,” in which one religious group effectively tells another, “Don’t be angry.” The message, he said, was an appeal to tolerance-- a message that the Vatican response only seemed to underline.

Celentano disagreed with the Catholic leaders who had said that the satires involving the Pope were tasteless. “There is nothing offensive about them,” he said. He added that Christians should welcome a sense of humor since “Jesus was a comic.”

The Italian comedian disclosed that he had received proposals for satires of the Vatican to air on his own program, “Rockpolitik,” but turned them down because he decided that his show was explosive enough without them.

Vatican wants China ties
but will stick by Taiwan



TAIPEI, Dec. 5 (Reuters) - The Vatican will move to resume relations with China after more than half a century if religious freedom is allowed but it will not abandon China's diplomatic rival Taiwan, an official said on Tuesday.

The Vatican, which Taiwan sees as an important ally as it fights for international legitimacy against China, would seek to restore an apostolic nunciature in Beijing for the first time since the Communist Party began ruling China in 1949, said Monsignor Ambrose Madtha, charge d'affaires at the Vatican's diplomatic mission in Taipei.

But the Vatican would seek to keep a delegate in Taiwan, he said. Taiwan split from China in 1949 after the civil war that brought the Communists to power, and the Vatican went with it.

"Holy See's position is quite clear and is known to the Taiwanese government," Madtha said. "The Holy See would maintain its delegate in Taipei. The Holy see will not abandon Taiwan."

Taiwan officials know about the Vatican's hopes for China but will not comment on anything presumptive, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman David Wang said.

Because China sees Taiwan as part of its territory rather than as a country, it is unlikely to let the Vatican or any other government maintain ties with Taiwan while pursuing diplomatic relations in Beijing.

Taiwan officials believe China is trying to isolate their island by persuading Taiwan's 24 remaining diplomatic allies to switch allegiance, joining 170 countries that already recognize Beijing over Taipei.

About 10 million Catholics live in China, but many are cut off from the Vatican, worshiping underground in fear of restrictions if they join government-sanctioned churches. The Vatican has indicated to Taiwan it would like to help those "lost sheep," Wang said.

Vatican-China relations dipped last week, when Pope Benedict criticized China for consecrating a bishop without Vatican permission, sparking outrage from Beijing days later.

About 300,000 Catholics live in Taiwan, which receives occasional visits from Vatican missionaries.

Patriarch Alexy thinks he is "prior inter partes" among ortodox metropolitans. So I think this speech was just childish reaction on fact Papa recognises this title to Constantinopol patriarch Bartolomeus I

Alexy II calls on Vatican to stop unfriendly policy toward canonical Church

Moscow, December 5, Interfax - Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexy II has called on the Vatican to stop its unfriendly actions toward the canonical Church in Russia, Ukraine and other CIS member-countries.

"The catholic mission continues among people baptized Orthodox Christians in Russia and other CIS member-nations. So does the exceedingly unfriendly policy by the administration of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church toward the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church," Alexy II said at a meeting with the Moscow clergy at the Christ the Savior Cathedral.

The patriarch said he hopes that the Vatican will take concrete steps to improve the situation.

"Without it, our meetings with representatives of the Roman Catholic Church will be just formal events, which will not help relieve the pain of people who suffer from non-fraternal actions," he said.

The World Religious Summit was held in Moscow ahead of the G8 Summit in St. Petersburg this summer. Representatives of various religions have common positions on issues of morality and assessments of social processes, Alexy II said.

Cooperation between clergymen will help "bring the expansion of pseudo-religious movements to an end," the patriarch said.

[Modificato da Maklara 05/12/2006 16.11]

Thanks for the item, Maklara. I posted related stories in NEWS ABOUT BENEDICT with my translation of the Panorama article that claims there may be a meeting next September in Hungary between Benedict and Alexei - to give perspective!

Translation alert: Joaquin Navarro VAlls has a great editorial in La Repubblica about why priestly celibacy is more than just a 'disciplinary norm' as Cardinal Hummes characterized it in his rather ill-considered statements in Brazil on the eve of taking up his new post as Prefect of the Cognregation for the Clergy.

Antonio Socci has a column on the same subject.

Pope accepts resignation of Polish Cardinal Glemp, names replacement

By Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI accepted the resignation of Polish Cardinal Jozef Glemp of Warsaw, who turns 77 Dec. 18, but said the cardinal will retain the personal title of Polish primate until his 80th birthday.

Announcing the cardinal's retirement Dec. 6, the Vatican also announced the pope had named Bishop Stanislaw Wielgus of Plock to succeed him.

Cardinal Glemp has headed the Archdiocese of Warsaw since 1981 and led it through the tumultuous years of Poland's martial law, underground Solidarity movement and the fall of communism in the late 1980s.

The new archbishop of Warsaw, 67, spent 30 years teaching philosophy at the Catholic University of Lublin. An expert on medieval philosophy and on the history of philosophy in Poland, he served three terms as the rector of the Lublin university.

Pope John Paul II named him bishop of Plock in 1999.

John Allen gives us some more background on the rivalries among the Orthodox churches and why the Patriarch of Moscow is behaving as he does - all this on the heels of a report that a meeting with the Pope is being arranged in Hungary next September.

===============================================================

Moscow's complaints reflect
Byzantine politics of Orthodoxy
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
New York
Posted on Dec 6, 2006


On day three of Benedict XVI’s Nov. 28-Dec. 1 trip to Turkey, I found myself in the press center early in the morning at the Istanbul Hilton, chatting with a couple of colleagues. That morning, the pope was to join Bartholomew I, the Patriarch of Constantinople, for a divine liturgy in the Patriarchal Church of St. George, while the afternoon would bring visits to Hagia Sophia and to the Blue Mosque.

The consensus in the press room was that the day’s big story would come in the afternoon, above all the drama of “the pope of Regensburg” setting foot inside one of Islam’s most storied mosques. (The question, by the way, wasn’t what the day’s story should be, but rather what it would be given the way the news business works).

As a thought exercise, a couple of us asked if there was anyplace on earth, outside of Turkey, where the encounter with Bartholomew would actually be news. The answer came almost at once: Moscow and Athens.

That instinct reflects the uniquely complex politics of Orthodoxy, for which the word “Byzantine” was coined. Though Bartholomew I is in theory “first among equals” among Orthodox prelates, in reality there has long been a three-way contest to determine which voices carry the most weight in Orthodox affairs.

The Patriarch of Moscow, whose see is known traditionally as the “Third Rome,” believes that because the Russian Orthodox Church is the largest and wealthiest – numbering, at least according to baptismal counts, more than 130 million out of Orthodoxy’s estimated global total of 250 million – Moscow is actually the most important Orthodox see.

The Archbishop of Athens and All Greece, on the other hand, generally insists that the church in Greece has preserved the most pure form of the Orthodox faith, which gives it a claim to preeminence.

Hence, any gesture from Rome towards one of these three figures is, unfortunately, often viewed dimly by the other two, who think of themselves as the most decisive interlocutors with the Catholic Church.

In recent years, Moscow has played this card most effectively; while John Paul II visited both the Phanar in Istanbul and Athens, the Russians kept him at arm’s length, creating a sense of drama around Catholic/Russian Orthodox affairs that endures to this day.

Thus it is perhaps no surprise just five days after Benedict and Bartholomew appeared on the balcony of the Phanar, arm-in-arm, giving the assembled crowd a victory wave, and signing a Common Declaration committing both churches to unity, that the Patriarch of Moscow has sent a further “shot across the bow” to the Vatican, reminding the Catholic Church that Bartholomew doesn’t speak for everybody.

On Tuesday, Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow called upon the Catholic Church to stop its “unfriendly” policy towards Orthodox churches in Russia and the former Soviet Republics.

“The Catholic mission continues to target people baptized in the Orthodox Church in Russia and other ex-Soviet nations, and the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church maintains its unfriendly policy in relation to the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church,” Alexy II told an annual meeting of the Moscow clergy.

“I hope the Vatican will take measures to improve the situation,” Alexy II said, adding that otherwise contacts between the Orthodox and Catholic Churches would be merely protocol and would “bring no relief to people hurt by the unfriendly actions” of Catholic missionaries.

The comments are part of long-standing complaints from Moscow about Catholic “proselytism” in Russia, Ukraine, and other parts of the former Soviet empire.

Ironically, it can be quite difficult to find evidence of a general policy of Catholic proselytism on the ground. In fact, the Vatican has an official slow-growth policy in the former Soviet domain, which is explicitly policed in these countries by the papal nuncio.

If a Russian, for example, shows up at a Catholic parish and expresses interest in becoming Catholic, the priest's first response, according to the official line, should be: ‘Why don’t you go back to the Orthodox church?’

In any other country, a small Catholic community struggling to build itself up would trumpet conversions and baptisms; in the former Soviet territories, Catholic officials do everything possible to play them down.

Meanwhile, there is proselytism going on in the former Soviet sphere, but it’s not from the Catholics. Sociologist of religion Nikolai Mitrokhin, who directs the Institute of the Study of Religion in the CIS and Baltic Countries, told me in 2004 that denominations such as the Pentecostals, the Baptists, and Jehovah’s Witnesses expanded at a clip of 20-25 percent a year during the 1990s.

Today, Mitrokhin believes there are at least one million practicing Protestants in Russia, and he calls their growth “the most important religious trend” in the country.

So why is Alexy II directing his ire at Rome?

In part, there is a real fear about the future of Ukraine. The Russian Orthodox Church currently receives about one-third of its funding and one-third of its clergy from Ukraine, and it would be a crippling blow to Moscow should Ukraine, which it sees as part of its “canonical territory,” slip outside its sphere of influence.

Currently, there are three branches of Orthodoxy in Ukraine: a branch linked to the Moscow Patriarchate, a “Kiev Patriarchate” under Metropolitan Filaret, and small breakaway “Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church.”

In addition, the 5.5-million Greek Catholic Church, concentrated in Western Ukraine, follows Orthodox liturgical and doctrinal traditions but is in full communion with Rome.

There’s little evidence that the Greek Catholic Church is actively “proselytizing,” in the sense of attracting large numbers of Orthodox converts. Yet no doubt the Greek Catholics represent a pro-Western force in Ukraine hostile to Moscow’s influence; many Greek Catholics, for example, played leading roles in the “Orange Revolution” that brought reformer Viktor Yushchenko to power in 2005.

The long-term project of some Greek Catholic intellectuals is to promote a unified, autocephalous Orthodox church in Ukraine, bringing together the various branches of Orthodoxy along with the Greek Catholics, which would then enter into communion with Rome while preserving its own traditions.

How realistic that vision is remains to be seen, but given the implications for finances and personnel, one understands why it makes Moscow nervous.

Beyond Ukraine, however, there is a basic anti-Roman instinct in Orthodox politics that is perhaps especially strong in Russia and Athens, both churches that see themselves as Orthodoxy’s last line of defense against Western colonialism. Certainly the more hard-line faction in Alexy II’s own Synod breathes this air.

Thus it was, for example, that at the Sept. 18-25 meeting of the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church in Belgrade, Serbia, it was the Russians who seemed most resistant to any accommodation.

Russian Orthodox Bishop Hilarion of Vienna and Austria, for example, protested afterwards against the use of voting instead of consensus, especially with regard to a section of a draft document on the authority of the Ecumenical Councils.

That draft states, among other things, that after the break in communion between East and West in the ninth century, “an ‘Ecumenical Council’ in the strong sense became impossible,” but that “both Churches continued to hold ‘general’ councils gathering together the bishops of local Churches in communion with the See of Rome or the See of Constantinople.”

The Russian Orthodox objected to this formula, which they contend assigns too much preeminence to Constantinople.

Metropolitan John of Pergamon, co-chair for the Orthodox side and a member of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, suggested a compromise that was unacceptable to the Russian Orthodox. The Catholic co-chair, Cardinal Walter Kasper, put the matter to a vote, and the majority of the Orthodox participants voted in favor of the Metropolitan's position.

Hilarion, however, insisted that no vote could force a church to betray its ecclesiological self-understanding, especially to accept a role for the Patriarch of Constantinople in the East analogous to that played by the pope in the West. Kasper indicated that he would take the protest under consideration at the 2007 meeting.

In that context, Alexy II’s complaints on Tuesday of “unfriendly” actions by the Catholic Church were perhaps imminently predictable.

This is likely to be the short-term future of ecumenism – a step forward with one church will sometimes come at the cost of a step back with another, and there’s a “hermeneutics of suspicion” in some circles which will take time, perhaps even generations, to overcome.

The split between East and West is conventionally dated to 1054, though in fact its roots are still more antique. The modern ecumenical movement, on the other hand, is barely a century old. If it takes another couple of centuries to put the divided Christian family back together, from a historical point of view that may ultimately seem like the blink of an eye.

In the meantime, however, observers should not be seduced by tantalizing gestures of unity, such as those shots of a beaming pope and patriarch embracing and swapping kisses of peace. Underneath such symbols, very real challenges remain.

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[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 07/12/2006 5.08]

Remains of St. Paul
may have been found


ROME, Dec. 6 (AP) - Vatican archaeologists have unearthed a sarcophagus believed to contain the remains of the Apostle Paul that had been buried beneath Rome's second largest basilica.

The sarcophagus, which dates back to at least A.D. 390, has been the subject of an extended excavation that began in 2002 and was completed last month, the project's head said this week.

"Our objective was to bring the remains of the tomb back to light for devotional reasons, so that it could be venerated and be visible," said Giorgio Filippi, the Vatican archaeologist who headed the project at St. Paul Outside the Walls basilica.

The interior of the sarcophagus has not yet been explored, but Filippi didn't rule out the possibility of doing so in the future.

Two ancient churches that once stood at the site of the current basilica were successively built over the spot where tradition said the saint had been buried. The second church, built by the Roman emperor Theodosius in the fourth century, left the tomb visible, first above ground and later in a crypt.

When a fire destroyed the church in 1823, the current basilica was built and the ancient crypt was filled with earth and covered by a new altar.

"We were always certain that the tomb had to be there beneath the papal altar," Filippi told The Associated Press in a telephone interview.

Filippi said that the decision to make the sarcophagus visible again was made after many pilgrims who came to Rome during the Catholic Church's 2000 Jubilee year expressed disappointment at finding that the saint's tomb could not be visited or touched.

The findings of the project will be officially presented during a news conference at the Vatican on Monday.
==============================================================

The Eternal City yields yet another of its buried treasures. If this is confirmed, we have yet another proof of the amazing trustworthiness of some traditions.

St. Peter's Basilica was built on the site of what was believed - on the basis of tradition handed down over centuries - to have been where St. Peter was buried. And lo and behold, it turned out to be true. PIETRO ENI! and we can now all venerate the remains of the Prince of Apostles right there, under the main altar at St. Peter's.

Now comes St. Paul. The same story. Tradition had it this was where he was buried, and we may have PAOLO ENI this time.

That tradition is vindicated after centuries tells us that the original knowledge about the burial sites of the Apostolic Twins who established the Church of Rome (I've always liked to think of them as the Christian analogs to Romulus and Remus, Rome's mythical founders) were known facts that were faithfully transmitted down the centuries. Yet another testimony to faith, really!

I'm particularlyy excited about this news, as I've always felt a special closeness to St. Paul because my childhood years were at a Catholic school called St. Paul's College run by the Sisters of St. Paul...and one of the earliest declamation pieces I can ever remember committing to memory is "The Road to Damascus" with its refrain of "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?"

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 07/12/2006 5.57]

Russian Church blames Uniates for difficult relations with Catholics

Moscow, December 6, Interfax - The difficulties in the relations between the Moscow Patriarchate and the Vatican stem primarily from the activities of Greek Catholics in Ukraine, the Russian Orthodox Church believes.

"When we speak of difficulties with Catholics we mean primarily Western Ukraine. The situation there is difficult and in some places critical," Bishop Mark of Yegoryevsk, deputy head of the Moscow Patriarchate department of external church relations, told a Moscow news conference on Wednesday.

He said that the Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate cannot has been unable to secure land for construction of a church in Lvov or other cities.

"The Vatican is in a position to influence the stance of the Uniates [Greek Catholics] but unfortunately does not do so," the bishop said.

He said that in the past representatives of the Catholic Church said they tried to support their religion among ethnic Poles and Germans in Russia but "today the vector has changed."

"A certain new approach that did not exist before is aimed at justifying the efforts that we regard as proselytism," the bishop said.

He added that "there are no problems with Catholics and relations can be described as perfect" for instance in Ireland and many other countries.

"Nevertheless, despite the difficulties, we call the Catholic Church a sister church and Catholics our brothers in Christ," he said.

China's illicit ordinations
by John Allen Jr.
Posted on Dec 7, 2006

At the very moment that Pope Benedict XVI was making a case for religious freedom in Turkey, the Chinese government offered a classic example of why debates over religious freedom are hardly confined to the Muslim world.

On Nov. 30, Chinese priest Giovanni Wang Renlei was ordained as a bishop in the Xuzhou diocese by edict of the country's Religious Affairs Office, and in defiance of Benedict’s authority. It marked the third illicit ordination in China this year, after similar acts on April 30 and May 2.

I’ve got an op/ed piece in today’s Asia Edition of the Wall Street Journal analyzing the impact of these moves on Sino-Vatican relations: China’s illicit ordinations

While the entire piece is available only to Wall Street Journal subscribers, I’ll offer a précis here. In effect, my argument is that if the problem were only the manner of selecting bishops, the Vatican and the Chinese government could have reached an accord long ago.

“There’s nothing in Catholic doctrine that says the pope has to appoint each and every bishop in the Church,” I write. “Direct papal appointment of bishops outside Italy is actually of fairly recent vintage. As recently as 1829, when Pope Leo XII died, there were 646 diocesan bishops in the Latin-rite church; 555 had been appointed by the state, 67 elected by cathedral chapters and only 24 appointed by the pope. These direct papal appointments were largely in Russia, Greece and Albania, all spots with unstable political situations.”

“Over the centuries, kings, emperors, prime ministers and presidents have all played some role in proposing or approving new bishops, and in principle the Vatican is not opposed to a similar arrangement in China.”

The real problem, I suggest, is that the ordinations are emblematic of the long-cherished dream of hardliners in the Religious Affairs Office, which is fostering a largely autonomous brand of Chinese Catholicism in which the pope is a symbolic point of reference, without real authority.

I point out that this is little more than a post-modern form of earlier attempts to establish a nationalist Catholicism which, under the lofty-sounding titles of Gallicanism, Febronianism and Josephinism, popes have devoted considerable blood, toil, tears and sweat to resisting.

In that light, the Nov. 30 ordination reminds us that unless something fundamental gives way, rapid progress towards full diplomatic relations between Rome and Beijing does not appear likely.

Nevertheless, the Vatican will continue to press forward, almost hoping against hope, for three reasons:

First, China is the globe’s emerging superpower, and the Vatican has no more desire to miss the train than anyone else.

Second, there is still a de facto schism between the above-ground, officially sanctioned Catholic Church in China and the underground Church, and any pope would see healing a schism as an important aim.

Third, China is the last great missionary frontier on earth, with a burgeoning population, a deep spiritual hunger, and no dominant religious tradition. In that sense, Vatican calculations are that the 13 million Catholics in China could become 130 million within a generation, if there is an opening.

Though there’s little evidence of such an opening in the foreseeable future, both the Chinese and the Vatican are accustomed to taking the long view.

HONG KONG – CHINA – VIETNAM
Cardinal Zen:
“Beijing should learn from Vietnam
and be open to religious freedom”

After a two-day visit in Ho Chi Minh City, the bishop of Hong Kong talked to AsiaNews about the deep faith of the Vietnamese people and the openness of the government towards the Church. He invited China to disavow the Patriotic Association and grant full freedom to its Catholics.

Hong Kong, Dec. 6 (AsiaNews) – The Vietnamese Church is “dynamic and vital, not least thanks to recent concessions by the government, which is moving ever closer towards full religious freedom.”

This “should serve as an example to the Chinese government, which should distance itself from the work of the Patriotic Association and grant full freedom to its Catholics.”

This is what Cardinal Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, bishop of Hong Kong, told AsiaNews on his return from Ho Chi Minh City, where together with three other Asian cardinals, he concelebrated mass to mark the 500th anniversary of the birth of St Francis Xavier, patron of missionaries.

The bishops of Hong Kong, Manila and Ranchi – Cardinals Zen, Rosales and Toppo – went to Vietnam at the invitation of the archbishop of Ho Chi Minh City, Cardinal Jean-Baptiste Pham Minh Man. The visit took place between 2 and 4 December.

Cardinal Zen immediately said the visit “was really beautiful. We were treated with the utmost hospitality. I noticed that the government is truly opening up to religious freedom: it has removed all limits on priestly ordinations and recruits to the seminary. This is very important, because it is precisely these limits that created many problems for the local Church. Now there is much more freedom, even in this respect. The Chinese government should take Vietnam as an example.”

Throughout the visit, “we felt the very strong faith of the people. The church hierarchy has a solid foundation on which to work, and as soon as the government gave a bit of freedom, this faith was released. With intelligent leadership like that of Cardinal Pham Minh Manh, the Church grows. Apart from Sunday Mass, we participated in an evening for youth, a magnificent moment. We were really touched by what we saw: the great affection they showed us was moving.”

Another example of openness and respect came from the civil authorities themselves, who “did not participate in mass” but invited cardinals for a private meeting: “We visited the civil authorities of Ho Chi Minh City, and they were very gracious to us.”

All this “should be taken by Beijing as an example. As regards, for example, the ordinations of bishops, the Church and government in Vietnam work with one accord. I do not know the exact way it works, but they explained to me that there is no unique formula: each case is discussed together reasonably. This approach is far superior to the current Chinese situation.”

Similar dialogue does not take place between Beijing and the Holy See because, according to Cardinal Zen, “there is one big difference from Vietnam. In the latter, there has never been a Patriotic Association of Catholics. There was a minor attempt to create one, a while ago, but this failed and the Church remained as one. In China, however, this association exists and it is an instrument of the Religious Affairs Department: it is they that decide, together, China’s religious policy.”

At times, this power “has actually been strengthened thanks to the involuntary help of external agents who, concretely, have practically legitimized the position of the government and given prestige to this Liu Bainian [PA vice-president], who has become semi-omnipotent: the government trusts him, but everything he does is opposite to the interests of the Church.”

The cardinal said: “It is difficult to reverse this at the moment, not least because I think China’s supreme authorities are too taken up by other things, including an ongoing power struggle. They do not have the time and still less, the courage, to come forward to negotiate with the Holy See, because negotiating means making concessions on both sides, and those who are not firm in their position and secure of their power would not dare to make concessions, because this would be dangerous. One could be accused of weakness, for example, and because of this fear, everything is always postponed.”

Persecutions suffered by Catholics in Vietnam and China in the past “were very similar: the strong points of one regime and the other used to be evident. On the one hand, there were the visits of bishops to Rome that Ho Chi Minh City always allowed. On the other, China never placed limits on ordinations to the priesthood, something that regularly happened in Vietnam, not least because the government wanted to increase the number of official priests, to counter those who were not official.”

In China, however, “many bishops and priests, even official ones, have always been faithful to Rome in their hearts: at this time, we hope they will find more courage to tell the government that they want a real normalization of ties between the State and the Church. So far, they have been very gracious and patient, they have tolerated this situation of compromise: now they deserve to have the trust of the government and to be allowed to be free to do what Catholic bishops and priests should do.”

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 07/12/2006 13.33]

This is awesome, awesome news! I think the next best job to actually working for the pope would be a Vatican archaeologist. I didn't know until last year that Saint Peter's remains were beneath the Papal Altar in the Basilica, because I didn't know anything about the Catholic Church until April 2005!! The two greatest saints are right there, where tradition has always maintained they were. Can't wait to hear all about it.

With Vatican backing,
news agency with ties to Legionaries
to launch video service
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
New York
Posted on Dec 7, 2006


A Vatican-endorsed TV news service will attempt to bring to the video age the same style of church-friendly reporting associated with the Zenit News Agency, an on-line project launched in 1998 with ties to Regnum Christi, the lay branch of the Legionaries of Christ.

The new “H2O” broadcast service – named, organizers say, for water as the symbol of life – is intended as a video news source available through the Internet, on cell phones with video capability, as well as through conventional Catholic television networks. The project was formally presented at an Oct. 10-12 world conference of Catholic television providers in Madrid, Spain, convened by the Vatican.

Initially, plans call for “H2O,” with offices in Rome, to produce five daily news items of one and a half to two minutes each: two on the activity of the pope, two on the church in other parts of the world, and one of artistic and cultural interest. Interviews with Catholic newsmakers and, to the extent possible, overviews of new Vatican documents will also be part of the mix.

The news items will be free of charge to Catholic TV networks which choose to broadcast them, and to Internet users. Initially, “H2O” will emphasize delivery on the Internet, attempting to reach the estimated 20 million users of Catholic web sites worldwide.

Organizers say they will try to take a positive approach.

“We won’t go looking for polemics,” said Jesús Colina, a Spaniard who founded and currently serves as director of Zenit, and who has been asked by the Vatican to oversee the new video project.

“That’s my personal style, and it’s what we follow at Zenit,” said Colina, a member of Regnum Christi.

The idea for a video version of Zenit’s text-based news service, which is offered daily to some 240,000 subscribers on five continents, was the brainchild of Monsignor Enrique Planas y Como of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. Planas asked Colina to oversee the project.

Though “H2O” carries the formal backing of the Vatican, and the Vatican Television Center will provide some content, Colina told NCR that “H2O” will be independent and financially self-sustaining. Assuming that funding can be found, organizers intend to provide a couple of “trial run” packages in January, with the full service to debut in March.

The news items are to be released in English, Spanish, Italian, French and German, though Colina told NCR these plans are subject to review based on market interest. Colina said he’d also like to broadcast in Arabic, but those plans are more tentative.

Colina told NCR Nov. 14 that while content can be produced by anyone, “H2O” intends to take advantage of Zenit’s existing network of contributors and correspondents around the world.

Colina said that “H2O” will also enjoy the collaboration of a new religious congregation founded in Spain in 1994 called the “Servant Sisters of the Hogar de la Madre,” some of whose members have taken up video production as a specialty. In the United States, the community runs a program of vocational discernment for women at Ave Maria University in Naples, Florida, an institution founded by Domino’s pizza magnate Thomas S. Monaghan.

One aim of “H2O,” Colina said, is to promote a “common platform” of production and editorial standards among the roughly 2,000 Catholic television channels around the world, so that content becomes more interchangeable and “synergies” can be created.

Colina said that while “H2O” does not have any formal agreement with EWTN, the independent American Catholic network which is by far the largest Catholic TV service in the world, he hopes the news items “will be so well-made, so interesting, that EWTN feels it can’t pass them up.”

Colina said he also hopes to work cooperatively with an already-existing Rome-based video production company called “Rome Reports,” founded by a Spanish Opus Dei member named Santiago de la Cierva. That agency, Colina said, is aimed primarily at the commercial and state-run TV market, while “H2O” is intended for Catholic TV outlets and the individual user on the Internet.

Colina is a member of Regnum Christi with close ties to Fr. Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, who was asked by the Vatican on May 19 to observe a life of “prayer and penance, renouncing every public ministry” in the wake of charges of sexual abuse lodged against him by former Legionaries. In 2003, Colina produced a book-length interview with Maciel titled Christ is My Life.

When the Vatican disciplined Maciel, its public statement rejected any collective guilt on the part of the order or other groups founded by the Mexican priest. The decision to entrust Colina with the “H2O” project is thus seen by some Vatican observers as a sign that the Legionaries and Regnum Christi are still in good graces.

Privately, Vatican sources told NCR that another factor weighed in the decision to launch an official TV service. In some Vatican quarters, sources said, there has long been concern that networks such as EWTN are becoming the “voice of the church” in the broadcast arena, without any oversight from church officials. The idea of a Vatican-sponsored news outlet, these sources said, thus restores a measure of “control” over the message.

This becomes a sore point, sources said, when Catholic TV outlets for one reason or another downplay aspects of the church’s message. Some Vatican officials, for example, feel EWTN did not give adequate attention to the church’s criticism of the Iraq war for fear of alienating conservative American Catholics. In other cases, sources said, there’s concern that some Catholic TV services are run by personnel who may not be fully supportive of church teaching on issues such as sexual morality or papal authority.

A preview of the H2O web site can be found here: H2O News

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 08/12/2006 14.13]

Married former priests warn against Milingo's group

Parsippany, NJ, Dec. 08, 2006 (CNA) - Two groups made up of former Catholic priests, who are pushing for a married priesthood in the Roman Catholic Church, have issued warnings to married former priests about a third, similar organization, Married Priests Now, which is headed by the excommunicated Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo.

The recently formed Married Priests Now is holding a convention, from Dec. 7 to 10, at the local Sheraton Hotel. As of Wednesday only 200 people were registered to attend, far less than the 1000 organizers had expected.

CORPUS and Celibacy is the Issue (CITI), both groups consisting of men who left the Roman Catholic priesthood to marry, along with their supporters, have expressed concern about Married Priests Now and the new group’s legitimacy.

CORPUS and CITI cited Milingo’s excommunication after his illicit attempt to ordain three married men as bishops. CORPUS also expressed concern about the new group’s connection with the Unification Church's Rev. Sung Myung Moon, who has called himself the Messiah.

"That doesn't click with most Roman Catholics," Russell Ditzel, president of CORPUS, told the Daily Record. CORPUS has about 1,500 members nationwide.

Paul Mayer, a former Benedictine monk of 18 years who got married decades ago, told the Daily Record that he sent e-mails this week warning married priests and organizations that represent them about Milingo's connection with Moon.

"It is very troubling," Mayer reportedly said. "I consider him (Moon) to be sinister."

Peter Paul Brennan, one of the married men supposedly ordained by Milingo in September, told the Daily Record that Moon provides funding for Married Priests Now and paid for much of their convention but he is not a member of the organization.

CITI, which runs a listing of married men who supposedly work as priests though they are not allowed to do so by the Catholic Church, issued a press release saying it did not support the convention and would not be represented there.

CORPUS is, however, advertising for the convention on their website.

Despite the renouncement of the vows or ordination promises of their members, CORPUS and CITI claim to be Roman Catholic organizations. "We are Roman Catholics and plan to stay that way," said Louise Haggett, founder of CITI.

Neither group is recognized by the Roman Catholic Church. Although the Church holds that a man, once ordained, remains a priest forever, the Church forbids Catholics from participating in sacraments celebrated by those who have left the active ministry, through the rejection of their vows.

Milingo, who said he does not recognize his excommunication, has announced that he plans to ordain three other married men as priests on Sunday at an independent church in West New York.

[Oy!]

Excommunicated Catholic archbishop says Rev. Moon behind his fight for married priests

By Rachel Zoll
ASSOCIATED PRESS
2:48 p.m. December 9, 2006

PARSIPPANY, N.J. – The renegade Roman Catholic archbishop who was excommunicated by the Vatican after he installed married priests as bishops acknowledged Saturday that the Rev. Sun Myung Moon was supporting his crusade against mandatory celibacy.
At a weekend conference of married priests, Zambian Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo distributed a statement to participants headlined “Thanks,” crediting the Korean evangelist for his backing for the meeting and for Milingo's Married Priests Now! advocacy group.

“Today we are present as beneficiaries of Rev. Moon,” Milingo wrote. “In order to ensure the success of our convocation he dedicated his key organizations to give their utmost support in every way needed to the Married Priests Now!”

Milingo was married to a Korean acupuncturist chosen for him by Moon in a mass Unification Church wedding in 2001. The archbishop appeared to drop those ties when he heeded pleas from Vatican officials and Pope John Paul II to renounce the marriage and return to Rome.

When Milingo disappeared from Italy this year, resurfacing in the United States in July, he and his aides denied any link with Moon. They said they were fighting on their own to save the church from its clergy shortage and sex abuse crises that they blamed on celibacy.

“He got his wife and now it's over,” a Milingo aide, the Rev. Dairo Ferrabolli, told The Associated Press in September.

However, at this weekend's meeting, Milingo overflowed with praise for Moon.

“I have witnessed the zeal of Rev. Sun Myung Moon for the realization of the Kingdom for God,” Milingo wrote. “His concern for the welfare of the whole world makes him not only a world benefactor, but more importantly a person whose vision, humility and saintly life has awakened our own courage and determination to organize and do what we ourselves know is right from God.”

Vatican officials have been scandalized by Milingo, trying to privately persuade him to drop his campaign, then openly censuring him when that effort failed.

After the church excommunicated Milingo, Pope Benedict XVI convened a summit last month that the Vatican said examined “the situation created by the disobedience of Monsignor Emmanuel Milingo.” The gathering ended with a reaffirmation of mandatory celibacy for clergy.

Archbishop Peter Paul Brennan, a married priest who was made a bishop by Milingo, acknowledged that the tie to Moon would provide more fodder for discrediting Married Priests Now!

Moon's doctrines are considered well beyond the bounds of traditional Christianity.

His followers regard him as “Lord of the Second Advent” who is providing the “physical salvation” that Jesus was unable to accomplish because he was executed and didn't marry. Jesus gave only “spiritual salvation,” Moon says.

Brennan and others insisted Moon was not directing their movement, which they said remained wholly Catholic.

“He's not involved,” Brennan said. “He shows an interest because of the family aspect.”

Asked why Milingo was acknowledging the link now, Brennan said it doesn't harm the movement to work with people “who may be controversial in their faith.”

Moon's American Clergy Leadership Conference paid for much of the weekend assembly with about 150 priests and their wives, along with leaders of other denominations who were invited as observers. Events included a renewal of vows by married priests and their spouses, who donned veils for the procession alongside their husbands, who were wearing clerical vestments.

The morning session Saturday included a lecture by Margaret Starbird, an author who says Jesus was married to Mary Magdelene and that the two had a child. Author Dan Brown cited Starbird's writing as a source for “The Da Vinci Code.”

Israel Agrees to Reopen Mt. Zion Talks with Vatican
israelnationalnews.com

10:49 Dec 10, '06 / 19 Kislev 5767
by Hillel Fendel

PM Olmert will meet in the Vatican this week with Pope Benedict - two weeks after Israeli diplomats confirmed the reopening of talks over the status of church property on Mt. Zion and elsewhere.


"In a move that surprised observers," CatholicNews.com reports, "Israel has agreed to re-launch negotiations with the Holy See over church status in the Holy Land that have been stalled since the Olmert government came to power."

A year ago, Arutz-7 reported that a Foreign Ministry official admitted that a blueprint of an agreement with the Vatican giving it control of parts of Mt. Zion in Jerusalem - also known as King David's burial site - had been received. The proposed contract read as follows:
"The State of Israel hands over to the Holy See the use of the Cenacle [the room of the event known as the Last Supper, above King David's tomb - ed.], of the access path to it, and of the spaces adjacent to it... It is the Holy See's intention to inform the Bishops - and through them the world's Priests - that the Catholic Church has been given the use of the Cenacle, inviting them to visit the Holy Place together with their faithful... The Holy See hands over this use of the Cenacle to the Custody of the Holy Land [which acts on behalf of the Holy See]... [which] will keep the Cenacle open from 6 AM to 8 AM for the celebration of the Holy Mass... Official liturgical celebrations of non-Catholic Churches can take place only upon prior written permission by the Custody of the Holy Land."

At the time, President Moshe Katzav was about to embark on a visit to the Vatican. In the face of increasing public pressure, he was forced to deny any plans to sign away the King David's complex in Jerusalem. It now appears, however, that this option has once again surfaced.

AsiaNews reported late last month that Israel and the Holy See "have agreed to hold negotiating sessions of their 'Bilateral Permanent Working Commission' in December and in January - after the Olmert Government had, in effect, declined to do so ever since taking office last spring... The news is being received with relief, and with cautious optimism, in Church circles."

The paper reported that "there were apprehensions that the protracted negotiations (begun on 11 March 1999) required by the 1993 Fundamental Agreement between the Holy See and the State of Israel, might be suspended indefinitely - with incalculable consequences, both for the Catholic institutions in Israel and for the bilateral relationship."

Church's Steady and Discreet Efforts Pay Off
"It is not known precisely what caused [Israel's] sudden change of attitude," AsiaNews reported, "though it is understood that the Vatican had never given up on its steady (though characteristically discreet) diplomatic efforts. Furthermore, it has often been reported in the media that both the American Catholic Church and influential components of the U.S. Government - at the Department of State, in the Congress, and in the White House itself - have been encouraging Israel constantly to make sure it is faithful to its international commitments vis-a-vis the Holy See and the Catholic Church."

At present, since shortly after the Six-Day War in 1967, the Diaspora Yeshiva is located on Mt. Zion, and has long warned of the catastrophic implications for Israel if the deal goes through. "This is an enormous issue that is being pushed through without any public debate whatsoever," Yeshiva Director Rabbi Shabtai Herman told Arutz-7 last year.

Rabbi Herman explained that if the Catholic Church receives control of the area, just a few hundred yards from the Temple Mount and adjacent to the Old City walls, it will turn it into "the international center for Catholics all around the world - and if the pope just gives the word, Christians will be flocking over here en masse."

Rabbi Mordechai Goldstein, who founded and still runs the Diaspora Yeshiva, officially known as Yeshiva Toras Yisrael, elaborated in a follow-up discussion with Arutz-7:
"According to their bible, the land is to return to the Christians, and 144,000 Jews are to return to Mt. Zion. So their plan is for them to take control of the site, and then to announce that they are holding a mass reenactment of the Last Supper, with [all types of religious rituals], and to invite millions of Christians to come to Jerusalem and celebrate." He said that this means much tourism money for Israel, and that someone in the Israeli government is apparently very interested in making this happen.

The King David's Tomb complex is a complex of buildings of some 100,000 square feet where David and Solomon, and kings of Judea, are said to be buried. "It is certainly one of the holiest spots in the Land of Israel," Rabbi Herman said. "We've already given away the Temple Mount and the Machpelah Cave, except for here and there when we're allowed in; now they want to give Mt. Zion away as well? For thousands of years, this area was almost always totally closed off to Jews. G-d gave it back to us in 1948, but parts of it were still in range and sight of Jordanian snipers and were not in full use. After 1967, Rabbi Goldstein founded the Diaspora Yeshiva here - and it became an island of holiness, the first yeshiva for baalei teshuvah [newly religious] in Israel; we were there day and night learning Torah. Rabbi Goldstein was almost prophetic in establishing this yeshiva at that time at that spot; destiny from above intertwined him with Mt. Zion."

Rabbi Herman said that the above plan is merely the first step of a larger plan to turn all of Mt. Zion into a Christian site. He explained that the lower level of the complex, containing many chambers, rooms, passageways and the like, has long been under the control of Israeli bodies such as the Lands Authority, and that half of the area was assigned to the Diaspora Yeshiva.

MK Benny Elon (National Union), who served twice as Minister of Tourism, told Arutz-7's Hebrew newsmagazine, "This issue was raised several years ago. When I was Tourism Minister, I made it clear to a representative of the Pope that we would allow them to use one room with a side entrance that would not bother the yeshiva. But under no circumstances would we allow the transfer of ownership. But they said they want ownership, and that the Pope sees this place as the second-holiest, after the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. We have to be very strong and not give in to the Vatican on this."