Month: August 2024

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Pope Francis has called on political leaders to be at the service of the poor, the unemployed and the common good.

The world cannot promote “universal fraternity” without good politics, the pope said in a video message released July 30 by the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network.

The network posts a short video of the pope offering his specific prayer intention each month. For the month of August, the pope dedicated his prayer intention to political leaders.

“Today, politics doesn’t have a very good reputation: corruption, scandals, distant from people’s day-to-day lives,” Pope Francis said.

“But, can we move ahead toward universal fraternity without good politics? No,” he said.

Good politics, as St. Paul VI defined it, is “one of the highest forms of charity because it seeks the common good,” Pope Francis said.

As opposed to “politicking,” he said, it is a “politics that listens to what is really going on, that’s at the service of the poor, not the kind that’s holed up in huge buildings with large hallways.”

“I’m speaking of the politics that’s concerned about the unemployed” and understands what it is like for people who are not able to work, he said.

“If we look at it this way, politics is much more noble than it appears,” he said.

“Let’s be grateful for the many politicians who carry out their duties with a will to serve, not of power, who put all their efforts toward the common good,” the pope said.

“Let us pray that political leaders be at the service of their own people, working for integral human development and the common good, taking care of those who have lost their jobs and giving priority to the poorest,” he said.

WASHINGTON (OSV News) – Legislation under consideration in Congress would help faith-based organizations respond to a shortage in affordable housing by easing restrictions on the use of their land to develop affordable housing, supporters say.

The Yes in God’s Backyard Act, introduced in March by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, would provide technical assistance to faith-based and nonprofit groups interested in using land they already own to respond to housing shortages in their communities, as well as technical assistance to local governments to facilitate training on best practices for working with such groups.

The bill would also create challenge grants to provide additional resources to communities that ease burdensome regulations on affordable rental housing on property owned by faith-based organizations and institutions of higher education.

In a July 12 letter to members of Congress, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops urged lawmakers to pass the bill, arguing it would “would help faith-based and nonprofit organizations improve their capacity to meet the housing needs of poor and vulnerable community members.”

Metropolitan Archbishop Borys A. Gudziak of the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Philadelphia, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, said, “The United States is in the midst of a profound and prolonged housing crisis. A systemic lack of affordable housing drives up housing costs for low-income households, exacerbating their financial insecurity.”

The legislation, he argued, would help the church serve low-income individuals and families at risk of homelessness by “empowering faith-based and other nonprofit institutions to use their resources responsibly to serve more vulnerable families.”

Brown’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from OSV News about the status of the bill, but a review of the Congressional Record shows its status has been unchanged since it was referred to the Senate Housing committee in March.

In a March 12 statement issued when he introduced the legislation, Brown said, “Housing is too expensive and too hard to find in almost every community in America.

“This is a common sense solution – families need more housing, and churches, synagogues, and other religious organizations want to put their faith into action by developing housing on land they already own.” Brown said. “By helping these institutions cut through red tape, we can lower the cost of housing and expand options in Ohio and around the country.”

Other signatories on the USCCB letter included Jesuit Father Christopher Kellerman, secretary of the Office of Justice and Ecology at the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States; Kerry Alys Robinson, president and CEO of Catholic Charities USA; and John Barry, president of the National Council of the United States for the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.

According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, the U.S. has a shortage of 7.3 million rental homes that are affordable and available to renters with extremely low incomes, defined as incomes “at or below either the federal poverty guideline or 30% of their area median income, whichever is greater.” The group’s data shows that only 34 affordable and available rental homes exist for every 100 extremely low-income renter households.

LOS ANGELES (OSV News) – Jesus Christ may have been the main protagonist at the National Eucharistic Congress July 17-21, but the golden, unusually large monstrance used to carry him each night before thousands at Indianapolis’ Lucas Oil Stadium caught people’s attention, too.

Where did they get such a big, beautiful monstrance from? And as one reporter jokingly asked, had Bishop Andrew H. Cozzens of Crookston, Minnesota, board chairman of the National Eucharistic Congress Inc., been lifting weights to be able to carry it through the stadium?

The monstrance, Bishop Cozzens told journalists at the congress, was actually the same model that organizers had seen images of Los Angeles Archbishop José H. Gomez use in a Eucharistic procession through the streets of San Gabriel in March 2023.

Almost immediately after the event, congress organizers at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops asked Archbishop Gomez’s office, “Where can we get one of those?”

The inquiry led them to Father Miguel Angel Ruiz, a 31-year-old Los Angeles priest ordained in 2019 with roots in Guadalajara, Mexico. Father Ruiz was known for having the same monstrance, and often lending it to other priests in the Los Angeles Archdiocese for special events. It was his monstrance, in fact, that the late LA Auxiliary Bishop David G. O’Connell borrowed when he famously blessed Los Angeles in the early days of the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020.

Father Ruiz told the officials that the monstrance was made by a liturgical store in Guadalajara, Articulos Religiosos San Jose. They ordered an exact replica of the monstrance — one of the store’s most popular ones — in a hurry, since Pope Francis had agreed to bless it in a private audience in Rome a few weeks later.

Four feet tall and weighing more than 20 pounds, the new monstrance — together with hosts specially sized for it — was shipped from Guadalajara to Tijuana, where Father Ruiz drove to pick it up. From across the border in San Diego, he had it shipped to USCCB headquarters in Washington, just in time for the congress delegation led by Bishop Cozzens to bring it to Rome for the pope’s blessing.
“It’s big. It’s beautiful,” the pope said with a smile to members of the congress planning team at the June 19, 2023, meeting.

Father Ruiz, now administrator at Our Lady of the Rosary of Talpa Church in East LA, told Angelus, the archdiocesan news outlet, that his personal connection with the monstrance actually began at a convent in Guadalajara he used to visit as a seminarian.

While praying before the Blessed Sacrament in the convent’s adoration room, “I would think to myself, ‘When I become a priest, I want one like that one,'” he recalled.

A few years later, the sisters at the convent purchased the monstrance as a gift for Father Ruiz’s ordination to the priesthood. The rest, as he says, “is history.”

(OSV News) – Ethiopian Cardinal Berhaneyesus Demerew Souraphiel of Addis Ababa has expressed deep sorrow at the deadly landslide in Gofa Zone, in the southern part of Ethiopia, where the death toll has reportedly reached 257.

Humanitarian agencies, including those that are faith-based, have scrambled to rush emergency relief to Kencho Shacha Gozdi, a remote village in the Gofa Zone, following the first landslide that struck July 22.

Gofa Zone is part of the state known as Southern Ethiopia, about 199 miles from the capital, Addis Ababa. Days of heavy rains in this part of Ethiopia triggered the landslide. Images of people digging through the mud, carrying bodies and women wailing have spread since.

Following the first landslide that engulfed four homes, local people rushed to the scene, digging through mud to rescue their fellow villagers. But another landslide hit July 22, swallowing many of those who were attempting to rescue the victims.

“This tragic event has resulted in a significant loss of life. We offer our heartfelt condolences to the families and friends of those who have lost their loved ones,” said Cardinal Souraphiel in a July 25 statement.

“As urgent rescue and humanitarian assistance are needed, on behalf of the Ethiopian Catholic Church, I express my profound sorrow and assure you of our unwavering support to the affected zone,” the statement said.

The United Nations put the death toll at 257 July 25, while warning that the number could rise to 500. This came as hundreds of young men for the third day continued to dig through mud — with their bare hands, spades and pickaxes — in hope of finding more survivors.

The number of missing persons is still unknown, but reports indicate that administrators, teachers, agriculturalists and other professionals were lost in the tragedy.

Cardinal Souraphiel, who is also the president of Ethiopia’s bishops’ conference, said the Development Office of the Ethiopian bishops, priests and staff of the Sodo Vicariate, and representatives of the Catholic Relief Services had visited the disaster site and witnessed the extent of the damage. CRS, the humanitarian relief and development agency of the U.S. bishops, has a strong presence in Ethiopia, responding to man-made and natural disasters and also supporting mitigation and recovery activities.

“I call upon all Catholics and people of goodwill to contribute in any way they can to the recovery efforts,” the cardinal said.

Archbishop Abune Mathias, patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, offered his condolences to the families affected by the landslide.

In a July 24 statement, the patriarch noted that while Ethiopia had faced its share of tragic events, the magnitude of this disaster was particularly difficult to comprehend. He stressed the importance of faith in times of crisis, highlighting the belief in the resurrection of the dead as a source of comfort and solace.

Archbishop Mathias called for prayers and support for the victims and their families, and urged the community to come together in solidarity and compassion.

Since the disaster, humanitarian agencies have been dispatching food, nutrition, health and other critical supplies to help people affected by the landslides.

An estimated 15,000 people at risk of further landslides need to be evacuated from the region, according to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Among these are at least 1,300 children under 5 and over 5,000 pregnant and lactating women.

In Ethiopia, Africa’s second populous nation, more than 21 million people, or about 18% of the population, live on humanitarian assistance. This is due to climate change-driven disasters, including floods and drought, and conflicts.

A war fought between the national army and the rulers of the northern region of Tigray left at least 1,5 million people displaced.