Catholic News 2

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(Vatican Radio) “What kind of world do we want to leave to those who come after us, to children who are now growing up?” Pope Francis asks in his encyclical Laudato Si’ dedicated to caring for our common home.

In an attempt to answer that question, a number of Catholic dioceses in Australia have begun rolling out a pioneering environmental programme which aims to cut energy consumption and costs by up to 80 percent. Using a combination of solar panels, LED lighting, battery storage and energy efficient air conditioning systems, the project not only reduces the carbon footprint of buildings but also promises big savings for its users.

The project, entitled Eco community, has already been implemented  in almost a hundred Catholic schools, early learning centres and other building in the dioceses of Townsville, Cairns and Darwin on the north east Australian coastline.

This week the founders of Eco community, Jesuit-educated brothers Justin and Martin Oldfield, were in Rome to seek support for their work from top Vatican officials. Accompanying them was Dr Cathy Day, Director of Catholic Education for Townsville diocese. She spoke to Philippa Hitchen about the project and about the broader implications of environmental awareness for children in those Catholic schools…

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Cathy says the project built on a growing desire to take some practical steps to cut greenhouse gas emissions, to look at energy efficiency in the 30 schools in the diocese and to make a statement to the students.

Payback in the pipeline

She says the diocese has invested about six million dollars, including some government subsidies, but that payback from savings “are already in the pipeline”. She points to the region’s longstanding history of environmental awareness, “being part of the wet tropics, the lungs of the world, and with the Great Barrier Reef right beside us”.

Consciousness raising

The diocese is the first in Australia to build an environmental centre offering students a consciousness raising programme. Cathy notes that the neighbouring dioceses of Cairns and Darwin are now coming on board and says she’s delighted the solar project is also being turned into an important part of the curriculum for the students who study the maths, the science and the social innovation.

Care for our common home

Cathy also speaks about the importance of Laudato Si’ which “reinforced everything that we’d already started to do”. She says the Pope’s words about sharing the planet as our common home “really resonated with the students” who understand their connectedness to the rest of the world. Neighbouring nations in the Pacific are struggling with rising sea levels, she says, and that is having an impact on how students are responding.

Learning from indigenous Australians

Commenting on the pioneering role of the Australian Church in responding to the environmental crisis, Cathy says “we owe a lot to our indigenous Australians who teach us every day” about connectedness and respect for the land. “It’s taken us 200 years to recognize”, she says, but there is a growing understanding that “we’re not just stewards of the land, but we live with the land and with all of creation”.

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(Vatican Radio) The Lahore Development Authority has announced that none of the four churches coming in the route of the Orange Line Metro Train project will be affected as a result of the construction.

An official handout issued on Wednesday said that the LDA was not acquiring any piece of land for the project nor boundary walls or any other structure of Cathedral Church, The Mall, and Nolakha Church, Nicholson Road.

"Rumors regarding demolition of the building of churches and protests on this pretext were totally baseless and uncalled for," the statement by the authority said.

“About 1.5 kanals of open land and 62 meters length of boundary wall of the Saint Andrew’s Church, Nabha Road, will be temporarily used during construction period for underground track in the area. This temporarily used land will be restored to its original condition and boundary wall will also be reconstructed after the completion of construction works.

“Almost 10 marlas of open land and 18 meters of boundary wall of Saint Paul’s Presbyterian Church, near Bohar Chowk, will be utilized for the stairs to railway station of the project. Building or any other structure will not be affected by the Orange Line Metro Train Project and the effected boundary wall will be re-constructed,” the statement concluded.

“A meeting to apprise of details in this regard to the Pastors of these churches had been convened on 2nd May 2016 under the Chairmanship of Kh Ahmad Hassan, chairman of the steering committee for Orange Line Metro Train Project and the pastors were briefed in detail about the construction work being carried out in the vicinity of church buildings. So there should not be any doubt that the buildings of these churches are fully safe and secure," the statement said.

The statement has come after Christian protesters took to the streets of Lahore against the project which had allegedly proposed demolition of two churches to clear the way for the train project. The demonstrators had demanded that the government review its plans, saying they would not give up their holy places.

Rights groups have also warned the Punjab government against demolition of churches and other historical buildings for the project. The UNESCO has also reportedly, opposed the Rs365 billion project for being a serious threat to Lahore’s architectural heritage.

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Washington D.C., May 18, 2016 / 06:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Speaking in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, Cardinal Robert Sarah enjoined Catholics to resist “ideological colonization” and the removal of God from society, in order to help the Church resist threats to the family and religious freedom around the world.

Cardinal Sarah is a native of Guinea, in west Africa, and is prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship.

“Nowhere is [religious persecution] clearer than in the threat that societies are visiting on the family through a demonic 'gender ideology,' a deadly impulse that is being experienced in a world increasingly cut off from God through ideological colonialism,” the cardinal said in his keynote address at the May 17 National Catholic Prayer Breakfast.

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R- Wis.) and Sister Constance Veit of the Little Sisters of the Poor also addressed the crowd before Cardinal Sarah’s talk.

Cardinal Sarah emphasized that individualism and a desire to create what he called a “utopian paradise” without God has had a profound impact on societies. “Rapid social and economic development in the past half century has not been accompanied by an equally fervent spiritual progress, as we witness what Pope Francis calls ‘globalized indifference,’” he critiqued.

This indifference to persons can be seen in “our closing our eyes and hearts to the poor and vulnerable, and, in a very despicable way, in how we discard the unborn and the elderly,” he continued.

The greatest challenges, however, he said, are the challenges facing the family. Quoting Pope Francis, Cardinal Sarah reminded the crowd that proposing less than what the Church teaches on marriage proposes less than what Christ offers the human person.

“This is why the Holy Father openly and vigorously defends Church teaching on contraception, abortion, homosexuality, reproductive technologies, the education of children and much more.” These and other injuries to the family, Cardinal Sarah elaborated, can turn the family from a place of flourishing and love into “a place where human beings can be humanly and spiritually wounded.”

Protecting the family is also linked to the preservation of religious freedom, Cardinal Sarah said as he urged the Americans to protect their history of religious freedom. While many Christians across the world are suffering from violence due to persecution from governments or groups like Islamic State, “ violence against Christians is not just physical, it is also political, ideological and cultural,” the cardinal said.

“This form of religious persecution is equally damaging, yet more hidden. It does not destroy physically but spiritually.” The 'violence' of cultural and ideological pressure seeks to separate the Christian from his or her conscience and blend them into society.

The Church’s teachings on marriage, sexuality and the family are under extreme pressure, Cardinal Sarah said.

“In the name of 'tolerance,' the Church’s teachings on marriage, sexuality and the human person are dismantled,” he said, citing the legalization of same-sex marriage, the contraception mandate, and a mandates that bathroom access be based on gender identity.

In the face of such threats to the free exercise of religion and conscience, Cardinal Sarah called on Catholics to be prophetic, faithful, and prayerful.

A prophetic approach requires careful discernment of how “in your lives, your homes, your workplaces – how, in your nation, God is being eroded, eclipsed, liquidated,” he said.  Faithfulness requires Catholics to be courageous in speaking the truth. And prayer, he said, is essential to discerning God’s will and to avoid discouragement.

“That is why I came to this prayer breakfast, to encourage you: be prophetic, be faithful, and above all, pray,” Cardinal Sarah told the crowd.

“These three suggestions make present that the battle for the soul of America, and the soul of the world, is primarily spiritual. They show that the battle is fought firstly with our own conversion to God’s will every day.”  

He hoped that the response to the spiritual problems facing the United States would result in a “spiritual awakening,” and would help to stop problems spreading throughout the rest of the world, particularly those facing human life, the family, and religious freedom.

“In the end, it is God or nothing,” Cardinal Sarah concluded.

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Vatican City, May 18, 2016 / 08:03 am (CNA/EWTN News).- If we don’t show mercy to others we shouldn’t expect to get it from God, Pope Francis said, stressing that while turning a blind eye to the poor might make life on earth easier, the eternal result will be much different.

“To ignore the poor is to despise God! We must learn this well: to ignore the poor is the despise God,” the Pope said May 18.

He spoke to the thousands of pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square for his general audience, continuing his ongoing catechesis on mercy as understood through scripture.

Francis focused his speech on the parable of The Rich Man and Lazarus, a poor beggar who laid outside the man’s house every day, asking for the leftover scraps from his table.

Both men eventually die, and the rich man, who ignored Lazarus and denied him the scraps, is tormented by constant fire and an insatiable thirst, whereas Lazarus is “carried by the angels” to heaven and comforted.

During their lives, “the door of the rich man’s house is always closed to the poor man,” the Pope observed, noting that the rich man wore expensive, luxurious clothing and ate lavish feasts every day, Lazarus starved and was covered in sores, with only the dogs to lick his wounds.

This scene, he said, is reminiscent “of the harsh rebuke of the Son of Man at the final judgement.”

“Lazarus represents well the silent cry of the poor in all ages and the contradiction of a world in which immense riches and resources are in the hands of the few,” he said, noting that eventually everyone, rich and poor alike, will die, just like Lazarus and the rich man in the parable.

Francis pointed out that after both of them die, the tormented rich man appeals to Abraham for help, calling him “father.”

By using this word, the rich man is claiming to belong to the people of God, yet during his life “he showed no consideration for God, and in fact, he made himself the center of everything, closed in his world of luxury and waste.”

Pope Francis then noted how in the parable, the rich man does not have a name, but is only referred to as “rich,” while Lazarus, the name of the poor man, is repeated five times.

Lazarus had served as a living reminder to the rich man to remember God, but the rich man did not welcome the opportunity, he said, explaining that in the end, the rich man “will be condemned not for his wealth, but for having been incapable of feeling compassion for Lazarus and assisting him.”

The Pope then turned to the second part of the parable in which the tormented rich man, upon seeing Lazarus being comforted by Abraham, seems to see the poor man for the first time.

But the rich man’s words immediately betray him, the Pope said, recalling how the man asked Abraham to “send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger into the water to cool my tongue, because I am suffering terribly in the flame.”

Suddenly the rich man recognizes Lazarus and knows his name, “while in life he pretended not to see him,” Francis said, lamenting how all too frequently “so many people pretend not to see the poor! For them the poor don’t exist.”

After first denying the poor man the leftovers from his table, the rich man now asks Lazarus to fetch him something to drink, Francis said, noting that the rich man “still believes he is able to claim rights based on his previous social condition.”

In turn, Abraham’s response that the good and evil bestowed on the two men in the afterlife is meant “to compensate for earthly justice,” offers the key to the whole parable, the Pope said.

As long as Lazarus sat outside his house, the rich man had the opportunity for salvation, yet he denied it and “the situation has become irreparable.”

“God’s mercy toward us is linked to our mercy toward others,” Francis warned, cautioning that if this aspect is missing from our attitude, God’s mercy “cannot find space inside our closed hearts, it can’t enter.”

“If I don’t throw open the door of my heart to the poor, that door stays closed. Even for God. And this is terrible.”

Pope Francis observed that when the rich man then asks if he can warn his friends and relatives, Abraham responds by telling him they have Moses and the prophets.

If we want to convert, we don’t have to wait for “miraculous events,” but must instead make the decision to open our hearts to the World of God, which calls us to love both God and neighbor,” the Pope said.

“The Word of God can revive a withered heart and cure its blindness,” he said, adding that “the rich man knew the Word of God, but didn’t allow it to enter his heart, he didn’t listen to it, and because of this, he was unable to open his eyes and have compassion for the poor man.”

Francis closed his address by stressing that “no messenger and no message can replace the poor we meet on the journey, because in them we meet Jesus himself.”

He encouraged all to pray alongside Mary, who in her canticle to God said: “you have cast down the mighty from their thrones and have exulted the lowly, you have filled the hungry with good things, and the rich you have sent away empty.”

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