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The Archdiocese of Nairobi has officially launched Caritas Microfinance Bank (Caritas MFB) whose aim is to empower local communities economically.

This is according to an announcement on Thursday by John Cardinal Njue, the Archbishop of the Catholic Archdiocese of Nairobi. He was speaking at the new Cardinal Otunga Plaza Annexe.

“Through Caritas microfinance bank, we seek to empower our local communities economically while ensuring that those who live in poverty, particularly vulnerable women and children are served in body, mind and spirit,” said Cardinal Njue.

The Nairobi prelate said the launch was an initiative that began three decades ago when the first Self-Help Group was started in the Archdiocese of Nairobi led by then Archbishop of Nairobi, Cardinal Maurice Otunga. 

Caritas Microfinance Bank CEO, George Maina said that the bank was dedicated to developing innovative products that will address the financial needs of ordinary local communities with the aim of, “improving livelihoods and growing our shareholder value,” he said. 

“We will endeavour to meet and exceed your expectations by building on gains that we have already established through strategic partners,” Maina said.

Caritas MFB currently has two branches in Nairobi’s Central Business District and has so far registered close to 10,000 clients who have current and saving accounts.

The bank plans to open 12 more branches in the next three years, with five of the branches lined up across Kenya for this year. The bank will also capitalise on mobile and agency banking platforms.

In June 2015, the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) granted the bank a license to carry out microfinance business, hence becoming the 12th microfinance bank in Kenya.

(CISA in Nairobi)

Email: engafrica@vatiradio.va

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(Vatican Radio)  French police have detained three family members of the attacker who was shot dead in Paris after killing a police officer on the famous Champs Elysees boulevard. A second suspect in the attack, which also injured three people, has handed himself over to Belgian police after they alerted
the French authorities of his possible involvement.

Listen to Stefan Bos' report:

A day after the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for another attack in France's capital, French officials released more details about the man who shot and killed a police officer and injured two other officers and a woman. 

French officials said gunman Karim Cheurfi, who was shot dead, was a troubled 39-year old. He  had previously served time for the attempted murder of
three police officers in 2001 and also on the security service’s watch list.

A potential second suspect was publicly identified as Youssouf El Osri in Belgium. But his lawyer strongly denied his client had anything to 'do with the attack and said a police raid at the man's home was linked to another criminal investigation.

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS

Thursday's attack in Paris came while the country prepared for presidential elections on Sunday. That's why French Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve announced dramatic security measures. “Over the next few days more than 50,000 police officers and gendarmes will be mobilized to ensure a calm and peaceful election," he stressed. "Nothing must be allowed to interfere with a democratic moment fundamental to the life of our nation.”

On Friday, the main candidates were quick to urge tough action against Islamist terrorism but cancelled the final rallies they had planned.

Prime Minister Cazeneuve, a Socialist, accused two of the frontrunners - far-right candidate Marine Le Pen and conservative François Fillon - of exploiting the attack for electoral gain. He condemned Le Pen for linking the attack to immigration.

Amid the turmoil, police already raided the attacker's family home in eastern Paris looking for evidence of links with the so-called Islamic State as the group claimed he was acting on their behalf. Three family members were detained.

The latest attack has led to international condemnation. US president Donald Trump was among the first leaders to express his sorrow over the shootings in Paris. He has pledged to destroy the Islamic State group.

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Rome, Italy, Apr 21, 2017 / 10:22 am (CNA/EWTN News).- India's Catholic bishops have strongly condemned a violent police disruption of a Good Friday service at a small parish in the south of the country.

The Dhalit Catholic community in the village of Sogandi was holding a liturgy for the Passion of the Lord April 14 when they were disrupted by the Tehsildar – local tax and revenue officers – as well as police during the Veneration of the Cross and distribution of Holy Communion.

“The Catholic Church in India is very distressed and saddened by the happenings in Sogandi, Tamil Nadu, on Good Friday, a day very sacred to Christians everywhere,” the April 19 press release stated.

“The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India expresses its full solidarity with the people of Sogandi and condemns in very strong terms the brutal action of the Tehsildar.”

The statement, signed by the secretary general of the bishops’ conference, Bishop Theodore Mascarenhas, SFX, said that they are proud of their country and the major part of the Hindu community has always treated them with respect and goodwill.

However, recently, fundamentalist forces have disturbed “the traditional peace and harmony” of the country, they said.

The bishops expressed concern at rising intolerance in India toward people of all religions from “fundamentalist fringe” groups, calling on the government to ensure that everyone in the country continue to feel safe and “enjoy the basic right to worship freely and without fear.”

Concern about religious intolerance has grown across India particularly since the May 2014 election of Narendra Modi as prime minister, which saw a spike in the number of attacks against Christians and Muslims.

After Modi took office the country saw a sharp rise in attacks against people and property, most of them perpetrated by the radical Hindu group Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, also referred to as the RSS, or the “the Sangh.”

The group, which has been described as “fundamentalist” and “violent,” sits on the right-wing and has no official, legal registration in India. However they maintain strong ties with India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.

Modi has been criticized for his silence regarding the mostly small-scale attacks, which have continued to take place.

The event in Sogandi on Good Friday was only the latest in a string of escalating anti-Christian incidents in the village, Bishop A. Neethinathan of Chingleput wrote in a report April 19.

The Catholic parish there, under the patronage of St. Theresa of the Child Jesus, was erected in 2007. It has 125 families, who also make up the population of the village.

In order to help foster strong Marian devotion, when the parish was built 10 years ago, the priest also developed a portion of a nearby hill into a little grotto with a covering and a statue of Our Lady.

The grotto and other public religious symbols have been at the center of the clashes between the Christian village and a nearby Hindu village, also of a different caste identity. The Hindu village is known to have temples and houses erected on the other side of the same hill, Bishop Neethinathan stated.

On April 14, the parish gathered at the grotto at 3 PM to celebrate the Lord’s Passion service. Many police were stationed around the area throughout the service, the bishop’s report states.

As the service continued, the local Tehsildar disrupted the Veneration of the Cross and the distribution of Holy Communion, not allowing them to finish.

The disturbance and subsequent disorder resulted in reactions from some of those present. Most of the local men, as well as some priests, have been booked for serious offences by the police, Bishop Neethinathan wrote.

The following day, April 15, the revenue department bulldozed large ditches around the area, preventing access.

It is believed that the recent incidents are the result of planned and systematic operations by anti-Christian Hindutva and anti-Dhalit caste fundamentalists, including pressure on the police and revenue departments.

Other recent actions include the demolition and removal from the hill Dec. 31, 2016 of many of the statues and crosses of the parish by more than 500 police officers “under the pretext of illegal occupation,” according to Bishop Neethinathan. The statues were not returned until April 19.

In February, every stone and boulder on the hill was found marked with the Hindu symbol and the Palm Sunday procession, though able to conclude, was also interrupted by objections and disturbances.

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IMAGE: CNS/L'Osservatore Romano

By Cindy Wooden

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- For St. Francis of Assisi, following Christ meant imitating his humility and forsaking riches, power and status; the men who call themselves Franciscans today believe they are called to embrace the same attitudes, including in their governance.

In early April, the ministers general of four men's branches of the Franciscan family -- the Friars Minor, Capuchins, Conventual Franciscans and the Third Order Regulars -- asked Pope Francis to give the Franciscans the "privilege" of allowing religious brothers to be elected to leadership positions, including those with authority over ordained priests.

The word "privilege" means special permission for something not generally envisioned by church law. In canon law, governance in the church usually is tied to ordination.

The Franciscans' request is about recovering the notion of fraternity and service St. Francis gave his first companions, said Father Michael Perry, minister general of the Friars Minor. But it also has implications for leadership, authority and governance in the wider church.

At its root, it raises the question: "Is leadership about organizing things in such a way that one has absolute control over everything? Or is leadership about empowering people so that there's a synergy, a bringing together of all the strengths within a community?" Father Perry told Catholic News Service.

The core identity of ordained ministry is involved as well.

Because of its unique connection to the Eucharist, the ministerial priesthood has a special and irreplaceable role within the Catholic Church and within a Catholic religious community, Father Perry said. The Franciscans' request "is not a question of challenging spiritual authority or the role of the shepherd; it's actually about liberating the shepherd so that he can be focused on the sheep and not have to be worried about the gates and the fences."

The Franciscan ideal for leadership is that it should invite and challenge the friars -- brothers among themselves, whether ordained or not -- "to 'minority,' to not going up, but going down," Father Perry said. Minority is the opposite of clericalism, which is "a drive upwards as if upward mobility offered something, some security and guarantee of fidelity, a way of controlling people so they remain faithful to the truth. Franciscans, we don't see it this way."

From 1208 to 1209 when Pope Innocent III approved St. Francis' initial rule for his order and up until 1239, Father Perry said, the Franciscans were allowed to elect brothers to leadership roles, including as minister general, and they did so.

Massimo Faggioli, a church historian and professor of theology at Villanova University, said that if Pope Francis grants the friars' request, "it would signal to the whole church a shift in the sense of a de-clericalization of the religious orders and the return to the original inspiration of the founders: Francis was not a priest but a lay person, and the clericalization of the Franciscans came later."

Some people have argued that St. Francis was a deacon, but Father Perry said even that is hotly debated among Franciscan scholars. What is certain is that he received the "tonsure," a ritual cutting of hair that often signified preparation for ordination. But Father Perry is convinced that in St. Francis' case, it was simply the official sign that he had been granted permission by the bishop to preach in churches.

Loosening the link between ordination and governance increases the possibilities for recognizing the dignity, gifts, skills and call to service of all the baptized, Father Perry said.

Reserving most leadership roles to the ordained, he said, "has not permitted space for women and also, at times, squelched competence. It has not promoted competence and, in fact, has awarded incompetence."

A model of church leadership in which the ordained are spiritual shepherds, who also have oversight to ensure administrative and financial matters are handled appropriately, is "a different model than one in which leadership controls, that has to make sure 'I'm in charge.' That comes from personal insecurity and a lack of faith, not from the presence of faith," Father Perry said.

In his view, he said, "clericalism is a sign of a lack of faith, a lack of trust -- a lack of trust in God, a lack of trust in others and, ultimately, a lack of trust in oneself."

Faggioli, the church historian, told CNS that "the clergy-centered church was part of the tight relationship between church and state in the Western world of established Christendom. It was more a social and political necessity than a theological one: the state or the political authority needed to count on a reliable professional class of clergy faithful to the political authority."

But the world has changed, he said, and "the church's mission in this secularized world needs all the hands, not only the clerical ones."

While "governance is still canonically tied to ordination," the professor said, "in the real life of the Catholic Church worldwide today many key decisions are made by laypeople: Catholic education, health care, media, social work, etc. are largely in the hands of laypeople."

"We have to come to terms with what is the nature of church and what is the nature of ministries in the church?" Father Perry said. "Francis of Assisi called for a new model, a model that would not challenge at all the nature of the church and the distinct roles within the church, but would remind the church that these are all in service to something higher, something greater."

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Follow Wooden on Twitter: @Cindy_Wooden.

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