Catholic News 2

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By Carol Glatz

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Hear confession every time someone asks, Pope Francis said, and don't ever put limited hours on the sacrament of reconciliation.

"Please, let there never be those signs that say, 'Confessions: Mondays and Wednesdays from this time to that time,'" he told hundreds of confessors and other participants attending an annual course sponsored by the Apostolic Penitentiary, a Vatican court that handles issues related to the absolution of sin.

"Hear confession every time someone asks you. And if you are sitting there, praying, leave the confessional open because God's heart is open," he said March 17.

Confession "is a pastoral priority," and is a daily call to head to the "peripheries of evil and sin, and this is an ugly periphery," he said.

"I'll confess," he told his audience, that the Apostolic Penitentiary "is the tribunal that I really like because it is a 'tribunal of mercy,' where one goes to get that indispensable medicine for our souls, which is divine mercy."

A good confessor, he said, has begged God for "the gift of a wounded heart, capable of understanding others' wounds and of healing them" with God's mercy, he said.

Accompany men and women "with prudent and mature discernment and with true compassion for their suffering, caused by the poverty of sin," he said.

So much harm is done to the church and human souls when a confessor is not guided by prayer and the Holy Spirit in discerning what God wants to be done, he said.

"The confessor never follows his own will and doesn't teach his own doctrine," but is called to be God's servant in full communion with the church.

Be ready to use confession as an opportunity to evangelize and remind people of the basic, essential truth of faith and morality. Pray to God for the gift of humility and the recognition of one's own sins that God fully pardoned, he told them.

This kind of prayer is not only "the prime guarantee for avoiding every harsh approach that fruitlessly judges the sinner and not the sin," he said, it also reminds confessors they are "simple, albeit necessary, administrators" of God's free gift. "And he will certainly be pleased if we make extensive use of his mercy."

Pope Francis also asked confessors to be very careful in discerning whether a person may be suffering from a mental disorder, "which must be verified through a healthy cooperation with" experts, or from demonic influence or possession.

Whenever a confessor recognizes the presence of evil spirits, he said, never hesitate to refer to an exorcist, who is charged with "this sensitive and necessary ministry" in each diocese.

 

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ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) -- Perched atop an Adirondack mountain, the 325-acre site for sale seems to have everything a developer could want: spectacular views, a man-made lake and close proximity to the tourist destination of Saratoga Springs. Oh, and former President Ulysses S. Grant lived out his final days in a home next door....

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LONDON (AP) -- A spokesman for Britain's prime minister says the White House has promised that it won't repeat a claim that U.K. spies snooped on U.S. President Donald Trump....

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A long-acting cholesterol medicine cut the risk of having a heart attack or some other serious problems by 15 to 20 percent in a big study that's likely to spur fresh debate about what drugs should cost....

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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The White House and some House conservatives agreed Friday to make changes in the troubled Republican health care bill in hopes of easing deep party divisions over the overhaul plan. But other conservatives expressed continued opposition and it remained uncertain that party leaders had won enough support to push the high-profile measure through the House next week....

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SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- The United States signaled a tougher strategy toward North Korea on Friday that leaves open the possibility of pre-emptive military action and rejects talks with the communist nation until it gives up its weapons of mass destruction....

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The Metropolitan Archbishop of Accra, Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle, says the correct and total formation of priests must be a shared responsibility of parents, seminarians themselves and the Church as a whole.

He noted that “The challenges are not to be underrated, but they are to be kept in sight and players, parents and guardians and society, are also to be kept on their toes for the good of the subject, the child or the student and for the greater good of the society and Church as a whole.”

He said, “it is the duty and the primary responsibility of parents to form or educate seminarians, while the seminarian himself has the onerous responsibility to be involved and committed to his own formation if he wants to become truly what God the Father has willed.”

Archbishop Palmer-Buckle was delivering a keynote address on the theme: “Sixty Years of Priestly Formation for the Church in Ghana and the Universal Church-A Shared Responsibility.” This was at St. Peter’s Catholic Seminary, Pedu in the Cape Coast, this week. The gathering was one of the activities marking the 60th national independence anniversary of Ghana and the 12th Theology week of the seminary.

The Archbishop noted that parents are the ones who literally start the task of educating the seminarian and they are to be complemented by other agents namely society, the state, Church or the religious leadership.

The prelate of Accra said that all were endowed by the Holy Spirit to nurture vocations especially to the holy priesthood, religious life as well as the calling to married life. 

“As a shared responsibility, it begins with praying to the Lord of the harvest to send labourers into his vineyard. Then it follows with calling people and nurturing them to follow Christ in the priesthood and religious life.”

(Damian Avevor in Accra, Ghana)

Email:engafrica@vatiradio.va

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(Vatican Radio) The new director of the Anglican Centre in Rome and representative of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Vatican will be the former head of the Anglican Church in Burundi, Archbishop Bernard Ntahoturi.

A statement from Lambeth Palace on Friday said Archbishop Bernard will take up his new post in September, succeeding the outgoing director, Archbishop David Moxon.

Listen to Philippa Hitchen’s report: 

Born in 1948, Archbishop Ntahoturi grew up in a small village in southern Burundi, the son of a poor farming family. After training at theological College in Uganda, he was ordained in 1973 and then continued his studies in England at Cambridge and Oxford universities.

After his training, he returned to Burundi where he joined the civil service, becoming chief of staff to President Jean-Baptiste Bagaza. When the government was overthrown in a military coup in 1987 he spent four years in jail.

In 1992 Ntahoturi became Provincial Secretary of the Anglican Church of Burundi and five years later he was consecrated Bishop of Matana Diocese.

In 2005 he became Archbishop Primate of the Province of the Anglican Church of Burundi.

Archbishop Ntahoturi has served as chair of the Council of Anglican provinces in Africa from 2011-2016, and as a member of the Anglican Consultative Council Standing Committee from 1993-2012.

Extensive ecumenical experience

He has extensive ecumenical experience having served as a member of the Central Committee of the World Council of churches since 1998, and co-moderator of the Permanent Committee on Collaboration and Consensus which brings together representatives of the Orthodox, Anglicans and Reformed Churches. He has also served on the Executive Committee of ACT (Action of Churches Together) International and participated in the creation of the new ACT Alliance which is the ecumenical branch of the WCC for Relief and Development.

Peace and reconciliation work

Archbishop Ntahoturi has been active in promoting peace in war-torn Burundi and the great Lakes region of Africa, representing the Protestant Churches of his country during negotiations in Tanzania, which were instrumental in bringing peace to Burundi. He is Vice Chair of the Burundi Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and Chair of the Inter-Anglican Standing Committee on Unity, Faith and Order (IASCUFO).

So that the world may believe

Following the announcement of his appointment, Archbishop Ntahoturi said he looked forward to building on the work of his predecessors and to strengthening “those areas, especially in peace building, where the Anglican Church and the Roman Catholic Church can work together for a common witness, so that the world may believe and God [be] glorified’.

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(Vatican Radio) Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has threatened to tear up a controversial migrant deal with the European Union that was aimed at halting the influx into Europe of people fleeing war and poverty. Hungary has used the controversy to raise support for its decision to build fences and a new law to detain all asylum seekers, including children.

Listen to the report by Stefan Bos:

Turkey's hardline President Erdogan says the European Union "can forget" about Turkey re-admitting failed asylum seekers who have reached Europe via Turkey. 

It is a key part of an agreement with the EU after more than a million often desperate migrants and refugees reached Europe by sea in 2015, with thousands feared drowned. 

Turkey's president also says that the EU's top court is leading a "crusade" against Islam.

His comments come at a time when Ankara has been enraged by the Netherlands, Germany and other nations' decisions to block its ministers from holding political rallies in those countries.

REFERENDUM CAMPAIGN

They wanted to campaign among Turkish immigrants for a yes vote in a referendum on extending the powers of Erdogan, despite international concerns over the massive arrests of journalists and political opponents as well as the dismissal of some 100,000 public servants for allegedly backing last year's coup attempt. 

Erdogan even compared the Netherlands and Germany to the Nazis of World War Two. European Commission President Jean Claude Juncker condemned those remarks when speaking in the European Parliament, recalling how his family and country Luxembourg suffered under the Nazi-regime. "I was scandalized by what was said coming from Turkey, on the Netherlands, on Germany, and on others. I will never accept this comparison between the Nazis and the now (today’s) governments,” he told the parliamentary session in Strasbourg, France.

“This is totally unacceptable, and the one who is doing this is taking distance from Europe, and not trying to enter the European Union. The European Union is not joining Turkey, Turkey is joining the European Union,” Juncker added. 

Yet, Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó says Turkey's threat to scrap the migration deal showed what he calls the EU's "unreasonable and failed" policies and that it was wrong to base Europe's long-term security exclusively on the agreement.

Hungary's president has now signed a disputed law allowing all asylum-seekers, including children older than 14, to be detained in border container camps, while border hunters and other special forces patrol border fences. President János Áder signed the bill on Wednesday, a national holiday in memory of Hungary's 1848 revolution against the Habsburg empire.

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