The Loreto Sisters of South Asia, headquartered in Kolkata, formerly Calcutta, are currently marking 175 years of their presence in the region. “Remember, Reimage, Renew,” is the theme of the year-long jubilee celebration that officially kicked off with a Thanksgiving Mass on December 30, in Kolkata’s Science City auditorium. Last week, in the first of a 2-part telephone interview with the superior of the Loreto Sisters of South Asia, Indian Sister Anita Braganza, we came to know a lot about her order. She narrated how a young group of 7 sisters and 5 postulants belonging to the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary (IBVM), better known as the Loreto Sisters, landed in Calcutta, on Dec. 30, 1841, four months after setting sail from Ireland, never to return home. This intrepid band of women was commissioned by their Superior in Dublin, Mother Teresa Ball who appointed the eldest of them all, Sr. Delphine Hart, ...
The Loreto Sisters of South Asia, headquartered in Kolkata, formerly Calcutta, are currently marking 175 years of their presence in the region. “Remember, Reimage, Renew,” is the theme of the year-long jubilee celebration that officially kicked off with a Thanksgiving Mass on December 30, in Kolkata’s Science City auditorium.
Last week, in the first of a 2-part telephone interview with the superior of the Loreto Sisters of South Asia, Indian Sister Anita Braganza, we came to know a lot about her order. She narrated how a young group of 7 sisters and 5 postulants belonging to the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary (IBVM), better known as the Loreto Sisters, landed in Calcutta, on Dec. 30, 1841, four months after setting sail from Ireland, never to return home. This intrepid band of women was commissioned by their Superior in Dublin, Mother Teresa Ball who appointed the eldest of them all, Sr. Delphine Hart, barely 23, as their leader. They came in response to the Calcutta Catholic community’s request for education of their girls. After landing in Calcutta, the nuns never looked back, and today they number 135 professed nuns, 14 novices and 8 candidates in India, Nepal and Bangladesh, engaged in 51 different ministries.
Sr. Braganza talked about how their original foundress Mary Ward, an Englishwoman began her ministry in the 17th century England where the Catholic Church was persecuted by the Protestants. Far ahead of her times, Mother Ward envisioned an active apostolic women’s order, headed by a woman, not a bishop, with members dressed in the ordinary habit of the people, and modelled on the spirituality of St. Ignatius and his constitution. However, Church authorities were not ready for all this and so she ran into problems with them. She went about Europe establishing schools, but because of the Protestant persecution, her association with the Jesuits and other historical reasons, her order was suppressed. Several of her centres and works continued functioning independently, some under bishops. One such centre came to be known as the Irish branch of the Loreto Sisters, pioneered by Mother Teresa Ball, under whose leadership the first group of nuns ventured out of Ireland and landed in India on Dec. 30, 1840.
Well today, in the final of this 2-part telephone interview, we asked Sr. Anita Braganza whether it is true that the Loreto institutions are meant only for the rich.
Archbishop Christopher J. Coyne. / Credit: Diocese of Burlington, VermontCNA Staff, Apr 29, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).A New England prelate is urging Catholics to both minister to transgender-identifying individuals in the Catholic Church while still continuously affirming "the goodness of human creation" as male and female.Coadjutor Archbishop Christopher Coyne of Hartford, Connecticut, told CNA last week that he would make it a point not to challenge a transgender-identifying man or woman when they present as the opposite sex.Coyne appeared on Connecticut Public Radio earlier this month arguing against the basic claim of gender ideology, which argues that men and women who "identify" as the opposite sex should be treated as such."Biology is biology. You're either XX or XY. That's a scientific fact. You can't un-prove that fact," the bishop told public radio. But, he argued, the LGBT debate has "pulled me more into a place of understanding and care," including regarding trans...
The Verona Arena is illuminated at night on Aug. 3, 2018, in Verona, Italy. The Holy See Press Office on Monday, April 29, 2024, released the pope's schedule for a one-day trip to the city scheduled for May 18, 2024, on the vigil of Pentecost. / Credit: Athanasios Gioumpasis/Getty ImagesRome Newsroom, Apr 29, 2024 / 11:30 am (CNA).After completing a one-day trip to Venice, Pope Francis is set to return to northern Italy in late May for a visit to the city of Verona, where he will attend events focused on peace and justice while also meeting with clergy, laity, and inmates. The Holy See Press Office on Monday released the pope's schedule for the one-day trip scheduled for May 18 on the vigil of Pentecost. Located in the Veneto region, approximately 75 miles from Venice, the city is renowned for its trove of Roman antiquities, medieval architecture, and as the setting of Shakespeare's tragedy "Romeo and Juliet."Pope Francis will leave the Vatican by helicopter at 6:30 ...
Pope Francis waves while traveling by boat in Venice, Italy, for a meeting with young people at the Basilica della Madonna della Salute on April 28, 2024. Earlier in the day he met with inmates at a women's prison. / Credit: Daniel Ibañez/CNARome Newsroom, Apr 28, 2024 / 08:00 am (CNA).Pope Francis opened his one-day visit to Venice on Sunday morning with a meeting with female inmates where he reaffirmed the importance of fraternity and human dignity, noting that prison can be a place of new beginnings. "A stay in prison can mark the beginning of something new, through the rediscovery of the unsuspected beauty in us and in others, as symbolized by the artistic event you are hosting and the project to which you actively contribute," the pope said to the female inmates gathered in the intimate courtyard of the Women's Prison on the Island of Giudecca. Pope Francis left the Vatican by helicopter at approximately 6:30 in the mo...