160203

The

S outher n C ross

February 3 to February 9, 2016

Reg No. 1920/002058/06

No 4962

www.scross.co.za

How Catholic schools did in matric 2015

R8,00 (incl VAT RSA)

Is Spotlight film fair to the Church?

The hijacking of the Catholic carnival

Page 2

Pages 3&10

Page 7

Cardinal Napier: Drugs are the new oppressor

By STUART GRAHAM

A crown of thorns is seen in a church. This year Ash Wednesday is on February 10. it marks the beginning of the penitential season of Lent, during which Christians reflect on the suffering of Jesus, especially on Good Friday, observed on March 25 this year. The Lenten season ends with easter, on March 27. (Photo: octavio duran/CNS)

What Lent means in Year of Mercy

By CiNdy WoodeN

L

ENT is a time of conversion and a time to deepen one’s faith, demonstrating and sharing it through the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, Pope Francis says in his Lenten message for 2016.

“Faith finds expression in concrete everyday actions meant to help our neighbours in body and spirit,” the pope said.

Feeding the hungry, visiting the sick, welcoming strangers, offering instruction, giving comfort—“on such things will we be judged”, the pope wrote.

Particularly during the Year of Mercy, he said, Catholics are called to recognise their own need for God’s mercy, the greatness of God’s love seen in the death and resurrection of Christ and the obligation to assist others by communicating God’s love and mercy through words and deeds.

“The root of all sin” is thinking that one is god, something often expressed in a total preoccupation for accumulating money and power, the pope wrote. And just as individuals can be tempted to think they have no need of God, social and political systems can run the same risk, ignoring both God and the real needs of human beings.

“Love alone is the answer to that yearning for infinite happiness,” Pope Francis wrote. It is the only response to the longings “that we think we can satisfy with the idols of knowledge, power and riches”.

“The danger always remains that by a constant refusal to open the doors of their hearts

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Pope Francis (Photo: Paul Haring/CNS) to Christ who knocks on them in the poor,” he said, “the proud, rich and powerful will end up condemning themselves and plunging into the eternal abyss of solitude which is hell.”

But through acts of mercy and charity, “by touching the flesh of the crucified Jesus in the suffering, sinners can receive the gift of realising that they too are poor and in need”, he wrote.

“In the corporal works of mercy we touch the flesh of Christ in our brothers and sisters who need to be fed, clothed, sheltered, visited.

In the spiritual works of mercy—counsel, instruction, forgiveness, admonishment and prayer—we touch more directly our own sinfulness.”

In the Christian life, Pope Francis said, “the corporal and spiritual works of mercy must never be separated”. n The full text of the pope’s message is at: www.bit.ly/1Sh2B46

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ARISHES have been called to fight back against “almost invincible” drug addiction which, according to Cardinal Wilfrid Napier of Durban, has taken over from apartheid as the new oppressor of South African society.

Tasks teams need to be set up countrywide to engage with drug users and their families, to set up rehabilitation networks and to set up support structures, Cardinal Napier said in a pastoral letter to is archdiocese. He said he wrote the letter after spending time working in a drug rehabilitation clinic in Durban.

Cardinal Napier recalled the apartheid-era demand, “Set my people free”. He proposed the slogan as a motto for the fight against drug abuse, as parishes and as individuals.

“Like apartheid, our new oppressor is assisted by two devious and hard to defeat allies—poverty and hopelessness,” Cardinal Napier said.

“Unlike apartheid, which was easier to identify as the enemy because it was in your face every day wherever you went, today’s enemy—drug addiction—is almost invincible.

We don’t know who it is, where it is hiding and how and when it will attack again,” said the cardinal, adding: “We don’t know how to defend ourselves against it.”

South Africans and Christians are, however, “resilient people” and do not give up easily, Cardinal Napier said.

“Rather, we will fight back with simple but effective strategies,” he said.

He proposed the See, Judge, Act method as an effective way of responding.

The first step in fighting drug addiction, said Cardinal Napier, is to see what is happening, where it is happening and why it is happening. As we do so we will get to know the seriousness of the situation, he said.

“We will not only see for ourselves but also experience or feel the harm being done to our young people in particular,” he said.

The next priority is to look for the root causes of the drug problem.

These problems are various, he said, but

deep down there is poverty, [and] the breakdown of the family, of community structures and of society.

Worst of all is the “catastrophic” abandoning of good morals and upright behaviour, he said.

“An ever-present factor is the sense of hopelessness that has overtaken too many of our unemployed young people who, after repeated attempts to find gainful and fulfilling employment, come to see themselves as unemployable, adding despair to their sense of hopelessness,” Cardinal Napier said.

“As people of faith our first and most effective action is prayer, asking God to enlighten, guide and direct our efforts as we try to see, judge and act,” he said. “In our praying we must place the greatest emphasis on listening to God’s word in the scriptures, but also in the Church’s teaching.”

On a practical level parishes can set up task teams that draw from across all communities—Christian and from other faiths.

“The task team will need to engage with those who need our intervention, namely drug users and their families and friends in the parishes where we live,” Cardinal Napier said.

“It will need to set up effective links or networks with individuals and institutions that are experienced in the use of tried and tested methods and paths towards achieving rehabilitation. It will establish support structures to accompany those who are seeking rehabilitation, but also returning from it,” he said.

“It will also work out whether we should use existing rehabilitation facilities or set up our own, either alone or in conjunction with other parties.”

Cardinal Napier stressed the importance of prayer and devotion in the fight against drugs.

A campaign should include prayer, Eucharistic adoration, making a good confession, and observation of special days of abstinence, fasting and prayer, the cardinal said.

Imagine a Church without The Southern Cross

he past few years have been rough on The Southern Cross, as it has been on most newspapers throughout the world.

This is especially so since The Southern Cross is entirely independent and unsubsidised. We survive solely on revenue and the kind support of our readers.

The changing face of media, the economic crisis, and spiralling costs of production have hit us hard over the past few years.

On top of that, the Post Office’s chronic unreliability and periodic strikes have affected our income to such an extent that we have had to draw from our reserves just to continue operation.

Our loyal staff have had to make sacrifices just so this newspaper can continue publishing every week, as it has done every week since 1920, almost 5 000 consecutive and uninterrupted weeks.

Now we need to rebuild our depleted reserves—or the next postal

strike or any other disaster could kill us off.

We can thank The Associates’ Campaign for our survival. Launched in 2002 to help us build up reserves and undertake important outreach work, The Associates’ Campaign is crucial in keeping The Southern Cross alive.

If you want to see The Southern Cross survive and thrive, please support our Associates Campaign with an annual contribution.

To do so is easy: choose one of the

categories of Associates you would like to join—Cardinal McCann Associate (R1 500 and above), St Maximilian Kolbe Associate (R500-1 499), or St Francis de Sales Associate (R100-499).

Make your contribution into the account: The Southern Cross, Standard Bank, Thibault Square Branch (Code 020909), Acc No: 276876016.

Please e-mail or fax payment details and your name and contact details to admin@scross.co.za or 021 465-3850.

Or visit www.scross.co.za/associates-

campaign for details.

Cardinal McCann Associates receive a free subscription (print or digital) for the year.

Two annual Masses are said for the intentions of our Associates and the repose of those who have passed on every year.

We will report on our outreach programmes in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, imagine a South African Church without The Southern Cross!

2

The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

LOCAL

Catholic schools outdo state schools again

By STAFF RePoRTeR

C

ATHOLIC schools again outperformed state schools in the 2015 matric exams, the Catholic Institute of Education has revealed after analysing the results.

Altogether 8 800 candidates in Catholic schools wrote their matric last year. Of these 7 213 in 83 schools wrote the state National Senior Certificate exams (DBE NSC), while 1 587 candidates in 27 schools wrote the IEB examination for independent schools.

Some 5 991 (83,1%) of the 7 213 candidates who wrote the DBE NSC passed, with 44,8% obtaining a pass which would allow them entry into a bachelor degree programme at university. 25,6% obtained a diploma-level pass and 12,6% a higher certificate-level pass.

While the average pass rate for Catholic schools offering the state examination did decline, this was only a 2,9% decline from 2014, while 920 more pupils wrote the exam.

The 83,1% pass is 12,5% above the national average. Of the 1 587 Catholic school pupils writing the IEB examination, only four failed, amounting to a 99,7% pass— 11,4% above the IEB national average. The overall pass rate of all Catholic schools—from mission schools to suburban private institutions—was 86,1%.

Eleven pupils from Catholic schools which offered the IEB examination achieved outstanding and commendable passes, putting them among the nation’s top achievers.

“However, it is when we come

The Catholic institute of education reports that Catholic schools achieved results in 2015 above those of state schools. to the provincial results that a concerning picture emerges in the inequality of resources in both the ordinary state system and the Catholic network,” the CIE said.

The Western Cape and Gauteng achieved the highest pass percentages in the country, at 84,7% and 84,2% respectively.

Catholic schools in these two provinces achieved 98,2% and 93,8% respectively.

Catholic schools in both these provinces increased their pass rate compared to 2014.

I

n the remaining provinces, in keeping with the decline in the general pass rate, Catholic results also declined to various degrees.

In the Free State, KwaZulu-Natal and the North West provinces, the decline in the Catholic school pass rate was negligible, at 0,6%, 2,2% and 2,3% respectively.

In KwaZulu-Natal, the general pass rate was 60,7%, while the Catholic schools’ pass rate was 74,9%.

In the Northern Cape, Catholic schools writing the state exam recorded a decline of 4,6%, which was still below the general average 8,8% decline in the province.

In the Eastern Cape the decline was 5,1%, but the 82,2% pass rate in Catholic schools was 25,4% above the provincial pass rate.

In Limpopo, the Catholic schools’ pass rate was 11% above the provincial pass rate, but this still represented a decline of 15.3% from 2014. This can be attributed to one large school having a low pass rate, the reasons for which are as yet not known.

The poorest province and the lowest performing is the Eastern Cape, with a provincial pass rate of 56,8%. Catholic schools achieved an 82,2% pass rate, which was 5.1% lower than 2014.

“It is important to note that while there has been a decline in the pass rate, many of these schools had ‘progressed learners’ writing in addition to increased numbers,” the CIE noted, referring to pupils who had been promoted to Grade 12 despite inadequate results in Grade 11.

The CIE highlighted “the need to stop emphasising the performance in the 12th year of the schooling system as a measure of quality, and to pay greater attention to the foundation phase”, meaning Grades 1-3.

“Here is where the Church can encourage parents to read to their children and begin reading clubs facilitated by teachers and volunteers,” the CIE said.

Events planned for Hurley Weekend

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HE annual “Hurley Weekend” will take place at Durban’s Emmanuel cathedral from February 7-8. This event commemorates the death of Archbishop Denis Hurley on February 13, 2004.

This year it will have an added dimension as 2016 is the 200th anniversary of the establishment of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, the congregation to which the archbishop belonged. An allOblate team of senior members will be the preachers for the four

Masses at the cathedral.

After the first Mass at 17:30 on Saturday, February 6, there will be a candle-light procession to the archbishop’s tomb in the Lady chapel of the cathedral where a brief service will be held and floral wreaths will be placed on the tomb by the Hurley family and representatives of leading ecumenical and inter-faith organisations.

At all the Masses the Acknowledgments Book, which records all donations to the Denis Hurley Centre, will be brought up in the

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Archbishop hails the work of Holy Cross Sisters

By FARAyi MAToNdo

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WO bishops joined the jubilee celebrations of nine Holy Cross Sisters in Pretoria.

Archbishop William Slattery of Pretoria was the main celebrant at the Jubilee Mass at Old Mission (St Theresa) church, with Bishop Kevin Dowling of Rustenburg and Frs James Thazhoor, Vincent Brennan and Terry Duurland, the convent chaplain, concelebrating.

Srs Bernard Aertker, Gisella Willenbrink, Maua Savage, Petra Maria Müller and Roswitha Pelle celebrated their 60th anniversaries; Srs Catherine O’Connor, Angela Jae and Agnes Mary Limbeck their 50th; and Srs Monica Madyembwa, the present provincial leader, and Otilia Musekiwa their 25th anniversaries.

Archbishop Slattery highlighted and applauded the combined years of

dedicated service given by the Sisters to the Church in South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe through education in schools and hospitals.

The Holy Cross Sisters are known for their schools and for assisting at frail care centres and nursing homes for the elderly. Their congregation provides outreach programmes to disadvantaged areas and informal settlements, such as skills development, youth projects and crèches.

The consecrated women promote quality life for HIV/Aids clients through provision of comprehensive HIV care, support lives of terminally ill HIV patients, and provide homebased care, among other activities.

Archbishop Slattery in his homily pointed out that God, who has called the individual Sisters, accompanies them faithfully to the end of their lives.

offertory procession and special prayers will be said for all the donors. Hymns composed by the archbishop will also be used at all the Masses.

On the afternoon of Sunday, February 7 at 15:00 there will be the annual report-back meeting on the progress made by the Denis Hurley Centre over the past year, and plans for 2016 will be presented. This is a public meeting and all are welcome. Secure parking will be available in the grounds of the cathedral.

(Above) Fr John-Paul Mopapa Mathebula says his first Mass at St Thomas More parish in Monavoni, Centurion, after his ordination as a priest of the archdiocese of Pretoria.

“Console, console my people” Is 40:1 We are a Religious International Congregation of Priests, Brothers, Sisters and Lay missionaries who are consecrated for the Mission, to see to it that all have a chance to hear the word of God and encounter Jesus Christ, God’s True Consolation.

Nine Holy Cross Sisters celebrated their jubilees, from 60 years to 25 years, in Pretoria at a Mass led by Archbishop William Slattery, with Bishop dowling of Rustenburg and three priests concelebrating.

(Right) Fr Mathebula blesses Archbishop emeritus George daniel after he was ordained by Archbishop William Slattery at Saulsville Arena in Atteridgeville.

(Photos: Fr Mathibela Sebothoma)

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The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

LOCAL

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Bishops plan to introduce further protocols to keep children safe

By STUART GRAHAM

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REVISED “safeguarding policy” to protect children from abuse will be implemented by the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference (SACBC) in the coming year.

The Church already has strict protocols in place but the Child Safeguarding Policy will align the Church with South Africa’s legal system, SACBC spokesman Archbishop William Slattery told The Southern Cross.

“The best interests of the child are of paramount importance,” the archbishop said.

“The safeguarding policy will be circulated to every parish in the country, so that every organisation within the Church is in line with the South African legal system.”

The policy, which has been under discussion over the past years, will ensure a “transparent and effective response” if cases of abuse arise, Archbishop Slattery said.

“It places responsibility on the [Church] hierarchy and on people in parishes, schools, classes, orphanages, playgrounds and so on.

All are responsible to ensure the utmost care is taken of our children.”

The Church’s current protocol, which has been in place since 2007,

requires that all reports of abuse be dealt with strictly and with the highest level of attention by Church authorities. “If there is a case to answer, we immediately call the police and social welfare,” Archbishop Slattery said.

The news of extra protocols comes ahead of an expected surge in local interest in abuse cases in the Church with this month’s South African release of the film Spotlight, which highlights the failure of the authorities to act on abuse cases in the archdiocese of Boston.

The movie reflects “a very sad” episode in the Church, Archbishop Slattery said.

“It was a terrible abuse [by] the Church, where the diocese authorities and parishioners tried to keep [allegation of sexual abuse of minors by priests] quiet,” he said.

In the movie, a link is made between the incidence of abuse by priests and the Latin-rite Church’s obligation of clerical celibacy.

“Celibacy is not a cause of abuse, it is something deeper than that,” Archbishop Slattery said.

“It is a failure of spirituality. It is a lack of authority.”

He also noted “a failure of the Church authorities to act with speed and responsibility” when abuse cases were reported.

Principal honoured

Dominicans elect new local head STAFF RePoRTeR

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EETING at the Franciscan retreat centre La Verna in Vanderbijlpark, the Dominicans of Southern Africa elected Fr Stan Muyebe as their new vicar-general.

He succeeds Fr Sikhosiphi Mgoza.

Fr Muyebe, currently coordinator of the bishops’ Justice & Peace Commission, is a canon lawyer who also holds a PhD in theology and law from Stellenbosch University.

The former parish priest of Our Lady of Mercy parish in Springs has also studied accounting and has served as the local Dominicans’ bursar for the last eight years.

Frs Martin Badenhorst, Chaka Motanyane, Damazio Ngoma andMyke Mwale were elected diffinitors.

The councilor is Fr Dominic Chihota; two substitute council-

lors are Fr Raphael Ntlou and Fr Clement Mweni.

The Dominican chapter, or meeting, was a scene of special celebration as Dominicans and Franciscans came together to witness the professions of six young Dominicans into the hands of the Fr Mgoza, as outgoing vicar-general.

The simple and colourful ceremony was attended by the Franciscan community of La Verna and about 12 Franciscan Sisters as well as all the Dominican Friars of Southern Africa.

“The festive nature of the ceremony was marked by jubilant singing which underscored that the Dominicans were celebrating their 800th jubilee and almost 100 years of ministry in South Africa,” Dominican Father Emil Blaser told The Southern Cross.

Nana Francis Amponsa, who is from Ghana and had just completed his novitiate, made profession for three years.

H

outgoing dominican vicar-general Sikhosiphi Mgoza (third from right) with Brothers making their professions (from left) Nana Amponsah, Kelvin Banda, Wilbroad Mulenga, evans Zulu and isaac Mutelo.

(Right) Newly dominican vicar-general Stan Muyebe.

Isaac Mutelo, Godfrey Chikaura, Evans Zulu, Kelvin Banda and Wilbroad Mulenga renewed their profession for one

Pilgrimage to Fatima, Santiago de Compostela, Lourdes and Paris Led by Fr. Robert Mphiwe 10 – 20 May 2016 R 29 995.00 Incl. Airport taxes Pilgrimage to The Holy Land Led by Fr. Teboho Matseke 10 – 26 September 2016 R 25 995.00 incl. Airport taxes Limited Space Available

Fr emil Blaser oP and Charles Vesazie sort out parcels of The Southern Cross for distribution to Johannesburg parishes. For several years Radio Veritas has taken over the weekly delivery of the parcels to most Johannesburg parishes. The parcels are couriered from Cape Town, where they are printed, because the Post office cannot guarantee delivery.

Similarly, The Southern Cross couriers parcels for West Pretoria parishes to a central parish, in Queenswood, from where they are collected every week.

The Southern Cross is grateful for all the collaborators in the social communications apostolate who go out of their way to ensure that Catholics have access to the only Catholic national weekly in South Africa.

The percentage of abusive priests was relatively small, he said, as the number of priests believed to be involved in abuse is less than 4%, possibly as low as 2%.

These numbers are the same as those in other churches and nonChristian religious groups, he said.

“Overall, Catholic priests are a decent group of men,” Archbishop Slattery said. Sexual abuse of minors “is a problem across the whole society. We need to re-examine the whole society.” n See page 10 for a review of Spotlight and an overview of what the US Church has done following abuse revelations in that country.

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year. They will now continue their studies at St Joseph’s Theological Institute in Cedara, KwaZuluNatal.

OLY Cross High School in Maitland, Cape Town, has paid tribute to its principal who has retired after 33 years at the school.

Erna Lehy (pictured) became the school’s principal in 2010. She decided to hang up the proverbial chalk at the end of 2015 to devote more time to her family, including three granddaughters.

She came to Holy Cross as a young teacher and mother in 1983 “to help out for a short while” because sisters who had been teaching were transferred elsewhere. The supposed few months turned into more than three decades.

Following the unexpected death of Sr Margaret McGovern, Mrs Lehy, then deputy principal, became the first lay principal at Holy Cross.

The farewell for Mrs Lehy, a yacht club member, was nautical, with a bus trip to Hout Bay harbour for a lunch.

She is succeeded as Holy Cross principal by Michael Fouché.

4

The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

INTERNATIONAL

Eucharistic Congress: Catholics ‘belong to a story’ M

By SiMoNe oReNdAiN

St elijah monastery in Mosul, iraq, which has been destroyed by islamic State militants. iraq’s oldest Christian monastery could not be saved despite a preservation effort that was mounted to save the 1 400-year-old site. (Photo: courtesy Fr Jeffrey Whorton/CNS)

Pope to Sweden for Reformation anniversary

By CARoL GLATZ

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OPE Francis will visit Sweden in October to participate in an ecumenical service and the beginning of a year of activities to mark the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.

Leaders from the Catholic Church and the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) had already been set to meet on October 31 for the ecumenical celebration in Lund, Sweden, where the LWF was founded in 1947.

Pope Francis “intends to participate” in the joint ceremony to commemorate next year’s anniversary.

The announcement came on the last day of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.

Pope Francis will lead the ecumenical commemoration in Lund alongside Bishop Munib Younan, president of the Lutheran World Federation, and the Rev Martin Junge, federation general secretary.

“The event will include a common worship based on the recently published Catholic-Lutheran ‘Common Prayer’ liturgical guide,” and will highlight ecumenical developments between Catholics and Lutherans over the past 50 years.

Cardinal Kurt Koch, council president, said: “By concentrating together on the centrality of the question of God and on a Christocentric approach, Lutherans and Catholics will have the possibility of an ecumenical commemoration of the Reformation, not simply in a pragmatic way, but in the deep sense of faith in the crucified and resurrected Christ.”

Rev Junge said in the joint statement that the federation “is approaching the Reformation anniversary in a spirit of ecumenical accountability”.

“By working towards reconciliation between Lutherans and Catholics, we are working towards justice, peace and reconciliation in a world torn apart by conflict and violence,” he added.

The common prayer document is the first jointly developed liturgical material prepared by a task force made up of representatives of the official Lutheran-Catholic Commission on Unity.

The prayer includes materials to be adapted to the local liturgical and musical traditions of the Catholic Church and Lutheran communities.—CNS

7-21 MAY 2015

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EDIA personality Bishop Robert Barron said popular culture’s message of individuals being “infinitely right” is “repugnant to [Catholics’] eucharistic faith”. But he also said Christianity is “running on fumes” as it tries to counter the trend of people leaving the Church or staying away from the Eucharist.

“To stretch out like someone dying of hunger is the right attitude towards the Eucharist,” Bishop Barron said at the 51st International Eucharistic Congress in Cebu, Philippines. “What’s sad today is so many in the Catholic world have become blasé about the Eucharist.”

At a news briefing after his presentation at the congress, he said that, unlike the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche’s ideology of selfinvention, Catholic faithful “did not invent [their] own story, we belong to a story” and that is “God’s drama”.

Bishop Barron—author of numerous books and auxiliary of Los Angeles—said the call of the Church today is to retain Catholics and attract new ones.

“If the Church can’t find a way to tell that story in a theo-dramatic way, people will drift away to this easy self-invention philosophy,” he said. “So it is a real challenge to the Church. ...We’ve got to be bold.

We’ve got to be confident. We’ve got to be smart.”

Patrician Brother Peter John Hayes of Ballyfin, Ireland, was in the crowd of about 12 000 who listened, took notes and clicked cameras as the bishop drove home the message of the Eucharist as a meal, a sacrifice and “the real presence” of Christ.

The bishop used a reading from the Gospel of Luke as an example of the two disciples who did not realise that the risen Lord was right next to them on Easter.

Bishop Barron said they were “walking the wrong way”, turning away from God as everyone does, since people are all sinners. And that made it hard to recognise Jesus in

People wave irish flags before Mass during the 51st international eucharistic Congress opening ceremony in Cebu, Philippines. (Photo: Francis Malasig, ePA/CNS) their midst. But once they heard his words and were compelled by the power of his life, then begged him to stay, he shared a meal with them and gave the same command he had given the night before he died, “Do this in memory of me”.

People ignore Jesus’ commands all the time, said Bishop Barron, but “over the centuries that one dominical command has been massively obeyed”. That revelation of the pattern of Jesus’ life in the breaking of the bread is the moment the faithful “get it” and are no longer walking the wrong way, he added.

The bishop highlighted the Eucharist as a sacrifice, a theme that he said was the least-known and leastdeveloped.

Bishop Barron emphasised that God does not need the sacrifices of the faithful because he “doesn’t need anything”, but by returning something to God, they “are united to him”.

T

wo Asian Church leaders urged participants in the congress to follow the example of Pope Francis, working to reach people on the periphery.

The pope's envoy to the congress,

Samurai, gaucho to become saints

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OPE Francis has advanced the sainthood causes of ten men and women, including the Argentine “gaucho priest”, Bl José Gabriel del Rosario Brochero (18401915), known for his ministry to the sick and the dying.

The pope also recognised the martyrdom of Justo Takayama Ukon, a 17th-century Japanese samurai who died shortly after he was exiled to the Philippines for being Catholic.

The pope also signed a decree recognising a miracle attributed to Bl José Sánchez del Río, a 14-year-old Mexican boy martyred for refusing to renounce his faith during the Cristero War of the 1920s.

In recognising the miracle attributed to Bl Brochero, the pope has cleared the way for him to become Argentina’s first saint. Pope Francis has expressed his admiration for the priest, saying that he was a man who “did not stay in the sacristy combing the sheep”.

In addition, he recognised a miracle attributed to Polish Blessed Stanislaus Papczynski, founder of the Marians of the Immaculate Conception. He was born in 1631 and died in Poland in 1701.

As in the case of Argentina’s “gaucho priest”, the miracles in the causes of Bl Papczynski and Bl Sánchez prepare the way for their canonisations.

Clearing the way for beatification ceremonies, Pope Francis also recognised miracles attributed to Italian Father Francesco Maria Greco, founder of the Little Workers of the Sacred Heart, who died in 1931, and Elisabetta Sanna, an Italian widow who died in 1857.—CNS

Cardinal Charles Bo of Yangon, Myanmar, said that the Eucharist should compel people to share with the less fortunate. He said that was why he declared a third- world war on poverty days before, while celebrating the opening Mass for the congress.

“We prepare missiles of charity and missiles of sharing,” said the cardinal. “There are many poor people, not because things are not sufficient, resources are not sufficient, not because food is not sufficient, but because of poor distribution.”

Archbishop José Palma of Cebu added: “We have seen images of the Holy Father really doing this... reaching out to the prisoners, to the poor.

And expect, for instance, certain revisions in the curia that would even manifest this love for people. Even the declaration of the Year of Mercy is also one way of making us aware that at the heart of Christianity should be the spirit of sharing love.”

Cardinal Bo added that in meetings with “many Christian leaders” of other denominations and also leaders of other religions, they have told him that in the world there is no other leader like Pope Francis.— CNS

‘Don’t confuse marriage with other kinds of unions’

By CARoL GLATZ

P

OPE Francis said there can be no confusion between God’s plan for marriage as an indissoluble bond between one man and woman who are open to life, and other sorts of unions.

“The Church, in fact, can demonstrate God’s unwavering merciful love towards families, especially those wounded by sin and life’s trials, and at the same time proclaim the essential truth of marriage according to God’s plan,” the pope said in a meeting with members of the Roman rota.

Pope Francis said that when the Church, through the court’s service, seeks to declare the truth about marriage in each specific case, it always bears in mind that those “who, through free choice or unfortunate circumstances in life, live in an objective state of error continue to be the object of the merciful love of Christ and therefore of the Church, too”.

The two gatherings of the Synod of Bishops focused on the family were occasions of “in-depth, knowledgeable discernment” and they gave the Church a chance to tell “the world that there can be no confusion between the family desired by God and any other kind of union”, the pope said.

“The family, based on indis-

soluble, unitive and procreative marriage, is part of God’s ‘dream’ and the Church’s for the salvation of humanity,” he said.

The Church will always offer the truth about marriage, he said, “not as an ideal for the few, despite modern examples based on what is fleeting and transitory, but as a reality that, with Christ’s grace, can be lived by all the baptised faithful”.

The Church—as both mother and teacher—knows that not every one of her children is perfect, he said.

“The Church knows that some Christians have a faith that’s strong, formed from love, strengthened by good catechesis and nourished by prayer and a sacramental life,” the pope said, “while others have a faith that’s weak, neglected, unformed, poorly taught or forgotten”.

“The lack of formation in the faith and even error concerning the unity, indissolubility and the sacramental dignity of marriage invalidate matrimonial consent only when they determine” or condition a person’s will, he said.

Precisely for this reason, “errors which concern the sacramentality of marriage must be evaluated very carefully”, he said.—CNS

INTERNATIONAL

The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

5

Iran’s president to pope: Pray for me

By CARoL GLATZ

M

EETING with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani at the Vatican, Pope Francis told him he had high hopes for peace.

And while Pope Francis usually asks those he meets for their prayers, the Shiite cleric pre-empted the pope’s request and said: “I ask you to pray for me.”

President Rouhani, who was in Europe to build political and economic ties after Iran’s historic nuclear agreement, met with the pope for private talks with the aid of translators. The president then had a separate meeting with Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state.

The recent international agreement limiting Iran’s nuclear programme was discussed as well as “the important role Iran is called to play with other nations in the region in promoting adequate political solutions to the problems that afflict the Middle East, opposing the spread of terrorism and arms trafficking”, the Vatican said in a written communique.

Also underlined during the discussions were “the importance of interreligious dialogue and the responsibility of religious communities in promoting reconciliation, tolerance and peace”, the Vatican said.

iranian President Hassan Rouhani exchanges gifts with Pope Francis during a private meeting at the Vatican. (Photo: Andrew Medichini, Reuters/CNS) “During the cordial conversations, common spiritual values were highlighted” and “the good state of relations between the Holy See and the Islamic Republic of Iran” was recognised, the Vatican said.

Mention also was made of how the Catholic Church in Iran and the Holy See seek to promote “the dignity of the human person and reli-

gious freedom”.

The small Catholic community in Iran dates back to the Church’s early centuries and has had a long history of living in harmony with the Muslim majority; there are some restrictions on full religious freedom, including the risk of the death penalty for those who convert from Islam.

After their closed-door meeting, Pope Francis greeted the 12-person Iranian delegation and accepted gifts from the president.

Speaking in Persian, Mr Rouhani said the intricately designed rug he was giving was “handmade in Qom”, a city considered holy for Shiite Muslims. The pope gave Rouhani a large medallion of St Martin of Tours giving his cloak to a poor person. The pope told the president that the medallion’s image depicted “a sign of selfless fraternity”.

The pope also gave him a copy of his encyclical letter Laudato Si’ and apologised there was no translation of the document in Persian, but “I’m giving it to you in English” and he explained a copy in Arabic is online.

As he was leaving Mr Rouhani said through a translator, “I ask you to pray for me,” and told the pope it had been “a true pleasure” and wished him good luck with his work.—CNS

Sr Maria Carlota de la Santa Cruz from Nicaragua makes a snow angel outside immaculate Conception church in Washington. She travelled to Washington with a Church group for a March for Life. Her group became snowed in when a blizzard hit, and they had to stay in Washington to weather out the storm. (Photo: Jaclyn Lippelmann, Catholic Standard/CNS)

Israel’s land grabs ‘harm peace hopes’

By JUdiTH SUdiLoVSKy

English cardinal warns: ISIS recruits I teens at an ‘astonishing speed’

By SiMoN CALdWeLL

I

T can take just one month to turn a disenfranchised teenage Catholic student into a fanatical Islamic terrorist, an English cardinal warned Catholic teachers.

Cardinal Vincent Nichols of Westminster told delegates at a London conference to guard against the Internet recruitment of vulnerable secondary school students by ISIS. The cardinal spoke to the Secondary Leaders’ Conference of the Catholic Association of Teachers, Schools and Colleges and the Catholic Education Service in London.

A combination of naivety, isolation, loss of shared values and easy access to the Internet are making children in their early teens prime targets for the terror group, his speech said.

It said that from his discussions with young people who have flirted with invitations to join Islamic State, he had learned that children, typically ages 14 or 15, were being recruited at astonishing speed.

“One said that it was clearly possible to bring a person to the point of being willing to leave all for the sake of their newfound cause, even to the point of embracing violence or suicide, within a four- or fiveweek period,” Cardinal Nichols said.

“One month is all it takes to transform a dissatisfied and disorientated teenager into a terrorist,” he added.

“We are talking about the age of children in your schools, in your care. We are talking about youngsters around here,” he said.

The speech described how one high-achieving girl he spoke to was dissuaded from joining ISIS at the last minute and only after long discussions “about what she wanted in life and what she stood to lose”.

The cardinal told educators that jihadis were targeting such children because they considered them to be “clean skins”, people “as yet unformed by substantive values, left ‘value-free’ by their life thus far”.

Many recruits, the cardinal said, were isolated by the modern world and often wished to be part of

something greater, and “may be finding life to be rather flat, functional and boring”.

Islamic extremists use the Internet to propose the existence of “a coherent, or at least seemingly coherent, whole” and to focus vulnerable teenagers into a narrative “which compels and captivates”.

“This is the skill that can obviously be put to good use, but it is also the skill of the recruiters of violence,” Cardinal Nichols said.

Catholic educators, the cardinal said, must have the courage to propose an authentic Christian purpose to young people that is equally as captivating as the false narrative of the terrorists.

Although Muslim converts make up 4% of Britain’s 2,7 million Muslims, they represent 11% of those convicted of terrorism offences.

One of the most high-profile cases is that of Michael Adebowale and Michael Adebolajo, converts from Christianity who were jailed for life for the murder of Lee Rigby, an off-duty soldier, in 2013.—CNS

SRAEL’S appropriation of about 1 5378km2 of Palestinian agricultural land in the Jordan Valley is another action that hinders the implementation of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a lawyer for a Catholic legal aid group said.

“Every time such a thing happens, it is a step further from the implementation of the original vision of having a two-state solution and leaves people in a state of despair and with a loss of hope of having any possibility of a settlement,” said Raffoul Rofa, executive director of the Society of St Yves.

“The issue of land appropriation is nothing new. It has been going on for years,” said Mr Rofa, who has contested similar confiscation cases for the past 18 years.

The land to be taken over is located north of the Almog settlement near Jericho in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, according to Israel Army Radio. It is entirely under Israeli control and is already being used as farmland

by Jewish settlers in the area.

Israel uses a 19th-century Ottoman Empire-era law, which holds that if parcels lay fallow and neglected for more than ten consecutive years, then the sultan, as ultimate ruler of the area, could take over the land and give it to someone else to use and make pro-

Muslim leaders affirm minority rights

M

USLIM leaders from around the world adopted a declaration defending the rights of religious minorities in predominantly Muslim countries.

Participants said the Marrakesh Declaration was based on the Medina Charter, a constitutional contract between the Prophet Muhammad and the people of Medina.

The declaration said the charter, instituted 1 400 years ago, guaranteed the religious liberty of all, regardless of faith.

The conference included Muslim leaders from more than 120 countries, representatives of persecuted religious communities and government officials.

Chaldean Catholics from Iraq were also represented The declaration said “conditions in various parts of the Muslim world have deteriorated dangerously due to the use of violence and armed struggle as a tool

for settling conflicts and imposing one’s point of view”, which has enabled criminal groups to issue edicts that “alarmingly distort” Islam’s “fundamental principles and goals”.

“It is unconscionable to employ religion for the purpose of aggressing upon the rights of religious minorities in Muslim countries,” the declaration said.

It called on: • Muslim scholars “to develop a jurisprudence of the concept of ‘citizenship’ which is inclusive of diverse groups”.

• Muslim educational institutions to review their curricula to address material that “instigates aggression and extremism, leads to war and chaos, and results in the destruction of our shared societies”.

• Politicians and leaders to take necessary steps to legally “fortify relations and understanding among the various religious groups in the Muslim world”.

• All members of society “to establish a broad movement for the just treatment of religious minorities in Muslim countries and to raise awareness as to their rights, and to work together to ensure the success of these efforts”.

• Religious groups to remove “selective amnesia that blocks memories of centuries of joint and shared living on the same land”.

The declaration said cooperation must be based on “A Common Word”, a statement issued in 2007 and originally signed by 138 Muslim scholars and endorsed later by dozens of other Muslim leaders.

Addressed to then-Pope Benedict XVI and the heads of other Christian Churches, the statement called for new efforts at Christian-Muslim dialogue based on the shared belief in the existence of one God, in God’s love for humanity and in people’s obligation to love one another.—CNS

ductive. The law’s aim was to support productivity while ensuring tax revenues for the sultan, Mr Rofa said.

But Israel, instead of giving the land to other Palestinians from the same village as the lands’ owners or from nearby villages, gives the land to Jewish settlements to be annexed, he said.

“It is very clear that this creates “pockets” on the ground, making it more and more difficult for the Palestinian Authority to expand into those areas,” he said.

Mr Rofa said most of the people who would be affected by the Jordan Valley land appropriation— the largest since August 2014 when Israel took over almost 4 000km2 in the Bethlehem area — are members of the nomadic Bedouin tribes living in the area.

The Israeli civil administration has been intent on resettling Bedouins living in the eastern periphery of Jerusalem and in the Jordan Valley to established villages that would leave huge tracts of land open to confiscation, Mr Rofa added.

“If there is no political will to stop these things from happening, legal action can mostly only delay them but not prevent them,” he said.

“Sometimes we are successful here and there, but mostly if something like this happens, it is a foregone conclusion that eventually they will take it.”—CNS

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The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

LEADER PAGE LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Nuclear power must lead the mix

Editor: Günther Simmermacher

T

A test of leadership

W

HEN Jacob Zuma takes to the parliamentary podium to address South Africa in his annual State of the Nation address on February 11, he will have an opportunity to showcase the successes of his government, but also to explain the alarming accumulation of blunders and scandals that have emanated from his administration.

Later this year South Africans will vote in the local elections.

While these municipal polls usually do not generate the enthusiasm of national elections, the 2016 version will provide a barometer of the nation’s mood, especially concerning the performance of the Zuma-led African National Congress.

With the ANC’s national conference, in which the party elects its national executive committee, due in December 2017, the local elections may well influence the future leadership of the party, and therefore the country.

If the electorate repudiates the Zuma-led ANC, then the party’s membership could decide that a fundamental change in leadership is necessary, for the good of the ANC and the country.

The local elections will be a valid testing ground for the future of Mr Zuma and his faction, unlike the ill-conceived and divisive #zumamustfall campaign which serves only to strengthen the president’s backing among those who otherwise might waver in their support.

With the effects of a freefalling economy—which is subject to external pressures outside the government’s control as well as systemic internal failure— being felt by almost all strata of our society, the nation now seeks

the authentic leadership which the electorate expected Mr Zuma to provide when it again entrusted the fortunes of the country into his hands in 2014.

Of late, the necessary quality of leadership we should expect from our president has been painfully absent. The State of the Nation address will be the pivotal point at which Mr Zuma must convince South Africans that he is a good and serious leader.

This means that the failings of his government cannot be glossed over or giggled away, nor ascribed wholly to apartheid or racism or the enemies of transformation.

True leadership requires the humility to take responsibility for failures while finding concrete ways to redress these.

A leader who cannot provide these elementary qualities should relinquish his position, and thereby demonstrate a modicum of leadership.

We need a leader who takes concrete action against maladministration and corruption, removing—and not strategically deploying—those who fail ethical measure.

We need a leader who can persuasively reassure South Africans and the rest of the world that he has the capacity and gravitas to address the economic and social crises facing the country.

We need a leader whose motivation is to serve the people, and not to be served by them.

The South African public is entitled to ask: Is Mr Zuma still capable of becoming such a leader, late into his presidential career?

And if he isn’t, are there any plausible leaders who can guide South Africa out of its present shadows?

Respond to school for deaf appeal

T

HE letter “School for the deaf needs urgent help” (January 6) refers.

Several years ago a similar appeal was made to our parish in Wynberg, Cape Town, and we recall that there was a favourable response, with several families supporting the appeal.

I am sure our Catholic spirit will again come to the fore and assist the school, in the short-term.

I would like to suggest that people who have “My School” cards make the school—the Dominican School for the Deaf, Wittebome—a beneficiary or co-beneficiary.

The Editor reserves the right to shorten or edit published letters. Letters below 300 words receive preference. Pseudonyms are acceptable only under special circumstances and at the Editor’s discretion.

Name and address of the writer must be supplied. No anonymous letter will be considered.

Some schools have an income from these cards that is in the R10 000s.

It could also be that this appeal will give the better resourced and wealthier Catholic schools an opportunity to review their outreach programmes and include a fellow “Catholic” school, albeit a Western Cape government-owned school, in their portfolio of fundraising distribution, if they are not already sponsors.

We wish Pam Fortune and her team every success.

Rodney Leak, Cape Town

HE bishops’ Justice & Peace Commission has called for a costly referendum on nuclear reactors (January 13), but such a poll is effectively happening this year in the form of local elections.

Let this matter, if it is important enough, be widely used as the basis, among other things, for the people’s votes.

But first allow me to also make some comments after my research about some statements made: 1. From a safety perspective, there have been only three noteworthy incidents, of which even the most severe (Chernobyl unit 4 only), was not so severe as to directly cause huge numbers of casualties and deaths. The Soviet government acted on it immediately by evacuating people, thereby avoiding long-term radiation effects.

In fact, the generation 1 technology used there was from the 1960s.

Technology has advanced to generation 3, and even generation 4 if we were to use fast-breeder reactors, which is highly recommended, since they do not produce any spent radioactive fuel elements which need to be stored safely for many years .

2. Renewable (solar and wind) energy is an excellent idea that I

Facebook racist

I

HAVE spent a good number of my 25 years of ministry as a priest in South Africa and cherished the goodwill, openness and forgiveness of the young students I was privileged to live and work with when I was a chaplain at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.

I was always amazed at their capacity to reach out to those who may have been very reticent to fully embrace the new South Africa.

Many of them keep in contact with me and I consider them as family.

And so I was very saddened and disturbed when a few of them drew my attention to the racist rant posted on Facebook recently by a woman from KwaZulu-Natal.

Her diatribe levelled at people celebrating the new year on Durban beaches was shocking and was made worse by her words of apology. I believed things had moved on from the day in 2001 when a opinions expressed in The Southern Cross, especially in Letters to the editor, do not necessarily reflect the views of the editor or staff of the newspaper, or of the Catholic hierarchy. The letters page in particular is a forum in which readers may exchange opinions on matters of debate.

Letters must not be understood to necessarily reflect the teachings, disciplines or policies of the Church accurately. letters can be sent to PO box 2372, cape town 8000 or editor@scross.co.za or faxed to 021 465-3850

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support strongly, but it can only be up to a maximum 25% of total capacity, since at night and when the wind does not blow there will be no power. Are you happy with that?

The alternative is to store the power in huge batteries for use during such times, which then makes it even more expensive than nuclear.

3. Coal power is out of the question due to the huge amount of greenhouse gases (GHG) emitted.

This invisible environmental pollution is causing global warming, and we are, after all, a signatory to COP21, saying we will reduce emissions to levels even below those 100 years ago. Gas power emits almost the same amount of invisible GHG. Coal power can be generated more cleanly, with carbon capture and storage (CCS)—but there is an additional cost to doing this, again pushing the price near nuclear’s.

4. The cost of not doing anything is even more expensive, as we have seen since 2008, with huge projects being cancelled as there is no power available for them, steadily reducing GDP and hence employment.

We have actually seen the increase in unemployment due to the government’s slow pace of building new power stations.

5. One suggestion is that we group of students I was with were refused entry to a hotel on the beachfront on the basis of their skin colour! Apparently not.

Sadly, the whole episode with the woman on Facebook raises grave concerns about the prevalence of racism and how it sinisterly manifests itself, both overtly and covertly, in the supposedly post-apartheid South Africa. It is a matter of grave concern that this woman’s thinking and frame of mind is shared by many of her fellow citizens.

The insidious nature of its manifestations was brought home to me recently too in a short documentary film, Luister, that gives testimony to the blatant racism experienced by students at the University of Stellenbosch. It is a truth-telling that deserves a lot more attention, and perhaps a wider circulation that will enable all of us to do some soul searching regarding our prejudices, and how the disease of racism destroys people’s lives.

I also had the good fortune of working with the Association of Catholic Tertiary Students at national and regional level. It is good to know that they are actively opposing any form of racism or discrimination at their institutions and that they are supporting the transformation of all colleges and universities in becoming equal and non-apartheid institutions.

I hope they will continue to

could rotate the limited electricity supply to the various people who support the various technologies.

Those who waste electricity should pay a premium.

In this way there will be enough electric power for the wheels of industry to keep turning, increase GDP, and create the employment we so desperately need.

6. We need plenty plus excess reserves of electricity to grow our economy reliably, and to do it responsibly without the damaging emissions from coal and gas.

The optimal base load is nuclear for say 50%, then 25% for coal with CCS, renewables with batteries for 25%, plus gas for peak loads, and then a 20% extra for reserves, for planned shutdown maintenance and unplanned breakdowns.

7. The inflated price of R1 500 billion given in the article for new nuclear plants already seems to have a large slice of the cake included for the negotiators. Corruption money is effectively stolen from the people of South Africa.

Corruption must be stopped, whatever the electric power source is, and it is here that the J&P Commission should focus its efforts, since large procurement projects should be acquired in a clean manner.

Frans van Neerijnen, Johannesburg speak up and that they will have the support of the Church and its leaders.

The late Archbishop Denis Hurley, who was vice-chancellor at the university when I was there, would indeed want all of us to speak out and surely he will support us from his place in heaven.

Fr Joseph McCullough SPS, London, UK

Keep the faith

I

HAVE read all too many letters which have suggested that we accept the current widespread culture and ethos.

One such letter was written by Chris Rawlins (December 2). Yet, I have also read many of the messages of Marian apparitions, such as those received at Medjugorje, which warn us of unexpected and unpleasant long-term consequences of accepting that culture.

In the debate, where does the human “wisdom” lie, and where do the revealed truths lie?

With a sense primarily of thanksgiving, I have attempted to embrace the Catholic faith and a life of prayer which is encouraged by the messages of the Marian apparitions.

O Blessed St Joseph, please give me the grace to persevere in the faith!

Patrick Q Gonsalves, Johannesburg

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PERSPECTIVES

The hijacking of carnival M Y long-suffering wife already sighs when she sees the posters, knowing that the moment I also spot them, I will morph from being the ray of boyish sunshine I think I am into the grumbling grouch whom I increasingly encounter in the mirror.

But invariably I will spot the sign that announces that the Cape Town Carnival will be held on March 12 this year—a month after Ash Wednesday! And inevitably my beloved will cut me short, having heard my objection that carnival refers to a particular time before Lent a thousand times before.

To be fair, Mrs S has also sat through my entire repertoire of jokes, stories and one-liners on countless social occasions.

Where at first, I presume, she was lavishly entertained by their undeniably charming punchlines, repetition has stripped my bon mots of their sparkle. So imagine what it must be like to hear my annual gripes about the term “carnival”, even if she were to agree with me.

But it needs to be said: One cannot have carnival in the middle of Lent, nor Mardi Gras in November, just as one can’t have Christmas in April or a football World Cup in December.

There is a reason why the Carnival in Rio—which is the event the Cape Town version evidently seeks to emulate—and Mardi Gras in New Orleans bear these names and why they always take place at the same time: in the days before Ash Wednesday, which is, as every reader knows well, the beginning of Lent.

The word “carnival” comes, depending on your sources, from the Latin carne vale (“farewell to meat/flesh”) or carnelevarium (“removal of meat/flesh), indicating a final celebration of carnivorous (and perhaps amorous) abandon before the season of Lenten fasting and penance begins.

In the final days before Lent, before the age of refrigeration and preservatives, Catholics and other Christians would empty their pantries of all Lenten-pro-

scribed foods which would spoil over the next 40 days, such as meats, fats and dairy products. Their consumption would be attended by all manner of merry-making before the fast would begin.

It is safe to say that the City of Cape Town neither envisages nor proposes the beginning of a season of gastronomic austerity following its carnival shindig.

Likewise, Mardi Gras is French for “Fat Tuesday”, indicating the feast that is to be had before the asceticism of Lent begins.

A

nglo countries have their equivalent in Shrove Tuesday, or Pancake Tuesday.

These things tend to be more restrained than a good old-fashioned Catholic carnival—flipping pancakes just isn’t a propitious premise for a wild fiesta.

Still, it’s a beloved tradition, even if in Britain (and doubtless elsewhere) the reason for the tradition is becoming lost.

Last year I saw a pancake fan on Facebook objecting to the prescription that Pancake Tuesday has to be on a Tuesday. I decided to be a ray of boyish sunshine that day and didn’t respond.

Historians will have sat patiently with

A reveller, wearing an elaborate hat showing a cathedral, celebrates the traditional Rose Monday carnival parade in düsseldorf, Germany. The carnival season precedes the penitential season of Lent.

(Photo: ina Fassbender, Reuters/CNS)

Günther Simmermacher

Point of Lent

their hands in the air while I was pontificating about the proper dates for carnival. And they are correct: there is indeed a strong theory that the Catholic preLenten celebrations absorbed older latewinter pagan traditions.

For example, there is evidence that the custom of dressing up with masks or disguises and the attendant mocking of the powerful—famously in the carnival celebrations in places such as Venice and various parts of Germany—goes back to non-Christian folk rituals.

There even was a Roman custom of fasting for 40 days, preceded by a period of revelry.

But carnival has been a festival governed by Christian impulse for at least 700 years. The pagans who once celebrated similar feasts aren’t around any longer; Christians still are, even if they are diminishing in numbers in some places.

In its truest sense, carnival is tied to a Christian, and particularly Catholic, identity—even if the manner of the festivities do not always accord with Catholic sensibilities.

All that is changing by the hijacking of the term. The term “carnival” is now used for all kinds of secular festivity at any time of the year; not only in South Africa but throughout the world, and any kind of funfair is now branded a “Mardi Gras” with no regard for the term’s religious roots.

My astute wife is prone to cut short my grumbles about that with the incontestable insight: “The meaning of words can change; get used to it.” As one who works with words, I know this to be true.

So in my ray of boyish sunshine mood I’d cheerfully agree with Mrs S. But the grumbling grouch in me still wants to know: “And what would have been so difficult about having a carnival on its proper day?”

Why we are called to Lenten fast Anthony T Gathambiri ODAY the sense of fasting is diminishing. Seeing fast food restaurants makes our stomachs growl, as though we are angry lions.

And yet, we need fasting more than ever in these times, even with these pressing desires for instant gratification.

St John Paul II once pointed out that “fasting has not lost its meaning; it ought to be rediscovered, especially in those parts of the world and in those circumstances where not only is there food in plenty but where one even comes across illnesses from overeating”.

This doesn’t mean that we need to punish our bodies by existing on bread and water every day. Fasting ought to be moderated. Moderation in all things, remember!

Fasting is necessary because we need to discipline ourselves. Like sports heroes are disciplined in their training and lifestyle in order to achieve top performance, so do we need discipline for spiritual gain.

The Lenten discipline of fasting helps us understand that food and other pleasures are not the only things that matter in life.

We need God in our lives: we need God in ourselves, we need God in our families, and we need God in our societies more than anything else. That is why fasting and prayer are paramount.

Fasting is a good means by which to deal with our sins. Fasting can help us control our appetites that sometimes rule us. For this to happen, one has to reflect on which elements of our indulgences distract us from following God. Whenever we progress materially,

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Point of Lent

A Christian Palestinian family breaks the Lenten fast at easter in Jifna, West Bank. our Lenten sacrifices must help us get closer to God. (Photo: debbie Hill/CNS) chances are that we forget God. When our business is doing well we might forget that we need God; when our children are excelling in school we might forget that we need God. After paying our rent and rates we might forget that we need God. Remember the parable of the rich fool who wallowed in luxuries (Lk 12:13–21)?

He told himself “relax my soul, eat and drink for you have everything”. And the Lord came for his soul.

We too can fall into this trap of forgetting that we need God at all times. Fasting humbles us and makes us realise the value of depending on God, and not on our wellbeing.

Dependence on God is healthy; independence from God is unhealthy.

F

asting is a means to conversion. On Ash Wednesday we will hear the invi-

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tation: “Repent and believe the Gospel.”

And for us to repent from our past lives, we need to extend our fast to things that are not healthy to our spiritual growth: greed, gossip, addictions, corrupting movies and so on.

Conversion is about recovering or deepening our relation with God; fasting from what doesn’t make us progress spiritually is an element of that conversion.

Fasting can help us to be in solidarity with others. Imagine giving the money you save from your Lenten fast—from alcohol, cigarettes, chocolate or cinema, for example—to a family that is struggling with school fees. Imagine using the time you take to watch soap operas to instead pray for the election of the right leaders.

Imagine skipping your afternoon nap to visit an aged person.

Spiritual fasting is a voluntary practice.

A voluntary fast is neither imposed by anyone nor do we do it because the law states that we must fast. God is not there to watch those who are not doing it. Our Lenten fast is for us; for our spiritual growth and of others too.

That is why we fast with a specific intention in our heart; fasting at Lent just for the sake of tradition or authority is meaningless.

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The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

7

Michael Shackleton

open door

Why our just God forgives sinners IN this Year of Mercy we are asked to show mercy to others. I cannot understand how God can be said to show mercy to us when we know that he is a just God and will punish sinners for their offences against his holy will.

F Joshua

T

HEOLOGIANS often describe God’s mercy as incalculable. Who could possibly know the divine criteria at the heart of God’s merciful judgments?

The love and mercy of God are evident in the person of Jesus Christ: “Therefore he had to be made like his brethren in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make expiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered and been tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted” (Heb 2:17).

This help that Christ offers is his mercy, his readiness to lift up the sinner despite the sin.

An example is found in the parable of the ungrateful servant. This wretched man owed a huge sum to his lord who, as a result, was prepared to sell him as a slave. On his knees the servant begged for time to pay. Pitying his distress, the lord forgave the debt entirely (Mt 18:23).

He could have given the man more time to pay. He didn’t. Moved by pity, his forgiveness was absolute.

When the servant abused this magnanimity by not forgiving a debt owed him by a fellow servant, the lord retracted his pity and punished the servant in full.

Jesus’ remark here is sobering: “So, also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart”.

This is the way God acts. When a sinner begs for forgiveness, God’s love takes over and forgiveness follows. In matters of serious sin the forgiveness comes through absolution in the sacrament of Reconciliation.

Our situation is somewhat the same as the servant’s. Sin offends God and he rightfully punishes us for it, but as soon as we beg for forgiveness, Christ grants it because he himself has suffered and been tempted and “is able to help those who are tempted”. His mercy is contained and expressed in his forgiveness.

Put it this way: God showed his mercy, his readiness to come to the aid of fallen humanity when he sent his Son to pay our debt and redeem us by his life, death and rising. Christ is the embodiment of divine mercy. All he asks is repentance for sin.

True sorrow for sin gains a judgment far more merciful than we can imagine.

n Send your queries to Open Door, Box 2372, Cape Town,

8000; or e-mail: opendoor@scross.co.za; or fax (021) 465 3850. Anonymity can be preserved by arrangement, but questions must be signed, and may be edited for clarity. Only published questions will be answered.

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The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

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The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

FAITH

9

How Lent helped me through a hard time Last year’s Lenten programme in an excellent parish was so faith-building, it gave CoLLeeN CoNSTABLe the strength to cope with an unusual series of turmoil

rael never slumbers nor sleeps” (121:2,4).

I

L

AST year Ash Wednesday fell on my birthday: a very profound encounter. It put me into a deep penitential mode.

The day was different. It was a day of obligation and the beginning of Lent, a period of prayer, fasting and almsgiving. I felt a need to “withdraw” from a busy world while still being active in the world.

I felt it was time for a special reflection. Lent offers opportunity to “empty ourselves”.

I embraced my Ash Wednesday birthday with a certainty of mind that I’ll go the extra mile. Recognising my own weakness to accompany the Lord during these 40 days and 40 nights, I looked forward to a new experience.

For inspiration, I turned to the women leaders of the early Church: the ones who supported Jesus during his earthly ministry and accompanied him during his Passion, when the apostles abandoned him.

I embraced Mary of Magdala, the “Apostle to the Apostles”. The Resurrected Lord revealed himself to her at a time when the testimony of women was not allowed in Jewish law.

She loved Jesus. She stayed by his side at the Foot of the Cross: a woman of great courage, inner strength and faith. She knew how to accompany Jesus during his earthly mission.

Turning to her for intercession during Lent seemed the perfect idea: she would know how to guide another woman. I looked forward to a spiritual journey that would rekindle the meaning of Lent in today’s world and for me as a single woman.

Inspired, I attended Holy Mass on the first Sunday of Lent, eager to sing Lenten hymns from the depth of my heart. Great was my disappointment: no Lenten hymns were sung. Dreading another Sunday Mass without Lenten hymns, I opted to become a parish-hopping pilgrim during Lent, even if it meant travelling some distances.

The decision turned out to be a blessing in disguise!

On the third Sunday of Lent I visited St John Fisher parish in Lynwood, Pretoria. What a blessed experience!

The parish was in Lenten mode and the atmosphere encouraged participation and engagement,

Station iX in a Way of the Cross designed by the late Fr Herman d’Hoore oMi at the Good Shepherd Retreat Centre in Hartebeespoort promises, “yet, i am not alone”. This insight, derived from an enriching Lenten programme at a Pretoria parish, helped writer Colleen Constable face a series of misfortunes in 2015. read, the voice became hoarse, overwhelmed by emotion and the emphasis placed on certain words could not be missed. This prayer was read with great faith from the heart of a penitent. The words sank into my soul and the cry for mercy became my own.

The parish created an engaging atmosphere and a 21st-century experience that draws souls closer to Jesus Christ.

The tension of Good Friday and the excitement of the Resurrection became visible as the days came closer to the Triduum. Under the leadership of the parish priest, the community celebrated Holy Thursday in a very profound manner.

They started with a Passover Seder, honouring God’s liberation of his people from slavery in Egypt, acknowledging that Jesus too participated in the Jewish Passover and that his Last Supper set the tone for the redemption of the world.

The Passover meal has a mystical element: a relationship between the Old and New Testament. It also symbolises the spiritual heritage between Jews and Christians. The celebration of the Passover Seder ended with the beginning of Holy Mass.

This communal gathering of the Passover Seder found parishioners sharing tables with strangers. It was my first Haggadah-Passover. Participation meant to practically connect as a spiritual family, with the rituals Jesus followed as a Jew, with his apostles, when he celebrated the Passover meal.

drawing people closer to Jesus.

Lenten songs, from the entrance to the recessional hymn, led by a small team of music ministry participants, characterised the Mass celebration. Before the Mass a short Lenten reflection was read to direct wandering minds. In his homily the parish priest offered encouragement, emphasising the necessity to avail oneself to others and their needs during this time. “You should become like bread,” he said.

O

n Fridays the parish gathered for Stations of the Cross—with a difference. The Eucharist was exposed during the Stations of the Cross, and various parishioners participated in reading the meditations. These meditations could also include reflections from parishioners’ own life experiences in relation to the Stations of the Cross.

The Stations of the Cross was followed by Benediction and Holy Communion.

It was no surprise to find a strong attendance at the Stations of the Cross. The intense spiritual reflection of the Stations of the Cross as presented by this parish community, strengthened by exposition of the Blessed Sacrament and engaging real-life experiences of those who so humbly and bravely volunteered to participate, is a true winner during a time of spiritual renewal.

Many times one could sense when a spiritual encounter occurred. One participant moved me.

As the prayerful meditation was

As the meal with its rituals progressed, at our table we got to know each other through the sharing of the bread (matza). We felt a deep sense of “togetherness” and unity, feeling part of each other, with boundaries suddenly disappearing.

It was the rituals which also instilled a deep sense of what it might have been like at the time Jesus shared the meal with his apostles.

The next morning, Good Friday at 9:00, the community held Stations of the Cross, which was very well attended. And there was another opportunity for confession: I too joined the long queue.

With so many people who sought God’s mercy in the sacrament of Reconciliation, it is evident that the spiritual message of Lent, through a proper programme that inspires the community and draws people closer to Jesus, delivered fruits.

Personally, the “Night of Holy Thursday 2015” was indeed different. With the Seder meal I discovered a practical connection with our Jewish roots as a Catholic Christian. And I grew in my faith with a deeper understanding of the mystical element that provides the spiritual link between the reality of the Old Testament and the New Testament truths.

This spiritual heritage is an established relationship with a God, a Triune God who is in control. The Psalmist states: “My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. Truly, the guardian of Is-

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Bishops close Consecrated Life Year

BY STUART GRAHAM

T

HE Church has paid tribute to the “heroic self-sacrifice and commitment” of South Africa’s religious community as the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference closed the Year of Consecrated Life at a Mass celebrated at the cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Pretoria.

Archbishop William Slattery of Pretoria presided, and Bishop Kevin Dowling of Rustenburg delivered the homily.

The cathedral was packed to capacity with female and male religious from the metropolitan provinces of Johannesburg and Pretoria joining all the bishops of the Southern African region.

In many ways the local Church was built on the foundation of the lives of the religious, Bishop Dowling said.

“They set up rural cl ini cs, schools, hospitals, farm schools, and other social ser vices years before the state came on the scene in some areas,” he said.

“That witness calls us to take from them relevant lessons for today.”

The reality of life today challenges the Church with many questions, he said.

For some of us, the questions is about discerning what God is calling us to as we experience the myster y of having to let go of

institutions and important pastoral and social ministries.

The “letting go” may be due to our limitations and also because the state has taken over some of what religious sisters and brothers pioneered.

“The myster y of ‘letting go’—whatever way we may be experiencing that now—all of us gathered here today witness in faith that God has done great things through you,” said Bishop Dowling, himself a member of a religious order, the Redemptorists.

“We are with all our religious today in gratitude and prayerful support as you—as we— discern together the present and the future.”

God is inviting us to imagine and creati vely bring to birth new forms of religious life and new forms of religious community, the bishop said.

“It is a question of how can we pass on our charisms to others, so that our spirit can continue in different, but nonetheless relevant ways especially through collaborative witness and ministries with our lay faithful as they live their baptismal calling, witness and mission.”

The Year of Consecrated Life began on November 29, 2014 and will be officially closed on February 2.

The Mass also saw the formal launch of the Catholic Board of Education.

SACBC department heads elected

For further info or to book contact Michael or Gail at 076 352 3809 or 021 551 3923 info@fowlertours.co.za www.fowlertours.co.za/ poland-2016/

B i s h o p s o n th e a l ta r o f Pr e to r i a ’s Sca r e d H e a r t c a th e d ra l a t a Ma s s to cl o s e th e Ye a r o f Consecrated Life. (Photo: Bishop Stanislaw Dziuba)

Local Lent book receives international praise

T

HE Jesuit Institute in Johannesburg has produced a book for Lent 2016 entitled Have Mercy, O Lord! The book was inspired by the Jubilee Year of Mercy which Pope Francis opened in December.

“Mercy” is the underlying theme that unites the book which was written by six people, all staff of the Institute: Jesuit Fathers Russell Pollitt and Anthony Egan, Annemarie Paulin-Campbell, Puleng Matsaneng, Grant Tugay SJ and Frances Correia.

Each writer brings a unique perspective: some tell stories, others share from their own experience and others draw on their ministerial experiences to make the text relevant and challenging.

vine Mercy Sunday.

The book also contains poems, written

Southern

Poland

Led by Bishop Stan Dziuba 13 - 21 May 2016

Kraków | Wadowice (on St John Paul II’s birthday) | Black Madonna of Częstochowa | Niepokalanów (St Maximilan Kolbe) | Divine Mercy Sanctuary | Warsaw | Kalwaria Zebrzydowska (with miraculous icon) | Zakopane | Wieliczka Salt Mine (with Mass!)

=

Feed your soul every week with The

S outher n C ross

IT’S WORTH IT!

t was three months after the Lenten programme that I found myself in the midst of personal turmoil. In early July 2015 I was stalked in broad daylight in a parking area opposite a mall. No one came to my rescue. With inner strength from above, I stayed calm and collected and managed to escape. In mid-July 2015 I became a victim of commercial crime and suffered a financial loss. I reported the matter to the police.

In August 2015, six days after moving house, I had two car accidents (by God’s mercy, no injuries).

I was not at fault both times.

First a woman crashed into the rear of my car at an intersection, citing failure of her brakes. My car was written off by the insurance.

Five days later another woman crashed into the rear of the courtesy car I drove, citing that she had a blackout. I had to pay the agency fees to open a claim for the repair of the courtesy car. I found myself without a car for weeks and depended on assistance from “Good Samaritans”, who, I discovered, are not always easy to find.

I have worked and lived in three other provinces in the country, lived and studied abroad. I was never faced with so many difficulties or challenges at the same time.

The lesson I learned from this experience is that my faith was tested through material loss, financial loss, lots of difficulties and complexities.

Would I, who had participated so actively in a Lenten programme, have had the faith to embrace this challenge? Or might I have asked: “Why me?”

Spiritual programmes increase our sense of God’s presence in our everyday lives: in good times and in bad times. By God’s grace and mercy, in the midst of turmoil and much uncertainty, I found inner peace deep within my soul. I knew that God is in control: I am not alone.

Now, with the dust settled, I know that the inner strength I had at the time, the inner peace I found in the midst of so much turmoil and the faith I had that the Lord is with me during all my difficulties, was truly his presence in my life.

Our lives cannot be without trials and tribulations: it is part of our human destiny. Suffering deepens character and strengthens us. It increases our faith, as we are never alone.

The Lord said: “And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age” (Mt 28:20). n Colleen Constable is founding CEO of the South African Institute for Violence Prevention and is an institutional transformational consultant.

THE JOURNEYS OF A LIFETIME!

Year of Mercy Pilgrimage

HOLY LAND 15 - 27 october 2016 Led by

Fr Larry Kaufmann CSsR

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10

The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

MEDIA

Spotlight film illuminates painful history The awards-nominated film Spotlight, about how the Boston Globe newspaper broke the clerical sex abuse crisis in 2002, is opening in South Africa this month.

JoHN MULdeRiG reviews the movie.

T

HE clergy abuse-themed drama Spotlight is a movie no Catholic will want to see.

Whether it’s a film many mature Catholics ought to see is a different question entirely.

This hard-hitting journalism procedural—which inescapably invites comparison with 1976’s All The President’s Men—recounts the real-life events that led up to the public disclosure, in early 2002, of a shocking pattern of priestly misconduct within the archdiocese of Boston. In the process, the equally disturbing concealment of such wrongdoing on the part of highranking Church officials also was laid bare.

One of the picture’s themes is the way in which Boston’s inwardlooking, small-town mentality contributed to the long-standing cover-up. For the supposed good of the community, locals suppressed the knowledge of what was happening, subconsciously choosing not to see what was transpiring just behind the scenes.

So it’s appropriate that the

whitewash begins to peel away with the arrival of a stranger to the Hub, the newly imported editor of the Boston Globe, Marty Baron (played by Liev Schreiber). Marty’s outsider status isn’t just based on his geographical origins; he’s also Jewish.

Perplexed that his paper has devoted so little attention to the earliest cases in what would become, over time, an avalanche of legal actions against clerics, Baron commissions the investigative unit of the title, which specialises in indepth investigations of local stories, to dig deeper.

Led by even-keeled Walter “Robby” Robinson (Michael Keaton), the Spotlight team— which also includes tightly wound Mike Rezendes (Mark Ruffalo), intrepid Sacha Pfeiffer (Rachel McAdams) and relentless research whiz Matt Carroll (Brian d’Arcy James)—uncovers a widespread and sickening scandal involving scores of clergymen and hundreds of young victims.

Director and co-writer Tom McCarthy maintains a taut rhythm as he focuses primarily on the dogged professionalism required to breach the walls of secrecy surrounding a respected, and therefore protected, institution.

And his script, penned with Josh Singer, apportions blame across a broad spectrum that includes the Globe itself—John Slattery plays veteran editor Ben Bradlee Jr (son of Ben Bradlee Sr, the Washington Post editor featured prominently in All The President’s

Rachel McAdams, Mark Ruffalo and Brian d’Arcy James in a scene from the movie Spotlight, which charts the investigation in Boston into sexual abuse by priests. John Mulderig, chief reviewer of Catholic News Service, writes that “this generally accurate chronicle can provide...valuable insight into one of the darkest chapters in ecclesiastical history”. (Photo: open Road Films/CNS) Men), whose semi-willful blindness to the problem typifies the attitude discussed above.

Like most of his colleagues, Slattery is a former Catholic, distanced from but not—initially at least— embittered towards the faith in which he was raised. Witnessing the further fraying of the reporters’ already fragile ties to the Church

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adds to the overwhelming sense of grief Catholic viewers will feel throughout Spotlight. Yet this generally accurate chronicle can provide them with a valuable insight into one of the darkest chapters in ecclesiastical history.

The movie is open to a few criticisms, large and small, however.

The portrayal of Boston’s then-

archbishop, Cardinal Bernard Law (Len Cariou), is predictably negative. But it also includes details that are subject to interpretation.

Thus Cardinal Law’s gift to Marty Baron of a copy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church is treated as both a religious and social snub. Yet Cardinal Law played an important role in translating that landmark text into English, so his gift may have been motivated more by a sense of pride in one of the most significant accomplishments of his career than by a desire to cut the newcomer down to size.

Much more significantly, the screenplay’s uncritical adoption of the results of research conducted by ex-priest A W Richard Sipe (a figure heard but not seen) opens its analysis to legitimate questioning.

The thesis that the scandal was the inevitable outcome of the Latin Church’s tradition of priestly celibacy—a discipline Mr Sipe maintains is routinely violated by fully half the clergy, thus creating a culture of secrecy among them —is ill-founded, to say the least.

To dispute that theory, however, is not at all to downplay the horrifying nature of what unfolds under this otherwise painfully illuminating Spotlight.

The film contains mature themes, multiple, sometimes coarse, references to perverse sexual acts, several uses of profanity as well as a few rough and numerous crude terms.—CNS

US Church now leading the way in keeping kids safe from abuse

By MARK PATTiSoN

C

ATHOLIC leaders, both ordained and lay, said in op-ed essays they welcomed the attention to be paid to the Catholic Church with the movie Spotlight, which chronicles the Boston Globe’s uncovering of the clergy sex abuse scandal in the archdiocese of Boston in 2002.

In the essays, published on the film’s US release, they say the changes made by the Church since the revelations made by the Globe have made children safer.

“No institution in the United States has done more in recent years than the Catholic Church to take proactive steps to protect children from the evil of sexual abuse,” wrote Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington in a letter emailed to Catholics in his archdiocese.

“While the film focuses on events of the past, viewers may think that the film is portraying the present situation in the Church, concluding that nothing has changed in the Church’s response to the sexual abuse of minors,” said an op-ed essay by Francesco Cesareo, chairman of the US bishops’ National Review Board.

“However,” Mr Cesareo added, “it is important to realise that the Church has implemented numerous successful steps in the years since the revelations of abuse.”

The all-lay National Review Board was established by the bishops in 2002 to provide an independent review of policies and programmes the bishops were establishing to prevent and respond to sexual abuse of minors, and assess their compliance in implementation of the “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People” through an annual audit of each US diocese and eparchy.

Cardinal Wuerl outlined

steps taken in the Washington archdiocese to stop what he called the “shameful evil” of abuse.

“My wish is that other entities, like the public school system, would attempt to do what the Church has done and offer the same level of protection to children in their care as we do,” Cardinal Wuerl said.

“For this reason, the archdiocese has shared its materials with public schools and other societal institutions, and we have offered to meet with them to explain all we do to protect young people.”

‘O

ver the last 13 years, the Church has created safe environments for children and become a place where victims and survivors can begin a process of healing,” Mr Cesareo said in his essay, published in The Catholic Free Press, newspaper of the diocese of Worcester, Massachusetts.

“Bishops across the United States—and around the world— have sought forgiveness for the lapses in Church policy and decisions made that led to harm for its most innocent and cherished members,” he said, “and will continue to apologise to victims and survivors for the abuse they have endured.”

But “the Church has done more than apologise. It has enacted an aggressive programme to encourage prevention of such abuse and to provide a comprehensive support system for victims and survivors,” added Mr Cesareo.

To date, he said, more than 1,9 million adults, or 98%, working in Catholic parishes and schools in the US have gone through background checks and had the training, and more than 4,4 million children, or 93%, in parishes and schools have been taught how to protect themselves from abuse and how to report an incident should it occur.

In another column in The Catholic Free Press, Bishop Robert McManus of Worcester said it is “painful” to recall “the crisis of abuse of children by members of the Catholic Church” with the advent of Spotlight.

“These crimes were heinous and they represented a broken trust on the part of some leaders in the Church to those who were harmed. While we are committed to restoring that trust, we know it will take time,” he wrote.

“Yet it would be naive to think this is a problem that is limited to the Catholic Church or even to faith groups in general.”

He quoted Pope Francis at the time the Holy Father established the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors to oversee the global Church’s response to sexual abuse: “Everything possible must be done to rid the Church of the scourge of the sexual abuse of minors and to open pathways of reconciliation and healing for those who were abused.”

The president of the commission is Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston—successor to Cardinal Bernard Law, who resigned amid criticism of his handling of clerical sex abuse cases.

In a statement, Cardinal O’Malley said: “The media’s investigative reporting on the abuse crisis instigated a call for the Church to take responsibility for its failings and to reform itself— to deal with what was shameful and hidden—and to make the commitment to put the protection of children first, ahead of all other interests.”

He added: “We have asked for and continue to ask for forgiveness from all those harmed by the crimes of the abuse of minors. As archbishop of Boston I have personally met with hundreds of survivors of clergy abuse over the last 12 years, hearing the accounts of their sufferings and humbly seeking their pardon.”—CNS

CLASSIFIEDS

Sr Brigitte Koch CPS

P

RECIOUS Blood Sister Brigitte Koch died on January 16 at the age of 91 at the congregation’s convent in Mariannhill.

She was born Theresa Koch on May 18, 1924 near Paderborn, Germany, as the third of six children to Hermann and Franziska Koch.

Her father was a railway official, but the family also owned a small farm. All her long life Sr Brigitte retained a strong bond with her family, and she suffered greatly when she could no longer go on home leave.

The family was staunchly Catholic. From early childhood Sr Brigitte was well acquainted with the Missionary Sisters of the Precious Blood of Neuenbeken, her home village, because some of them made home visits to the family, and, if the need arose, also nursed and cared for sick family members.

It was therefore almost self-evident that, when Sr Brigitte experienced the call to religious life in 1947, she decided to join the congregation, making her first profession in 1953.

In February 1954 she was missioned to South Africa, where she committed herself to God forever

on August 15, 1956.

Here her readiness for any good work was tested right from the beginning. Her secret wish had been to become a teacher, like one of her aunts whom she greatly admired. God and her superiors, however, had different plans for her. She was asked to train for nursing at St Mary’s Hospital, Mariannhill.

In 1958 she became a registered and surgical nurse. Sr Brigitte nursed in St Mary’s Hospital from 1954-68. She applied herself fully and with great dedication to her task.

For some time she also tutored the student nurses. Those who studied under her found her very

Liturgical Calendar Year C – Weekdays Cycle Year 2 Sunday February 7 Isaiah 6:1-8, Psalms 138:1-5, 7-8, 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, Luke 5:1-11 Monday February 8, St Jerome Emiliani, St Josephine Bakhita 1 Kings 8:1-7, 9-13, Psalms 132:6-10, Mark 6:5356 Tuesday February 9 1 Kings 8:22-23, 27-30, Psalms 84:3-5, 10-11, Mark 7:1-13 Wednesday February 10, Ash Wednesday Joel 2:12-18, Psalms 51:3-6, 12-14, 17, 2 Corinthians 5:20--6:2, Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18 Thursday February 11, Our Lady of Lourdes Deuteronomy 30:15-20, Psalms 1:1-4, 6, Luke 9:22-25 Friday February 12 Isaiah 58:1-9, Psalms 51:3-6, 18-19, Matthew 9:14-15 Saturday February 13 Isaiah 58:9-14, Psalms 86:1-6, Luke 5:27-32 Sunday February 14, 1st Sunday of Lent Deuteronomy 26:4-10, Psalms 91:1-2, 10-15, Romans 10:8-13, Luke 4:1-13

good in imparting knowledge.

Her insistence that “everything must be correct” was well remembered by students.

Sr Brigitte’s readiness to be of service is well demonstrated in her acceptance of transfers to a number of mission stations. She served at Reichenau mission from 1968-72, doing housework and caring for the guests. From 1972-75 she did laboratory work in Centocow hospital.

She was put in charge of the sisters at St Michael’s mission from 1976-77. After that she served in Tre Fontane Lodge and then as a nurse in Sacred Heart Home.

She joined the Mariannhill Liturgical Vestment Department in 1985. A year later she worked in the Mariannhill convent mending room and from 1986 till her retirement in 2004 in the mending room of Tre Fontane Lodge.

When her health began to fail, she became wheelchair bound.

Sr Brigitte was a woman of strong character. She had a lively personality and a good sense of humour. She found her strength and consolation in a very intense prayer life.

Southern CrossWord solutions SOLUTIONS TO 692. ACROSS: 1 Salt, 3 Ashkelon, 7 Cuticle, 8 Glory, 10 Evening Mass, 11 Ampler, 13 Shinto, 15 Outbuilding, 17 Shawl, 18 Algebra, 19 Tuesdays, 20 Here. DOWN: 1 Secretaries, 2 Lithe, 4 Sleigh, 5 Looks on, 6 Accidental, 8 Graphology, 9 Year of Grace, 12 Profane, 14 Sugary, 16 Imbue.

community calendar To place your event, call Mary Leveson at 021 465 5007 or e-mail m.leveson@scross.co.za (publication subject to space)

cAPe tOWn: Helpers of god’s Precious infants. Mass on last Saturday of every month at 9:30 at Sacred Heart church in Somerset Road, Cape Town. Followed by vigil at Marie Stopes abortion clinic in Bree Street.

Contact Colette Thomas on 083 412 4836 or 021 593 9875 or Br daniel SCP on 078 739 2988.

DUrbAn: Holy Mass and novena to St Anthony at St Anthony’s parish every Tuesday at 9am. Holy Mass and Divine Mercy

Devotion at 17:30pm on first Friday of every month. Sunday Mass at 9am. 031 309 3496.

9018 or 031 209 2536.

Overport rosary group.

At emakhosini Hotel, 73 east Street every Wednesday at 6.30 pm.

Contact Keith at 083 372 nelSPrUit: Adoration of the blessed Sacrament at St Peter’s parish every Tuesday from 8:00 to 16:45, followed by rosary, Divine Mercy prayers, then a Mass/communion service at 17:30pm.

ST. KIZITO CHILDREN’S PROGRAMME St. Kizito Children’s Programme (SKCP) is a community-based response to the needs of orphans and vulnerable children, established through the Good Hope Development Fund in 2004 in response to the Church’s call to reach out to those in need. Operating as a movement within the Archdiocese of Cape Town, SKCP empowers volunteers from the target communities to respond to the needs of orphans and vulnerable children (OVCs) living in their areas.

The SKCP volunteers belong to Parish Groups that are established at Parishes in target communities. Through the St. Kizito Movement, the physical, intellectual, emotional and psycho-social needs of OVCs are met in an holistic way. Parish Groups provide children and families with a variety of essential services, while the SKCP office provides the groups with comprehensive training and on-going support.

In order to continue its work, SKCP requires on-going support from generous donors. Funds are needed to cover costs such as volunteer training and support, emergency relief, school uniforms and children’s excursions. Grants and donations of any size are always appreciated. We are also grateful to receive donations of toys, clothes and blankets that can be distributed to needy children and families.

if you would like to find out more about St. Kizito Children’s Programme, or if you would like to make a donation, please contact Wayne Golding on 021 782 2880 or 082 301 9385 email info@stkizito.org.za. donations can also be deposited into our bank account: ABSA Branch: Claremont, 632005; Account Name: St Kizito Children’s Programme ; Account Number: 4059820320 This advertisement has been kindly sponsored

The Southern Cross, February 3 to February 9, 2016

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Births • First Communion • Confirmation • engagement/Marriage • Wedding anniversary • ordination jubilee • Congratulations • deaths • in memoriam • Thanks • Prayers • Accommodation • Holiday Accommodation • Personal • Services • employment • Property • others Please include payment (R1,60 a word) with small advertisements for promptest publication.

in MeMOriAM

gOUVeiA—edwardo. in loving memory of edwardo Gouveia 16/2/1944 to 30/7/2010. Although you cannot be with us, our love will never die, and your love is always guiding us from way up in the sky.

Missing you always, your loving wife, children, grandchildren and all the family.

HOliDAY AccOMMODAtiOn

lOnDOn: Protea House.

Single ₤30(R540), twin ₤45(R810) per/night. Selfcatering, busses and underground nearby. Phone Peter 0044 208 7484834.

KnYSnA: Self-catering accommodation for 2 in old Belvidere, with dStv and wonderful lagoon views.

044 387 1052.

MAriAnellA Guest House, Simon’s Town: “Come experience the peace and beauty of God with us.” Fully equipped with amazing sea views.

Secure parking, ideal for rest and relaxation. Special rates for pensioners and clergy. Malcolm Salida 082 784 5675, mjsalida@ gmail.com SOUtH cOASt: Uvongo.

Holiday flat, full security, belinda@kmchurch.za.org

tO let

MOrningSiDe, Sandton: Furnished apartment, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 1 lounge/dining room, 1 TV lounge with large patio, 2 undercover parkings.

Rental R12 000, one-year lease. 083 455 0445.

PrAYerS

tHAnK YOU, Ss Jude and Rita for prayers answered.

Jenny Randles HOlY St JUDe, apostle and martyr, great in virtue and rich in miracles, kinsman of Jesus Christ, faithful intercessor of all who invoke you, special patron in time of need. To you i have recourse from the depth of my heart and humbly beg you to come to my assistance. Help me now in my urgent need and grant my petitions. in return i promise to make your name known and publish this prayer. Amen.

Thank you for prayers anLOVING FATHER bless us, the people of AFRICA, and help us to live in justice, love and peace Mary, Mother of Africa, pray for us

For prayer leaflet: sms your name + postal address 083 544 8449

swered. Leon and Karen.

HOlY SPirit you make me see everything and show me the way to reach my ideals. you give me the divine gift to forgive and forget. in all instances of my life you are with me, protecting me and opening for me a way where there is no way. i thank you for everything, and confirm once more that i never want to be separated from you, no matter how great the material desires. i want to be with you and my loved ones in your perpetual glory. Amen. Say this prayer for 3 consecutive days. Publication promised. AF

AlMigHtY eternal God, source of all compassion, the promise of your mercy and saving help fills our hearts with hope. Hear the cries of the people of Syria; bring healing to those suffering from the violence, and comfort to those mourning the dead. empower and encourage Syria’s neighbours in their care and welcome for refugees. Convert the hearts of those who have taken up arms, and strengthen the resolve of those committed to peace. o God of hope and Father of mercy, your Holy Spirit inspires us to look beyond ourselves and our own needs. inspire leaders to choose peace over violence and to seek reconciliation with enemies. inspire the Church around the world with compassion for the peo-

ple of Syria, and fill us with hope for a future of peace built on justice for all. We ask this through Jesus Christ, Prince of Peace and Light of the World, who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

Amen. Prayer courtesy of the USCCB. O Virgin Mother, in the depths of your heart you pondered the life of the Son you brought into the world. Give us your vision of Jesus and ask the Father to open our hearts, that we may always see His presence in our lives, and in the power of the Holy Spirit, bring us into the joy and peace of the kingdom, where Jesus is Lord forever and ever.

Amen

PerSOnAl

AbOrtiOn iS MUrDer: Silence on this issue is not golden, it’s yellow! Avoid pro-abortion politicians.

AbOrtiOn WArning: The truth will convict a silent Church. See www. valuelifeabortionisevil. co.za ViSit PiOUS KintU’S official website http://ave maria832.simplesite.com This website has been set up to give glory to the Most Holy Trinity through the healing power of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.

View amazing pictures of Pious Kintu’s work in Congo and various African countries since 2007. Also read about African Stigmatist Reverend Sister Josephine Sul and Padre Pio among others.

DeceASeD cAtHOlic PrieSt HAS LeFT BeHiNd VoLUMeS oF CoiNS, STAMPS ANd TiNKA ToyS NeediNG VALUATioN ANd NoW FoR SALe To Aid PooR MiSSioNS. PLeASe ReSPoNd THRoUGH THe SoUTHeRN CRoSS. 021 465 5007.

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cASA SerenA The retirement home with the Italian flair.

7A Marais Road, Bedfordview, Jhb. Provides full board and lodging, medical services and transport.

Senior citizens wishing to retire in this beautiful Home, please phone

011 284 2917 www.casaserena.co.za

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the

1st Sunday in Lent: February 14 Readings: Deuteronomy 26:4-10, Psalm 91:1-2, 10-15, Romans 10:8-13, Luke 4:1-13

S outher n C ross

Start your Lenten journey

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N Wednesday we start our six-and-ahalf-week journey towards Easter, and next Sunday is the first Sunday of Lent.

As always, on the first Sunday of this sombre season, we are asked to reflect on Jesus’ temptations (symbolic of the ways in which we are tempted); and all temptation is the seductive suggestion that we are gods, and not creatures.

So the first reading tells them what the Israelites are to do when they come into the longed-for Promised Land; they are to make it clear that it is God who has brought them there, by offering to the Lord the “first fruits” of the land, and to recite their history: “A wandering Aramean was my father, and he went down to Egypt, and was an immigrant there with a small house.”

Then comes the reminder of what God did for them: “The Lord brought us out from Egypt with a mighty hand…and he made us come into this place and gave us this Land, a land flowing with milk and honey, and now, behold, I have brought you the first-fruits of the soil, which you gave me, Lord.”

That is to say, they (we on our Lenten jour-

ney) are not to forget what God has done for them, not to suppose for a moment that it is we who have done it all.

The psalm offers immense confidence in this God: “The one who dwells in the shade of the Most High, in the shadow of the Almighty says to the Lord, ‘My refuge and my fortress—my God, I trust in him.’ ” So our Lenten journey is not attracting God’s benevolent attention by the severity of our fasting, but simply a matter of letting God do it, in this Year of Mercy; for we can trust this God: “For he commands his angels for you, to keep you in all your ways.” We listen to God’s promise to satisfy us “with length of days” and show us “my saving power”.

For Christians, of course, we speak not only of God but also of Jesus; Paul argues that the covenant at Sinai includes the mention of Jesus as “Lord”: “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe with your heart that God raised him from the dead, you are going to be saved.” That is all that we have to do on our Lenten journey,

not worry about giving up gin. And Paul argues, powerfully: “No one who believes in him is going to be put to shame…everyone who calls on the name of the Lord is going to be saved.”

The Gospel sums all this up. Since it is Luke whom we are following this year, and Luke is the Gospel of the Spirit, we find two references to “the Spirit” (“full of the Spirit… led in the Spirit”) in the opening verse.

Then we gaze in astonishment as Jesus endures just the same temptation to deny God that we too have known. First, the “devil” raises the question of the voice that Jesus (and we) had heard at his baptism: “If you are the Son of God”, and invites him, hungry as he is after forty days of fasting, to do a conjuring trick, “tell this stone that it is to turn into bread”, in other words to play God. Effortlessly, Jesus rebuffs the temptation with a quotation from Deuteronomy: “It is written that human beings shall not live on bread alone” (and he does not need to add what follows, “but on every word that comes

God’s kiss on our soul W

Hence we come into the world already knowing, however dimly, perfect oneness, perfect truth, perfect goodness, and perfect beauty because they already lie inside us like an inerasable brand.

Thus we can tell right from wrong because we already know perfect truth and goodness in the core of our souls, just as we also instinctively recognise love and beauty because we already know them in a perfect way, however darkly, inside ourselves.

In this life, we don’t learn truth, we recognise it; we don’t learn love, we recognise it; and we don’t learn what is good, we recognise it. We recognise these because we already possess them in the core of our souls.

S

ome mystics gave this a mythical expression. They taught that the human soul comes from God and that the last thing God does before putting a soul into the body is to kiss the soul. The soul then goes through life always dimly remembering that kiss, a kiss of perfect love, and the soul measures all of life’s loves and kisses against that primordial perfect kiss.

The ancient Greek Stoics taught something similar. They taught that souls preexisted inside God and that God, before putting a soul into a body, would blot out the memory of its pre-existence. But the soul would then be always unconsciously drawn towards God because, having come from God, the soul would always dimly remember its real home—God—and ache to return there.

Conrad

HAT is the real root of human loneliness? A flaw within our make-up? Inadequacy and sin?

Or, does Augustine’s famous line, “You have made us for yourself, Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you”, say it all?

Augustine’s adage, for all its merit, is not quite enough. We are infinite souls inside finite lives, and that alone should be enough to explain our incessant and insatiable aching. Except there is something else, that is, our souls enter the world bearing the brand of eternity and this gives all of our aching a particularised colouring.

There are various explanations of this.

For example, Fr Bernard Lonergan SJ, the much-esteemed theologian and philosopher, suggests that the human soul does not come into the world as a tabula rasa, a pure, clean sheet of paper onto which anything can be written. Rather, for him, “we are born with the brand of the first principles indelibly stamped inside our souls”.

What does he mean by this?

Classical theology and philosophy name four things that they call transcendental, meaning that they are somehow true of everything that exists, namely, oneness, truth, goodness, and beauty. Everything that exists somehow bears these four qualities.

However, these qualities are perfect only inside God. God alone is perfect oneness, perfect truth, perfect goodness, and perfect beauty. For Fr Lonergan, God brands these four things, in their perfection, into the core of the human soul.

For further info or to book contact Michael or Gail at 076 352 3809 or 021 551 3923 info@fowlertours.co.za www.fowlertours.co.za/ poland-2016/

Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI

Sunday Reflections

from the mouth of God”).

Secondly, therefore, there is the vision of “all the kingdoms of the world”, and the offer to “give you all this authority”, provided only that Jesus treats the devil as God. This gets the answer: “The Lord your God shall you worship—and him alone are you to adore.”

So to the final temptation, another invitation to play God: “Throw yourself down” (from the pinnacle of the Temple), and the devil even manages to quote today’s psalm: “He will command his angels to guard you.”

Jesus responds, “You shall not test out the Lord your God”, and that is the end; “Having completed every temptation, the devil went away from him until the right time”, which is presumably a reminder to us of the Passion that awaits Jesus at the end of Lent.

There is the invitation to us, to remember that we are not God, and that it is our task in Lent simply to follow our Lord on the journey.

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In one rather interesting version of this notion, they taught that God put the soul into the body only when the baby was already fully formed in its mother’s womb.

Immediately after putting the soul into the body, God would seal off the memory of its pre-existence by physically shutting the baby’s lips against its ever speaking of its pre-existence.

That’s why we have a little cleft under our noses, just above the centre of our lips: it’s where God’s finger sealed our lips.

That is why whenever we are struggling to remember something, our index finger instinctually rises to that cleft under our nose. We are trying to retrieve a primordial memory.

Perhaps a metaphor might be helpful here. We commonly speak of things as “ringing true” or “ringing false”. But only bells ring. Is there a “bell” inside us that somehow rings in a certain way when things are true and in another when they are false? In essence, yes!

We nurse an unconscious memory of once having known love, goodness, and beauty perfectly. Hence things will ring true or false, depending on whether or not they are measuring up to the love, goodness, and beauty that already reside in a perfect form at the core of our souls.

And that core, that centre, that place in our souls where we have been branded with the first principles and where we unconsciously remember the kiss of God before we were born, is the real seat of that congenital ache inside us which, in this life, can never be fully assuaged.

We bear the dark memory, as Fr Henri Nouwen says, of once having been caressed by hands far gentler than we ever meet in this life.

Our souls dimly remember once having known perfect love and perfect beauty. But, in this life, we never quite encounter that perfection, even as we ache for someone or something to meet us at that depth.

This creates in us a moral loneliness, a longing for what we term a “soulmate”—a longing for someone who can genuinely recognise, share and respect what’s deepest in us.

St John Paul II Pilgrimage to Poland Southern Cross

Nicholas King SJ

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ACROSS

1. You are the ... of the earth (Mt 5) (4) 3. Samson killed 30 men here (Jg 14) (8) 7. Lice cut from the fingernail (7) 8. It’s given to God the Most high (5) 10. Vigil eucharist (7,4) 11. More than enough is enough (6) 13. Religion of Japan (6) 15. Not in constructing the shed (11) 17. The Jewish man wears this at prayer (5) 18. Mathematician’s way to grab ale (7) 19. They dawn before the start of Lent (8) 20. Where are you now? (4)

DOWN

1. They keep the minutes for Zodiac sign after Crete’s move (11) 2. Supple (5) 4. We hear there’s slaughter in snow transport (6) 5. Behaves as a spectator (5,2) 6. A lactic end that’s unintended (10) 8. Study of your handwriting (10) 9. Good period for Christians (4,2,5) 12. Secular, not religious (7) 14. Sweetly sentimental when Gary joins us (6) 16. Instil (5) Solutions on page 11

CHURCH CHUCKLE

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MAN and his young son were on a trip far from home. They decided to attend Sunday Mass in a smalltown church.

The father had forgotten to bring his cash but found a R1 coin in his pocket which he gave to his son to drop into the collection box.

After Mass the father complained: “The Mass was too long, the sermon was boring, the choir was off key.”

The boy disagreed: “Dad, I thought it was pretty good for a rand.”

A journey to the places of St John Paul II’s life and devotions, led by a Bishop who knows Poland intimately.

Led by Bishop Stan Dziuba 13 - 21 May 2016

Kraków | Wadowice (on St John Paul II’s birthday) | Black Madonna of Częstochowa | Niepokalanów (St Maximilian Kolbe) | Divine Mercy Sanctuary | Warsaw | Kalwaria Zebrzydowska (with miraculous icon) | Zakopane | Wieliczka Salt Mine (with Mass!)