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Bishop: Our politicians don’t respect the Church BY erIn CAreLSe

Mario Lala, an Italian missionary based in Goodwood, Cape Town, speaks about his experience in the neocatechumenal Way, at the Great Mission in the Square event on a rainy Saturday morning in Cape Town’s city centre. Mr Lala, his wife Anna and their ten children lived as a missionary family in england for 20 years before coming to South Africa a few years ago. On his left is Stefan Michalski, a Polish seminarian.

A

BISHOP has expressed his disappointment at the lack of representation by elected leaders at the closing ceremony of the year-long bicentennial celebration of the Catholic Church in Southern Africa.

In a Facebook post, Victor Phalana of Klerksdorp noted the absence of the premier of the Western Cape, the mayor of Cape Town and the national presidency—all of whom were invited to the celebrations at the Velodrome in Bellville, Cape Town.

At the celebrations, Archbishop Stephen Brislin of Cape Town conveyed the apologies of President Cyril Ramaphosa. Despite the presidency’s undertaking to send a representative, the chair reserved for that delegate remained empty.

No messages from Premier Helen Zille or Mayor Patricia de Lille were read out.

Bishop Phalana wrote that “this government and these two parties [African National Congress and Democratic Alliance] don’t take us [the Catholic Church] seriously”.

“We have a membership of more than 4 million in South Africa. We have contributed to the liberation of this country. After the government, we are the largest provider of services to the poorest of the poor in the area of healthcare, education, social services and justice and peace. Yet, these governments— local, provincial and national—undermine us,” Bishop Phalana said.

“Well, we are not a political party. For them to undermine us like this, and to ignore our invitations, is enough,” he wrote.

Noting anti-Catholicism during the colonial and apartheid eras, Bishop Phalana wrote: “We had hoped that now, in the new era, we would have a better relationship with this government, but unfortunately it ended with

Missionaries take to city centre Archbishop Stephen Brislin and nuncio Archbishop Peter Wells at the bicentennial celebrations. (Photo: Sydney Duval) [Nelson] Mandela. He appreciated the Church and the support he received while he was on Robben Island. He respected the bishops; he attended their functions and responded to the invitations of the Catholic churches.”

The celebration saw 5 000 worshippers, 20 bishops, 90 priests, 19 deacons and 70 religious from all over the region gather together, with Archbishop Brislin presiding over the Mass (see page 2).

Archbishop Brislin said that both parties had responded to the invitations sent out and indicated their officials would not be able to attend due to previous commitments.

“It must be said that the invitations to political leaders went out later than we hoped as there was uncertainty as to where the bicentennial celebration would be held, and the last-minute change from Stellenbosch to the Velodrome. I am quite sure that no offence was intended by any of these leaders and that they would have attended if they could have,” Archbishop Brislin told The Southern Cross.

BY LAuren O’COnnOr-MAY

M

ISSIONARIES from all over the world “walking” in Neocatecumenal Way gathered at in central Cape Town for the “Great Mission in the Square”.

The gathering, which included singing, dancing and the telling of their experiences, kicked off the mission which began in cities all around the world.

This mission was in response to Pope Francis’ call to the 200 000 people who gathered in Rome on May 5 for the 50th anniversary of the Neocatechumenal Way. “Mission is giving what we have received.

Mission is fulfilling Jesus’ mandate which we have heard: ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all peoples’,” the pope said.

“The words of the pope set our communities in motion,”said Dino Furgione, an Italian missionary based in Cape Town who is responsible for the Neocatechumenal Way in Southern Africa.

“This ‘Mission in the Squares’ gives us the opportunity to meet many people who would never enter a church. They see people of different ages and colours singing and praying together. Many stop and receive a word, they have the possibility to experience

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the beauty of the Church,” he said.

Marco Malacaria, a missionary in Pretoria, also from Italy, said: “We are amazed by the response of people. While we were busy setting up for the mission a man approached us and started to talk to some of our sisters. He was just curious about who we were and what we were doing there.

“He was a normal man, well-dressed, you would not have expected that he was carrying an unbearable burden of suffering. He opened up and told the sisters about his plan to commit suicide. They encouraged him to stay with us and we talked for a long time with him,” Mr Malacaria said.

“He cried when he listened to the witnesses of the other brothers and he stayed with us the whole morning. At the end he was very consoled and he joined in the singing and dancing. He thanked us many times for what we had done for him.”

The mission in central Cape Town is continuing every Saturday morning until July 14.

“We go into the streets out of gratitude for what the Lord has done in our lives,” said Mr Furgione. “We see that the Lord uses what we do to touch the hearts of people. That is our reward.”

October 2019

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The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

LOCAL

SA Church at 200: We must have hope

BY SYDneY DuVAL

T

HE spirits of the past, the missionaries and pioneers, converged with the pilgrim Church of the present to celebrate the closing Mass of the bicentennial founding of the Catholic Church in South Africa.

Some 5 000 people gathered at Bellville Velodrome, Cape Town, on the feast of St John the Baptist to reflect with Archbishop Stephen Brislin on the planting of the seed in the river Jordan—the faith seed that was carried across oceans to Cape Town, where it took root, then spread across the land over the following 200 years.

There to share in celebration igniting renewal were apostolic nuncio Archbishop Peter Wells and the bishops of Southern Africa, including Cardinal Wilfrid Napier of Durban.

The all-ticket celebration was marked by joyful singing. Liturgical dance groups from across the archdiocese led the entrance procession, followed by religious orders and congregations, whose members carried banners identifying them with an expression of their future vision of the ongoing life of the local Church.

Growth of missionary seeds Mgr Andrew Borello, vicar for pastoral development in the archdiocese of Cape Town, introduced the Eucharistic celebration with a warm welcome to all present, saying it was also a thanksgiving for all who had been a part of the realisation of the Church in Southern Africa.

“Two hundred years ago, as those first missionaries came to Southern Africa, they could never have imagined what the seeds they were sowing would become,” Mgr Borello said.

“Equally, we need to pray for the future of the Church in Southern Africa as she faces huge social, political and economic challenges in a rapidly changing society—that she may speak to these challenges with a prophetic voice.”

Archbishop Brislin, who is also

Left: Anglican Bishop raphael Hess of Saldanha Bay greets Archbishop Stephen Brislin at the final celebration of the Church’s 200 years in the region. right: One of the liturgical dance groups from Cape Town archdiocese. (All photos: Sydney Duval) the president of the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference, took as the opening theme of his homily the words of Pope John Paul II: “Remember the past with gratitude, live the present with enthusiasm, and look forward to the future with confidence.”

The bicentennial celebrations over the past year had indeed recalled the past with gratitude, especially the religious congregations responsible for establishing the Church in the region, he said.

“But,” the archbishop added, “we have not forgotten the ordinary men and women who, over the past two centuries, have sacrificed so much, and with such generosity, that we can rejoice today in the faith handed on to us.”

Archbishop Brislin continued: “As we bring to a close this year of celebration, it is appropriate now to look to the future. The baton of the faith is in our hands; we are entrusted not only with our faith but the faith of future generations.”

The archbishop noted that we are living in a time of “rapid and confusing changes in the world and the

Church”.

“The very foundations of our faith and values seem to have slipped from beneath us—even in our own families we experience this divergence from what we believe.

But knowing we are entrusted with the baton of the faith, another question arises,” he said.

Dismissive secular world “It is the same question many asked John the Baptist when he was baptising in the River Jordan. They went to him and asked: ‘What must we do?’ Given the complexities and confusion of our times, we need to ask: ‘What must we do?’”

The answer, the archbishop said, is to “bear witness in the world, to be the light of the world, as commanded by Jesus himself”.

Archbishop Brislin said that with fundamental Christian values not only questioned but dismissed today, many have experienced a knock to their confidence and self-esteem.

He attributed this to several major reasons: secularisation, the abuse cases, and divisions within the Church.

The archbishop associated secularisation with religion, especially in the West, having lost its social and cultural significance. Within modern societies, faith lacks cultural authority, and religious organisations have little social power. The practice of religion is tolerated but viewed as a private affair that should not impinge on the public domain. Faith is ultimately considered subject to secular law, even in areas of moral teaching.

On the issue of abuse, Archbishop Brislin said the number of cases of child abuse by Catholic clergy and others, as well as the bad handling of a number of those cases, has caused a deep lack of confidence in Church authority.

“Rightly, we experience profound shame,” he said.

“We know this has happened due to human weakness, and that does not mean that our faith is wrong.

But a consequence of the abuse cases is disillusionment and insecurity.”

While diversity of views within the Church is a blessing from God, Archbishop Brislin said, the aggressive promotion of ideologies is divisive and tears people apart.

Siege mentality will fail us

Clergy and bishops at the final celebration of the Church’s bicentennial year in Bellville, Cape Town.

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“The problem with losing confidence in our faith or our mission, even if we know the reasons for it, is that it can lead to a siege mentality,” he said.

“We are tempted to seek security by remaining among like-minded people, fearing to go beyond what is comfortable.

“It may cause us to idealise the past, believing in a ‘golden era’ of our faith which we should try to recapture.” This, he said, “is a foolish endeavour since we live in the world of here and now with all its present problems, mentality and attitudes”.

Archbishop Brislin told the faithful that they can only look to the future and embrace the challenge to be the light of the world.

This requires a “missionary offensive”—a New Evangelisation.

“The missionary era of the Church is not over and never will be until the Kingdom of God is brought to perfection,” the archbishop said.

A first response to the situation is to express our willingness to be Christ’s instruments, by focusing our lives on Christ.

A second response is not to succumb to the attempts to “privatise”

religion, wittingly or unwittingly.

Other responses require us to be compassionate to people in their struggles.

Focus on whole human good Archbishop Brislin said we must know that the greatest gift the Church has to offer humanity is its teaching on the “whole human good”, which is why it is not simply one lobby group among others.

He listed three examples of what the late English Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor had in mind when he said the Church had a perspective and a wisdom which our society could not afford to exclude or silence.

The first, the archbishop said, is our fundamental belief in the dignity and sanctity of life—whether the life of a strong healthy young person, a mentally challenged person, a street person, one at the end of their life, or life in the womb. Each person was made in the image of God, and thus no person should be exploited or enslaved, demeaned or derided.

The second is the economy. The Church does not offer a blueprint on practice, but argues that the economy is at the service of people, rather than people at the service of the economy. No person should be treated as a commodity. The economy must operate within a moral framework and must advance the common good.

The third is the Church’s teaching on marriage and family.

“We cannot be fulfilled as persons without others,” Archbishop Brislin said. “The family is the foundation of society and, consistently, people express the importance of family in their own experience. Yet, we live in a era of experimentation with the meaning and structures of marriage and family.

“The undermining of the concept of marriage as a lifelong commitment of fidelity between a man and woman, open to the transmission of life, denies a fundamental good of society,” he said.

Archbishop Brislin said that, facing multiple challenges, we must remember that “our faith is the way to life and salvation”.

“As much as we may feel that we are like a voice crying in the wilderness, we have faith that God is still at work in the world, that his Kingdom is indeed like the mustard seed, tiny but steadily growing into the largest bush of all.”

1 Plein Street, Sidwell, Port elizabeth religious orders, including the Holy Cross Sisters, carried banners identifying them and their vision for the future of the local Church.

LOCAL

The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

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‘Miracle healing’ at hands of De Aar priest A

The Alpha and Omega team on their way back to South Africa, outside the church of the Holy Miracle in Santarém, the home of the 13th-century eucharistic miracle. (From left) Alice Grota, Tania Camara Mendonca, Michael Francis, Paulo Ferreira, Fr Colin Bowes, Fernanda de Sequeira, and Charles Pritchard.

SOUTH African priest presided over the healing of a disabled woman during a conference in Portugal.

Fr Colin Bowes, the vicar-general of De Aar and its diocesan exorcist, accompanied members of South Africa’s Alpha and Omega Mission to a healing seminar for a team of Catholic Charismatic Renewal members in the Algarve region.

The seminar was led by founding members of the mission Charles Pritchard, Fernanda de Sequeira and Alice Grota.

Together with mission prayer team members Michael Francis, Paulo Ferreira and Tania Camara Mendonca, they shared their testimonies.

Mgr Barney McAleer of Johannesburg and Fr Bowes assisted in hearing confessions, offering Masses, and deliverance and healing prayers.

“The highlight of the seminar was a miraculous physical healing led by Fr Bowes,” said Mr Pritchard.

One evening around midnight, Fr Bowes, assisted by team members, prayed over wheelchairbound Maria José Encarnação.

“Fr Bowes instructed her to get up and walk, which, to everyone’s surprise, she did,” Mr Pritchard said. “Jubilant praise, worship, song, and dance persisted until the

early hours of the next morning while prayer-overs were taking place.”

Fr Bowes is also the founder and director of the Amazing Grace Retreat Centre in Noupoort, and is internationally respected in the exorcism field, answering many healing requests.

According to Mr Pritchard, Christ truly showed his healing presence at this seminar.

He said that the attendees left the seminar with renewed and strengthened spirits, and were “armed with the knowledge to be God’s servants in this lost and chaotic world today”.

Mr Pritchard added that in December 2017, Christ showed his presence in a similar way at the first Alpha and Omega healing seminar in Durbanville, Cape Town, after he miraculously healed a disabled woman after she was prayed over.

The Alpha and Omega Mission, based in Johannesburg, has a publishing office, counselling and deliverance prayer facilities in Johannesburg and Cape Town, as well as homes for the destitute and spiritually afflicted.

The mission’s primary focus is to help people grow closer to Christ by implementing his living word, and to encourage them to

Alpha and Omega co-founding member Fernanda de Sequeira (left) with Maria José encarnação and her husband Álvaro on the morning after Maria’s miraculous healing. make use of the healing sacraments in the Catholic Church.

Archbishop Buti Tlhagale of Johannesburg has blessed the Alpha and Omega Mission and declared it in good standing with the local Church in his archdiocese.

Africa’s Secular Franciscans meet in SA for first time T HE first congress in South Africa of the Pan-African Secular Franciscan Order and Franciscan Youth will be held at Padre Pio Spirituality Centre in Pretoria from July 20-25.

The theme will be “The Secular Franciscan Order at the service of reconciliation, peace and social justice in Africa”.

Participants will come from across the continent: South Africa, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Cameroon, the Central Africa Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Madagascar, Mauritius, Chad, Togo, Angola, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Egypt,

Eritrea, Nigeria, Rwanda, Burundi, Benin, Burkina Faso, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Guinea Bissau, Ethiopia, Ghana, Lesotho, Namibia, and Uganda.

During the congress, presentations will cover topics taken from Pope Benedict XVI’s 2011 apostolic exhortation Africae Munus, which flowed from the deliberations of the Second Synod of Bishops on Africa. These include: • The Church in Africa • Present socio-political situation in Africa • Protection of life, respect for creation, good governance • Youth, what future for our

children?

• Embracing the lepers around us • Family as a school of reconciliation, peace and social justice.

The Secular Franciscan Order, a community of Catholic men and women who seek to pattern their lives after Christ, has its own place in the Franciscan family.

Formed by the union of all the Catholic fraternities throughout the world, members commit themselves to live the Gospel in the manner of St Francis, in their secular state, following the Rule approved by the Church.

Since 2011, through fraternal

and pastoral visits, as well as congresses in Africa, the Secular Franciscans, especially in countries of Francophone Africa, have shared their feelings of isolation and the need to communicate with sisters and brothers of other national fraternities.

A Project Africa coordinating team was commissioned at the general chapter in 2014 to focus on national fraternities in Africa, and they immediately identified formation as a priority.

Three formation workshops were organised: in Lusaka, Zambia, in June 2016 (in English and Portuguese); in Abidjan, Ivory Coast,

in June 2017 (in French); and in Mondou, Chad, in August 2017 (also in French).

The organisers of the Pretoria congress are charging a minimal registration fee, as flight costs are expensive, so the amount of money coming in will be small.

They are appealing to the Catholic community for financial help, as besides the fixed costs for the congress, the organisers have to hire translation services in three different languages (English, French and Portuguese). n To help, contact Nina Richards at 083 694 8118 or PANafrican Congress2018@gmail.com

Pilgrimage to medjugorje

Southern Cross columnist Mputhumi ntabeni (left) launched his historical novel The Broken River Tent at the Book Lounge in Cape Town, where he was interviewed by Bongani Kona (right). The novel, set in a context of Xhosa resistance to British colonisation, is published by Blackbird Books.

Alexis Santana Callea of Holy Family parish in Turffontein, Johannesburg, received an invitation to a general audience with Pope Francis at the Vatican.

Alexis is a freelance photographer for the Knights of da Gama.

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The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

INTERNATIONAL

Pope: Individual bishops must decide about intercommunion

BY CArOL GLATz

The document stresses that while in individual pastoral circumstances a Protestant spouse in an interdenominational marriage may receive Communion, it does not seek to issue a general permission to all interdenominational couples.

T

HE question of allowing Protestants married to Catholics to receive Communion at Mass in special cases has to be decided by each individual bishop and cannot be decided by a bishops’ conference, Pope Francis told reporters after a oneday journey to Geneva.

During an inflight news conference, the pope was asked about his recent decision requesting the Catholic bishops’ conference of Germany not to publish nationwide guidelines for allowing Communion for such couples.

He said the guidelines went beyond what is foreseen by the Code of Canon law “and there is the problem”. The code does not provide for nationwide policies, he said, but “provides for the bishop of the diocese [to make a decision on each case], not the bishops’ conference”.

“This was the difficulty of the debate. Not the content,” he said.

Cardinal-designate Luis Ladaria, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, had written to the bishops that “the Holy Father has reached the conclusion that the document has not matured enough to be published”.

Pope Francis expanded on that by saying it will have to be studied more. He said he believed what could be done is an “illustrative” type of document “so that each diocesan bishop could oversee

I Pope Francis answers questions from journalists aboard his flight from Geneva to rome. (Photo: Paul Haring/CnS) what the Code of Canon Law permits. There was no stepping on the brakes,” he said.

The German bishops’ conference has said that the bishops will continue to examine the issue in September.

The bishops said the text of their pastoral handout does “not appear as a document of the bishops’ conference” and that the text is “within the responsibility of individual bishops as an aid to orientation”.

In other words, the final document will not be issued as a policy by the bishops’ conference but as a guiding document for bishops in their particular dioceses.

n response to another question, the pope said human rights are in a serious state of crisis today, having become relative or unimportant in the eyes of some parts of the world.

Today there is a “crisis of hope, a crisis of human rights, a crisis of mediation, a crisis of peace”, he said.

The lack of belief in and enthusiasm for basic human rights is a serious concern, he said, and “we have to look for the causes for how we got here—that human rights today are relative, even the right to peace is relative. It is a crisis of human rights”.

Conflicts in the world should not be resolved the way Cain tried, with violence, he said, referring to the biblical story of Cain and Abel.

“Resolve them with negotiations, with dialogue, with mediation.”

Recounting remarks he had heard, he said: “If a Third World War is waged, we know what weapons will be used. But if there were to be a fourth, it will be waged with sticks, because humanity will have been destroyed.”— CNS

Vatican diplomat guilty of distributing child porn

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VATICAN court has found Mgr Carlo Alberto Capella, a former staff member at the Vatican nunciature in Washington, guilty of possessing and distributing child pornography.

Judge Giuseppe Della Torre, head of the tribunal of the Vatican City State, delivered the verdict and sentenced Mgr Capella to five years in prison and fined him 5 000 euro

(R80 000).

The Vatican press office said he would serve his sentence in a Vatican cell located in the building of the Gendarme Corps of Vatican City State, as the Vatican police force is formally known.

Mgr Capella was accused of having and exchanging with others “a large quantity” of child pornography; the quantity is such that the

charges are considered “aggravated” by the Vatican City court.

The Vatican press office said a decision regarding Mgr Capella by the Congregation of the Doctrine of Faith would be made at a later date.

The congregation’s investigations of clerical sexual abuse cases is separate from how those cases are handled by criminal courts.—CNS

Fr Paul Ogalo performs rap songs about drug abuse, food insecurity, and the environment at St Monica church in rapogi, Kenya. Since then, the 45-year-old priest has been suspended for one year by the diocese of Homa Bay for performing rap after Mass. (Photo: Doreen Ajiambo/CnS)

Disappointment after ‘rap’ priest suspended for a year

BY DOreen AJIAMBO

M

ANY parishioners at St Monica church in western Kenya are unhappy after their favourite priest was suspended for misconduct by the diocese of Homa Bay. Fr Paul Ogalo was suspended for using secular music, drama and dance to attract youths to the Church. The 45-year-old priest had been entertaining his parishioners with rap music, urging them to stop using drugs and to get involved in environmental and social justice issues.

Locals came to love his unique style of preaching the Gospel.

“I'm very disappointed that he is suspended. I will now not go to Church until he is reinstated,” said Benard Oketch, 28.

“Fr Paul has been our mentor. He uses the language youths understand,” Mr Oketch said. Through rap, the priest “has saved thousands of youths” from abusing drugs, he said.

Called Father Masaa or Paul SWIT, an acronym for Sees World In Turmoil, Fr Ogalo had stunned and

thrilled his congregation in equal measure. After celebrating Mass, he would change his priestly vestments for black shorts and a white shirt, tie a red bandana around his head, and begin rapping to the congregation.

“I use the rap music to bring youths to the Church,” Fr Ogalo said. “Thereafter, I bring them to Christ.”

But the bishops have dismissed Fr Ogalo’s style of preaching. Fr Charles Kochiel, judicial vicar of the interdiocesan tribunal of Kisumu, confirmed Fr Ogalo’s suspension and said it would have been wise for the priest to have consulted the bishops “to find out if what he was doing was in accordance with Church doctrine”.

“We have suspended him for a year to give him time to reconsider his ways,” Fr Kochiel said, noting that “every institution has its own code of conduct”.

“There are ways of doing things.

There are certain things the Church promotes in the society. If we mix ...what the secular and Church institutions do, then definitely people are going to read different messages,” he said. —CNS

Bishops react after Philippine president calls God ‘stupid’ GET YOUR TICKEETS FOR THE R100 000 DRA AW!

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ISHOPS and some politicians reacted negatively after Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte questioned the logic of the Bible creation story and called God “stupid”.

Ucanews.com reported that, speaking during a technology summit in the southern city of Davao, Mr Duterte questioned how Adam and Eve brought about “original sin”.

“Adam ate the apple, then malice was born. Who is this stupid God? This son of a bitch is stupid if that’s the case,” he said.

“You created something perfect and then you think of an event that would tempt and destroy the quality of your work,” added Mr Duterte.

The president, who has been at odds with Church leaders who criticised his administration’s policies, questioned the Christian concept of “original sin”.

“It’s something that your mother and father did, you were not part of it, then you have original sin. What kind of religion is that? I can’t accept it,” said Mr Duterte.

Christian theology teaches that we inherit a fallen nature through the sin of Adam.

The Philippine leader, who was baptised Catholic shortly after he was born, said he believes in a “universal mind” but said he could not picture God as a human being.

Bishop Arturo Bastes of Sorso-

Philippine President rodrigo Duterte questioned how Adam and eve brought about original sin and called God “stupid”.

(Photo: Jeon Heon-Kyun, ePA/CnA) gon described Mr Duterte as “a psychological freak, a psychopath with an abnormal mind,” and said the president’s tirades revealed why he should not have been elected. The bishop said Mr Duterte’s statements and actions in recent months have become “intolerable to normal, well-minded people”.

Bishop Bastes said some people have been praying “that God will deliver us from this evil”, Ucanews.com reported.

“I share with the feelings and thoughts with these concerned fellow Filipinos,” said the bishop as he called on the nation to “fervently pray to the Lord that such blasphemous utterances

and dictatorial tendencies of this mad man will cease”.

Bishop Ruperto Santos of Balanga said that the president should “not tempt God”.

Several political leaders also condemned the president’s statement.

“May my God forgive him and make him atone for all his sins,” said Panfilo Lacson, who has supported the president on numerous issues.

Senator Antonio Trillanes, one of the president’s vocal critics in Congress, said Mr Duterte’s most recent attacks against Christianity and God send the message that he is “one evil man”.

“It is the height of arrogance of power not only to disrespect and spit on an individual’s faith but also to act as though he is God,” said the senator.

However, presidential spokesman Harry Roque defended Mr Duterte, saying the president is entitled to his own religious beliefs.

“That is the personal belief of our president. Our president has a personal spirituality, and it’s up to him,” said Mr Roque.

Mr Duterte has made several scathing attacks against Catholic Church leaders critical of his administration’s policies, especially the war on illegal drugs that has claimed thousands of lives.— CNS

INTERNATIONAL

The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

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Pope in Geneva: Broken world needs unity

BY CArOL GLATz

N

(Top) Pope Francis speaks as he attends an ecumenical prayer service at the World Council of Churches’ ecumenical centre in Geneva.

(Below) Pope Francis arrives in procession to celebrate Mass at the Palexpo convention centre in Geneva. (Photos: Paul Haring/CnS)

OT only God, but today’s broken, divided world is begging for unity among Christians, Pope Francis said on a one-day ecumenical pilgrimage to Geneva celebrating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the World Council of Churches( WCC).

“Our differences must not be excuses,” he said, because as Christ’s disciples, Christians can still pray together, evangelise and serve others.

On his 23rd international apostolic journey , the pope spent several hours with Christian leaders at the headquarters of the World Council of Churches, a fellowship of 350 ecclesial communities, including many Orthodox Churches.

The pope came to help celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of what is the largest and broadest ecumenical fellowship in the world.

He was greeted on the tarmac by two former members of the Swiss Guard who stood by the red carpet in the corps’ full colourful uniform, which only happens on papal trips to Switzerland. Active guard members travelling with the pope are always in plainclothes.

Accompanied by the leadership of the WCC, the pope attended an ecumenical prayer service, marked by songs from the Protestant and Catholic traditions. There was a common witness of faith in reciting the Nicene Creed and representatives from the Catholic Church and other Christian communities alternated readings, including a prayer of repentance.

In his speech, the pope said: “Our lack of unity” is not only contrary to God’s will, it is “also a scan-

dal to the world”.

“The Lord asks us for unity; our world, torn by all-too-many divisions that affect the most vulnerable, begs for unity. Divisions between Christians have often arisen because at their root, [because] a worldly mindset has seeped in,” the pope said.

“First self-concern took priority over concern for Christ,” he said, and from there, it was easy for the devil to move in, “separating us”.

Following Christ entails loss, he warned, because “it does not adequately protect the interests of individual communities, often closely linked to ethnic identity or split along party lines, whether ‘conservative’ or ‘progressive’”.

Christians must belong to the Lord above and before they identify with anything else, “right or left; to choose in the name of the Gospel, our brother and sister over ourselves”, he said.

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peaking at an ecumenical encounter with the central leadership committee of the WCC, Pope Francis praised their work and commitment to unity; however, he expressed his concern that the Christian sense of mission was no longer “as closely intertwined” with their ecumenical pursuits.

“Faith in Jesus Christ is not the fruit of consensus, nor can the people of God be reduced to a nongovernmental organisation.”

Christians must never “debase this treasure” of knowing and praising God and his glory, by turning it into “a purely immanent humanism”.

Also “troubling,” he said, “is the

‘Church now facing its own #MeToo’ I

BY JunnO ArOCHO eSTeVeS

N the wake of historic allegations of sexual abuse and cover-up in countries around the world, the Catholic Church is experiencing the same challenge that has brought a reckoning to those who used their authority to abuse or silence victims, said an Australian archbishop.

Allegations such as those raised against Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington, represent a “major shift” within the culture of the Church, Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane said. Abuse survivors are “willing to speak and they are believed”, and the Church has new processes of investigation, he added.

“It’s not unrelated to the #MeToo phenomenon; there’s something going on in the culture. And one of the elements of that cultural shift is that people are prepared to speak up in a way that they would never have done before,” he told journalists following a four-day conference in Rome on safeguarding and child protection.

The Anglophone Safeguarding Conference, held at Rome’s Pontifical Gregorian University, reflected on the theme, “Culture, an enabler or barrier to safeguarding”.

Among the speakers at the conference was Jesuit Father Hans Zollner, head of the Pontifical Gregorian University’s Centre for Child Protection, and Bishop Gilles Cote of Daru-Kiunga, Papua New Guinea.

While local cultures can influence how the Church in a particular area handles abuse cases, there are aspects of Church culture that have hindered progress in addressing allegations of sexual abuse, Archbishop Coleridge said.

“One word that’s used to describe a large and complex phenomenon within the culture is clericalism. In other words, authority geared to power and not to service,” he said. “In many ways, what happened in the Catholic Church was that our strengths became our weaknesses.”

An example of those strengths was that closeness that Catholic clergy and religious shared with families. However, he said, it was precisely that which, “in certain situations, gave them access to the children who were abused”.

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evertheless, Archbishop Coleridge said that just as strength can become a weakness, a weakness can also become a strength.

“I believe that the agony we are passing through this time in fact is a purification

of the Church that has already made us stronger. It’s kind of a searing grace that we never saw coming, and we certainly wouldn’t have chosen. But somehow, God is in the midst of it all, purifying the Church and calling us to what we are intended be,” Archbishop Coleridge said.

Following the conference’s conclusion, Fr Zollner told journalists that allegations such as those raised against Cardinal McCarrick are signs that “things are tightening up and that the thoroughness of the approach reaches now even the highest levels”.

Cardinal McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington, said that he would no longer exercise any public ministry “in obedience” to the Vatican after an allegation he abused a teenager 47 years ago was found credible.

“A few years ago, we probably wouldn’t have so easily seen that headline,” Fr Zollner said. “The Church—step-by-step, too slow but more and more consistently— comes up with or lives up to what the norms are.”

Archbishop Coleridge agreed with Fr Zollner, adding that “what’s happening with Cardinal McCarrick focuses on episcopal accountability” but “we have more to do”.—CNS

Romero official prayer card leaked

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FTER a trip to Rome to discuss details about an upcoming ceremony that will result in El Salvador's first saint, Mgr Rafael Urrutia was eager to share a cache of official prayer cards of soon-to-be St Oscar Arnulfo Romero.

During a meeting with San Salvador’s archbishop and others, one of those present in the room took a photo of the prayer card, posted it online, and the image quickly spread on social media.

In an interview with Radio Paz, Mgr Urrutia said that because of the image’s fast internet travels, he felt “pushed” to announce that it was indeed the official image the Vatican will use on a tapestry when Bl Romero is declared a saint on October 14.

The image has a blue background with a white aura around Bl Romero’s head.

The portrait shows the fourth archbishop of San Salvador with a golden halo, and

the prayer card has the words “St Oscar Arnulfo Romero, bishop and martyr” below.

During the interview, transmitted via Facebook Live by Television Catolica, Mgr Urrutia also discussed other details about the upcoming canonisation and said two of Bl Romero’s siblings plan to be present at the ceremony.

For those facing the facade of St Peter’s basilica, where the ceremony will take place, the image of Bl Romero will hang on a balcony to the left of one featuring the image of his friend and mentor Bl Paul VI, who also will be declared a saint that day

and whose image will be in the centre of all those canonised, or declared saints, Mgr Urrutia said.

The four others who will be canonised that day are Bl Francesco Spinelli of Italy, founder of the Sisters Adorers of the Blessed Sacrament; Bl Vincenzo Romano, who worked with the poor of Naples, Italy, until his death in 1831; Bl Catherine Kasper, the German founder of the religious congregation, the Poor Handmaids of Jesus Christ; and Bl Nazaria Ignacia March Mesa, the Spanish founder of the Congregation of the Missionary Crusaders of the Church.—CNS

conviction on the part of some, who consider their own blessings clear signs of God’s predilection rather than a summons to responsible service” to the whole human family and the environment.

The pope said he wanted to “take part personally” in the celebrations marking the anniversary of the WCC as well as reaffirm the commitment of the Catholic Church to the cause of ecumenism and encourage cooperation.

He said it was critical that Christians come together for “the credibility of the Gospel,” which is “put to the test by the way Christians respond” to those suffering in the world today.

At the end of a day dedicated to celebrating 70 years of an ecumenical fellowship forged by the WCC, Pope Francis turned to the region’s Catholics, reminding them of what lies at the heart of the faith.

Celebrating Mass at the city’s enormous indoor expo centre, the pope pointed to the essential lessons contained in the Lord’s Prayer, which Jesus teaches his disciples in the day’s gospel reading.

The Lord’s Prayer “offers us a road map for the spiritual life” by reminding people they are part of one human family, that they should live a simpler, more caring life and that forgiveness works miracles in history, he said.

“There is no greater novelty than forgiveness, which turns evil into good,” he told 40 000 Catholics from Switzerland, France and other nations not far from this landlocked country, whose history was built on the values of peace and neutrality.—CNS

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6

The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

LEADER PAGE LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Editor: Günther Simmermacher

The invisible Church

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ATHOLICS were rightly disappointed at the empty chairs reserved for political leaders at the bicentennial celebrations in Cape Town.

As the Catholic Church celebrated the 200th anniversary of its establishment in South Africa, neither the national presidency nor the Western Cape premier’s office nor Cape Town’s mayoral office was represented, despite having been invited.

There may be reasons for this.

Archbishop Stephen Brislin of Cape Town has acknowledged that the invitations were dispatched rather late. It is understandable that President Cyril Ramaphosa and Premier Helen Zille had already made other plans for the day, and that Cape Town mayor Patricia de Lille did not know from one day to the next whether she would still be in office.

But the chairs reserved for them were left unoccupied. The Democratic Alliance leaders did not bother to send a representative, or even send a message of congratulations to be delivered to the Catholic faithful, and the delegate promised by the presidency apparently failed to turn up.

On three levels of government, represented by the country’s two leading parties, the Catholic Church was disrespected. This cannot stand.

It cannot be tolerable that political leaders use the Catholic Church when it is expedient for them, but otherwise disregard and disrespect the country’s four million Catholics at will.

As Bishop Victor Phalana of Klerksdorp notes: “This government and these two parties don’t take us seriously.” But they should take the Catholic Church seriously—and not because of its position but because of what it has done and is doing for the country.

After the government, the Catholic Church is the largest provider of services to the poorest, especially in education, healthcare and social services. Without the Church’s schools and clinics, South Africa’s education and health-care systems would likely crumble.

Bishop Phalana recalls that the Catholic Church was marginalised by colonial and apartheid governments but enjoyed some respect during the presidency of Nelson Mandela, from 1994-99. That appreciation for the Church has since diminished.

For that, one can point to deficient attitudes by politicians and

their parties, though there are many devout Catholics in parliament—even President Ramaphosa is known to maintain a closeness to the Catholic Church.

One may also identify the rapid spread of secularisation which seeks to marginalise religion from the public forum. As it is in the West, so it is taking root in South Africa. This can take expression in acts such as casually disregarding the special celebrations of faith bodies.

The effects of secularisation and plain poor manners might have contributed to the empty seats at the bicentennial celebrations, but the Church itself also bears a major responsibility.

The diminution of the Catholic Church’s profile in South Africa— to the extent that its existence barely registers with politicians or the public—can be attributed to its negligent attitude to media over the past 25 years.

After 1994, the bishops’ Social Communications Commission was successively downgraded, staffed part-time by priests already burdened with pastoral responsibilities, and deprived of adequate sources. The best efforts of some people notwithstanding, the local Church’s approach to media has been inadequate and often amateurish, even in its dealings with Catholic media.

By contrast, the office of the Anglican archbishop of Cape Town includes two full-time media professionals who communicate the vision, hopes and concerns of their Church to the public.

For almost 25 years, the bishops have not had a media strategy which would bring the vision, hopes and concerns of the Catholic Church to the public, or to bring its Christian witness to a broader audience by telling the story of the many great Catholic initiatives.

When Catholics grumble that the media is publishing only bad news about the Church (which, in any case, usually is of the Church’s own making), we must ask whether the fault for that resides with the media or with us.

The Catholic Church has so much to tell the public, but, a few exceptions apart, it isn’t heard because it fails to make itself heard.

And when it fails to tell its story—when it fails to establish and maintain a public profile—the Church cannot be surprised when it is seen as irrelevant and subject to indifference by public officials.

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.

Core truth is Christ of the gospels

C

HRIST himself chose 12 everyday men to preach the Good News to all nations of the earth, and Pope Francis as an archbishop mixed with the people of Buenos Aires on the streets and buses, identifying himself with ordinary folk.

The pope has stressed that all of us, including him, are ordinary humans with failures and frailties. So we should hold back on judgment, and try to see each other through the eyes of mercy, something Christ showed us throughout his life and emphasised in the Beatitudes.

Yet Pope Francis has been strongly criticised from certain

End emotional abuse of women

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HERE is an evil going around which moves silently and filters into the lives of people behind closed doors—mental abuse of women and children.

You will find this in affluent “white collar” elite communities.

Many abusers are leaders in their fields.

They abuse in the worst kind of way: “mental” abuse, which leaves an indelible scar. Women then, in turn, unwittingly take it out on their children.

You “nice”, intelligent leaders who abuse: Stop! Think and realise you are inflicting hurt, and instilling in your own children the next cycle of abuse.

God is watching you, or shall we rather say that God loves you.

We only have one life—so make it beautiful. When you die, let those left behind feel sad and not happy at your departure from their lives.

Cecil Roberts, Cape Town

quarters—I believe wrongly.

Four cardinals attempted to discredit him by publicly releasing a letter stating that the pope’s emphasis on mercy for those who have made mistakes, to possibly receive the sacraments, was against Church teaching. This was particularly related to divorced Catholics possibly receiving Communion.

Pope Francis did not seek to change the Church’s basic teaching on marriage at all. What the pope rightly stressed was that we should pay more attention to Christ’s message of mercy and forgiveness.

And in our own Southern Cross,

could retain a neutral stance towards the rights of the unborn child in all its precious vulnerability.

Archbishop Hurley, like Mandela, unrelentingly opposed the shame of apartheid in the face of friend and foe. Would he have closed his eyes to the appalling reality of abortion or wished his supporters to rhapsodise over those who placed no barrier in legalising its blood-soaked existence?

Worldwide and locally, there are those who refuse to accept the irreversibility of legalised abortion.

They continue to fight this evil.

I keep praying and hoping that one day God’s will will triumph, and that abortion will be outlawed worldwide—once and for all.

Until then, the beautiful appellation of Father should be withheld from those who support abortion.

Luky Whittle, Kroonstad

We have indeed come a long way

M Mandela backing

abortion pains me

M

Y spirits rose to the roof reading Damian McLeish’s letter (June 13) to Arlene Foster, leader of the Democratic Unionist Party of Northern Ireland, praising her unreserved defence of unborn human life.

Those spirits plunged to the depths in the same issue when I saw in Raymond Perrier’s column on the Denis Hurley Centre, the breathless description of Madiba as the “Father of the Nation, Tata Nelson Mandela”.

When, during the early 1990s, I interviewed the late Nelson Mandela for a newspaper, I was overwhelmed by his charism and courtesy. Subsequently, I felt pained and bewildered when abortion was legalised in South Africa under his presidency.

It astonished me that such a man

PHUTHUMI Ntabeni in his column “We must learn to walk hand in hand” (June 20) is so right in all he says, and in the wonderful way in which he plans to take the “racist bull” by the horns.

I think we have come a long way since 1994, and many beautiful things have happened. We see kindergartens set up; recycling initiatives to help youngsters; people collecting plastic clips to buy wheelchairs; and art and dance classes in townships.

To inform yourself on such initiatives, watch the Kwêla programme on DStv channel 144 on Sunday nights. You will be moved to see how many outreaches exist, caring for people of all creeds and cultures!

The answer to Mr Ntabeni asking why he still has to go to the townships for friendship is simple: “Birds of a feather flock together.”

That is the reason why one finds in the middle of, say, New York,

we have had serious criticism of Pope Francis too, which I believe has been misguided. Letters have tackled the pope on several issues, including homosexuality.

I think there are a number of “old Catholics” who have been taught to adhere to the doctrines of the Church above all else.

This can lead to becoming like the Pharisees, who knew all the laws and could quote them, but failed to live good lives.

What Pope Francis is trying to do is turn our primary commitment to the teachings of Christ in the gospels, something the Church should have been doing long ago, but did not.

PD Hoar, Waterfall, KZN

areas like Chinatown, Little Italy or Harlem. People are just more comfortable in their own cultural group.

Maria Kruger, Plettenberg Bay

Pray for suffering we cause Jesus

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MEN to Stephen A Clark’s beautiful letter (May 16) on bringing Europe home to God. I become weepy for God, recalling Jesus crying over Jerusalem.

It hurts me deeply to see what we are doing to our Saviour, not only breaking his heart but daily putting him through suffering for our sins.

Let us pray to the Holy Spirit to come down in tongues of fire to renew the face of the earth.

Let us also pray our rosaries, that our Mother will come into our homes, not alone, but with the choirs of angels and the Trinity.

How blessed we are; the mere thought of this warms my heart.

Thanking you all in Jesus’ name.

Mary Bowers, Cape Town

Timeline mistake

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N his “A timeline of Catholicism in SA” (June 6), Günther Simmermacher got a date seriously “out of line”.

The Trappists did not come to Dunbrody in 1855, but only 25 years later, in 1880, before they moved on to Natal and started Mariannhill in 1882.

Fr Ivo Burkhardt CMM, Archives CMM, Rom 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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The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

PERSPECTIVES

Loosen those collars!

‘I

NEGLECT you when I’m working; when I need attention, I tend to nag…I don’t know why you love me, and that’s why I love you.”

These are the lyrics to the song “Flaws and All” by Beyoncé. People have wondered whether she is singing about her relationship with her fans or her husband Jay-Z, or whether maybe she is actually singing a song about God. This came to my mind when I read recently that the Anglican cathedral in San Francisco was organising a “Beyoncé Mass”.

Having read several news articles and watched different clips of what happened at the “Beyoncé Mass”, I found it to be a different and strange-but-wonderful way of getting people to church. The Mass, which was based on Rev Yolanda Norton’s “Beyoncé and the Hebrew Bible” university course, drew about a thousand people.

A choir performed various Beyoncé hits at the service, including “Survivor” and “Freedom”. The Mass also included Scripture readings and a sermon by Rev Norton.

I commended the Anglican cathedral on my social media for thinking out of the box.

Of course, some people saw the Mass as a way of “worshipping” the pop idol.

But I believe that this idea could be a way for us Catholics to loosen our collars and draw people, especially the youth, to the Church.

Rev Norton, who is an assistant professor of the Old Testament at the San Francisco Theological Seminary, said that when she preached her first sermon at the age of 24, people had a lot of opinions about who she was supposed to be. She recalls being told that she should listen only to gospel music and dress a certain way. Rev Norton said she felt like she was becoming something she was not. It was compromising her relationship with God and her life was at a tipping point. She even considered abandoning the ministry.

For me this is a lesson for the lot of us. I

am close friends with a few priests and religious throughout South Africa and globally. Some of them tell me that they are no longer happy in their ministry.

One priest told me that he felt like his life was being controlled by his parishioners. He couldn’t do or say anything without it being rectified by the parish council. When he tried initiating something youth-friendly for one of his youth Masses, some of the older parishioners complained about it.

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peaking as a Catholic who religiously wears a tie to church, I think it is time we loosen our collars a little and allow for dynamic reform to take place in the Church’s attitudes.

There is so much we can learn from pop culture, and there is so much which we can do to draw people back to church, if we use that culture correctly.

How appealing are we truly to the young people in our parishes? Do they really want to be at Mass on Sundays, and is their faith growing as they sit in the pews or serve in ministry—or are they sitting there dying a slow death internally?

I am not suggesting that God cannot bring people to himself without the glitz and glamour of what pop culture and the

The Anglican Grace cathedral in San Francisco held a “Beyoncé Mass”—and the Catholic Church can learn from that, argues Keenan Williams.

In good conscience...

A FTER the recent Irish referendum on abortion, I read that some priests said that Catholics who voted “Yes” to decriminalise abortion should go to confession because they had sinned by not defending the life of the unborn child.

Should the Church tell us how to vote in civil matters? And if we vote contrary to the position taken by the Church, have we sinned?

As Christians, we have a moral obligation to participate in civil matters and use our voice to contribute to the wellbeing of society. However, the issues that require our voice are not simply black and white, completely right or completely wrong. Our choices—and the reasons behind them— often reside in that murky grey area where we choose what we perceive to be the lesser evil.

So I asked myself: How would I have voted in the Irish referendum? I am pro-life.

I believe abortion is murder and that all life is a gift from God and should be protected from conception to natural death.

I also believe that most women do not choose abortion lightly. It is a choice induced by fear or deep hurt. It is the fear of rejection, the fear of raising a child alone or feeling completely unprepared for the responsibilities of motherhood. It is the fear of how to find the material and emotional resources to deal with a grave disability, or love a child conceived through sexual abuse. It is, more often than not, a decision made under mental and psychological anguish.

Every life should be protected—the unborn and the living. The unborn should have the right to life. Similarly, women in precarious circumstances should not be treated as criminals (especially when we don’t know the reasons or suffering that prompted the decision), nor should they resort to dangerous backstreet abortions because they feel they have no other options.

If I were Irish, I might have considered voting “Yes” to decriminalise abortion. Not as a rejection of the life of the unborn child but as a declaration of the need to promote legislation that better protects vulnerable women. It would have been a profoundly imperfect “Yes” but one that, to me, would seem to be the lesser evil.

Here’s the crux: Would this choice mean that I have sinned? What if I genuinely believe that my choice was the right one?

Each of us has to weigh up the options, inform ourselves thoroughly about all sides

A voter casts his ballot in Dublin as Irish voters decide to change the country's abortion laws. (Photo: Max rossi, reuters/CnS) of the issue, seek out the Church’s teaching on the issue, pray on it, and make a decision in good conscience.

In good conscience: That is often a huge sticking point in our Catholic teaching on morality. How do we define good conscience? Must good conscience mirror the Church’s authority on the matter? Can we still have acted in good conscience even if our position differs from Church teaching?

Acting in accordance with our conscience is not an excuse for laziness in matters of moral formation. Nor is it a cop-out to turn away from Church teaching, simply because it is no longer the popular voice in society today.

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audium et Spes, a Vatican II document guiding the Church entering a postmodern, relativist world, describes the primacy conscience as a pondered decision that we are compelled to obey after we have actively searched for truth: “In the depths of his conscience, man detects a law which he does not impose upon himself, but which holds him to obedience. Always summoning him to love good and avoid evil, the voice of conscience when necessary speaks to his heart: do this, shun that. For man has in his heart a law written by God; to obey it is the very dignity of man; according to it he will be judged,” Gaudium et Spes notes (16).

“In fidelity to conscience, Christians are joined with the rest of men in the search for truth, and for the genuine solution to the numerous problems which arise in the life of individuals from social relationships.

Hence the more right conscience holds sway, the more persons and groups turn aside from blind choice and strive to be

Keenan Williams

Talking Faith

world has to offer. However, as we serve in ministry, it is good to also allow God’s call to be extended to those who have ignored traditional methods. And as our newly ordained priests and deacons heed the call to minister, may we support them in their radical but Spirit-led decisions.

As we watch with bated breath to see who will walk away as football world champions, my mind goes back to 2010, when the World Cup was hosted in South Africa.

I remember the Catholic Church, with the help of Fr Francois Dufour SDB, drawing up a helpful guide of the Mass and churches for football fans to visit for worship, under the title “Church on the Ball”.

I also remember fondly “Soccer Sunday”, when our church was decorated and our parish priest came running into the church with a bright yellow chasuble with some Bafana Bafana regalia on it.

For some of the parishioners this was too radical an approach; others told the priest that it was a sight for sore eyes.

We do well to take note of what a Catholic friend told me recently: “It is quite sad that the Church caters so much for the elderly in our parishes, forgetting that the youth are the future.”

Of course, our parishes must be a welcoming home for older Catholics. However, church should be a place where our young people desire to be as well.

And if that means creating something crazy like a “Beyoncé Mass”—provided it accords with the rubrics—then why not?

After all, Jesus used wild and crazy parables to minister to the multitudes.

Let us allow the Holy Spirit to lead us— and for our priests to loosen their collars (for us to follow suit)—to guide reform and charismatic healing as people are drawn to God, and ultimately their eternal salvation in Christ.

Sarah-Leah Pimentel

The Mustard Seeds

guided by the objective norms of morality.”

The formation of conscience is an arduous process. It requires examining our own personal belief structures, deeply questioning our commonly held ideas about right and wrong, and recognising our own feelings and biases.

It is then our responsibility to search for what the Church has to say on the topic, comparing and contrasting it with other voices in wider society. We need to interrogate the arguments that each poses and test their reasoning and logic. We should pay careful attention to any deliberate efforts to sway our emotions in a particular direction.

In all this, we need a prayerful attitude of humility to bring the issue to God in prayer and to read the Scriptures with this topic in mind, asking the Holy Spirit for guidance. And then we need to stop and listen—for the voice of conscience to speak to the heart. When we have our answer, we should again test it and ask ourselves—is this position governed by love?

If we have followed all of these steps, then our decision will be made in good conscience, regardless of whether it is contrary to the voices of the times or even the Church.

But the question remains: Can this choice still be sinful?

The Catechism defines sin as “an offence against reason, truth, and right conscience; it is failure in genuine love for God and neighbour caused by a perverse attachment to certain goods. It wounds the nature of man and injures human solidarity. It has been defined as “an utterance, a deed, or a desire contrary to the eternal law” (1849).

If I am reading this correctly, if my choice is driven by a genuine attempt to love God and neighbour, to promote human solidarity, and is made after a sincere effort to discern the truth, then it is not a sin. But I recognise that my understanding of truth and reason is not absolute and is limited by my own imperfection.

As I continue to grapple with the complexity around the formation of conscience, I draw comfort from Pope Francis’ own reflections on the subject: “Naturally, every effort should be made to encourage the development of an enlightened conscience, formed and guided by the responsible and serious discernment of Continued on page 11

7

Michael Shackleton

Open Door

How does the devil work?

When we renewed our baptismal promises at Easter, we together renounced Satan and all his works and all his empty promises. How am I to understand this? How does Satan perform his works and how does he make empty promises?

P Evans

A

T your baptism the priest or deacon handed over a lighted candle, saying: “Receive the light of Christ”, and keep the flame of faith alive. This is a highly symbolic gesture.

In contrast to the powers of darkness and the evil deriving from Satan, Christ is the light that is born of God our Father.

We profess this when we recite the Creed and say that Christ is born of the Father before all ages, “God from God, light from light”.

The lighted candle represents God himself. In receiving it, the newly baptised must now promise to live forever in that divine light and therefore have nothing to do with the opposite of light, that is the darkness of Satan.

The practice of renouncing Satan goes back to the early days. In the third century Tertullian observed that before baptism is administered, “we solemnly swear that we disown the devil and his pomps and angels”.

This renunciation of the devil and his wiles is underestimated. This is because the works and empty promises he practises are all around us and we live with them too comfortably. The devil is, as Jesus called him, a liar and the father of lies (Jn 8:44).

Satan’s influence is witnessed wherever men and women lie to one another and deliberately deceive one another. Satan is the “prince of this world” (Jn 12:31) whose sway of power cannot extend to eternal life with Christ.

Those who find themselves beguiled to believe that riches, fame and luxury are the only way to go are the ones who fall victim to Satan’s works and empty promises, as do those whose businesses or personal designs uncaringly exploit others to the point of poverty.

They can easily lead lives of deception, lying or hiding the truth from others in order to achieve what they want in the here and now.

Not desiring their fraudulence to be exposed, they keep it dark, away from the light of truth.

There is no better way to express this than in Christ’s words: “Though the light has come into the world, men have shown they prefer darkness to the light because their deeds were evil. And indeed anyone who does wrong hates the light and avoids it for fear his actions should be exposed.

The man who lives by the truth comes out into the light, so that it may be plainly seen what he does is done in God” (Jn 3:19-21).

Satan’s works and empty promises are the absolute opposite of the promise of eternal life we receive when we are baptised.

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.

8

The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

COMMUNITY

Father’s Day was celebrated at Holy Angels parish in Bez Valley, Johannesburg. During Mass the congregation prayed for all fathers in the parish, and at the end parish priest Fr Arnaldo nyathi called up fathers for a blessing.

(Submitted by Sr Angela Sutton OP)

The extended community of Holy rosary School in edenvale, Johannesburg, donated 26 pints of blood during a blood drive. Blood representative Lara Irons is seen with her father russell Irons, who is chairman of the school board.

St Therese parish in edenvale, Johannesburg, celebrated parish priest Fr Joe Leathem’s birthday and his continued service. (Submitted by Barbara Gregory)

Fr nkosinathi njoko OFM is seen with the novices and youth of St Francis of Assisi parish in reiger Park in Boksburg, part of the Johannesburg archdiocese. (Submitted by Sekabata Solomon Mphela OFM)

St Francis parish in Observatory, Cape Town, celebrated the First Communion of parish members. Fr Aloysus Abone hands a certificate to one of the communicants.

Three honorary life members of the Catholic Women’s League at Holy Trinity parish in Musgrave road, Durban, were among those given a special blessing by Cardinal Wilfrid napier at the CWL’s diocesan AGM. (From left) Cynthia Jones, rosalie Donachie and Joan Shannon. (Submitted by rea Mina)

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Daily life in a Benedictine abbey

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Page 7

Bishop: Our politicians don’t respect the Church

BY ERIN CARELSE

Mario Lala, an Italian missionary based in Goodwood, Cape Town, speaks about his experience in the Neocatechumenal Way, at the Great Mission in the Square event on a rainy Saturday morning in Cape Town’s city centre. Mr Lala, his wife Anna and their ten children lived as a missionary family in England for 20 years before coming to South Africa a few years ago. On his left is Stefan Michalski, a Polish seminarian.

A

BISHOP has expressed his disappointment at the lack of representation by elected leaders at the closing ceremony of the year-long bicentennial celebration of the Catholic Church in Southern Africa.

In a Facebook post, Victor Phalana of Klerksdorp noted the absence of the premier of the Western Cape, the mayor of Cape Town and the national presidency—all of whom were invited to the celebrations at the Velodrome in Bellville, Cape Town.

At the celebrations, Archbishop Stephen Brislin of Cape Town conveyed the apologies of President Cyril Ramaphosa. Despite the presidency’s undertaking to send a representative, the chair reserved for that delegate remained empty.

No messages from Premier Helen Zille or Mayor Patricia de Lille were read out.

Bishop Phalana wrote that “this government and these two parties [African National Congress and Democratic Alliance] don’t take us [the Catholic Church] seriously”.

“We have a membership of more than 4 million in South Africa. We have contributed to the liberation of this country. After the government, we are the largest provider of services to the poorest of the poor in the area of healthcare, education, social services and justice and peace. Yet, these governments— local, provincial and national—undermine us,” Bishop Phalana said.

“Well, we are not a political party. For them to undermine us like this, and to ignore our invitations, is enough,” he wrote.

Noting anti-Catholicism during the colonial and apartheid eras, Bishop Phalana wrote: “We had hoped that now, in the new era, we would have a better relationship with this government, but unfortunately it ended with

Missionaries take to city centre Archbishop Stephen Brislin and nuncio Archbishop Peter Wells at the bicentennial celebrations. (Photo: Sydney Duval) [Nelson] Mandela. He appreciated the Church and the support he received while he was on Robben Island. He respected the bishops; he attended their functions and responded to the invitations of the Catholic churches.”

The celebration saw 5 000 worshippers, 20 bishops, 90 priests, 19 deacons and 70 religious from all over the region gather together, with Archbishop Brislin presiding over the Mass (see page 2).

Archbishop Brislin said that both parties had responded to the invitations sent out and indicated their officials would not be able to attend due to previous commitments.

“It must be said that the invitations to political leaders went out later than we hoped as there was uncertainty as to where the bicentennial celebration would be held, and the last-minute change from Stellenbosch to the Velodrome. I am quite sure that no offence was intended by any of these leaders and that they would have attended if they could have,” Archbishop Brislin told The Southern Cross.

BY LAUREN O’CONNOR-MAY

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ISSIONARIES from all over the world “walking” in Neocatecumenal Way gathered at in central Cape Town for the “Great Mission in the Square”.

The gathering, which included singing, dancing and the telling of their experiences, kicked off the mission which began in cities all around the world.

This mission was in response to Pope Francis’ call to the 200 000 people who gathered in Rome on May 5 for the 50th anniversary of the Neocatechumenal Way. “Mission is giving what we have received.

Mission is fulfilling Jesus’ mandate which we have heard: ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all peoples’,” the pope said.

“The words of the pope set our communities in motion,”said Dino Furgione, an Italian missionary based in Cape Town who is responsible for the Neocatechumenal Way in Southern Africa.

“This ‘Mission in the Squares’ gives us the opportunity to meet many people who would never enter a church. They see people of different ages and colours singing and praying together. Many stop and receive a word, they have the possibility to experience

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the beauty of the Church,” he said.

Marco Malacaria, a missionary in Pretoria, also from Italy, said: “We are amazed by the response of people. While we were busy setting up for the mission a man approached us and started to talk to some of our sisters. He was just curious about who we were and what we were doing there.

“He was a normal man, well-dressed, you would not have expected that he was carrying an unbearable burden of suffering. He opened up and told the sisters about his plan to commit suicide. They encouraged him to stay with us and we talked for a long time with him,” Mr Malacaria said.

“He cried when he listened to the witnesses of the other brothers and he stayed with us the whole morning. At the end he was very consoled and he joined in the singing and dancing. He thanked us many times for what we had done for him.”

The mission in central Cape Town is continuing every Saturday morning until July 14.

“We go into the streets out of gratitude for what the Lord has done in our lives,” said Mr Furgione. “We see that the Lord uses what we do to touch the hearts of people. That is our reward.”

October 2019

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Feed your soul with The

S outher n C ross

IT’S WORTH IT!

pics@scross.co.za

The St Kizito children’s group of St Mary Magdalene parish in Lentegeur, Cape Town, hosted more than 50 children from the parish, as well as from neighbouring areas in Mitchells Plain, for a youth day with refreshments and games. Isabel Oliver and her parish team have been doing this for the last couple of years, and Wayne Golding, archdiocese of Cape Town facilitator, was on hand to offer support. The Men for Change group collected the children in the morning and took them home in the afternoon. (Photo: Jacob eiman)

PRICE CHECK

Sacred Heart Mahobe mission in umzimkulu diocese held a youth talent show and trophies were presented to the winners. (Submitted by zithobile zondi)

Send your photos to

Grade 10 students at Marist Brothers Linmeyer, in Johannesburg south, hosted an outreach event at the school for 75 Grade 3 students from the Lerato educational Centre in Jackson’s Drift squatter camp. The centre is run by Sr Helen Hartnett and the Salesian Sisters.

Marist Grade 3 students each made a bear with the help of Grade 10 students and Mrs newport and her company Creative Crafty. All the Lerato pupils took a new bear home with them. The funds for the event were raised by students and staff at the school.

The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

FAITH

9

Abbey Rote: How Benedictines live What is life like for a Benedictine today, 1 500 years after the order was founded

by St Benedict, whose feast day is on July 11? Br BASIL TSuBAne OSB writes about his abbey in Polokwane.

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INCE its foundations in the 1920s and its official opening on the Palm Sunday of 1981, St Benedict’s Abbey in Polokwane has described itself as a pastoral community and it has sought to balance the daily demands of monastic observances and those of pastoral work.

It is one of two Benedictine abbeys in South Africa; the other is Inkamana Abey in northern KwaZulu-Natal.

The Belgian Benedictine monks who founded the Polokwane abbey came to South Africa in 1910 as missionaries.

The monastery was a territorial abbey, or an “abbey nullius”, which meant that the abbot was the superior of both the monastery and the surrounding territory. So Abbots Osterrath (1939-52) and Van Hoek (1954-74) also were the bishops of Pietersburg diocese, now called Polokwane.

Elected in 1974, Abbot Fulgence Le Roy eventually managed to separate the monastery and the diocese, and in 1988 became the first bishop of the diocese (his successors, Bishops Paul Mogale Nkumishe and Jeremiah Masela, have been diocesan priests).

This separation allowed the monastery to focus on its monastic observances more than it was doing when it was fully involved in the pastoral activities in the diocese of Polokwane.

The monks of St Benedict’s Abbey in Polokwane gather for a meal. They live strictly by the rule of St Benedict, the founder of their order and of Western monasticism, who lived from 480 to 547 AD. belongs in the Subiaco-Cassinese congregation.

The Subiaco-Cassinese congregation was formed in order to follow the Rule of St Benedict (RB) as it was laid down—and strictly so. All Benedictine monasteries under this congregation follow an exact observance of the Rule of St Benedict as it is. Our abbey is no exception to this exact observance.

We are a “coenobitic monastic community” which lives under an abbot and the Rule of St Benedict: We pray seven times a day. We observe silence as much as possible, especially in the enclosure. We put on the monastic habit, a sign of our consecration and commitment to God. We have times for lectio divina.

Daily life at St Benedict’s

Let me introduce you to our life here at St Benedict’s Abbey.

The monks have everything in The early missionaries common, meaning that we do not The Belgian Benedictine monks have any personal belongings; even built this foundation to serve the our own bodies do not belong to us. local villages through education We are a community and we share and evangelisation. They accom- everything in common. plished this by building the current We prefer nothing above the foundation and schools, a clinic work of God (RB 43:3). All our life and a pastoral centre. here at St Benedict’s Abbey is cenThese were built to teach the tred around prayer. After all, this local people what they is the Benedictine Way: termed the “Benedictine Ora et Labora—Pray and Way”. Some locals joined We pray Work. the community and began Prayer is at the centre of to be trained how to be seven times our life. It is the breath and monks. Some persevered life of the monastery and it a day, until the end to become is the engine that drives Benedictine monks, others everything else. Without observe joined the diocesan clergy. prayer, we could not call It has been over a censilence as ourselves monks or Benetury since the Belgian Benedictines. much as dictine monks came to this Other religious congrepart of the world to lay the gation take the vows of possible, obedience, chastity and seed of faith and built this foundation, and the comand wear poverty. Our monastic munity of St Benedict’s vows are obedience, stabilAbbey is still continuing our habits ity and conversatiomorum the work these missionaries (usually translated as “Conversion of Life” or “Converstarted when they came to sion of Manner”). the country.

When a monk at St Benedict’s The community is still seeking to balance the demands of monas- Abbey makes these vows, he means tic observance and its pastoral re- that he will obey the abbot and his sponsibility in the parish for which seniors; he will live at St Benedict’s it is responsible. Yet our main pri- Abbey forever because this is where ority is monastic observance amidst he chooses to spend the rest of his the busyness of our pastoral re- life; and he will be transformed into a new person every day for he sponsibility.

St Benedict’s Abbey is currently knows that he is a sinner who needs home to nine monks: three the grace of God on his journey to solemnly professed, three tempo- wholeness and holiness (conversatiomorum). rary professed and three novices.

The Rule expects that we praise The nine monks are Fr Ghislain Maluvu (prior administrator) from God through the psalms seven times the Democratic Republic of Congo, a day. So seven times a day we come Fr Gregory Vu and Fr Joseph Gabriel together to pray for each other, the Cusimano from the United States, world, the environment and the sitBr Francis Wanjiku from Kenya, Br uation of the monastery.

We also have the daily celebraLaurent Nkuebe and Br Edward Kabi from Lesotho, Br Jean-Jacques tion of the Eucharist. After all, a Mpula from the DRC, and from monk is called upon to prefer nothSouth Africa Br Charles Xaba and ing to the Work of God (RB 43:3) and this is our life here at St Benethe present writer. dict’s Abbey.

Living by St Benedict’s Rule We rise early in the morning to As a Benedictine monastery, St pray the Office of Vigils which is Benedict’s Abbey is a part of the then followed by the Office of Benedictine Confederation—that is, Lauds (commonly known as Mornthe Order of St Benedict (OSB)—and ing Prayer).

After the Mass we have the Office of Terce which is followed by monastic work.

We pray the Office of Sext at midday in order to thank God for the work we have done thus far and to ask for strength and grace to continue.

We have the Office of None in the afternoon which is followed by the Office of Vespers. Before we go to bed we complete our prayer-day with the Office of Compline (Night Prayer) asking to have a peaceful death.

Besides these times we also have scheduled time for study and lectio divina (sacred reading).

Our observance of silence in the enclosure allows the monks to meditate and contemplate on the Word of God wherever they are, especially in their monastic cells.

It is in the cells that a monk learns a lot of things for the cell teaches us everything. This is why after the Office of Compline there is what we call the “Great Silence”, because it allows the monk to gnaw on the Word of God he has received throughout the day (RB 42).

This is most essential during lectio, for the monk is required to gnaw at the Word of God slowly so in the end the Word becomes flesh in him.

Our daily work However, if we were to pray all day without any work, how would the monks be able to provide for their daily essential needs?

St Benedict in his Rule states that However, our income does not we are truly monks if we live by the always cover all the costs the labour of our own hands (RB 48:8-9). monastery incurs, so from time to We are still continuing the mis- time we ask for donations from any sionary work of our predecessors. willing person. Any help is always We have a pastoral responsibility appreciated. over one parish with its nine outstaThis is our Benedictine Way at St tions (or local churches).

Benedict’s Abbey. While we are proApart from parish work, St Bene- viding for most of our needs, we are dict’s Abbey has a vegetable farm still in need of any kind of assisthat supplies local retailers. We tance. have chickens, sheep and pigs that An invitation to visit us we sell to local villages.

We are Benedictine monks living The monastery also has a carpentry workshop which supplies under an abbot and the Rule of St Church benches, ambos or lecterns, Benedict. Our life is coined by the presidential chairs, beds, tables, simple motto of “Pray and Work”, but prayer is our first and wardrobes and so on to the primary work (RB 43:3). local parishes and villages.

If anyone is interested We have a pastoral cenA monk is to know more about our tre which provides accommodation for groups, and truly a monk community it is always good to “come and see”, as we have a catering service if he lives Jesus told his first disciples that goes along with it.

(Jn 1:39).

We also allow groups to There is so much we can come for retreats at our by the fruits monastery because the at- of the labour tell you about our community and the work we do, mosphere of the but the best testimony that monastery allows anyone of his people can have is when to do a silent retreat; or if one needs a guided retreat own hands they actually visit the monastery and experience they can be provided with it for themselves in order one.

We are working in education that they can bear witness to what through the schools that are owned we are about at St Benedict’s Abbey by the monastery. We also have a (Jn 1:40-42).

If anyone wishes to visit us, for a boarding hostel for the learners in these schools, especially the high retreat or to see how we live, they can contact Fr Ghislain Maluvu at school.

A monk indeed is truly a monk ghislainosb@yahoo.com. May our when he lives by the fruits of his founder, St Benedict, pray for all of us. labour.

The Benedictine monks gather seven times a day to pray together. Their life is governed by the Benedictine motto “Ora et Labora”, which means “Pray and Work”.

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The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

BIBLE

Pilgrims renew their baptismal vows at the river Jordan. • The authentic spot of Jacob’s Well, where Jesus met the Samarian woman, is now in the crypt of a Greek Orthodox church in nablus, West Bank. • A model of the Pools of Bethesda as it was in the 1st century AD. To the surprise of the experts, it was exactly as St John had described it in his gospel when it was excavated in the 19th century. • The reputed rock on which the risen Christ cooked the fish breakfast in the church of Peter’s Primacy at Tabgha at the Sea of Galilee. (Photos: Günther Simmermacher)

Finding Jesus at the waters Water features prominently in the Bible. Following on from Fr Ralph de Hahn’s article last week, GÜnTHer SIMMerMACHer picks five important events in the gospels which took place at, in or on the water.

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N biblical times, as today, water was vital: to be hydrated, to stay clean, to produce crops, to raise livestock. Water was life.

So it is no accident that so many crucial events in the Gospel take place around water: the Sea of Galilee, the River Jordan, and the various wells and healing pools.

Moreover, Jesus used the imagery of water to communicate the promise of eternal life.

Here are five Gospel moments taking place at, in or on water.

River Jordan John baptises Jesus in the River Jordan (Mt 3:13-17; Mk 1:9-11; Lk 3:21-2) t’s the event that serves as the inauguration of Jesus’ public ministry. At this point, John the Baptiser is the more famous man, but in proclaiming himself as only the one who prepares the way for the Lord, he officially declares Jesus in charge.

The Church accepts as the authentic site of the baptism Bethany Beyond the Jordan, a place in Jordan where early Christians built monasteries and pilgrim facilities.

With the Muslim conquest in the 7th century all that fell into disuse. But note the Arabic name of the site: al-Maghtas, which means baptism or immersion.

Holy Land pilgrims can renew their baptismal vows there: on the eastern bank in Jordan, or on the other side in the occupied West Bank which bears the name Qasr elYahud, or Gate of the Jews.

This is the spot where ancient tradition holds the Jews entered the Promised Land at the end of their exodus from Egypt. So if this is indeed the site of the baptism of Jesus, it is symbolic that the public ministry of the Messiah who speaks of a different Promised Land launched his public ministry at this place.

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Sea of Galilee Jesus calms the storm (Mt 8:23-27, Mk 4:35-41; Lk 8:22-25) ne can’t really speak of one moment on the Sea of Galilee.

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Much of Jesus’ public ministry took place on and around the Sea of Galilee: Jesus calling the fishermen to follow him, the feedings of the multitudes, the walking on water, the expulsion of the demons into the herd of swine, the preaching of many parables and so on.

In the gospel narratives, the Sea of Galilee is not just a location; it’s a leading character in its own right.

This is especially so when Jesus commands the lake to stop misbehaving.

Jesus is with his disciples in a fishing boat when a violent storm erupts. This usually placid lake can become wild in storms, caused by winds from the Golan Heights.

When that happens, typically at night, waves can go as high as four metres.

So the disciples have good reason to fear for their lives—while Jesus keeps on sleeping soundly. Eventually roused from his sleep, and taken to account by the disciples for his apparent indifference to their safety, Jesus tersely commands the wind: “Quiet! Be still!” And, like a rebuked child, the wind obeys and the waters calm.

The disciples are awed by this man’s ability to control nature (which they have seen before and still they marvel at, as would we today). And while they are still going, “Who is this guy?”, Jesus berates them for their lack of faith.

The lesson is that when we have faith, there is no need be afraid.

Of course, it’s not a lesson that sticks—not with us, and not with the disciples. Soon after the calming of the storm, Simon Peter attempts to walk on the water—and sinks.

Jacob’s Well Jesus meets the Samarian woman (Jn 4:5-15) esus’ noon encounter with the Samarian woman is a scandal. For one thing, she’s not like us—she’s a hated Other, a Samaritan. Jews did not consort with Samaritans and vice versa, even if they were in Samaria, as we find Jesus here.

So that’s pretty bad. But the real scandal is the woman herself, with her many ex-husbands and now a live-in boyfriend.

And Jesus knows about it, yet he does not shun her! More than that: he treats her with humour and respect. And then he has her become the first non-Jewish missionary.

It is an extraordinary story in many ways. The most important lesson, of course, is that Jesus announces the distinction between the water we need for life and the

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Tabgha Christ commissions Peter (Jn 21) ven in the post-Resurrection narrative, the Sea of Galilee plays a starring role.

Having appeared to the Apostles in Jerusalem, Christ sent them back to Galilee, to wait there for further instruction. So they immediately set to returning to their jobs, possibly still rubbing their eyes at the strange experiences of the previous weeks, and unsure about what would happen next.

They’d soon find out. But presently we encounter some of them just before dawn in their boat, after a night of fruitless fishing. As they are ready to call it a night, a stranger on the shore tells them to cast the net to the other side. It would not spoil the suspense to reveal the outcome of that.

Having recognised the stranger, Peter swims ashore, while the others battle with the rich catch.

After the fish breakfast which Christ had cooked them, we get to the nub of things: the Apostles are to set out into the world to spread the Good News of salvation. That thing about being fishers of men is only just beginning.

And Peter, who had to make a triple oath of love for the Lord, is appointed head of the new Jesus Movement.

Ancient tradition places all that at a place called Tabgha, on the north-western shore of the Sea of Galilee, the place of seven springs, near where Jesus fed the multitudes.

Three storage towers stood there in Jesus’ time, to hold water for irrigation. The fresh water from the springs would have made the tiny bay there ideal for washing and fixing fishing nets.

Perhaps it was here where Jesus first met these fishermen, at the beginning of his public ministry.

A small stone church marks the spot of that post-Resurrection appearance. It is called St Peter’s Primacy, though for those Christians who don’t believe in papal primacy, the alternate name is Mensa Christi, the Lord’s Table, after the rock in the church on which, by tradition going back to at least the 4th century, Christ cooked that fish breakfast.

Next to the church is a boulder on which, tradition suggests, Christ stood as he gave fishing tips to the Apostles.

In short order, the Apostles returned to Jerusalem and eventually spread out all around the world they knew.

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The Sea of Galilee is usually placid, but in storms its waves can reach heights of four metres. It was during one such storm that Jesus controlled nature. (Photo: Günther Simmermacher) Living Water which we are invited to drink for eternal life.

The location is also of symbolic importance: near Sychar (or Shechem), the modern Nablus in the West Bank, at a well which was founded by Jacob, the progenitor of the Twelve Tribes of Israel.

Jacob’s Well still exists, in the crypt of an attractive Greek Orthodox church which was built over predecessor churches going back to the earliest time when Christians could build churches.

And like Jesus’ new friend, the woman of many divorces, we can still draw water there today.

Pool of Bethesda Jesus heals the paralysed man (Jn 5:2-15) f Jesus was causing scandal in Samaria, he topped that in Jerusalem. There was the overturning of the tables in the Temple which exercised the religious and political establishment, and the talk about being the King of Jews would get him killed. For that, we can give the Sadducees and the hand-wringing brutalist Pontius Pilate a disapproving sideward glance.

But the Pharisees—mostly good people of faith, but rigoristic about the law and thus very judgmental—were none too pleased with Jesus either. For one thing, they didn’t appreciate Jesus’ theological claims. For another thing—and here’s where the scandal kicks in— Jesus was rather loose with the law.

Jesus overstepped the law twice in one go when on a Saturday he healed the man who had been

I

paralysed for 38 years, at the Pool of Bethesda. Firstly, he had no business healing people on the Sabbath, neither at healing pools nor elsewhere. That was quite bad.

But it’s what he did next that was even worse: He told the man to pick up his mat and walk away with it.

He incited another Jew to violate the Sabbath. John mentions that this was why “the Jews persecuted Jesus, and sought to kill him”. Certainly the Pharisees, who had tried to outsmart Jesus before on points of the law, now had their smoking gun.

Strangely, for a very long time, Scripture scholars believed the story to be apocryphal, perhaps added later by an overzealous editor with a knack for a good metaphor: the word “Bethesda” means “House of Mercy” or “House of Grace”. But it also could mean “disgrace”, giving it a double meaning: disgraceful for the presence of society’s rejects, and a place of grace or mercy for the water’s healing properties.

Since there was no evidence of such a pool, the scholars believed it was intended as a metaphorical story, written by somebody who had never seen the Pool of Bethesda or even knew Jerusalem.

Then, in the mid-19th century, the Turks handed the Crusader church of St Anne’s to the French, who restored it. Excavations nearby revealed the ruins of an old basilica—and the remains of a pool, with the five porticos John had described.

John had indeed been there.

The ruins of the basilica and pool still exist today.

S outher n C ross Pilgrimage

5-17 May 2019

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The Southern Cross, July 4 to July 10, 2018

CLASSIFIEDS

Sr Aelred O’Donovan OP

S

ISTER Aelred (Margaret) O’Donovan, a Newcastle Dominican Sister from Marian House, Boksburg, died on June 5.

Sr O’Donovan was born in Bushey Heath, Hertfordshire, in England, in 1938 and was the eldest of four—her brother Jim and two sisters, Helen and Angela.

In 1952, she was accepted into the juniorate at Rosary Priory and then entered the novitiate in 1955. Sr O’Donovan made her first profession in 1957, and her final profession in 1960. She completed teacher training in London.

After her final profession, Sr O’Donovan was sent to South Africa and her first assignment was at Benoni Convent. Thereafter, she taught in many schools on the Rand. She was

appointed principal of St Rose’s Convent in La Rochelle, and of St Catherine’s Convent in Germiston.

Sr O’Donovan was a dedicated and enthusiastic principal and teacher, and the wellbeing, progress and success of her pupils was of paramount importance to her.

Due to ailing health, she was assigned to Marian House in

1996. While in this community, she was asked by the regional prioress Sr Flora McGlynn to take charge of the region’s library (which had just been built and opened) and to create and be the curator of the Newcastle Dominican Sisters’ Heritage Room—situated in St Dominic’s Convent School in Boksburg.

This was Sr O’Donovan’s pride and joy. Thanks to her many talents, gifts, and perfection, the Heritage Room truly portrays the heritage and legacy of the Dominicans.

Not only did she keep this room in order, but also spent much time presenting and explaining the material to groups of students and many other visitors. This she did until a few weeks leading up to her death.

Sr O’Donovan was interred in the Marian House cemetery.

Deacon Vic Pereira

D

EACON Batista Avito (Vic) Pereira, who was born at Mataffin, Nelspruit, in 1935, has passed away after a long illness at home on his family farm in Sterkspruit near Nelspruit.

He was the fourth child of a humble farming family. After starting his school career at Loreto Convent in Lydenburg, he moved on to Middelburg Hoërskool where he matriculated in 1952.

Deacon Pereira then did a BSc in civil engineering at the University of the Witwatersrand. As a postgraduate student, he completed a scholarship in actuarial sciences at the University of Glasgow in Scotland, before settling back in South Africa.

After working for a short stint in Johannesburg, he was recalled by his family in 1960 to contribute and work on the

family farm in Sterkspruit, where he settled.

Over the years, Deacon Pereira took on the role of guardianship and mentorship for many in his family and beyond, sacrificing his time, skills and finance to help all who asked, and many more besides.

He never married, lived a simple life, and was benevolent, caring and unassuming. He was always a very active member of

Liturgical Calendar Year B – Weekdays Cycle Year 2 Sunday July 8, 14th Sunday of the Year Ezekiel 2:2-5, Psalm 123, 2 Corinthians 12:710, Mark 6:1-6 Monday July 9, Ss Augustine Zhao Rong and Companions Hosea 2:14-16, 21-2219-20 (16-18, 21-22), Psalm 145:2-9, Matthew 9:18-26 Tuesday July 10 Hosea 8:4-7, 11-13, Psalm 115:3-10, Matthew 9:32-38 Wednesday July 11, St Benedict (below) Hosea 10:1-3, 7-8, 12, Psalm 105:2-7, Matthew 10:1-7

We are called to act in good conscience Continued from page 7 one’s pastor, and to encourage an ever-greater trust in God’s grace.

“Yet conscience can do more than recognise that a given situation does not correspond objectively to the overall demands of the Gospel,” Pope Francis writes in his apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia.

“It can also recognise with sincerity and honesty what for now is the most generous response which can be given to God, (my emphasis) and come to see with a certain moral security that it is what God himself is asking amid the concrete complexity of one’s limits, while yet not fully the objective ideal…it [conscience] must remain everopen to new stages of growth and to new decisions which can enable the ideal to be more fully realised” (303). n Read more articles by Sarah-Leah Pimentel at www.scross.co.za/category/perspectives/sarahleah-pimentel/

OmI STAmPS

Thursday July 12 Hosea 11:1-4, 8-9, Psalm 80:2-3, 15-16, Matthew 10:7-15 Friday July 13, St Henry Hosea 14:2-10, Psalm 51:3-4, 8-9, 12-14, 17, Matthew 10:16-23 Saturday July 14, St Camillus de Lellis Isaiah 6:1-8, Psalm 93:1-2, 5, Matthew 10:24-33 Sunday July 15, 15th Sunday of the Year Amos 7:12-15, Psalm 85:9-14, Ephesians 1:3-14, Mark 6:7-13

St Peter’s parish in Nelspruit.

After several years of training, in 1983 he was ordained a permanent deacon by Bishop Mogale Paul Nkhumishe of Witbank.

As a deacon, he served the parish of Nelspruit and the diocese of Witbank with humility, commitment, and availability.

Deacon Pereira was an example of service to all.

In 2007 he retired from active diaconal ministry because of ill health.

He is survived by three brothers and a number of nephews and nieces.

Deacon Pereira’s funeral Mass was held on June 18 at the Diocesan Pastoral Centre of Maria Trost near Lydenburg/Mashishing, and was presided over by Bishop Giuseppe Sandri of Witbank.

He is buried in one of the plots in the cemetery of Maria Trost reserved for the clergy.

YOUR USeD STAmPS

can help in the education of South Africans for the PRIeSTHOOD at St Joseph’s Scholasticate, Cedara, KwaZulu-Natal.

Please send them to: OmI Stamps, Box 101352, Scottsville, 3209

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11

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PERSONAL

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asked me to pray for them, all who have been kind to me, all who have wronged me, or whom I have wronged by ill-will or misunderstanding. Give all of us to bear each other’s faults, and to share each other’s burdens. Have mercy on the souls of our loved ones who have gone before us. Grant them peace and happiness.

Amen.

mindful of his mercy. As he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his posterity forever. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son: and to the Holy Spirit; As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen. Magnificat

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PRAYERS

HEAR ME, LORD, on behalf of all those who are dear to me, all whom I have in mind at this moment. Be near them in all their anxieties and worries, give them the help of your saving grace. I commend them all with trustful confidence to your merciful love. remember, Lord, all who are mindful of me: all those who have

MY SOUL magnifies the Lord. And my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour; Because he has regarded the lowliness of his handmaid; For behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed; Because he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name; And his mercy is from generation to generation on those who fear him. He has shown might with his arm, he has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. He has put down the mighty from their thrones, and has exalted the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. He has given help to Israel, his servant,

DEAR SAINT JOSEPH, you were yourself once faced with the responsibility of providing the necessities of life for Jesus and Mary.

Look down with fatherly compassion upon me in my anxiety with my present inability to support my family.

Please help me find gainful employment very soon, so that this great burden of concern will be lifted from my heart and that I am soon able to provide for those whom God has entrusted to my care. Help me guard against discouragement, so that I may emerge from this trial spiritually enriched and with even greater blessings from God. Amen.

Southern CrossWord solutions

SOLUTIONS TO 818. ACROSS: 4 Sprites, 8 nooses, 9 edified, 10 Outlaw, 11 Member, 12 Distaste, 18 Lot’s wife, 20 Append, 21 rights, 22 Slander, 23 Gospel, 24 Poorest. DOWN: 1 unloads, 2 Hostess, 3 Cedara, 5 Pediment, 6 Infamy, 7 eleven, 13 Soldiers, 14 Bishops, 15 Tensile, 16 Apollo, 17 Meaner, 19 Shiloh.

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: Perpetual Adoration Chapel at Good Shepherd parish, 1 Goede Hoop St, Bothasig, welcomes all visitors. Open 24 hours a day.

Phone 021 558 1412.

DURBAN: Holy Mass and Novena to St Anthony at St Anthony’s parish every Tuesday at 9:00. Holy Mass and Divine Mercy Devotion at 17:30 on first Friday of every month.

Sunday Mass at 9:00.

Phone 031 309 3496 or 031 209 2536.

St Anthony’s rosary group. every Wednesday at 18:00 at St Anthony’s church opposite Greyville racecourse. All are welcome and lifts are available. Contact Keith Chetty on 083 372 9018.

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 17:30.

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We can use your old clothing, bric-a-brac, furniture and books for our second-hand shop in Woodstock, Cape Town.

Help us to create an avenue to generate much needed funds for our work with the elderly.

Contact Ian Veary on 021 447 6334 www.noah.org.za The

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the

15th Sunday of the Year: July 15 Readings: Amos 7:12-15, Psalm 85:9-14, Ephesians 1:3-14, Mark 6:7-13

‘I

MMIGRANTS, go home!” That is the cry that is heard on many lips these days, and it is a refusal on the part of the powerful to listen to the voice of God, who does not think in terms of “immigrants” but of beloved members of his human race.

That is certainly the cry raised in our first reading for next Sunday, by the unmistakably powerful “Amaziah, priest of Bethel”, a kind of royal chaplain to the government, working for the rights of his boss, King Jeroboam of the Northern Kingdom, and wanting to get rid of the prophet Amos.

For Amos is a Southerner and has been indicating what God thinks of the situation in Israel; but, all over the world, and wherever you look in history, Southerners are not thanked for giving their point of view; moreover, there is money involved here.

So Amaziah tells Amos to “run away back to the land of Judah, and earn your supper and do your prophesying there”; the point being that he has trespassed on reserved territory. He is not to do any more prophesying in Amaziah’s territory: “It is the king’s sanctuary and the Temple of the monarch.”

Amos’ response is devastating: “I am not a prophet, nor a prophet’s son” (so not someone who is in it for the money), “but a shepherd and a dresser of sycamore trees.” And the reason that he has been doing all this is because

S outher n C ross

Hear God on immigrants the Lord told him to: “The Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said to me, ‘Go and prophesy to my people Israel.’”

That, of course, is what the immigrants have been doing whom we try to send home, speaking the words of God. Next Sunday’s psalm knows all about this obedience to God’s word: “I shall listen to what God says to me—for God is going to speak of peace to his people, and to his loved ones.”

Our task, when we reflect on politics, and what to do (for example) about immigrants, is to listen for God’s voice: “Salvation is near for those who fear God—glory shall fill our land.”

Then comes a beautiful image, on which our politicians will do well to meditate: “Love and integrity shall meet…justice and peace shall kiss; truth shall spring from the earth, and justice look down from heaven.”

Then comes a vision of what life in our country might be like, were politicians to look for the face of God: “The Lord shall give prosperity, and our land shall yield its fruit. Justice shall go before him, and good fortune shall follow behind”.

It is a charming picture, and our task is to bring it to life in our country today.

The second reading begins us on a run of nearly two months through the Letter to the Ephesians, loveliest of all the Pauline letters.

T

has had on much of Latin America.

In all of the Americas, most of the indigenous peoples are now Christian. However, in North America, while most of the indigenous peoples are Christian, Christianity itself is not seen as a native religion, but rather as a religion brought from elsewhere. In Latin America, in every place where Our Lady of Guadalupe is popular, Christianity is seen to be a native religion.

But piety and devotions also run the risk of theological sloppiness and unhealthy sentimentality. That’s the case too with the Mary of Devotions.

We’ve tended to elevate Mary to divine status (which is simply wrong) and we have far too often encrusted her in so much piety that she, the Mary of Devotions, cannot possibly be the same person who wrote the Magnificat. The Mary of Devotions is often so enshrined in piety, oversimplicity and asexuality that she needs to be protected from human complexity. Still, the Mary of Devotions offers us a lot vis-à-vis our spiritual journey.

M

Conrad

uch more ignored is the Mary of Scripture and the role the various gospels assign to her.

In the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark and Luke), Mary is a model of discipleship.

More simply, she’s shown to us as the one person who gets it right from the beginning.

But that isn’t immediately evident. On

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Sunday reflections

Over the next few weeks, we shall see how opposed the author is to any kind of division in the Christian community; and the answer to all division is to keep our eyes on God and on Jesus.

Our reading begins in that familiar and breath-taking way: “Blessed be the God and Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ, who blessed us with all spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.”

So instead of looking at “those other people”, we have to remember that our position as believers is a matter of God’s choice “from before the foundation of the world”.

It has absolutely nothing to do with any merits of our own, and we must be very careful about adopting any political policies that might conflict with the love of God, because “God marked us out in advance as adopted children through Jesus Christ”; and it is all about God, not because God demands our unstinting admiration, but we are to give ourselves “to the praise of the glory of his grace, which he gave us as a free gift in the Beloved”.

Do you see how different this is from any political agenda? This is particularly true when we contemplate the costliness of what God has done for us; “redemption through his blood” is an uncomfortable reminder of how we were freed from “transgressions, in accordance with

The two sides of Mary HERE’S an axiom that says: Roman Catholics tend to adore Mary while Protestants and Evangelicals tend to ignore Mary. Neither is ideal.

Mary, the Mother of Jesus, has, in effect, two histories within Christian tradition. We have the Mary of Scripture and we have the Mary of Devotions—and both offer something special for our Christian journey.

The Mary of Devotions is the more wellknown, though mostly within Catholic circles. This is the Mary invoked in the Rosary, the Mary of popular shrines, the Sorrowful Mother of our litanies, the Mother with the soft heart through whom we can get the ear of God, the Mary of purity and chastity, the Mother who understands human suffering, the Mother we can always turn to.

And this Mary is pre-eminently the Mother of the poor. Fr Karl Rahner once pointed out that when you look at all the apparitions of Mary officially approved by the Church, you will notice that she has always appeared to a poor person—a child, an illiterate peasant, a group of children, someone without social standing.

She has never appeared to a theologian in his study, to a pope, or to a millionaire banker. She’s always been the person to whom the poor look. Marian devotion is a mysticism of the poor.

We see this, for example, very powerfully in the effect Our Lady of Guadalupe

Nicholas King SJ

the wealth of his grace, which he poured generously over us”.

There is no room for squabbling here, still less for fighting: “To sum up everything in Christ, everything both in heaven and on earth in him.” None of this is anything that we can achieve on our own: “You have been sealed by the Holy Spirit of Promise, which is the pledge of our inheritance.”

That is the context in which we must come to the Gospel for next Sunday, which is the summoning of the Twelve, after an unsatisfactory bout of preaching in Jesus’ home town of Nazareth, and the start of their first-ever mission: “He began to send them out in pairs and he was giving them authority over the unclean spirits.”

Just to remind them that they are not in charge, they are instructed to travel light, without credit cards or spare clothes. Despite this restriction, they are quite successful (“They were expelling many demons, and were anointing many sick people with oil, and healing them”).

But it has nothing to do with them, only with what God was prepared to do through them. Let us imitate them in the coming week.

Southern Crossword #818

Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI

Final reflection

the surface, the opposite sometimes seems to be the case.

For example, on a couple of occasions as Jesus is speaking to a crowd he is interrupted and told that his mother and his family are outside wanting to speak to him. His response: “Who is my mother and who are my brothers and sisters? It’s those who hear the word of God and keep it.”

In saying this, Jesus isn’t distancing his mother from himself and his message—the opposite. Before this incident is recorded in the gospels, the evangelists have been very careful to point out that Mary was the first person to hear the word of God and keep it.

What happens here is that Jesus singles out his mother first of all for her faith, not for her biology. In the synoptic gospels, Mary is the paradigm for discipleship.

John’s gospel gives her a different role.

Here she’s not the paradigm of discipleship (a role John gives to the Beloved disciple and to Mary Magdala) but is presented as Eve, the mother of humanity, and the mother of each of us.

Interestingly, John never gives us Mary’s name, in his gospel she is always referred to as “the Mother of Jesus”. And in this role she does two things: First, she gives voice to human finitude, as she does at the wedding feast of Cana when she tells her son (who is always divine in John’s gospel) that “they have no wine”. In John, this is not just a conversation between Mary and Jesus, but also a conversation between the Mother of Humanity and God. Secondly, as Eve, as universal mother, and as our mother, she shows helplessness under human pain and within human pain when she stands under the cross.

In this, she shows herself as universal mother but also as an example of how injustice must be handled, namely, by standing within it in a way that does not replicate its hatred and violence so as to give it back in kind.

Mary offers us a wonderful example, not to be adored or ignored.

ACROSS

4. Priests convert these elves (7) 8. Loops seen soon back east and south (6) 9. Deified and turned out to be morally impressed (7) 10. A fugitive, not in legislation (6) 11. Arm, for example, or belonging to a group (6) 12. Aversion for asset I’d altered (8) 18. She was warned not to look back (Gn 19) (4,4) 20. Add on: Happened he is missing (6) 21. Wrongs that can be put to these (6) 22. The sin of calumny (7) 23. The kind of truth of the New Testament? (6) 24. Mother Teresa cared for them (7)

S

DOWN

1. Removes burden of conscience in confession (7) 2. She may welcome you to her party (7) 3. St Joseph’s Scholasticate is in this KZN place (6) 5. Let Piet mend architectural feature (8) 6. Bad reputation if many disturbed (6) 7. Tea-time for cricket team?

(6) 13. Christians urged onward in the hymn (8) 14. Prelates on board (7) 15. Eli sent to be elastic (7) 16. Greek god of the sun (6) 17. More of a miser than Scrooge? (6) 19. Where Elkanah offered sacrifice (1 Sm 1) (6)

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