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| Lainey |
Posted - December 29 2002 : 11:09:48 PM
Charlotte, NC seems to be gaining a reputation as a refugee base for victims of persecution in Asia & Africa. Already home to many, many Christian Sudanese who have fled at great peril the war-torn lands of the Sudan, Charlotte is also home to thousands of Montagnards.
Vietnam Bans Celebration of Christmas
Threaten Montagnards with Fines, Arrests and Even Death
HANOI, Vietnam, DEC. 24, 2002 (ZENIT.org).- The Vietnamese government has stepped up its campaign against the Montagnard minority to keep them from celebrating Christmas.
The Montagnards, who live in the southern and central highlands of this communist-led country of 81 million, are mostly Christians.
The U.S.-based Montagnard Foundation (http://www.montagnard-foundation.org) said that the communist authorities announced they would enforce fines of about $10 against any Montagnard caught celebrating Christmas. Officials have also threatened the minority with arrest, imprisonment and even the death penalty, the foundation said.
The group also charged that government forces, since Dec. 15, have arrested anyone they suspect of having supported the Montagnard Foundation.
The authorities contend that those arrested belong to the United Front for the Struggle of the Oppressed Races, a group fighting for independence from Vietnam. |
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| Lainey |
Posted - January 20 2003 : 05:05:01 AM
Burma Not Treating the Church Fairly, Says Missionary
ROME, JAN. 19, 2003 (Zenit.org).- The Catholic Church in Burma is persevering despite persecution by the government, says a missionary.
The Church has not given up its "evangelizing mission," which is stronger in that Southeast Asia nation because it is "close to the poor, those who suffer, and the oppressed," says Father Vito del Prete, secretary of the Pontifical Missionary Union.
Father del Prete made his comments last week when inaugurating the meeting "Freedom of Religion: Human Right Denied in Burma."
In Burma, which in 1988 officially took the name Union of Myanmar, "the military junta that has governed for over 40 years perseveres in a constant persecution against the Catholic Church and human rights," Father del Prete said.
"Missions cannot have schools, Christians are prohibited any external manifestation, [and] any kind of apostolate or meeting, and communities are regarded as accomplices of the northern guerrillas," he added.
According to Father del Prete, "the situation is different toward 'state' Buddhism -- not authentic but imposed on the population as an attempt to control the social fabric -- and Islam, with its 400,000 faithful, which is tolerated."
U.S. government data say 89% of Burma's 42 million people are Buddhists; 4% are Muslims. |
| Lainey |
Posted - January 20 2003 : 05:02:12 AM
Israelis Block Patriarch Sabbah at Tel Aviv Airport
Officials Disregard His Vatican Diplomatic Passport
VATICAN CITY, JAN. 19, 2003 (Zenit.org).- Latin-rite Patriarch Michel Sabbah of Jerusalem was unable to leave Tel Aviv airport because of a security search he was subjected to by Israeli officials.
The Vatican's semiofficial newspaper L'Osservatore Romano reported today that the search was a violation of the respect due to a Vatican diplomatic passport, which the patriarch showed at the airport Friday.
Consequently, the patriarch was unable to attend the symposium organized on Saturday in Rome by the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. During that event, Archbishop Michael Louis Fitzgerald, council president, publicly noted the patriarch's absence.
The Latin patriarch was scheduled to deliver an address on "The Spiritual Resources of Religion for Peace."
In his speech, which was read at the symposium in his absence, Patriarch Sabbah said that the priority task of religions in the Middle East is to contribute to "break the spiral of violence."
Sources of the patriarchate told ZENIT that the Israeli security services not only obliged the patriarch to open his suitcases to inspect what he was carrying, but they also tried to search through his personal documents.
The Italian newspaper Avvenire considered the search a violation of the fundamental 1993 agreement between the Vatican and the state of Israel, which provides for the safeguarding by the Israeli state of the freedom necessary for pastors of the Catholic Church to carry out their mission. |
| Lainey |
Posted - January 18 2003 : 01:23:02 AM
Albania Showing Signs of a Comeback in Religion
An Orthodox Views the Former Communist Nation
ALKMAAR, Netherlands, JAN. 17, 2003 (Zenit.org).- The world may have forgotten Albania, but the Orthodox and Catholic churches haven't.
Jim Forest, secretary of the Orthodox Peace Fellowship and author of "The Resurrection of the Church in Albania" (Geneva: WCC Publications, 2002), gave ZENIT his view on what has been happening in the former Communist nation.
Q: Albania was the first atheist state in the world. In what degree is there religious freedom in this country today?
Forest: For many years no country in the world, not even the Soviet Union or China, had more repressive legislation regarding religious life than Albania.
Not only was every place of worship closed -- in most cases destroyed -- but even within the home prayer was forbidden. No cross or icon could be hung anywhere.
However, in the past 12 years, after the collapse of Communism, the major obstacles to religious life have been removed. I haven't got the figures for the Catholic Church, but only 22 Orthodox priests were still alive when Communism at last collapsed in 1990.
Of approximately 1,600 Orthodox churches, monasteries and cultural centers that existed in Albania prior to 1967, less than 5% were still standing in 1990. Those that had not been demolished had been turned into armories, post offices, barns, laundries or put to other secular purposes.
Many thousands of Christians had been jailed or sent to labor camps, often dying as a consequence. There were also those, especially clergy, who were murdered or executed.
Q: You say that the Orthodox Church in Albania has been transformed from a repressed Church into a vibrant community. How has this been achieved?
Forest: A crucial factor was the hidden churches that survived in several places -- homes where, at great risk, baptisms were conducted, confessions heard, the liturgy celebrated, and marriages blessed.
Many people, though they had no access to services, nonetheless lived ... a prayerful life in their home -- again, a risky undertaking as there was always the danger of betrayal or of a child making an innocent but revealing remark at school. But perhaps the most important factor was the wisdom of the former ecumenical Patriarch Dimitrios, in asking Archbishop Anastasios -- a missionary-minded Greek bishop then serving in Kenya -- to visit Albania.
The request came in January 1991. It was at the time not intended as a permanent assignment, only a reconnaissance effort to see if and how the local Church could be revived.
It would require, however, a substantial interruption of his work in Africa. "My main task was to try and find someone who could become bishop," Archbishop Anastasios told me, "but I was unable to find a priest who was prepared and strong enough. There were only a few priests who had survived, all of them old and often not in good health."
It would take six months before the reluctant authorities in Tirana finally issued a visa, and that was only initially for one month. "The Communist times were over, but not completely," as Archbishop Anastasios explained. "Attitudes formed in the course of many years of propaganda do not change quickly. However, once in the country, my visa was extended."
As events unfolded, however, his visit became permanent. Archbishop Anastasios now heads the revived Orthodox Church in Albania -- a term he greatly prefers to the Albanian Orthodox Church. One can sense the scale of Archbishop Anastasios' achievement in noting that in the past 10 years 80 new churches have been built, 75 churches restored from ruin, more than 140 churches have undergone major repairs, in almost every case major, and five monasteries brought back to life.
In addition, many 20 large buildings have been erected or renovated to house the theological academy in Durres, Holy Cross High School in Gjirokaster, the office of the Archdioce |
| Lainey |
Posted - January 16 2003 : 01:40:55 AM
Vatican Diplomacy: A Force to Be Reckoned With
Aims to Defend the Right of Religious Freedom of Every Believer
VATICAN CITY, JAN. 14, 2003 (Zenit.org).- The Vatican's action at the international level has never been as extensive as it is now.
With the agreement signed with the Arab Emirate of Qatar on Dec. 1, the Vatican now maintains diplomatic relations with 177 countries, including special ties with the Russian Federation and the Palestine Liberation Organization. The figure has doubled during John Paul II's pontificate.
The Vatican still has no diplomatic relations with China (which severed ties with Rome in 1957), Vietnam and Saudi Arabia. The Hanoi government, nevertheless, holds annual meetings with Vatican representatives to resolve disputes over the exercise of freedom of worship.
The primary objective of relations established by the Vatican, through concordats or Church-state agreements, is to defend freedom of worship. In recognizing Catholics' right to religious liberty, states feel obliged to acknowledge the principle of religious liberty in general. The Vatican, in effect, has become the champion of all believers' rights, not just of Catholics.
In this connection, the great diplomatic success of the Vatican took place in the 1960s. It came at the height of the Cold War, during the Helsinki proceedings and the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe.
The work of then Archbishop Agostino Casaroli, who would later become Vatican secretary of state, made possible the recognition of religious liberty as a principle in Communist countries dominated by the Soviet Union.
Witnessing the Vatican's work over the past 15 years for the defense of peace and human rights in poor countries, some diplomats have suggested that the Vatican should become a member of the United Nations. Currently the Vatican is a permanent observer there, with a voice but no vote.
In an interview with the Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera on Nov. 26, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Vatican secretary of state, did not reject the possibility that one day the Vatican might vote in the United Nations, if this is requested of it and "if it is useful."
"It is an open question," he said. For the Vatican to become a full U.N. member, the Security Council would have to approve and recommend its membership to the General Assembly.
In addition to its U.N. status, the Vatican participates in other international organizations, such as the Arab League (as a delegate), the Council of Europe, the Organization of American States, and the Organization for African Unity.
Jean Gueguinou, France's new ambassador to UNESCO, and former ambassador to the Vatican, told the daily Le Monde on Dec. 26 that it is possible to think that the Vatican's action irritates some in the international realm because of the values it promotes. However, he said, "increasingly more countries try in any way possible to maintain relations with the Vatican and to receive the Pope." |
| Lainey |
Posted - January 16 2003 : 01:31:30 AM
Turkey Investigating Capuchin for Baptizing a Muslim
Case Worries a Fellow Religious
ANKARA, Turkey, JAN. 14, 2003 (ZENIT.org-Avvenire).- Turkish authorities are investigating a Capuchin friar for baptizing a 26-year-old Muslim who asked for the sacrament but later turned on the priest.
Italian Father Roberto Ferrari, 70, whose passport has been seized, has been a missionary in Turkey for the past 45 years. The Capuchins have several houses and missions in the country.
Another Capuchin, Father Mario Cappucci, who is familiar with Turkey, said that "Father Roberto baptized a 26-year-old youth in the mission of Iskenderun, on the border with Syria, who had asked insistently that the sacrament be administered to him, after appropriate preparation."
"However, the youth then denounced the missionary to the Turkish authorities, who removed his passport and put him under investigation," said Father Cappucci, 67.
Father Cappucci is the chaplain at Santa Maria Nuova hospital in Reggio, Italy, and a native of Quara, a town of the region, where Father Ferrari was born.
Father Cappucci was surprised at the news. "I have been in that country some 30 to 40 times, both to lead pilgrimages as well as to visit our houses," he said. "I have good relations with the guides and with different authorities. I never expected an incident like this."
"The situation in Turkey is certainly complex," he added. "However, this serious event is worrying."
In fact, although the constitutional law guarantees religious freedom, there are strong social pressures against conversion from Islam -- the main religion in Turkey -- to Christianity. In some regions, local authorities back the persecution of Christian communities, especially the Chaldeans.
"Why does Turkey call itself a secular state and put a friar under investigation who baptized a converted Muslim?" Father Cappucci asked. "Why can't religious wear their habit?"
"A lay state is not concerned with these matters," he added. "And this is happening in countries that would like to form part of Europe, where human rights are the foundation of the secular state."
He further stressed: "Father Roberto did not baptized an unconscious child, but an adult who consented to it." |
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